Why do we need public companies?
What is energy, actually? (2011)
71–80 of 286 posts
Re: What is energy, actually? (2011)
#72Somewhat tangentially related: I wrote this in a private note to a friend last year. I don't believe this 100%, but the idea is worth exploring in my opinion: 1. Corporations desperately pursue continuous growth, even when they're already profitable, and do so at the expense of the environment, employee welfare and sometimes, the rule of law. 2. Corporations pursue growth because investors demand it. 3. Investors dem…
> 1. Corporations desperately pursue continuous growth, even when they're already profitable, and do so at the expense of the environment, employee welfare and sometimes, the rule of law. And sometimes its to the benefit of the environment, the employees and its in accordance with the rule of law. > 4. Investors need to invest money in instruments with a certain minimum ROI because if they don't, inflation will erode…
>And sometimes its to the benefit of the environment, the employees and its in accordance with the rule of law.
Yes. Sometimes lottery is also the right investment: in the 1/10000000 of cases where you win...
Re: What is energy, actually? (2011)
#73A lot of charts and napkin math to reach an obvious conclusion. Better discussion would be, " A) Why do we worship GDP, and B) how do we stop? " My own answers (shared as a starting point rather than a destination) would be: A) - old westerners are really attached to the pensions they promised themselves - marginally-skilled people prefer the illusion of agency offered by employment over being total dependents of the…
The elephant in the room is the continual neglect or the downright (intellectual) hate shown to anyone who had dared mention Malthus in the last 25-30 years (his thoughts had a bit of intellectual resurgence in the 1970s, but that was pretty much it). It seems like in the last 2 or 3 years we have tried and tried to reach his same conclusions in very convoluted ways, ignoring his very existence.
The good thing at least is that some of us have at last reached the conclusion that some sort of planet-wide environmental growth limits have been reached, even that wasn't the case until not that long ago, when any mention of a possible limit was met with "we'll technologically surpass that, we always have".
Re: What is energy, actually? (2011)
#74It would make far more sense to massively increase energy efficiency across all segments. This will further decouple GDP from emissions.
Re: What is energy, actually? (2011)
#75Somewhat tangentially related: I wrote this in a private note to a friend last year. I don't believe this 100%, but the idea is worth exploring in my opinion: 1. Corporations desperately pursue continuous growth, even when they're already profitable, and do so at the expense of the environment, employee welfare and sometimes, the rule of law. 2. Corporations pursue growth because investors demand it. 3. Investors dem…
I've long been of the opinion that the public trading of companies is directly responsible for much of the social injustice we see in the West. As soon as there's a fiduciary duty to maximise ROI, morals go out the window. If you as an officer resist, the collective of shareholders will replace you with someone who will make more money. There's a dissolution of responsibility that comes with the distributed nature of…
« Under capitalism, man exploits man. Under communism, it's just the opposite. »
Re: What is energy, actually? (2011)
#76I'm very very unconvinced by this, why can't we have a green jobs revolution and sensible environmental protections and growth! These are not exclusive, just caused by a lack of imagination.
Re: What is energy, actually? (2011)
#77Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm merely suggesting that we maintain the money supply at a level that does not result in any inflation.
Per other comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21664066 ; inflation is already near-zero, and this is controlled through interest rates rather than simple M0.
I do agree with this, but what of pension plans? At 2% inflation, a fund of $10,000 will deplete to slightly over $6000 (inflation adjusted) in 20 years...
Re: What is energy, actually? (2011)
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
That falls very short of what should be done to limit our impact on the planet for the sake of protecting the environment and remaining wilderness. I really don't understand this disconnect between the message of urgency about the environment and the climate, and the widespread complacency about an actual root cause of the issue (as illustrated by your comment), which is population growth: " Oh it's slowing and will…
Most of the world is empty: https://geoawesomeness.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/world-... We just need to learn to be efficient.
To illustrate the same point differently: if the USA had the same population density as the UK, there would be 2.5 billion people living there, instead of the current 327 million.
Math: 327 million US ppl * 274 UK ppl per sq km / 35 US ppl per sq km.
Re: What is energy, actually? (2011)
#79A lot of charts and napkin math to reach an obvious conclusion. Better discussion would be, " A) Why do we worship GDP, and B) how do we stop? " My own answers (shared as a starting point rather than a destination) would be: A) - old westerners are really attached to the pensions they promised themselves - marginally-skilled people prefer the illusion of agency offered by employment over being total dependents of the…
The elephant in the room is the continual neglect or the downright (intellectual) hate shown to anyone who had dared mention Malthus in the last 25-30 years (his thoughts had a bit of intellectual resurgence in the 1970s, but that was pretty much it). It seems like in the last 2 or 3 years we have tried and tried to reach his same conclusions in very convoluted ways, ignoring his very existence. The good thing at lea…
Malthus is just the tip of the iceberg. There are so many "forbidden charts" that people can lose their jobs over these days!
Outside of global warming--all we plebes get are Pinker-nuggets on how everything is just fine.
Re: What is energy, actually? (2011)
#80The argument is based on looking a the world as a whole. In developed world energy intensity of GDP is decreasing even when you take into account imports. Post-industrial economies can grow while decreasing energy use. What the author is suggesting is that the developing world should stop growing. I can't agree with that. They need their electricity and washing machines. GDP per unit of energy use (constant 2011 PPP…
They need their electricity and washing machine, but do they need exotic vacations and long commutes in powerful cars? Do they need clothes that are made to be worn for a very short time? Do they need technology that's cheap to the point of it being wasted without an afterthought?
Indeed, you can run a lot of new fridges in the developing world on the kWh budget of a heated private swimming pool.