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PaperclipPerfector  4d ago (text post)   20715 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 24, 2025

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I have seen people on data secrets lox complaining that we'll importing a ruling class of foreign rich people to push Americans down a peg. But personally at that price I don't see it being an issue.

If it isn't inflation-pegged... could become an issue in the future.

It should be in gold, not dollars.

That's about 80kg at today's prices, or approximately 1700 troy ounces.

Just round it up: 1776 ty oz of gold can buy you citizenship in the USA. Today's price puts that at $5.2 million.

This is beautiful. However, it doesn't account for the collapse in the price of gold when Elon Musk takes a spaceship to Psyche 16 and flies it back with 100 quintillion USD worth of gold. We'll be using it as paperweights by the end.

It would be safer to peg it to a basket of goods.

It would be safer to peg it to a basket of goods.

Which goods, exactly? Other precious metals such as platinum? Foodstuffs like corn and pork? Livestock, such as cows and goats and sheep? Manufactured goods? Cotton, linen, silk, or wool? Does it have to be spun? Does it have to be woven, or knit? Cars, televisions, sewing machines? Or does it need to be chips? What about optics, can I buy my citizenship with monocles and telescopes?

I'd rather peg it to gold and platinum only than some nebulous basket, and the only reason I'm including platinum is because it's only possible to fake the density with more expensive and rare elements like iridium.

Psyche will be explored by NASA, with a spacecraft of the same name, marking the first time a manmade object will journey to a metallic asteroid, launched on 13 October 2023, with an expected arrival in 2029.

I think with six years of lead time we could foresee the impact and adjust, which would still be better than a basket.

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