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The Demoralization is just Beginning

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Re: The Demoralization is just Beginning

#381

Post by tomhoward »

elisharobinson wrote: post #376
tomhoward wrote: post #355

There's an implicit assumption in the article and the comments here that "brain drain the world" is a free lunch. But does anyone think through to the end-game of that? That when you drain the most smart/productive people away from every other country, all those countries become less wealthy and more dysfunctional, leading to societal decline, poverty, resentment, radicalisation, war, etc? Aside from anything else, t…

this assumes that a smart person would move to US 100% of the time. given the bipolar nature of US i doubt 100% of smart people would move .

I worry that all the replies to my comment will be claims about what percentage of the smartest and most productive people will want to move to the US in practice, thereby avoiding debating the central point.

The first reply asserted that my comment was based on a “ridiculous premise” without addressing the principle.

Re: The Demoralization is just Beginning

#382

Post by lqet »

foven wrote: post #380
tomhoward wrote: post #355

There's an implicit assumption in the article and the comments here that "brain drain the world" is a free lunch. But does anyone think through to the end-game of that? That when you drain the most smart/productive people away from every other country, all those countries become less wealthy and more dysfunctional, leading to societal decline, poverty, resentment, radicalisation, war, etc? Aside from anything else, t…

More to the point, when you write an article like this foretelling the doom of the american economy, why would you think you are able to brain drain any country? What stops the countries you are trying to drain from offering better incentives to stay?

Also consider that the US is now threatening direct (even neighboring) allies with military intervention (Canada, Denmark). It is very hard to drain brain which considers the US an enemy country.

Meanwhile, China is playing the long game and is building infrastructure projects all over the world, including the EU [0]

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pelje%C5%A1ac_Bridge

Re: The Demoralization is just Beginning

#383

Post by [deleted] »

georgeecollins wrote: post #143

I get tired of people talking about how the US doesn't "make anything". I spent my adult life creating software that was super valuable. Along the way I worked with a bunch of people (from all over the world) who-- because of their brains and their education-- could have made almost anything very well. They didn't make steel or automobiles because that wasn't where their skills were best deployed.

[deleted]

Re: The Demoralization is just Beginning

#384

Post by cookiemonsieur »

csomar wrote: post #164
ryandamm wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China has major structural weaknesses in its economy that are currently overshadowed by the US cr*pping its own and its allies’ pants. Specifically: there is not much of a home grown consumer economy; they have driven growth too heavily on exports and infrastructure build, leading to a massive overhang in building, a housing bubble that is teetering dangerously close to unwinding, and a major shortage of domestic con…

Since the pandemic China on Western TVs is about to "collapse". However, what I saw is new EVs, new Phones, record high exports, record high solar panels installations, new metros/airports etc... Something must be very wrong in your assessment, right?

> Since the pandemic China on Western TVs is about to "collapse". However, what I saw is new EVs, new Phones, record high exports, record high solar panels installations, new metros/airports etc...

This pre-dates the pandemic by 20 years. There are articles as far back as 2000 that detail the impending collapse Chinese civilisation. To the point where it's now become a meme (the economist are notoriously known for their bad predictions on this subject)

Re: The Demoralization is just Beginning

#385

Post by ccppurcell »

tomhoward wrote: post #355

There's an implicit assumption in the article and the comments here that "brain drain the world" is a free lunch. But does anyone think through to the end-game of that? That when you drain the most smart/productive people away from every other country, all those countries become less wealthy and more dysfunctional, leading to societal decline, poverty, resentment, radicalisation, war, etc? Aside from anything else, t…

Brain drain happens when the quality of life in a particular country dips below some standard. It's relative to other countries only up to a point. I strongly doubt it is possible to increase quality of life (albeit for a minority) in one country so high to outweigh the utility of staying put in other countries. You certainly can't do it in a democracy: who would vote to increase the quality of life specifically for a small group of immigrants? I'm pro immigration btw but people are not going to vote against their own interests to such an extent.

