3 ms·
Until humanity is operating at its full economic potential, then money will continue to have time value, for it can be invested to increase economic potential.
by fennecfoxen 7y ago
Until humanity is operating at its full economic potential, then money will continue to have time value, for it can be invested to increase economic potential. And if you think that humanity is operating at a fraction of its economic potential, even just given today's technologies, well, take a look at the world. The current state of sub-Saharan Africa comes to mind as an obvious counterexample.
"The exhaustion of growth" is political rhetoric meant to excuse anti-growth policy environments which actively suffocate growth by destroying incentives for growth and misallocating resources away from growth.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- toomuchtodo 7y agoInterest rates of safe investments don't agree with your thesis. If there's growth to be captured, capital would rush to invest (and we see some dysfunction in that, like SoftBank's Vision fund, and we all know how that's turning out, throwing VC money into a dumpster fire of unprofitable ventures). Risk adjusted returns are an important metric. There is a lot of growth left in the developing world, but the risk profile is drastically different than the first world.
- TheOtherHobbes 7y agoThere's plenty of growth to be captured, but its potential has been diverted into financialisation - which is essentially just moving money from middle and working class people to rich people - and away from physical invention and innovation. The financial sector has eaten the last couple of generations of top mathematical talent, and there's almost nothing of lasting value to show for it. With a more balanced economy we'd be further ahead in quantum computing, aerospace, AI, medical/bio tech, green tech, and education - all of which still have huge potential.