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Do you think there's a correlation between the top comment, about erosion of values and the entitlements you refer to? "My personal favorite is to look at the

Do you think there's a correlation between the top comment, about erosion of values and the entitlements you refer to? "My personal favorite is to look at the original values that were used to build the empire. If those values degrade and are not sufficiently replaced/reinforced, this is a sure sign your empire is in decline"

6510 7y ago
It simplifies it, all empires are build on hard work rewarded proportionally. Something else struck me the other day.. Imagine a bar chart with the essential services on the left and entertainment on the right. We all know that the work needed to keep society going isn't paid so well. We also know that profit is huge in things no one needs. The new thing I noticed is that it works like that over the entire spectrum. The more we need something the smaller the investments. New hip things (that we've always done without) are flooded with money. Amazon is hip, the postal service is not. I think it works like this: After a hard reset society rebuilds from scratch. At this point the market is interested in stuff people need. We want that hip new broomstick and we want it now. Eventually the sector stabilizes. Broomsticks continue to be made but the excitement is over. Margins go down and the market moves its attention to the right of the bar chart. Meanwhile the essential industries become more and more efficient but less and less resilient. You could still call it "the original values of the empire" but I believe this public attention or market focus to be a more granular perspective. Entitlements could extend the chart beyond producing stuff no one needs. (at least they are still making something even if it is just video games) Since attention is something that can be controlled it becomes a puzzle that can be solved. We could plant enormous food-forests. They take 80 years to fully mature but I'm sure we can invent some futures market and some subsidies to make it into a truly hip thing.
- _curious_ 7y ago
  Interesting thoughts, thanks for sharing.

6510 7y ago

It simplifies it, all empires are build on hard work rewarded proportionally. Something else struck me the other day.. Imagine a bar chart with the essential services on the left and entertainment on the right. We all know that the work needed to keep society going isn't paid so well. We also know that profit is huge in things no one needs. The new thing I noticed is that it works like that over the entire spectrum. The more we need something the smaller the investments. New hip things (that we've always done without) are flooded with money. Amazon is hip, the postal service is not. I think it works like this: After a hard reset society rebuilds from scratch. At this point the market is interested in stuff people need. We want that hip new broomstick and we want it now. Eventually the sector stabilizes. Broomsticks continue to be made but the excitement is over. Margins go down and the market moves its attention to the right of the bar chart. Meanwhile the essential industries become more and more efficient but less and less resilient. You could still call it "the original values of the empire" but I believe this public attention or market focus to be a more granular perspective. Entitlements could extend the chart beyond producing stuff no one needs. (at least they are still making something even if it is just video games) Since attention is something that can be controlled it becomes a puzzle that can be solved. We could plant enormous food-forests. They take 80 years to fully mature but I'm sure we can invent some futures market and some subsidies to make it into a truly hip thing.

_curious_ 7y ago
Interesting thoughts, thanks for sharing.