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Man. When did I say I was good at finance? I literally said I don't understand it. I don't understand tax law either, but I don't have to understand tax law to

Man. When did I say I was good at finance? I literally said I don't understand it. I don't understand tax law either, but I don't have to understand tax law to know that it is so complicated that corporations have found loop holes they can use to exploit it. Literally tell me how this is wrong.

Excel_Wizard 7y ago
>The problem is finance is so unnecessarily complex I have no idea what's going on. You're not wrong but you're not making any measurable claims. If you want to understand what complexity is "necessary" you should define necessary a bit better for the purpose of discussion. If necessary means "required for the individual stakeholders in the financial enterprise to achieve their goals" that is a productive starting point. If necessary means "required so people are happy" that is a quagmire.
- crimsonalucard 7y ago
  I’m not even the guy who made the term necessarily complex. I used the term overly complex. You should probably ask the initial replier to my statement to define it as he introduced the term, not me. That being said if finance serves to achieve certain goals I assume necessarily complex means a minimal set of rules and concepts that serve to achieve said goals. Overly complex means a system with way more rules and concepts necessary to achieve a certain goal. I cannot pinpoint definitively what the overall goal of finance is. Like how it is with everyone else, the notion is vague and complex. I would love to make meAsurable claims but it is hard to do so in a topic that is relatively unmeasurable. What is the measure of complexity in finance? I don’t know. The starting point established here is the best I can come up with. If you can do better by all means do so, I would love to hear more on the science and statistical measurements of complexity in finance.
airstrike 7y ago
Finance is only complex to those outside of it. It's ridiculously simple after some basic training. I often say I get paid far too much given how simple my work is. Just like a Python script seems magical to the layman. Loopholes don't exist because Law is too complex. They either exist on purpose or because lawyers will hack the letter of the law in their favor, not unlike many of us on HN would do. Your claims are just shallow, I'm sorry to say – you need to understand Finance or Law before you can really have a meaningful opinion on it. Just like Linus doesn't care what a script kiddy thinks of his kernel. Sorry if that seems blunt but hope the analogies show the merit in this reply.
- crimsonalucard 7y ago
  My claims are shallow you are 100 percent correct on this. I do not have quantifiable evidence or statistical evidence for this as over complexity is a very very hard thing to measure. In other replies to this thread I have provided my inductive reasoning for why I believe finance is overly complex. To your reply I will provide some counter examples since you cite yourself as an example. If finance wasn’t over complex why does this investigative report require career forensic accountants to dig out the details? If finance reports weren’t over complex why was GE able to hide fraud by simply changing the formatting of their reports once in a while? I’m willing to bet even a finance expert can’t uncover fraud by looking at GE finance statements. They are so complex you need a forensics expert to find it. Another example of over complexity is loop holes in tax law. Loop holes aren’t created intentionally. They are created unintentionally. How? Because complexity of tax law makes the creator of a loop hole unaware that he is creating it. The law maker creates a law to improve the system, the loop hole is created as an unintended consequence hidden by over complexity/ My claims are shallow this much is true. But your claim is equally shallow. Analogies and examples are shallow. If we want to move forward one of us needs a quantifiable measure of over complexity and statistical analysis of this on finance. If neither of us can offer this then we are at a draw.
  - airstrike 7y ago
    > If finance wasn’t over complex why does this investigative report require career forensic accountants to dig out the details? Because this particular company has chosen to produce incredibly complicated financial statements due to a variety of reasons. It's the exception to the rule. Just like the Underhanded C contest[0] doesn't describe the entire universe of computer programming And Tax Law doesn't represent the entirety of the body of Law that governs a country. Law is an entirely different beast because there isn't a BDFL who can refactor the existing code into something meaningful, and there is no unit testing to ensure the any refactored law will work as intended won't have terrible adverse effects. Legislating is a social experiment, and if you've ever been part of a group project you know how hard that can be with a handful of people, let alone hundreds of representatives or millions of voters. My claims are just as deep as they need to be to discredit yours. I'm happy to engage in a deeper debate, but you haven't invited us to one yet. Right now this is just noise, particularly considering that you choose to take the stance of someone who thinks they're right even though they admit to being a layman, instead of asking genuine questions driven by intellectual curiosity and the desire to become better informed. __________ 0. http://www.underhanded-c.org http://www.underhanded-c.org

