HughCaulk
3mo ago
Yeah unironically this. Sprinkle some typos, call someone a fag, etc. AIs will never be at this level 😄
HughCaulk
3mo ago
Of course, since we can export “nothing” (ie: fiat money) for something (like real imports). So our material wealth is greater than most other counties (who don’t have this power up).
Things are not all rosy though. Chronic disease is higher here than any western nation, life expectancy is down, and severely lags behind our peers, deaths of despair are up… material wealth is not the only type of wealth. And at what cost?
HughCaulk
3mo ago
You’re missing the point here imo. This is economics 101 level analysis. America isn’t drilling for oil and then trading oil for Japanese cars. That’s what a persistent and high trade deficit means.
America is creating dollars ex-nihilo and then trading these dollars for real overseas goods. This is how having the reserve currency is a huge blessing, since we can trade unbacked paper money for real cars, computers, microwaves, etc!
But this blessing turns into a curse. This benefits individuals and orgs which can create dollars out of nothing, who are people with assets who can create money through debt. The government debt being at $37T is an exact symptom of this too, all these paper bonds have been exported overseas and we’ve received real items in return. The issue is that poorer people don’t benefit much from this “print money for overseas goods system” and it increases wealth inequality over time. Also, it hollows out your manufacturing base, for an increasingly financialized economy (dominated by the coastal regions in the US)
Tarriffs attempt to undo this curse, as being the reserve currency is starting to cause major issues at home (wealth inequality, ballooning government debt, no manufacturing is a national security issue). There’s going to be major pain. But it’s better now, than later, when the USG goes ~bankrupt and needs to default on the entire financial system. That’s gonna be some pain…
HughCaulk
3mo ago
Yes, and that American/domestic producers will compete to gobble up these new margins on the newly more expensive goods.
HughCaulk
3mo ago
Saying that manufacturing jobs haven’t left America, and especially in the middle states is just plain stupid
HughCaulk
3mo ago
Why exactly are they non sensical? The first order effect is that tarriffs make it more profitable to produce things in America vs offshore, so there will be more jobs and industry created here. It’s only the secondary and tertiary effects where it starts to get ugly
HughCaulk
3mo ago
If houses depreciate significantly it crushes bank loans and mortgage backed securities basically making them worthless. This caused the 2008 crisis.
If most people put 20% or less on their mortgage, and the price of houses goes down >20%, they own zero equity and will just walk away, not pay loans, and hand the keys to their lender. Now it’s the banks problem and a brewing financial crisis.
HughCaulk
3mo ago
Very detailed explanation, thanks a lot.
The entire reason the founders set the system up the way they did was to make things intentionally hard to coordinate.
Yeah, and this is why DOGE will likely fail. They will get some culture war cuts and furious headlines, but it’s actually up to Congress to not just pass CR bills that roll over the last budget into a new one. Congress will actually need to sack up and significantly cut outlays. Won’t hold my breath.
HughCaulk
3mo ago
Actually I’ve found that the zerohedge in house analysis is pretty accurate (and sensational, but they are in the selling-clicks business). A lot of their reposts and features from different figures like Peter Schiff (long time gold bug) is very doom and gloom.
But also, they’ve been shilling gold for years and now it’s up >50% YoY on one of its biggest pumps ever?
Secondly, doom and gloom doesn’t mean that stocks are going to zero, economy dead. Really we are in a slow motion crack up boom, where runaway government spending moons the currency supply and this pushes home prices, stock prices, and asset prices all to unfathomable highs.
HughCaulk
3mo ago
Is there conclusive evidence on how these cuts are actually going, and how much money is being saved? It’s nearly impossible to navigate the media landscape of propaganda, lies, and hit pieces to really know what the numbers are saying.
Just wait and see what the next budget reports say? See if debt to gdp actually starts falling?
Here is a projection from the CBO (congressional budget office) projecting DOGE to be a massive failure, and note this analysis is from a right wing/libertarian news org so I’d actually give it more credibility: https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/cbo-forecasts-doge-and-ai-will-be-massive-failures-sees-us-debt-exploding-productivity
HughCaulk
3mo ago
Facebook has so much garbage in it it’s incredible. To many idle hands over there.
