StandardFuture

To clarify: this is not from "financialization" generally speaking. This is specifically from consolidation for the sake of increasing efficiency and thus margins (as you pointed out).

This is opposed to increased competition (which also increases volatility) in the markets.

The reason why the markets are so consolidated is because it removes short-term risk. If there is an obvious market and only one (or a few) companies involved then everyone makes money (magic, I know). This is why Wall Street lobbies for regulations so hard. They have ownership in all the existing major companies that can afford those regulations and it consolidates the profits (and thus returns). De facto Crony Capitalism at its finest. Your aristocratic oligarchs.

So, stop giving your money to large index funds. (And every time there is a comment on HN telling you to, and there are plenty, downvote them and tell them a proper F-off).

The idea that no one can/should ever lose is what is killing the economy. It got its birth in the boomer-retirement-fund markets of the past few decades.

To recap, it is consolidation for margins that is the problem. That is not the same as general "financialization" (increased trading) that helps increase volatility in the markets and actually increases the size of the economy.

We desperately need real markets and not this crony capitalism that seems self-persistent.

The current system is such a marriage between corrupt politicians and wall street (which is now heavily extended into SV, btw) that it is absolutely disgusting.

Perhaps the only thing that actually happens is that bubbles pop (as they always have and always will) and all that remains is anything of substance? Many cryptocurrencies and stocks are garbage but quite a number of cryptocurrencies and stocks are backed by solid companies and technology.

A few greedy people get lucky and pull out of the bubble with returns. Most greedy people get burned by their get- rich-quick gambling.

This is not anything new or terrible. Of course, all of this craziness can be used to mask genuine scams or scamish-marketed "investments". Those are what the Feds need to chase and prosecute. There are plenty of cryptocurrencies (and inflated stock evaluations) that are genuine pump and dump scams. These pump and dumps really should be prosecuted harshly.

We really need to get over this idea that we can regulate away losses and negative outcomes of basic stupid human behavior simply because it seems like an ideal that we be able to do so.

> it's outright selfish.

Yes, but aren't we all to at least some degree? "Self-focused" is perhaps an easier adjective to digest?

The reality is that the boomers dominated politics (local and national) up until now. That starts to change inside this decade. So we are going to see dramatic shifts by 2030 and we will see if that is for the better or the worse.

You have completely missed the point despite your temper-tantrum rage ranting. Maybe grow up a little?

But first, your entire argument against the grandparent comment is "Trump is rich and had some policies that benefitted some rich people" as equaling that his base is in love with the very concept of political and business elitism?

Do you not see how completely nonsensically disingenuous and logically fallacious of an argument that is?

Are you actually interested in having an intellectual discussion on the topic or do you want to rant like you are on Twitter, Reddit, or some cable media show?

Feel free to head over to one of those if that is your intentions.

The primary reason why Trump was elected was because he was the only candidate brave enough to attack both the Bush and Clinton dynastic era policies (on live Television, btw). IIRC, he did replace NAFTA. A lot of Americans actually are interested in the idea of a strong focus on American job availability.

Regardless of a subjective judgement on whether Trump mad e progress on this or not, those were the policies he publicly promoted.

He also has done other public things like Twitter rants against companies that are moving factories to Mexico, etc.

So, his base is entirely aware of all of these things and that is exactly what GP commenter was referring too. And that is exactly what you failed to negate with all of your flamebaiting ranting.

> where there are many times the number of candidates as available good jobs

And there it is.

This same phenomenon is also exactly the "leetcode phenomenon" that we see in the SE field, btw.

You could call it an Eastern culture thing, but your summation captures the why more accurately.

> being a college graduate meant that you were almost guaranteed to achieve a middle class lifestyle.

I imagine that up until the 80s and possibly even 90s this was an upper middle class guarantee.

> the difference between good and bad career choices was not that great

I have never seen it expressed this way but this is spot on. The worst part about this modern reality is that the vast vast majority of jobs that "require a degree" really should not be doing so.

You are talking about the man himself and not the policies that he was promoting.

While both are reasonable things to discuss, you did not actually negate the comment you were responding to.

> the educational pyramid is even more skewed

TBF, this might be a more accurate representation of what the education pyramid was always supposed to be.

The biggest problem that I see in the west was the rise of the belief that anyone can simply go through a curriculum and now be upper middle class too.

It's ruining potential, drive, competition, etc. It's super quasi-Marxist as well. Anytime someone proposes a simple solution that will somehow magically guarantee your life to be better is selling snake oil.

> Countries with more equal societies, like the Nordics, and Canada, do not have strong populist movements

Perhaps not as strong, but I am not sure this is actually true. There are growing populist movements in France and Spain for sure. And you could be correct in establishing a pattern between slower economies, higher-inequality and unrest.

