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Post by ben on Apr 16, 2017 12:37:13 GMT -5
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Post by robeiae on Apr 16, 2017 14:06:16 GMT -5
Seems fairly naive, to me. He says this: ...and that's ridiculous (and inconsistent). You can't just go "work" to make money. The opportunity to be--to use his examples--a nurse or a waste collector--doesn't simply exist in nature. Shit, money doesn't exist in nature. This isn't to say that all wealth is created by people at the top of wealth pyramid, so to speak, or by governments. But neither is the simple application of labor the only means of creating wealth. Meh, the guy is an idealist who imagines there can be some sort of Marxist utopia... if only everyone would do as he says. Here's one of his books: Utopia for Realists: The Case for a Universal Basic Income, Open Borders, and a 15-hour Workweek. From what I can tell--based on some reviews out there--his "case" is built around the already extant wealth of Europe and the West. So it's great until the money runs out. Plus, I can't help but sense that there would end up being exceptions for that 15-hour work week, starting with the people growing the food... |
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Post by Don on Apr 16, 2017 16:28:23 GMT -5
I think he did a piss-poor, illogical rip-off of Albert Jay Nock's theory in Our Enemy, the State. Interesting how he picked " rentiers" of all the components of the political means (see also: Public Choice Theory), with no mention of any of the others, or of how the power of "rentiers" is derived from the state. Indeed, he seems to think the solution to political privilege is the granting of even more political privilege, just to different identity groups. I suppose that's useful from an anti-Enlightenment viewpoint. |
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Post by robeiae on Apr 16, 2017 17:26:15 GMT -5
Part of the problem, Don, is that he's all over the map on what is the first way of making money. Note that he tossed up app designer (and others "creating something new") as emblematic of this first way, yet had already identified "waste collectors" as the real wealth creators in the first paragraph. He's kinda boxed himself in (maybe because he's so young and such an idealist) by trying to maintain a link between the bluest of blue collar jobs and "creative" entrepreneurs. By doing so, he kinda limits the potential bad guys (Steve Jobs, for instance, would have to be a good guy) and I guess backs in to "rentiers," though even there he doesn't seem to recognize the role of creativity.
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Post by Don on Apr 16, 2017 17:56:21 GMT -5
Part of the problem, Don, is that he's all over the map on what is the first way of making money. Note that he tossed up app designer (and others "creating something new") as emblematic of this first way, yet had already identified "waste collectors" as the real wealth creators in the first paragraph. He's kinda boxed himself in (maybe because he's so young and such an idealist) by trying to maintain a link between the bluest of blue collar jobs and "creative" entrepreneurs. By doing so, he kinda limits the potential bad guys (Steve Jobs, for instance, would have to be a good guy) and I guess backs in to "rentiers," though even there he doesn't seem to recognize the role of creativity. Entrepreneurship has no role in any political system based on the Labor Theory of Value, as far as I can figure. Naturally, he would therefore see no difference between the creation of a takeout app and pouring a perfect pint. I'd say that "waste collectors" are wealth creators. Their service improves the value of the location where they perform their services, or perhaps more correctly, lack of their service would decrease the value of that location over time. In any event, they are providing a service in return for compensation and are therefore no less a producer of wealth than a barber or a yard care professional, for example. The wealth may be intangible, but it is still an increase in well-being that customers may choose to forego in light of higher preferences. It may not be so straightforward as the cook who turns raw hamburger into a delicious burger, and thereby profits, but it's wealth creation nonetheless. It's just higher up the Maslow pyramid. Credit where credit's due, I think he got this part right. |
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Post by ben on Apr 17, 2017 14:13:55 GMT -5
I reread it and this in particular struck me:
It looks like he's comparing apples, oranges, rocks, and who knows what else. There seems to be so much wrong here that it must be from a lack of understanding of, among other things, what "technologies" are, what they can do, why some things are done and others aren't.
There's gotta be a double facepalm emoji around here somewhere.
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Post by Don on Apr 17, 2017 14:28:49 GMT -5
It's not really hard to understand why the major innovations have been in some areas and not in others. His major problem seems to be trying to fit everything going on under his "rentier" umbrella.
flying cars - under the jurisdiction of the FAA/DOT
curing cancer - healthcare is the most over-regulated portion of the economy, excepting the money supply and perhaps primary education.
colonizing mars - restricted to NASA until very recently.
