4 ms·

The last 80 years have taught us a few things: - State collapse is more common than we think, but not impossible to recover from (Germany post WW2, Iraq post 2

The last 80 years have taught us a few things: - State collapse is more common than we think, but not impossible to recover from (Germany post WW2, Iraq post 2010?) - The international community is willing to cooperate during major natural disasters (2004 earthquake, Japanese earthquake, Haiti earthquake) - The international community is less willing to cooperate during man-made political disasters with humanitarian consequences (Somalia 1980s, Russia 1990s), though there are notable exceptions (Bosnian War, Kosovo War) - No one really cares about genocides happening in other countries - Successful nation building directed by a foreign power is the exception, not the norm. - Some countries will never achieve prosperity

XorNot 5y ago
> - Some countries will never achieve prosperity Seems like a weirdly determinate conclusion for span of time less then one human lifetime.
- Thorentis 5y ago
  Prosperity is unfortunately a zero sum game. Until we develop the means to fully automate the creation of all of humanity's needs and wants, there will be winners and losers at the national level.
  - asdfasgasdgasdg 5y ago
    That is definitely not true. Many of the things we value the most are found in abundance in all countries, if the society is well organized to achieve these ends. Leisure, food, space to live, friends, peace, safety, etc. There are some few goods whose production is truly limited by our ability to extract raw resources, but these are the exception, not the norm.
    - rsj_hn 5y ago
      This is a good point, but I'd point out that well-organized societies are much rarer (and shorter-lived) than any vein of gold, one of the biggest enemies of having a well-organized society being the politics of envy and resentment as displayed in the post you were replying to. When that type of culture is ascendant, then things are not only zero sum, but often negative-sum, since the party takes a cut of transferring wealth from winners to losers, and often just transfers wealth to itself.
      - imtringued 5y ago
        Let's ignore money for a second. Mugabe took land away from successful white farmers in Zimbabwe and gave the land mostly to friends and black people who wanted to start farms but had no ability to do so. The former category might be extorting consumers and workers but he is "doing his job", he definitively values the land. When you give the land for free to friends those friends don't give a damn about the land because they got it for free. It's not difficult to see how this transaction is destructive. Every person involved is less happy than they could be. The second class of black people who wanted to become farmers faced a completely different problem. They couldn't get loans to start their farms and they didn't get any financial support from the state to start farming, instead farmers were banned from selling their food when the government introduced price controls. It doesn't take much to understand that hyperinflation results in absurd prices and a ban on absurd prices when every price is absurd is a ban on trade itself. Now back to money. Money is zero sum. One person's dollar is another person's debt. That's not wrong but holding onto money for no reason will require better conditions on the debt (e.g. lower interest rates) or more debt overall to satisfy the savers. So telling the savers to get lost with inflation or negative interest rates will tell them that working to earn money that they don't intend to spend on consumption or investment is not wanted by anyone and they should either start working less or they should spend more. Letting money sit idle for no reason just doesn't make any sense from a societal perspective.
  - School-Cotton 5y ago
    > Prosperity is unfortunately a zero sum game. Virtually every part of the world is far more prosperous than it was 100 years ago.
    - Thorentis 5y ago
      Yes, because our ability to automate has increased.
  - imtringued 5y ago
    >Prosperity is unfortunately a zero sum game. Only if you delude yourself that full time jobs and money are equivalent to prosperity, many have deluded themselves that this is the case but I did not, I live in reality instead of a financial world of made up work. https://youtu.be/ZFRVfXeIaek https://youtu.be/ZFRVfXeIaek
sbmthakur 5y ago
> - Some countries will never achieve prosperity Which countries these would be?

XorNot 5y ago

> - Some countries will never achieve prosperity Seems like a weirdly determinate conclusion for span of time less then one human lifetime.

Thorentis 5y ago
Prosperity is unfortunately a zero sum game. Until we develop the means to fully automate the creation of all of humanity's needs and wants, there will be winners and losers at the national level.
- asdfasgasdgasdg 5y ago
  That is definitely not true. Many of the things we value the most are found in abundance in all countries, if the society is well organized to achieve these ends. Leisure, food, space to live, friends, peace, safety, etc. There are some few goods whose production is truly limited by our ability to extract raw resources, but these are the exception, not the norm.
  - rsj_hn 5y ago
    This is a good point, but I'd point out that well-organized societies are much rarer (and shorter-lived) than any vein of gold, one of the biggest enemies of having a well-organized society being the politics of envy and resentment as displayed in the post you were replying to. When that type of culture is ascendant, then things are not only zero sum, but often negative-sum, since the party takes a cut of transferring wealth from winners to losers, and often just transfers wealth to itself.
    - imtringued 5y ago
      Let's ignore money for a second. Mugabe took land away from successful white farmers in Zimbabwe and gave the land mostly to friends and black people who wanted to start farms but had no ability to do so. The former category might be extorting consumers and workers but he is "doing his job", he definitively values the land. When you give the land for free to friends those friends don't give a damn about the land because they got it for free. It's not difficult to see how this transaction is destructive. Every person involved is less happy than they could be. The second class of black people who wanted to become farmers faced a completely different problem. They couldn't get loans to start their farms and they didn't get any financial support from the state to start farming, instead farmers were banned from selling their food when the government introduced price controls. It doesn't take much to understand that hyperinflation results in absurd prices and a ban on absurd prices when every price is absurd is a ban on trade itself. Now back to money. Money is zero sum. One person's dollar is another person's debt. That's not wrong but holding onto money for no reason will require better conditions on the debt (e.g. lower interest rates) or more debt overall to satisfy the savers. So telling the savers to get lost with inflation or negative interest rates will tell them that working to earn money that they don't intend to spend on consumption or investment is not wanted by anyone and they should either start working less or they should spend more. Letting money sit idle for no reason just doesn't make any sense from a societal perspective.
- School-Cotton 5y ago
  > Prosperity is unfortunately a zero sum game. Virtually every part of the world is far more prosperous than it was 100 years ago.
  - Thorentis 5y ago
    Yes, because our ability to automate has increased.
- imtringued 5y ago
  >Prosperity is unfortunately a zero sum game. Only if you delude yourself that full time jobs and money are equivalent to prosperity, many have deluded themselves that this is the case but I did not, I live in reality instead of a financial world of made up work. https://youtu.be/ZFRVfXeIaek https://youtu.be/ZFRVfXeIaek

sbmthakur 5y ago

> - Some countries will never achieve prosperity Which countries these would be?