> This winner take all economy is stupid

Yes i.e. crony capitalism.

> this competition is the result

Of course, everyone doing the exact same thing and expecting to be the exception to the rule is not actually competition.

Why are you not asking the more critical questions like: why is there yet no competition to Universities themselves?

> obsessed with the same hamster wheel

Perhaps this is by design? Imagine that same level of obsessions, dedication, and intelligence redirected at building competing entities to existing large corporations, investment firms, or establishing new political parties? Instead of competing on an ever-decreasing probability window of being one of those who are "in the top 1%" of everything in life.

Top 1% high school. Top 1% standard test scores. Top 1% University. Top 1% internship. Top1% GPA. Top 1% corporate job. Dont' forget that those probabilities multiply ... Oh woops, can't even get wealthy even if you do win those insane odds? Hmm. Whose game is this again? Who is profiting from this funneling?

The problem is that right here on HN there will be a few who have won those odds and will fail to see past their personal anecdotes (out of a lack of desire and not ability).

Stop playing the crony capitalism lottery. YC is one alternative, but starting any business (technical or not) is another. Business is 100% about how you compete. If you are already willing to do that for numbers that are not your bank account then why not just do that instead for your bank account?

> college as we know it going to cease to exist sometime in the next several decades

Probably not because we live in a crony capitalist society now. It's well established at this point and not likely to change anytime very soon.

College began as a purely elitist cultural institution for the rich. Like all other technologies it was only adopted by the masses once the rich became more bored with it.

The only pre-middle-class-era attendees of University were the highly-religious attending theological schooling and the highly-genius (ala Newton).

In our crony capitalist society college represents a simple and profitable hamster-wheel class separator. The same percentage as has always been will be granted upward mobility while an increasing percentage will remain in place.

Until you convince average intelligence people that college will not grant them wealth, status, or success then they will flock in greater numbers to it like a lottery. They will willingly indebt themselves for a mere chance at a better life.

It's absolutely horrific and disgusting what our society has become. If only we could convince people to focus on strengthening the middle class and having a degree of contentment in life then we could get past the crab in a bucket mentalities that the University system breeds.

> any thread unifying these things

Yes, this is the critical question. And I think the authors of this "reading group" answer that in this really smooth introduction to sequent calculus:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xLRUofFSq5Y

Recommended watching!

The summary (explained in the video) is that these three areas: differential programming, probabilistic programming, and logic programming are all just programming language semantics that are more specifically "languages for calculating" and thus "calculi" languages.

These three areas are also all linked to historical and current AI research. And I think AI research is the primary motivation (another underlying thread) for this collection.

What job can you go on on political rants at? If you can get away with that then this means

1. You have a controlling share in the company and don't give af (b/c you might lose customers and employees)

2. Everyone else (at the company) already completely or mostly agrees with your rants

3. You are so damn good at what you do that people have to put up with you

Let's be honest, the most common reason people do get away with personal political rants at companies is because they get lucky and are in Scenario 2.

This is another reason why everything is becoming more polarized. Companies are beginning to "lean" much more one direction or another. There is no reason to think that this will change anytime soon.

So, how does this address anything the parent comment has talked about?

> keep all the politics talk to a minimum

Ok, so this is one management strategy and the parent comment provided another. You seem to be implying that one management choice has moral superiority to the other?

> whatever can be just as divisive and counterproductive

Yes, and their management choice could be to minimize these just as you choose to minimize politics. That is entirely orthogonal to making managerial decisions to ban certain topics.

They could choose to ban some of the non-politics topics of discussion as well. Hell, they could just say "shutup and work". They could say no work related discussion allowed at work.

Again, these are all managerial choices but you seem to be accusing the company of not managing at all?

> when they can pee or whether they fear for their lives at the speed trap that's stationed about a mile up the road from the office.

> their skin color/presence or lack of uteruses/accents come along.

You have addressed nothing about the actions of employees as the parent comment discussed. You have only addressed that people have different looks, feelings, organs, and politics. Great observation.

>I don’t know if I’d go that far with the set in stone nature.

It's a stone that will only be moved by future technology. Perhaps a mastery of biology/neurology or more. Until then, it is essentially unchangeable.

> Doesn't it ring alarm bells

It should but it is likely that the alarm will not be raised enough. We are ALL taught from grade 1 to "prepare for college, so it can turn us into adults" as a life philosophy.

It probably does not help that every single one of our teachers was forced through that system in order to be granted the "privilege" of teaching us.