These are also segments that are highly rentier-centered, thanks to huge barriers to entry, regulatory capture and massive special interests feeding politicians at the trough. New regulations overwhelmingly protect the status quo.
General information tech, OTOH, is essentially the wild west compared to these locked-down industries, as is communication tech once you get past spectrum allocation. It hasn't become a stagnant, tightly-controlled swamp government-protected wetlands... yet.
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Post by celawson on Apr 19, 2017 10:25:47 GMT -5
Interesting discussion. I will add just a tiny point - With regard to curing "cancer", there have been a ton of amazing advances over the last 20 years. Many people who would have been given a death sentence years ago can be cured now. www.webmd.com/cancer/5-curable-cancers#1Not only that, but there are many different types of cancers, and they have such different characteristics/causes/natural progression, that it's impossible to put them all into the same pot. *end derail* |
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Post by ben on Apr 21, 2017 22:50:07 GMT -5
Interesting discussion. I will add just a tiny point - With regard to curing "cancer", there have been a ton of amazing advances over the last 20 years. Many people who would have been given a death sentence years ago can be cured now. www.webmd.com/cancer/5-curable-cancers#1Not only that, but there are many different types of cancers, and they have such different characteristics/causes/natural progression, that it's impossible to put them all into the same pot. *end derail* Furthermore [continuing the derail], I remember seeing the prime-time live televised speech by President Nixon in which he announced the War On Cancer (I recall he also started the War On Drugs, but I don't think that was a televised speech). Somewhere I read a recent article about that, that medical and science people were saying back then that that was the wrong approach, that they didn't know enough at the time to cure cancer and they knew it - they needed the money to go to more general biological/biomolecular type research so they could learn more about how a healthy body as well as cancer worked before they could make effective cures. |
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Post by maxinquaye on May 21, 2017 0:07:51 GMT -5
speri.dept.shef.ac.uk/2016/09/20/what-if-the-national-economy-is-like-a-household-budget/I have to say, "Wealth creator" is such a ridiculous term. Steve Jobs is not a "wealth creator" because he didn't create any wealth - he was just the beneficiary of a redistribution of wealth from consumers to the retail sector, and he was the beneficiary of a changed flow of capital from consumers to other companies. What Apple produces has no inherent worth until someone decides to consume what they make, and pay a price for the ability to do that. Apple's genius has been to convince consumers to change their purchasing patterns. Instead of buying a Noka, or a PC, they've convinced the buyers to get an iPhone or a Mac. The term "wealth creator" comes from the same people who want people to think of a national economy as a household budget or a company budget. It is ridiculous, and it is inaccurate. A nation's economy is nothing like a household or a company budget. It's the same people who use the term "UK plc" or "USA Inc." Ugh. The economy is a cycle, and it's important to maintain the cycle. The initiator of the cycle is the consumer, not the producer. The good economy comes from the consumer having the means to buy things, and from punishing hoarding behavior severely. Whoever slows the velocity of money should pay a high price for that.
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Post by Don on May 21, 2017 6:17:49 GMT -5
Wealth <> currency. Dollar values are but one aspect of the economy. Absent innovation and the creation of goods and services, there is no economy. How fast markers move around the Monopoly board says absolutely nothing about who's winning and who's losing.
The velocity of money was cranking when trash paper was being resold with higher and higher values in terms of dollar prices, but absolutely no additional wealth was being created. The same thing happened in housing and is happening in education today.
Bubbles churn currency like nothing else, contributing greatly to the velocity of money yet adding absolutely no wealth to the economy. The velocity of money says absolutely nothing about how wealthy an economy may be, although it may be a valuable indicator of an economy's health.
Look how fast money's chasing an ever-decreasing supply of good and services in Venezuela today, FFS.
OTOH, the information/communication revolution has created immense wealth. Literally billions of people have traded currency for Apple products because they judged the value they would receive from their purchase would be greater than the value of the currency which they gave up in return. For some, that may have been better income from their jobs because of increased productivity, but that's only one tiny component of the formula.
The delta between the currency they gave up and the currency they earned as a result of that transaction is only one component of the wealth created by the transaction. The subjective evaluation of those billions of individuals was that the increase in computational and communication ability provided by those devices made them wealthier than had they left the currency in their pockets.
Tell the billions of people who's lives are better today because of that transaction that Steve Jobs didn't create any wealth.
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