site banner
PaperclipPerfector  8d ago (text post)   35797 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 27, 2025

This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.

Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.

We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:

  • Shaming.

  • Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.

  • Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.

  • Recruiting for a cause.

  • Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.

In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:

  • Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.

  • Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.

  • Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.

  • Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.

On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.

5
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Has there ever been a time in history when a superpower as economically huge as the U.S. implemented major tariffs?

Personally my take is that while economists are very intelligent and have put a lot of thought into these things, there really just isn't any way to know exactly what will happen. Tariffs could lead to:

  • economies getting destroyed overnight
  • a renaissance of modern industrial capacity in the U.S. & Canda
  • no noticeable effect on anything as large industries get exemptions carved out
  • closer relations b/w Canada & the U.S. as well as Europe and the U.S., as they are forced to negotiate
  • more distant relations, vice versa above
  • literal war with China
  • trade war with China
  • Greenland and Canada joining the United States to avoid tariffs
  • etc etc

There are just so many possibilities, and even with all the statistics and math in the world I genuinely don't think any economist has a great idea how things will shake out. The global market is one of the most complex systems in existance.

Either way, it's a high variance move and as others have said, it allows Trump a TON of leverage when negotiating with our allies. Personally I'm very curious to see what comes of all this.

If tariffs are supposed to make you stronger because less access to foreign industries will force your own industry to grow stronger, maybe america should tariff trade between states? then each state will become an economic superpower, alone we are strong, together we are weak.

But enough sarcasm, I know there is one benefit to independence, it is that larger economies like China cant just pull the rug away from you (by using tariffs themselves) unless you cave into their demands, so tariffs based on how hostile the other government is make sense, tariffs based on "economic deficits" make no sense, and using it just to be hostile to smaller governments, might get you some concessions, but say goodbye to long term alliances.

Jacking up the tariffs in 1930 likely caused the Great depression. Other countries retaliated, international trade slowed down, companies reliant on exports for large part of revenue started losing money, market panicked, which led to more interventions in the economy, so on and on...

Didn't the Depression kick off in the late 20's?

One thing that really irritates me and makes me have less regard for economics as a study is that no one can agree on the cause of the great depression. Some people say FDR saved us, some people say he made it worse and was the real reason it went on so long. There are so many theories that completely contradict each other. If economists can't figure that out, I have no faith in their ability to make predictions in our time.

FDR’s real achievement is that he created enough of an appearance of “doing something” to prevent a communist or fascist revolution in the United States.

Initial stock market crash was in 1929 but it didn't have to cause such a long term disaster by itself.

Meynard Keynes arguably predicted the Great Depression in 1919 by forecasting the obvious inability of the Germans to pay back their crushing war reparations and the economic fallout that would ensue. Tariffs might have impacted things but I choose to believe that the Depression was mostly baked in since 1919 (since correct predictions are cool).

Germany paid almost none of the reparations. Less than 1/6 of the 130 billion marks were paid by 1930 (after which payments were paused, then indefinitely deferred due to the great depression), almost all by American banks which Germany never paid back. (N.b. only 50B (the A and B bonds) were required to be paid.) If you calculate for inflation etc. the US actually paid Germany significantly more than in the Marshall plan after!

For comparison, after the Franco-Prussian war, France received a similar proportion of GDP, had its banks finance it within a month then paid them off within 3 years. The German Empire (the Weimar state's actual name) via Havenstein instead chose to call a general strike and hyperinflate its currency to erase local war debts the government owed to German citizens and banks.

Also, the great depression started when the US stock market crashed, spreading elsewhere.

almost all by American banks which Germany never paid back.

Yes this seems Bad For The Economy

Also, the great depression started when the US stock market crashed, spreading elsewhere.

Certainly. But am I wrong that Germany rug-pulling US banks and investors (and the European economy performing poorly due to the issues you mention, along with the occupation of the Ruhr) was bad for American speculators? And "overspeculation" was a leading cause of the 1929 stock market crash, wasn't it?

Yes this seems Bad For The Economy

How did this impact the German economy if it never circulated (neither entered nor left it)?

I assume it was bad for the German economy because it made banks less likely to lend to them, drying up credit. (Plus the whole part where the French got irritated by the lack of repayment and seized some of their territory.)

We're literally talking about the opposite situation!

American banks gave Germany perhaps 4x as much as the 20 years later Marshall plan. Some was from the reparations (Dawes and Young plans) they bankrolled, without being paid back, which did not circulate in the German economy, but they loaned and invested even more (about $5 billion/year in the late 1920s, more than Germany (American bankers) paid in reparations in total (for comparison, in dollars, the total original reparation sum was $30 billion) which helped Germany grow production 30% above 1914 levels, with the 2nd largest industry in the world.)

Be that as it may, I don't think it's good for the American economy to loan money and not have it paid back. Obviously a certain amount of this is the cost of doing business, but it's not good when that happens.

Are you saying that failing to pay their war debts didn't hurt German credit?

I sense I might be losing the thread on this, so feel free to lay your thesis out for me.

More comments

What percent of American GDP were German war reparations?

It's been a long time since my economics and history courses, but I don't think the United States was owed much if anything by Germany. To the extent that anything in 1919 was causitive [and, to be fair, I don't think most things are monocausal] I think it would have been by American investments in Germany and Europe failing to yield expected returns. Germany had a string of economic problems – hyperinflation, the occupation of the Ruhr – related to its reparations debts, and from what I understand these not only negatively impacted Germany but Europe as a whole. Now, to your question, I don't know what degree of American stock market speculation was actually in Europe, so possibly my cool Keynes myth is bunk, but given that the European markets in the 1930s were sensitive to the American stock market, I imagine the reverse was true as well. But do take the theory with a grain of salt, I gather that the True Causes of the Great Depression are still a cause for debate among actual economists.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats