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> > The best minds of my generation are thinking about how to make people click ads > What a waste. If you consider "what people (un-coercedly) spend money on

> > The best minds of my generation are thinking about how to make people click ads > What a waste. If you consider "what people (un-coercedly) spend money on" as "what people actually want", the situation gets obvious: People don't voluntarily spend money so that e.g. deep scientific questions are worked on or other things are done that are often claimed that "smart people should do". (by the way: a lot of problems that are claimed that "we need smart people to solve" actually don't need smart people (i.e. the problem could be solved by raw intelligence), but are rather "political" problems, i.e. problems of manipulating people). I wish it was different, but before you claim that it is a waste that "the best minds are thinking about how to make people click ads", you should better find an idea what these people should do instead.

tovej 7mo ago
Maybe resources shouldn't be distributed purely using a free market that can easily be manipulated, especially if the top dogs are allowed to use manipulative advertising and sales tactics.
- aleph_minus_one 7mo ago
  > Maybe resources shouldn't be distributed purely using a free market that can easily be manipulated Which kind of resource allocation do you suggest? At least one can clearly tell that existing experiments with planned economies went really bad, so how do you want to overcome the problems that plagued existing big-scale experiments of planned economies?
  - tovej 7mo ago
    Why does everyone on the right always read "not totally free economy" as "planned economy". Regulate the markets. Have the government own natural monopolies. Have large government sellers and buyers in all markets. Break up monopolies. Ban harmful products and services. Ban marketing to children. Ban dishonest marketing. Ban planned obsolescence. Increase the capital gains tax to companies are incentivized to invest in production rather than pay out dividends. Ban stock buybacks. Have CEOs be personally responsible for crimes (remove the LL from LLC). Those are good places to start.
  - squibonpig 7mo ago
    Not arguing for planned economies exactly but we now have computers on a different level. Amazon, walmart, etc. are all incredibly massive logistics systems that function a lot like planned economies. These are only possible with modern tech.
account42 7mo ago
It just so happens that pure unchecked capitalism isn't the only way to organize our society.

tovej 7mo ago

Maybe resources shouldn't be distributed purely using a free market that can easily be manipulated, especially if the top dogs are allowed to use manipulative advertising and sales tactics.

aleph_minus_one 7mo ago
> Maybe resources shouldn't be distributed purely using a free market that can easily be manipulated Which kind of resource allocation do you suggest? At least one can clearly tell that existing experiments with planned economies went really bad, so how do you want to overcome the problems that plagued existing big-scale experiments of planned economies?
- tovej 7mo ago
  Why does everyone on the right always read "not totally free economy" as "planned economy". Regulate the markets. Have the government own natural monopolies. Have large government sellers and buyers in all markets. Break up monopolies. Ban harmful products and services. Ban marketing to children. Ban dishonest marketing. Ban planned obsolescence. Increase the capital gains tax to companies are incentivized to invest in production rather than pay out dividends. Ban stock buybacks. Have CEOs be personally responsible for crimes (remove the LL from LLC). Those are good places to start.
- squibonpig 7mo ago
  Not arguing for planned economies exactly but we now have computers on a different level. Amazon, walmart, etc. are all incredibly massive logistics systems that function a lot like planned economies. These are only possible with modern tech.

account42 7mo ago

It just so happens that pure unchecked capitalism isn't the only way to organize our society.