Being educated != being smart. Intelligence is a biological phenotype of neurological potential. It's distribution is set in stone across humanity. Being lucky and born into a family that can afford your higher education that will grant you a title has nothing to do with biological intelligence. In other words, a lot of very stupid people with PhDs and MDs can parrot mass media like the "low IQ" individuals that they are.

I am not your guy, buddy.

> Money isn't a natural phenomenon.

Asset trading is about as natural to human civilization as you can get. Having a socially accepted intermediary asset is not much beyond that. Simply saying its not a "natural phenomenon" is not a mathematical or scientific self-validating statement. It's just a statement.

> it's their currency.

Yes, and literally anyone can create a currency out of thin air. Other people will use it if they decide to assign it value.

> Its existence is inherently political

No, It's existence is civilizational. It technologically fulfills the ability to have high transaction rates of an increasing population that other assets can not satisfy. the ability to transact more easily and more quickly is what determines the bounds of the potential of an economy. So, of course, all major civilizations have utilized this technological tool for political means. As a way to increase and concentrate power through economics.

This is fundamentally different from intermediary assets being constructed initially as a political tool. Money is technology. It is not politics. Like literally any other technology it can be used politically.

> isn't something that has been perverted by evil external forces

I am not sure what insanity you are trying to project onto me, but I never even came close to implying anything along these lines. You should attempt to avoid fallacious arguments a little harder.

> some fanciful alternative perfect system

You mean like your supposedly perfectly controlled and singular monetary systems with artificial inflation hoses? Have you seen the economy?

If this is your dream economic system then why not live in China with even more inflation and more centralization? Or maybe you already do. Genuine question, nonetheless.

> Money is not wealth. Money is a tool.

Can you please stop making up your own economics? A currency is an asset. End. Of. Story.

Deflation is a directional property of an exchange rate between a pair of assets.

By "used" you mean traded. And yes trade increasing (of which consumer spending is a kind of trading) is a good thing. You only get that with volatility. This can be created through an inflation but dually it is also created through deflation.

There is nothing wrong or immoral about a particular asset going up or down in price relative to another asset.

This unscientific stance of considering all deflation as immoral is based on absolutely nothing except emotional propaganda.

You have provided exactly zero proofs verifying that any and all deflation in a currency is a bad thing. And you will never be able to provide such a "proof" because it does not exist.

Let's see if you are even capable of constructing a proper intellectual retort. My doubts run high.

> you can buy 2 rolls of toilet papers 2 months later for the price of 1 toilet paper today,

This is called a sale and happens all the time in consumer spending. It is a well known phenomenon that many people (not all) will wait to purchase when they have more purchasing power. But it is also well known that a subset of the population will not wait.

I am not sure how you perceive your arguments as being a rigorous support of your position or a rigorous critique against the opposing position. It is truly mysterious.

But if salaries actually rose with inflation then there would be no inflation.

You are fundamentally misunderstanding the purpose of the modern central banking nonsense that the parrots you are replying to merely repeat without any understanding whatsoever of how absolutely devastating it is to the economic stability of the middle class.

> spoken like someone who has never actually been poor

It's not even just that. It is spoken like someone who has not even been around poor people.

Class segregation is a much more serious issue than simply class distinction. I wonder if it is a growing problem in society. Because if so, it will not end well as it never has historically.

If you grew up upper middle class or wealthy and you have not had multiple friends on much lower financial tiers than you then you are absolutely out of touch. It is not possible to be aware of the (mostly minor but not insignificant) differences in people's lives by simply reading a book, watching a documentary, listening to a TED talk, or "being an activist".

> The dollar depreciates and appreciates against commodities and other currencies all the time.

Bingo! But, I do not see anyone complaining about this "only benefiting the creditors".

> econ 101

To be fair, I find a reference to very weakly approximating models of reality, taught to ignorant and naïve students for the sake of starting them off somewhere, to be slightly disingenuous.

> Appreciation due to contracting supply.

Contracting supply is not the only reason for appreciation. If we take that fact into consideration then your causality arrow of 'low monetary velocity' -> 'supply shrinks' -> 'appreciation' is one of many possible paths. Therefore, deflation is not what causes appreciation, it is in of itself a description of that very appreciation. Again, appreciation RELATIVE to something. You seem to be ignoring this very important fact.

You also created circular thinking. In a prior comment you said the deflation causes monetary velocity to fall, and then you say monetary velocity causes appreciation. Appreciation is where the deflation comes from. So, which is it? Deflation pops into existence and causes monetary velocity to fall? Or a magical appreciation occurs from a slowing monetary velocity and causes deflation to occur?

