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Not being able to buy a $1 2023 product does not mean the poorest of the poor in 2023 would be richer than the richest in olden times. Rockefeller and Carnegie

by j7ake 3y ago

Not being able to buy a $1 2023 product does not mean the poorest of the poor in 2023 would be richer than the richest in olden times. Rockefeller and Carnegie were (and still is) absolutely richer than most people today even though they were not able to buy a transistor with their wealth at the time. Because what money can buy is a high dimensional problem, and focusing on goods that didn’t exist back then is myopic and ignores that money can be used to establish endowments. The funds from Rockefeller (resource extraction), Carnegie (steel), or from English army (plundering) directly contributed to the large endowments of many of the wealthiest research institutes today. So colonialism, plundering, and resource extraction is unambiguously profitable by increasing absolute wealth (by taking goods) and increasing innovative activity (by funding institutes).

astrange 3y ago
> The funds from Rockefeller (resource extraction), Carnegie (steel), or from English army (plundering) directly contributed to the large endowments of many of the wealthiest research institutes today. Spain, Portugal, Mongolia and Russia should have a lot of them then. And Korea, Switzerland and Germany shouldn't, as none of them were big colonizers. "Endowments" meaning successful very long running investments, most of all requires something to invest in, which is economic development. Harvard doesn't sit on a big pile of gold. > So colonialism, plundering, and resource extraction is unambiguously profitable by increasing absolute wealth (by taking goods) Taking something doesn't increase absolute wealth… However, it may not really be taking it, because we also don't observe that the colonized countries are poorer due to losing resources sometime before 1900. Rather, having a lot of natural resources is usually bad for your development ("resource curse") but some countries like Australia and Norway have avoided it through good institutions.

by j7ake 3y ago

astrange 3y ago

> The funds from Rockefeller (resource extraction), Carnegie (steel), or from English army (plundering) directly contributed to the large endowments of many of the wealthiest research institutes today. Spain, Portugal, Mongolia and Russia should have a lot of them then. And Korea, Switzerland and Germany shouldn't, as none of them were big colonizers. "Endowments" meaning successful very long running investments, most of all requires something to invest in, which is economic development. Harvard doesn't sit on a big pile of gold. > So colonialism, plundering, and resource extraction is unambiguously profitable by increasing absolute wealth (by taking goods) Taking something doesn't increase absolute wealth… However, it may not really be taking it, because we also don't observe that the colonized countries are poorer due to losing resources sometime before 1900. Rather, having a lot of natural resources is usually bad for your development ("resource curse") but some countries like Australia and Norway have avoided it through good institutions.