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> If much of the population is too poor to buy anything, too sick to consume much etc - who is left to buy anything at all? No one. That's the idea. A low-pop
by ceejayoz 2mo ago
> If much of the population is too poor to buy anything, too sick to consume much etc - who is left to buy anything at all?
No one. That's the idea.
A low-population paradise. Venice without its pesky people to mess with Bezos's wedding. Bora Bora without the peasants.
- sznio 2mo agohow's Bezos going to fund his wedding if there's no population of proles buying from Amazon, nor anyone putting their retirement into a fund that buys Amazon stock? does he just plan to use force rather than money at this point?
- ceejayoz 2mo agoWhy do you think they're all so into AI and robots?
- willturman 2mo agoThe wars of the future will not be fought on a battlefield or at sea. They will be fought in space, or possibly on top of a very tall mountain. In either case, most of the actual fighting will be done by small robots. And as you go forth today, remember always, your duty is clear: to build and maintain those robots. Thank you.
- esafak 2mo agoThat is in the past.
- nancyminusone 2mo agoThey need to? The have all the money right now already.
- tshaddox 2mo agoThe plan is that he (along with a small number of other people) will already own everything. The only reason he currently wants proles to buy things from Amazon is that he has not yet achieved what he considers sufficient ownership of the world.
- ryandrake 2mo agoYea, at some point, these guys won't really need the vast majority of us to buy from them. They'll be buying from and selling to other wealthy people.
- megaman821 2mo agoThat makes litteraly no sense. All the biggest companies are driven by middle-class purchases. Rich-only companies are boutique and are order-of-magnitude smaller than mass market companies.
- lenkite 2mo agoThis is actually changing. Many consumer and retail companies are already shifting their focus from the mass middle class toward high-income and affluent segments. Businesses find higher profit margins and more resilient demand in premium goods. And in enterprise, companies just pay other rich companies who pay them. (sometimes just directly).
- georgemcbay 2mo ago50% of all consumer spending now is done by the top 10% and this keeps shifting up. We've got a horribly K-shaped economy even before AGI.
- andriy_koval 2mo ago> how's Bezos going to fund his wedding if there's no population of proles buying from Amazon there will be new economy around satisfying super rich and few layers of their servants. You can think about shifting production and distribution to more luxury cars/clothes/jets etc for them. Bezos and Andreesen won't live alone on planet, there still be population, just much smaller.
- swat535 2mo agoAnd who is going to maintain this low-population paradise of elites, if there is no one left but the elites ?
- ceejayoz 2mo agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robot
- prepend 2mo agoRobots
- 65 2mo agoAnd who is going to fix the robots when they break down?
- triceratops 2mo agoRobots
- smallmancontrov 2mo agoServants. Yes, robots eventually, but servants are the classical answer. The terrible truth is that palace economies are stable -- we see them in "resource-cursed" countries around the world and through time. When a single easily-owned fountain of wealth dominates the economy, a small group of people consolidate ownership and everyone else polarizes around them, forming into concentric rings of gatekeepers and masses struggling to access the only thing that matters. It's terrible but it's stable, and if you're inside the palace it doesn't feel like much of a curse at all.
- bodge5000 2mo agoThere's been plenty of good sci-fi written about this, but surely they know that any any display of power is meaningless without someone to have power over? The wedding in Venice only means anything because people live in Venice and you're still able to "take over". Any "paradise" built like this will never be paradise, it'll be just chasing the next extreme until there's nowhere left to go
- tetris11 2mo ago[flagged]
- chabes 2mo ago[flagged]
- harambae 2mo ago> Rich white man's paradise The majority of new billionaires are either Chinese or Indian [0] so at some point you’ll need to update your race-based hatred (if you feel passionately about it) to remain accurate [0] https://www.hurun.net/en-us/info/detail?num=FTJ5PSSPOWOF https://www.hurun.net/en-us/info/detail?num=FTJ5PSSPOWOF
- jambalaya8 2mo agoI would have called BS on that before but I think now I would just call BS on the part where it was people like Bezos or whatever. It seems there is a neverending number of people who would do the same. Look at the stories about the sunflower fields that had to close down before the pandemic, or the current overrunning of cities and villages in Italy (like Lake Como). Or competing for views on social media (not just attempting to get them). Fighting for status is as old as.... well maybe humanity. What is fairly new is money and real property... and virtual property. There probably is nowhere left to go. Maybe one of those little islands in the South Pacific but you can't live there and they are all mapped too.
