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I think you've been drinking too much of the Warren coolaid. If you are American, vilifying wealth and building companies is quite a silly endeavour. This blame

I think you've been drinking too much of the Warren coolaid. If you are American, vilifying wealth and building companies is quite a silly endeavour. This blame game mentality is counterproductive and will only restrict and impede your own financial success.

throw_this_one 7y ago
I mean what is the end effect of this though? Basically some smart people get very rich. Due to zero-sum game, other people lose. No benefit is derived in the real economy. The only possible benefit is increased liquidity... which really isn't that beneficial past a point right? I don't see the benefit. If you have a different angle I'd be glad to hear it.
- bhupy 7y ago
  > Due to zero-sum game Wealth is not zero-sum, it's created. Real GDP (i.e. adjusted for inflation) in the world has increased from ~$3.4T to ~$110T since the 1900s.
  - throw_this_one 7y ago
    Yeah, but what does that have to do with trading? When you create something that physically benefits people/the world, you usually extract your own value (profit) by providing even more value and selling it. When you trade like this, what net value are you providing? It seems like they are just extracting value. Also, if all the smart minds were doing advanced trading in 1900, would the GDP have risen as much? Instead people were creating aircraft, fighting disease, creating the internet, etc.
    - patentatt 7y ago
      Agreed. And as you mentioned above, many believe the “real value” or whatever of liquidity is indeed capped and has diminishing returns. Trading financial instruments doesn’t just perform the capital allocation task that we were told it does in Econ 101. It’s also a fantastic way to take other peoples money. Why is that so hard to believe? And to those feeling a need to deny such behavior as an attack on capitalism, I’d suggest that it’s the purest expression of capitalism. The goal of investors or capitalists isn’t to do anything useful other than acquire more money. To the extent useful stuff happens, that’s just a side effect of acquiring more money. There’s no altruism involved. So it should be something that a true capitalist would embrace.
  - sweeneyrod 7y ago
    The parent comment is talking about hedge funds. It does not seem likely that they are responsible for the increase you are talking about.
- patagurbon 7y ago
  I generally agree that there are some really bad effects of funds like this. But wealth is not zero-sum.
  - dredmorbius 7y ago
    Inequality is. Thermodynamics has some interesting implications regards wealth.
  - tuesdayrain 7y ago
    Wealth is not zero sum in the long term. But it is in the short term. When a fund makes a billion profit in one day, do you think that was just the natural creation of wealth? No, other market participants collectively lost that much.
patentatt 7y ago
It’s perfectly reasonable to think that whatever strategies they are using are being shielded from scrutiny at least in part because of a concern that it would be regulated out of existence, i.e., made illegal, if public. That’s just good capitalism there.

throw_this_one 7y ago

I mean what is the end effect of this though? Basically some smart people get very rich. Due to zero-sum game, other people lose. No benefit is derived in the real economy. The only possible benefit is increased liquidity... which really isn't that beneficial past a point right? I don't see the benefit. If you have a different angle I'd be glad to hear it.

bhupy 7y ago
> Due to zero-sum game Wealth is not zero-sum, it's created. Real GDP (i.e. adjusted for inflation) in the world has increased from ~$3.4T to ~$110T since the 1900s.
- throw_this_one 7y ago
  Yeah, but what does that have to do with trading? When you create something that physically benefits people/the world, you usually extract your own value (profit) by providing even more value and selling it. When you trade like this, what net value are you providing? It seems like they are just extracting value. Also, if all the smart minds were doing advanced trading in 1900, would the GDP have risen as much? Instead people were creating aircraft, fighting disease, creating the internet, etc.
  - patentatt 7y ago
    Agreed. And as you mentioned above, many believe the “real value” or whatever of liquidity is indeed capped and has diminishing returns. Trading financial instruments doesn’t just perform the capital allocation task that we were told it does in Econ 101. It’s also a fantastic way to take other peoples money. Why is that so hard to believe? And to those feeling a need to deny such behavior as an attack on capitalism, I’d suggest that it’s the purest expression of capitalism. The goal of investors or capitalists isn’t to do anything useful other than acquire more money. To the extent useful stuff happens, that’s just a side effect of acquiring more money. There’s no altruism involved. So it should be something that a true capitalist would embrace.
- sweeneyrod 7y ago
  The parent comment is talking about hedge funds. It does not seem likely that they are responsible for the increase you are talking about.
patagurbon 7y ago
I generally agree that there are some really bad effects of funds like this. But wealth is not zero-sum.
- dredmorbius 7y ago
  Inequality is. Thermodynamics has some interesting implications regards wealth.
- tuesdayrain 7y ago
  Wealth is not zero sum in the long term. But it is in the short term. When a fund makes a billion profit in one day, do you think that was just the natural creation of wealth? No, other market participants collectively lost that much.

patentatt 7y ago

It’s perfectly reasonable to think that whatever strategies they are using are being shielded from scrutiny at least in part because of a concern that it would be regulated out of existence, i.e., made illegal, if public. That’s just good capitalism there.