Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?
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Notes -
There's modest consensus around here that Vivek & Elon firing half of the government would be a good thing, and that most of those workers are largely vestigial parasites/culture warriors who don't productively contribute to society.
What would the practical effects be of Trump pulling a Xi and dropping the hammer of god on wall street and hedge funds, HFT outfits, etc.? Say you can keep venture capital and bank loans to businesses and all the other stuff, but the 'quants' who make a living with options, trading commodities and the like? I'll leave it to someone better versed in that world to carve out precisely what should or shouldn't be banned, or try to convince me that this is a mistake.
The friends I have in that space freely admit that they don't believe that they contribute meaningfully to society. They have advanced degrees in physics, math and CS; wouldn't society be better off pushing them towards engineering, manufacturing, company creation? And redistributing capital from the non-STEM people at these places who contribute nothing of value to society?
I'm actually largely with you that the minute optimizations that these guys build in "The Market" are generally pretty worthless, and probably outstripped by the other perverse incentives and distortions they create.
I view them as an inevitable side effect of capitalism, and I don't think anyone's smart enough to carve out what should be banned and enforce it. I think China would more effectively compete with us overall if Xi didn't treat their economy the way he does.
It is always satisfying, though, to read about what China does occasionally to stomp on corruption or other frivolously antisocial bullshit like this. No pussyfooting around with fines: people go to prison, get tortured, or executed. The second order effects suck I think but my paternalistic/animalistic monkey brain loves it.
There’s something instinctual about hating people who make lots of money off of not highly visible or hard work things. We love NFL players and moviestars, we hate investment bankers.
In the historical record, we see merchants being hated and nobles being loved. Granted, this is partly because nobles are writing things down. But noblemen seem to also have been genuinely more popular among the commoners than merchants. Every society replicates the distinction in rich people between nobles, who are wealthy for visible, high status reasons, guild masters who are wealthy for visibly working hard(even if the hard work is mostly someone else’s- think titans of industry that build companies), and merchants, who are wealthy for moving value around. As a general rule the commoners love the nobles, admire the guild masters, and hate the merchants. And, obviously, stewards code as a subset of merchants; making a living off of managing somebody else’s money or property is- well, it’s not yours, it’s gotta be at least mildly dishonest.
Today we see that Elon and Trump had popular fanbases before their political turn; Wall Street types never do. There are villain professional athletes, but in equal measure there are those beloved by the public. I think this explains a lot of todays political divides that confuse the PMC(is there any definition for that word?). But it’s a deeper thing. The peasants think, and always have, that the stewards and merchants are there to screw them for personal gain and if the nobles and guild masters knew they’d stop it.
Like yes, cultural affinity explains some of the Republican gains with the working class, but can you imagine Trump driving a pickup truck? Democrats used to get this- they had union reps that worked their way up from the shop floor campaigning for them, not professional managers. No amount of hunting photo shoots can get around the issue there.
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