> In a fractional reserve system

Yes, in a central banking system the 'monetary velocity' is artificially controlled. Almost completely. You can push money into parts of the economy to inflate things at a whims notice. Then everyone loves that the "values" of investment vehicles are bigger than they were yesterday.

So, you are effectively only arguing for the status quo. But the status quo is not working. Is this really your best argument?

> volatility, and there is price discovery

Ah, word games. Even if someone might provide definitional differences, there is no objective real-world difference between the two things.

---

Here is what I argue for:

Not allowing natural (not managed) volatility (or 'monetary velocity') -- MOVEMENT -- is a fool's game. You cannot beat basic game theory that is dependent on the biology of humans. You just can't. There is no fancy economic jargon that can allow you to. There is no monetary policy that will enable you to. You can pitch and sell artificial manipulation of the economy (via economic theories or political ideologies) but you are only pitching bubbles.

Allowing natural periods of deflation in the economy allows for volatility, trade, flux, interest, investment, wins, ... and here is the most important word: losses.

Loss. It allows for someone to actually lose.

These hippie boomers have never had to lose anything in their lives. The artificial manipulation of the markets and the economy reflects this mindset and attitude.

There is more than one currency and that fact alone negates any possible argument against allowing deflation to occur naturally in the economy. If it occurs because of temporary "contracting supply" (of one currency) then so be it.

Not that my above comment was perfect, but let me attempt to be more succint.

> Monetary appreciation only helps

Appreciation of an asset only helps the holders of said asset. But "appreciation" is always an exchange rate. Appreciated relative to what?

> A deflationary environment explicitly benefits creditors.

And this is where my contention lies. This dogmatic condemnation of deflation ever being allowed to happen. Temporary deflation or even deflation for some extended period of time is not a bad thing.

Economic velocity runs on volatility and not what one currency or asset is doing relative to another. Inflating and deflating exchange rates only increase volatility. But, truly, only if both types of relationships are allowed and are not artificially snuffed out by government and/or central bank intervention.

And you assume that creditors are the only ones holding an asset? Credit is only one kind of exchange. Spending is another. Stock trading is another. They all depend on volatility.

Thus, I am not arguing for inflation or deflation. I am arguing for the greatest amount of allowance for natural volatility.

> in your proposed monetary environment.

I see that you assumed that I was arguing for constant monetary appreciation. I was arguing that there is nothing wrong with monetary appreciation.

It seem that you and others are deadset on arguing that all deflation is immoral.

My above comment mentions the common root of such views.

> Much like it's difficult for newcomers to buy large amounts of bitcoin.

Yes, I should clarify my bitcoin comments. Bitcoin is deflationary relative to USD (where most "newcomers" are coming from).

BUT, to add substance to my point it should also be noted that there are coins that outperform Bitcoin and are thus deflationary in their relationship to Bitcoin. A newcomer holding these would actually have more purchasing power.

I clarify this to stress that at the end of the day: consumer spending, loans, credit, etc. are all trading. And trading is what makes the economy go around. Volatility is good.

> reduces money velocity and investment

Yes, this is because of the interchangeability of the value of an asset declining and the fact that no one is buying it. No different than a stock price in free fall. Why is it in free fall? Because no one wants it.

Artificial infinite inflation takes away from the buying power of especially younger generations (but average people in general). It inflates the supposed price of assets (in terms of the inflated exchange asset, e.g., USD) which makes it much more difficult for newcomers to gain access to the necessary amount of buying power otherwise.

Think of it like inflating bitcoin. True, bitcoin is worth more. But, it takes a lot more work and time to get more bitcoin. This actually causes deflation to people's labor value and thus their buying power and leverage.

And not all assets will inflate equally. And some assets will receive government subsidies (this is an increasing phenomenon due to the inflating economy) because they are considered "critical" to society e.g., gasoline, milk, and green energy.

Overall, allowing things to deflate and inflate more naturally actually increases volatility which is actually what will increase economic velocity. Trading will increase, and interest will increase because of profitable trading, and thus investment will increase.

So, no, the current artificial and centralized system that thinks it can outgame game-theory is just stupid.

It's just Neo-Liberal/Neo-Conservative hippie baby boomer nonsense to concentrate wealth and power into an aristocratic elite empowered by trillions of dollars of managed retirement portfolios. They simply do not want to allow for natural volatility so that their managed assets are always increasing. It's absolute insanity.

EDIT:

Not that my above comment was perfect, but let me attempt to be more succint.

> Monetary appreciation only helps

Appreciation of an asset only helps the holders of said asset. But "appreciation" is always an exchange rate. Appreciated relative to what?

> A deflationary environment explicitly benefits creditors.