Idk how granny actually makes sense of the app
HughCaulk
3mo ago
But the inexplicable predicament many 'rationalists' have to contend with is that their view of objective reality somehow manages to conform itself precisely within the lines of the mainstream Overton Window.
Yuuuuuuuuuup great point here. How are you Berkeley rationalists so perfectly left leaning and in alignment on all the thorny issues of our time? Crazy coincidence!
HughCaulk
3mo ago
It’s called getting trolled on the internet brah
But seriously, 1/3rd of your budget wasted is a failing company, or a nearly bankrupt government. Raise your standards
HughCaulk
4mo ago
Good take. I think Latinos and Asians (that have chosen to be in the states) actually gasp like whites!
First it’s clearly a selection bias, otherwise why would they move to an Anglo country? And secondly, we are generally respectful, rule abiding, and have good business culture. Racism exists everywhere, but whites are much less racist than inter-Asian country racism, and for Latinos, you’re making a hell of a lot more here than for the same work in your home country, so it’s hard to argue with the numbers!
HughCaulk
4mo ago
It’s just crazy to me how the left, which was the party of LSD, get us out of vietnam, hippy living is now the party of:
Ukraine proxy war, big pharma propaganda campaigns, giant national debt (which directly moons home prices)…
Tell me more about how you toured the US in a school bus for 6 years, went to Woodstock, lived on an avocado farm, and then bought your first home with your seasonal earnings
HughCaulk
4mo ago
Yuuuuuup. But that 1/3 spending is someone else’s paycheck, so expect a lot of screaming and crying as we attempt this.
HughCaulk
4mo ago
Sad thing is that the counties where it’s mostly white kids, they are definitely still learning math. In the places where they actually need it and were behind in math, this gives the teachers a way to opt out of even trying.
HughCaulk
4mo ago
2/3 being “good” for the federal government is why we are $37,000,000,000,000 in debt…
HughCaulk
4mo ago
Aging gracefully seems really difficult. Especially when your generation is the largest by number of souls and you’ve always been the most relevant as you move up through the age bracket.
Now you need to reckon with the fact that the news you consume is a scam, you got totally bamboozled and fucked over generations of youth from the Covid mega-money print, and tbh, you’re just getting old and aren’t fashionable and/or cool anymore.
I hope that when I’m older, I can be the “wise” old man with more timeless wisdom, versus “ewwww fuck tesla”, or “OMG stupid Drumpf AHAHA” type of classic boomer lib takes. Feels like some people haven’t thought a genuinely new thought for their brain in 30 years. Take more psychedelics or something, idk
HughCaulk
4mo ago
People have been educating their children competently for years. We don’t need to mandate curriculum from a federal or even state level. Let’s let teachers, who are with these kids 6+ hours a day and know them intimately, decide when and how to teach them.
Education has been getting gradually worse for years, unlikely that cutting the bureaucrats and grifters out of the DoE is going to make things even worse?
Oh the horror, how is little Johnny in Oregon going to learn math without a squadron of grifters in Washington getting paid?!
HughCaulk
4mo ago
It’s not a good idea because some industries like Ag are completely dependent on this “illegal” labor. If you could snap your fingers tomorrow and instantly deport them all, you’re going to have food shortages and food rotting on the vine in California.
Trust me, I’d rather have a few more Mexican neighbors than have food shortages!
Breaking: all reciprocal tariffs halted for 90 days EXCEPT on China. Tariff rates over 100% on Chinese exports.
So it seems like it’s more of a targeted war against China specifically? Likely giving other nations time to choose (with us or against us), and slapping the nations who chose to align with China with huge tariffs in 90 days.
Interesting choice to make as a country then… do we want cheap goods from China but lose access to the American market? Or do we want to be able to sell to Americans?
The next “stick” will be weaponizing the financial system against China-aligned nations, while China dumps treasuries and tries to spark a financial crisis.
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/china-holds-back-retaliation-opts-strategic-messaging-through-white-paper-trade
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