Excel_Wizard 7y ago

>The problem is finance is so unnecessarily complex I have no idea what's going on. You're not wrong but you're not making any measurable claims. If you want to understand what complexity is "necessary" you should define necessary a bit better for the purpose of discussion. If necessary means "required for the individual stakeholders in the financial enterprise to achieve their goals" that is a productive starting point. If necessary means "required so people are happy" that is a quagmire.

crimsonalucard 7y ago
I’m not even the guy who made the term necessarily complex. I used the term overly complex. You should probably ask the initial replier to my statement to define it as he introduced the term, not me. That being said if finance serves to achieve certain goals I assume necessarily complex means a minimal set of rules and concepts that serve to achieve said goals. Overly complex means a system with way more rules and concepts necessary to achieve a certain goal. I cannot pinpoint definitively what the overall goal of finance is. Like how it is with everyone else, the notion is vague and complex. I would love to make meAsurable claims but it is hard to do so in a topic that is relatively unmeasurable. What is the measure of complexity in finance? I don’t know. The starting point established here is the best I can come up with. If you can do better by all means do so, I would love to hear more on the science and statistical measurements of complexity in finance.

airstrike 7y ago

Finance is only complex to those outside of it. It's ridiculously simple after some basic training. I often say I get paid far too much given how simple my work is. Just like a Python script seems magical to the layman. Loopholes don't exist because Law is too complex. They either exist on purpose or because lawyers will hack the letter of the law in their favor, not unlike many of us on HN would do. Your claims are just shallow, I'm sorry to say – you need to understand Finance or Law before you can really have a meaningful opinion on it. Just like Linus doesn't care what a script kiddy thinks of his kernel. Sorry if that seems blunt but hope the analogies show the merit in this reply.

crimsonalucard 7y ago
My claims are shallow you are 100 percent correct on this. I do not have quantifiable evidence or statistical evidence for this as over complexity is a very very hard thing to measure. In other replies to this thread I have provided my inductive reasoning for why I believe finance is overly complex. To your reply I will provide some counter examples since you cite yourself as an example. If finance wasn’t over complex why does this investigative report require career forensic accountants to dig out the details? If finance reports weren’t over complex why was GE able to hide fraud by simply changing the formatting of their reports once in a while? I’m willing to bet even a finance expert can’t uncover fraud by looking at GE finance statements. They are so complex you need a forensics expert to find it. Another example of over complexity is loop holes in tax law. Loop holes aren’t created intentionally. They are created unintentionally. How? Because complexity of tax law makes the creator of a loop hole unaware that he is creating it. The law maker creates a law to improve the system, the loop hole is created as an unintended consequence hidden by over complexity/ My claims are shallow this much is true. But your claim is equally shallow. Analogies and examples are shallow. If we want to move forward one of us needs a quantifiable measure of over complexity and statistical analysis of this on finance. If neither of us can offer this then we are at a draw.
- airstrike 7y ago
  > If finance wasn’t over complex why does this investigative report require career forensic accountants to dig out the details? Because this particular company has chosen to produce incredibly complicated financial statements due to a variety of reasons. It's the exception to the rule. Just like the Underhanded C contest[0] doesn't describe the entire universe of computer programming And Tax Law doesn't represent the entirety of the body of Law that governs a country. Law is an entirely different beast because there isn't a BDFL who can refactor the existing code into something meaningful, and there is no unit testing to ensure the any refactored law will work as intended won't have terrible adverse effects. Legislating is a social experiment, and if you've ever been part of a group project you know how hard that can be with a handful of people, let alone hundreds of representatives or millions of voters. My claims are just as deep as they need to be to discredit yours. I'm happy to engage in a deeper debate, but you haven't invited us to one yet. Right now this is just noise, particularly considering that you choose to take the stance of someone who thinks they're right even though they admit to being a layman, instead of asking genuine questions driven by intellectual curiosity and the desire to become better informed. __________ 0. http://www.underhanded-c.org http://www.underhanded-c.org