A weekly thread to discuss financial matters - from personal all the way up to global.
Ground Rules
- Remember that we're all just Internet randos. Don't bet your life savings on a hot tip from this thread.
- Keep culture war in the culture war thread. Yes, global events may impact our personal finances, but that does not mean we have to incessantly harp on culture war aspects here. If you are going to discuss it, please stick to the practical impacts of it on an individual level.
- Be kind. Remember that everyone here comes from different circumstances. We all have different resources available and different risk tolerances.
- Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. Better is better. Celebrate people when they take a step up and work to move their finances in the right direction. Don't flame out because they haven't followed what you consider the optimal path. Everybody has to start somewhere.

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Notes -
Point 1 is directionally correct, points 2 and three are completely off.
There is a big risk of ai making individual preparation essentially worthless for everyone or at least everyone aside from a few oligarchs. That covers a variety of apocalyptic and dictatoria scenarios, but as reasoned isn't worth worrying about.
If that turns out to not be the case, then it's going to be because:
Under those conditions, you have to understand that the market not only allocated but reflects how scarce labor and human resources have already been allocated. Even if a company builds GAI, if they ask that GAI something like, "what's the best way to cure mortality and profit?" The answer will likely start with, "well we need infrastructure and testing data, so first buy these existing pharmaceutical companies." That in the end distributes wealth through the broader market. Since in advance it's hard to predict exactly how the wealth will flow, you wnd up back at the time-tested advice to just buy index funds and sit on them instead of trying to pick winners.
AI will change how wealth is distributed. Some classes of people will rise, and others fall. But in general I predict that your social and economic status after ai will remain very correlated with your pre-ai standing.
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