Re: The Demoralization is just Beginning

#386

Post by globular-toast »

sam_goody wrote: post #270
globular-toast wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not convinced that software is really intrinsically valuable. We write it to help us make and deliver things that are actually valuable, which are physical goods. The whole service sector would be nothing without the physical. Finance doesn't exist just to see numbers changing on a screen. It's there so we can buy food after we retire etc. Maybe games are truly software that isn't tied to anything physical. I can…

At work, we provide video courses of therapists to other mental health professionals. I help run a youth group, which uses lots of software to manage, communicate, learn and empower the next generation. Nothing physical, but there is no question in my mind that all this software is intrinsically valuable.

If it were intrinsically valuable then it would still be valuable if you took away the businesses. Would your healthcare software be valuable if there was nobody to produce the video course? Would your youth group be valuable if nobody attended it? What are you empowering the youth to do? Also write software to empower the next generation? It has to end somewhere.

You can't eat software. You can't eat gold either, but if society collapsed I bet you'd still be able to trade a gold ingot for a carrot, because it maintains a modicum of value. I doubt you'd have many takers for a JPEG codec you just wrote, though, and that's far more generally useful software than business software which is what most software is.

Re: The Demoralization is just Beginning

#387

Post by l0ng1nu5 »

t-3 wrote: post #293
l0ng1nu5 wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US since the GFC is probably the most obvious one. As I understand it, pretty much every developed country employed mmt practice in response to covid. Now we have (even more) rampant inflation and wealth inequality with no sign of slowing down.

"Pretty much every country" couldn't possibly employ "mmt practice" - a significant number of countries don't have sovereign currencies. That's ignoring the fact that MMT is descriptive rather than prescriptive, it doesn't have practices, it is a theory used to describe how a modern economy with sovereign fiat currency works.

I said developed country which is a pretty major distinction. Maybe my definition is off but it appears to prescribe the printing of currency which is consistent with what we've seen in most major economies and low and behold - we have rising inflation and wealth inequality.

Re: The Demoralization is just Beginning

#388

Post by pif »

KaiserPro wrote: post #349

Going back to a gold standard will limit the money supply. This means that there will be less capital for building $thing. A gold standard means that when the economy gets overheated it pops, then contracts and you get deflation. This makes crashes last longer and harder. It requires greater fiscal discipline to overcome. The problem with the USA "empire" is that for a trading empire to work you need a plan, and stic…

> That takes planning, money vision and time.

And a dictatorship. Democracy does not fit very well with long term plans, unless you either make huge efforts to ensure everyone gets their fair share (see Scandinavia) or you have a good plan for people being rich with not too much effort (see Switzerland and other tax havens).

Concerning the USA, the divide between the extra rich and the general poor is nowadays too large to have a functioning country.

Re: The Demoralization is just Beginning

#389

Post by [deleted] »

tomhoward wrote: post #355

There's an implicit assumption in the article and the comments here that "brain drain the world" is a free lunch. But does anyone think through to the end-game of that? That when you drain the most smart/productive people away from every other country, all those countries become less wealthy and more dysfunctional, leading to societal decline, poverty, resentment, radicalisation, war, etc? Aside from anything else, t…

[deleted]

Re: The Demoralization is just Beginning

#390

Post by adampwells »

Rury wrote: post #144
ryandamm wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you can truly come up with an objective measure of wealth, I believe there might be a (quasi) Nobel Prize in economics for you. The reason economics is hard, in part, is that there isn't some core firmament you can rest on; there is no fundamental, provable truth. And yet, with fancy statistics and clever experimental design, you can still make intelligent statements and understand the world better. To me, economi…

I think some people need to step back and ponder what's the purpose of economics? Why do we even study it? What are we hoping to achieve in analyzing it? I can only think it began with the philosophy for making better decisions, solving problems, and improving society - particularly in the allocation of its resources. As so, I think a huge part of the problem with economics, including most economists, is that people…

"The purpose of economics is to make astrology look respectable!"
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