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This sentiment resonates. People seem unable and uninterested in pursuing anything meaningful.

by aklemm 7y ago

TeMPOraL 7y ago
It seems to me that our economy is extremely good at removing meaning from anything. Great many jobs - possibly most - involve being paid for doing arbitrary tasks that become inputs to further arbitrary tasks that make money for someone else. A worker is just a replaceable piece in a vast machinery. And even if you elect to search for meaning on the front lines of value delivery - if you become, say, a doctor, or a fireman - you'll discover your job is as much about helping people as it is about making money and preserving your ability to make money. I wonder whether it's just the price of progress, of increasing complexity in human organization? As heartbreaking as it is, could it be any different?
- lotsofpulp 7y ago
  >As heartbreaking as it is, could it be any different? Not if all those 401(k), IRA, and defined benefit pension funds want fat ROIs. There is something quite humorous about people working hard to earn money to invest, and then those same investments causing them to work even harder to meet their ROIs.
  - dmoy 7y ago
    Huh, total US retirement stuff about a year ago was ~$28T, and total US market cap at the same time was ~$30T. Now obviously there's not complete overlap there, because a huge chunk of retirement accounts are not invested in equities at all, and a less huge but still significant chunk is not invested in US equities. However, that means that the remainder is still a massive chunk of all US equities. I would not have guessed this, given the size of the average person's 401(k). My guess was much smaller. Not sure if I'm worried or relieved to be wrong about that.
    - lotsofpulp 7y ago
      It doesn’t matter if it’s equities or debt, once an assumption about growth in the future is made, then if it doesn’t come to pass, it is considered a loss. And who doesn’t like to make rosy assumptions about the future so that they can enjoy life today. Let’s assume 8% returns, so that we can save less and spend more now. Well...now you have to work harder to make those 8% returns come true. And the savers get screwed too because people (aka government) will opt to pump up the value of equities to make sure the 8% nominal return comes true at the expense of sacrificing the value of the currency.

This sentiment resonates. People seem unable and uninterested in pursuing anything meaningful.

by aklemm 7y ago

This sentiment resonates. People seem unable and uninterested in pursuing anything meaningful.

It seems to me that our economy is extremely good at removing meaning from anything. Great many jobs - possibly most - involve being paid for doing arbitrary tasks that become inputs to further arbitrary tasks that make money for someone else. A worker is just a replaceable piece in a vast machinery. And even if you elect to search for meaning on the front lines of value delivery - if you become, say, a doctor, or a fireman - you'll discover your job is as much about helping people as it is about making money and preserving your ability to make money. I wonder whether it's just the price of progress, of increasing complexity in human organization? As heartbreaking as it is, could it be any different?

lotsofpulp 7y ago
>As heartbreaking as it is, could it be any different? Not if all those 401(k), IRA, and defined benefit pension funds want fat ROIs. There is something quite humorous about people working hard to earn money to invest, and then those same investments causing them to work even harder to meet their ROIs.
- dmoy 7y ago
  Huh, total US retirement stuff about a year ago was ~$28T, and total US market cap at the same time was ~$30T. Now obviously there's not complete overlap there, because a huge chunk of retirement accounts are not invested in equities at all, and a less huge but still significant chunk is not invested in US equities. However, that means that the remainder is still a massive chunk of all US equities. I would not have guessed this, given the size of the average person's 401(k). My guess was much smaller. Not sure if I'm worried or relieved to be wrong about that.
  - lotsofpulp 7y ago
    It doesn’t matter if it’s equities or debt, once an assumption about growth in the future is made, then if it doesn’t come to pass, it is considered a loss. And who doesn’t like to make rosy assumptions about the future so that they can enjoy life today. Let’s assume 8% returns, so that we can save less and spend more now. Well...now you have to work harder to make those 8% returns come true. And the savers get screwed too because people (aka government) will opt to pump up the value of equities to make sure the 8% nominal return comes true at the expense of sacrificing the value of the currency.