And this is where my contention lies. This dogmatic condemnation of deflation ever being allowed to happen. Temporary deflation or even deflation for some extended period of time is not a bad thing.

Economic velocity runs on volatility and not what one currency or asset is doing relative to another. Inflating and deflating exchange rates only increase volatility. But, truly, only if both types of relationships are allowed and are not artificially snuffed out by government and/or central bank intervention.

And you assume that creditors are the only ones holding an asset? Credit is only one kind of exchange. Spending is another. Stock trading is another. They all depend on volatility.

Thus, I am not arguing for inflation or deflation. I am arguing for the greatest amount of allowance for natural volatility.

> in your proposed monetary environment.

I see that you assumed that I was arguing for constant monetary appreciation. I was arguing that there is nothing wrong with monetary appreciation.

It seem that you and others are deadset on arguing that all deflation is immoral.

My above comment mentions the common root of such views.

> Much like it's difficult for newcomers to buy large amounts of bitcoin.

Yes, I should clarify my bitcoin comments. Bitcoin is deflationary relative to USD (where most "newcomers" are coming from).

BUT, to add substance to my point it should also be noted that there are coins that outperform Bitcoin and are thus deflationary in their relationship to Bitcoin. A newcomer holding these would actually have more purchasing power.

I clarify this to stress that at the end of the day: consumer spending, loans, credit, etc. are all trading. And trading is what makes the economy go around. Volatility is good.

> I intentionally enter a large percentage of invalid data into recaptchas to spoil their dataset.

So do a few others. You are easily selected out as anomalous data, just fyi.

> Google Analytics is blocked by my ad blocker.

Great. Are you also blocking Google Fonts? Are you sure that Google is not hosting anything you are touching on a website?

> Same goes for ads on youtube.

But advertisers pay YouTube based on the viewership reputation of YouTube. You are merely providing a reduced amount of value to Google in this way.

> You just shouldn't encourage any further people to use Google stuff by filling their ecosystem with more new software.

Very honest question: Do you think you would have actually said this same thing about the C programming language in the 70s, 80s? Maybe you would have.

All in all, I am not sure that your stance justifies writing no code in Go which provides less value to Google's bottomline than even Google Fonts.

Perhaps some advertiser somewhere in the tech industry benefits from Google's public-facing Go packages proxy data for reaching a developer audience to sell to? Who knows? But, developers can turn that off and/or use self-hosted proxies.

Also, lone wolf retaliation is fine but not nearly as effective as just running for political office and being anti-Google.

> app store model

Yes, well we as a developer community can never let up on Apple and Google's app store models being legally reprehensible.

We are quite literally the most negatively affected community by these monopolies over general consumer's devices.

We need to be the "force to be reckoned with" here and constantly petitioning politicians for action else get campaigned AGAINST electronically (our domain).

I would say that the app store model negatively affects a growing "small software business" sector of the economy which will only continue to grow as a stable pillar of the modern middle class.

In other words, this is only becoming that much more of a critically important issue.

Tax evasion is allowed by the people you elect, and you know it. Any unelected corporation can only be bound by the laws and system that it is a part of.

If you really want to change things then start speaking out against any and all politicians in bed with private actors (for ANY political party, btw) -- not overly-focusing on just "those politicians who disagree with you on abortion" or something else insanely and profoundly silly.

Also, if you really, and I mean truly, despise the way things are then stop complaining on the internet and run for local office? Then if that goes well, run for a higher office? Just an idea. But an idea that the vast majority of us on HN never take seriously.

> One pedantic point

Your point is not pedantic at all and in fact completely negates the other commenters counterpoint made to your initial argument.

The buying power of the entity you are exchanging in has changed -- for everyone. This absolutely does not diminish your work. It is literally equivalent to being paid in many more bitcoin in 2012 versus today.

I am sure there are valid critiques of allowing deflation. But, as of yet a solid one has not been provided in this thread.

It would be interesting to see if anyone can offer other sources or arguments against this pro-savings, deflation-allowable, economy.

Allowing natural volatility into the value of any asset that is traded, including the USD, likely resolves to a more natural equilibrium in the economy, no?

Very valid points about recaptchas. Now, what does that have to do with the Go programming language that is FOSS?

Or are you calling for developers to essentially put restrictive sanctions on any and all Google products/projects?

And if so, are you actually holding yourself to the same standard? Never using a recaptcha? Never visiting a site that uses Google Analytics? Never watching a YouTube video? Never using a device which runs the Android operating system? etc., etc.?

Because you seem to be demanding such a standard from the rest of us.

You are absolutely right! And this is why I avoid any and all software written in C due to AT&Ts prior evil monopolistic practices of the mid-20th century. /s