- tavavex 2mo ago> There's been plenty of good sci-fi written about this Can you recommend me some? I feel like my brain still can't fully internalize the world these people are pushing for.
- jackp96 2mo agoEh, you see too many of these guys complaining about declining populations for this to be a thing. I don't think you need Machiavellianism to explain their actions. These people have everything they could need, but death comes for all of us and they aren't getting any younger. Purely speculating, but if you had everything in the world (except time) wouldn't you put everything you have into building a future with a 10% chance of living as long as you wanted? What would you sacrifice for that?
- bigbadfeline 2mo ago> Eh, you see too many of these guys complaining about declining populations for this to be a thing. Overpopulation is the best way to get to low population - eventually. > if you had everything - wouldn't you put everything you have for a 10% chance of living [forever]? No, I wouldn't, that sounds awfully silly. > What would you sacrifice for that? Nothing. I don't sacrifice stuff for BS even if it's 100% sure.
- SmirkingRevenge 2mo agoLots of those people complaining about population decline aren't really talking about the absolute number. They're dog-whistling about demographic replacement - the idea that minorities are reproducing too fast and whites are reproducing too slow.
- ornornor 2mo agoWe’re already heading into a certain demographics crisis. It’s not only about the pyramidal system that retirement is but also about who will be your nurse when you’re old, make your car, be your doctor, etc if there aren’t enough people anymore? Every developed country is well below replacement rate with no real plans from the powers that be to address it because it’s so far in the future that it’s the next best guy problem (30 years horizon)
- m4rtink 2mo agoTime of the robots has come! ;-)
- account42 2mo agoCountries are not doing anything about low replacement rates because its currently in the interest of the elite to keep them low so that they can sell the need to import lower paid foreigners instead.
- andriy_koval 2mo agoElite is interested to have their country to win the race and not other, and healthy menpower is still essential for this.
- happymellon 2mo agoWhen you are far removed from everything, your logic doesn't always make sense. The problem with local workforce is that you have less threats hanging over their heads. Ones you can threaten with deportation, separation from their children, or just shoot in the streets, are just more controllable. Imported labour has less rights and will be more open to grovelling.
- andriy_koval 2mo agoyou still need local country to be attractive enough to make people come and fear of deportation, meaning locals will be Ok too.
- CM30 2mo agoBut why wouldn't the rest of society kick them out before that point? Like at some point, there's going to be a lot of political pressure to fix things, especially if the majority of the population is going hungry or struggling to find work. Feels like at some point, some 'rogue' political figure will win election by saying the elites need to be overthrown, and the latter's influence will burn to the ground. If even a percentage of the world's countries are still democracies by that point, then any sort of 'leave the population to suffer while we live in luxury' plan will fail.
- ozozozd 2mo agoI keep questioning this as well. Also, what protects their wealth is the justice system and the enforcement mechanisms, which are run by ordinary people. There is no invisible force that will prevent the “peasants” from attacking the wealthy if the police also loses belief in the system and just starts looking the other way. Or just suddenly becomes _less competent_.
- m4rtink 2mo agoYou don't even need a democracy for this - the moment people go hungry beacause of you, they will do something about it.
- voakbasda 2mo agoBread and circuses. The only thing sustaining our civilization at the moment.
- suburban_strike 2mo agoThe moment people go hungry because of you, they will eat each other long before they think to challenge their oppressors. Those selling you the romance of revolution are ones sabotaging your food supply. They're sadists, and taunting you with false hope.
- account42 2mo agoWhy do you think countries are creating more and more ways to quickly squash dissent. If people can't organize because their messages are being monitored and public protests will get you immediately imprisoned then the resistance will come too late.