5 ms·

At any given time are there, or are there not, finite goods and services?

Manuel_D 2y ago
At one given instant sure, but the key thing is that over time the collection of goods and services grows. Adam, Bob, and Charlie are all shipwrecked on an island. They divy up the ship's goods equally. One day, Charlie decides to build some furniture. Now he has more goods than Adam and Bob. Did he deprive others, to achieve his comparatively greater wealth? If you just looked at one snapshot of time, you'd see Charlie with more wealth than the others, though.
- dventimi 2y ago
  > At one given instant sure [goods and services are finite] I'm glad we finally agree that wealth is finite. > the key thing is that over time the collection of goods and services grows. That's cold comfort for people who never live to see a time when they can compete for those goods and services.
  - Manuel_D 2y ago
    > I'm glad we finally agree that wealth is finite. Wrong, wealth is not finite and it can be - and is - increased. Yes, the amount of wealth at Monday, 03-Jun-24 04:12:33 UTC is going to be finite, because that's a fixed point in time. This is just a pointless tangent, because in our world time is not frozen. In our reality, where time flows, wealth is not finite and is indeed grown in absolute terms. > That's cold comfort for people who never live to see a time when they can compete for those goods and services. Yes, people who lived in preindustrial societies saw more or less fixed living standards for generations. But fortunately for us, we live in one of the most economically dynamic points of in all of human history [1]. Your statement does ring true for most of human history, but not in our age. 1. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:World_GDP_per_capita_1500_to_2003.png https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:World_GDP_per_capita...
    - dventimi 2y ago
      >>> At any given time are there, or are there not, finite goods and services? >> At one given instant sure > Wrong, wealth is not finite Perhaps you could make up your mind. > Yes, people who lived in preindustrial societies saw more or less fixed living standards for generations. But fortunately for us, we live in one of the most economically dynamic points of in all of human history [1]. Your statement does ring true for most of human history, but not in our age. These people do not live in a preindustrial society. https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/mar/28/poverty-racism-gary-indiana-factory-jobs https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/mar/28/poverty-raci...
      - Manuel_D 2y ago
        At any one given instant in time, the planets have just one position around the sun. Does that mean orbital paths are a lie? The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere at any one point in time is fixed. At a particular instant in time, there is an exact number of CO2 molecules in the atmosphere. And that number is fixed and doesn't change, unless you pick a different timestamp. Does that mean we can just keep burning fossil fuels and the amount of carbon dioxide doesn't change? No, because time isn't frozen. We don't live in a world where time is fixed. Seriously, I can't believe how much time I've wasted on this.
        dventimi 2y ago
        > Seriously, I can't believe how much time I've wasted on this. Then let's cut out fanciful stories of the planets and the birds and the bees and cut to the chase. In the 8 years between its IPO and Elon Musk taking it private again, Twitter (now X) made a profit in only two, according to Wikipedia. Meanwhile according to Glassdoor it has a median total comp for a Twitter Software Engineer in SF at $250k. But the median restaurant worker in SF makes about $40k according to Ziprecruiter. All of these people, Twitter engineers and regular restaurant workers, are generally competing for housing in the Bay Area. Tell me. Who's typically going to win those bids for housing, the Twitter engineer or the restaurant worker?

At one given instant sure, but the key thing is that over time the collection of goods and services grows. Adam, Bob, and Charlie are all shipwrecked on an island. They divy up the ship's goods equally. One day, Charlie decides to build some furniture. Now he has more goods than Adam and Bob. Did he deprive others, to achieve his comparatively greater wealth? If you just looked at one snapshot of time, you'd see Charlie with more wealth than the others, though.

dventimi 2y ago
> At one given instant sure [goods and services are finite] I'm glad we finally agree that wealth is finite. > the key thing is that over time the collection of goods and services grows. That's cold comfort for people who never live to see a time when they can compete for those goods and services.
- Manuel_D 2y ago
  > I'm glad we finally agree that wealth is finite. Wrong, wealth is not finite and it can be - and is - increased. Yes, the amount of wealth at Monday, 03-Jun-24 04:12:33 UTC is going to be finite, because that's a fixed point in time. This is just a pointless tangent, because in our world time is not frozen. In our reality, where time flows, wealth is not finite and is indeed grown in absolute terms. > That's cold comfort for people who never live to see a time when they can compete for those goods and services. Yes, people who lived in preindustrial societies saw more or less fixed living standards for generations. But fortunately for us, we live in one of the most economically dynamic points of in all of human history [1]. Your statement does ring true for most of human history, but not in our age. 1. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:World_GDP_per_capita_1500_to_2003.png https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:World_GDP_per_capita...
  - dventimi 2y ago
    >>> At any given time are there, or are there not, finite goods and services? >> At one given instant sure > Wrong, wealth is not finite Perhaps you could make up your mind. > Yes, people who lived in preindustrial societies saw more or less fixed living standards for generations. But fortunately for us, we live in one of the most economically dynamic points of in all of human history [1]. Your statement does ring true for most of human history, but not in our age. These people do not live in a preindustrial society. https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/mar/28/poverty-racism-gary-indiana-factory-jobs https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/mar/28/poverty-raci...
    - Manuel_D 2y ago
      At any one given instant in time, the planets have just one position around the sun. Does that mean orbital paths are a lie? The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere at any one point in time is fixed. At a particular instant in time, there is an exact number of CO2 molecules in the atmosphere. And that number is fixed and doesn't change, unless you pick a different timestamp. Does that mean we can just keep burning fossil fuels and the amount of carbon dioxide doesn't change? No, because time isn't frozen. We don't live in a world where time is fixed. Seriously, I can't believe how much time I've wasted on this.
      - dventimi 2y ago
        > Seriously, I can't believe how much time I've wasted on this. Then let's cut out fanciful stories of the planets and the birds and the bees and cut to the chase. In the 8 years between its IPO and Elon Musk taking it private again, Twitter (now X) made a profit in only two, according to Wikipedia. Meanwhile according to Glassdoor it has a median total comp for a Twitter Software Engineer in SF at $250k. But the median restaurant worker in SF makes about $40k according to Ziprecruiter. All of these people, Twitter engineers and regular restaurant workers, are generally competing for housing in the Bay Area. Tell me. Who's typically going to win those bids for housing, the Twitter engineer or the restaurant worker?