AIER

> You either love meat and won't touch these things with a 10 feet pole Assuming you can afford to eat meat, which many meat eaters might find themselves less able to do if prices continue to climb and/or beef subsidies end. Ground beef could easily cost $15+ per pound without subsidizes: https://www.aier.org/article/the-true-cost-of-a-hamburger/

Levitt was also a signatory: https://www.aier.org/article/aier-hosts-top-epidemiologists-authors-of…

Henry George: Progress and Poverty. Explains how taxing land instead of labour is the path to a far better world. Versus now where progress means higher land prices which means poverty for those excluded from land. Once nearly got to be mayor of New York. Sold 6 million copies (at the time only the bible outsold it). https://www.aier.org/article/amazing-influence-henry-george-ec-harwood As recommended by Albert Einstein and many others.

I don't know this particular company's methodology but, in a nutshell, usually they consider a number of glide paths and then run Monte Carlo simulations for each, then choose the best performing one. The goal is to minimize the probability of running out of money before dying, assuming the retiree withdraws a constant amount every year. Some studies concluded that a rising-equity path performs better. Of course it's more complicated than that. There's a lot of assumptions embedded in those simulations: life expectancy, bonds and stocks returns, etc. See below for more info. The Case for Increasing Stock Exposure in Retirement https://www.aier.org/research/case-increasing-stock-exposure-retiremen… Reducing Retirement Risk with a Rising Equity Glide Path https://www.onefpa.org/journal/Pages/Reducing%20Retirement%20Risk%20wi…

Thanks for the reply. You make an excellent point on the systems aspect of all this. And I personally agree things like poverty, fishery depletion, and so on are important issues to address. But, I am not sure Freeman Dyson intended to imply these are disconnected problems. With his broad-ranging mind, Freeman Dyson was definitely a systems thinker -- though with a bias to quantification. Assuming what you say is true, he might ask, to what degree are those problems made worse by CO2-driven climate change? 1%? 10%? 100%? 1000%? Assuming that is a significant amount, we can choose to invest some resources to reduce emissions and/or we can choose to invest some resource to mitigate the consequences and/or we can choose to invest resources in some other way like space program, UBI, the arts, creating 1000s of free water-only-fasting and nutritional-reeducation health clinics like True North Healthcare to deal with the "diabesity" crisis overwhelming the USA and making things like respiratory viruses more deadly given comorbidities, to come up with safer plastics and safe ways to detox people of their current microplastics, and so on. "Water-only Fasting" https://www.healthpromoting.com/water-only-fasting "Woodstock Occurred in the Middle of a Pandemic" https://www.aier.org/article/woodstock-occurred-in-the-middle-of-a-pan… "Lifespan in the US in those days was 70 whereas it is 78 today. Population was 200 million as compared with 328 million today. It was also a…

>This little parable is, of course, a description of the Cantillon Effect. Except all the proponents of the cantillon effect can't seem to point at where it happens because it happens everywhere in the economy and every single economic actor has their own cantillon effect as anyone who saves demand deposits temporarily destroys money and creates a reverse cantillon effect at every single point in the economy and everyone who spends off their demand deposits causes a forward cantillon effect even if the central bank does nothing, making the whole theory completely useless as a method of blaming the government or central bank. When you consider the fact that commercial banks create commercial bank money and that there's thousands of them competing with each other the cantillon effect becomes more like a conspiracy theory because if the cantillon effect exists, it would be caused by inequality, not the other way around. I have never seen anyone who points out the "Cantillon Effect" complain about too high banking profitability, for example. The Austrian Economists, who love the Cantillon Effect, always appear to demand higher interest rates which increases banking profitability, which immediately exposes their hypocrisy. https://www.aier.org/article/the-mythology-of-cantillon-effects/

If the “government” becomes the only source of truth, that source of truth is necessarily political. The oft-mentioned NHS — do they not have an incentive to lower health care expenditures? Would providing medical information to the public that prescribes a suggested course of action incentivize the course of action that is least expensive to the government but not necessarily the best treatment? Is there any potential for a conflict of interest there? Of course there is. If some condition is best treated with an expensive procedure, would the NHS be incentivized to recommend a cheaper, but less effective approach? Of course they would. The NHS routinely denies or delays life-changing surgeries over cost despite such denials not being in the best interests of the patient. (Try getting an NHS knee replacement.) There are treatments NHS won’t recommend because a person is too old. Not because they can’t handle the procedure but because the expense isn’t worth the amount of lifespan remaining in the patient. Medical information provided by governments is often centered around what’s best for “populations” and not necessarily the individual. Covid is a prime example: masking kids was bad for the kids but allegedly “good” for the population. Damaging to the individual for the alleged benefit of the so-called greater good. Despite all the kid masking “science” turning out to be garbage. Covid vax for kids is another example: the government right now in the US promotes vaccinating…

Regarding Truman: In September 23, 1946, Robeson and a delegation representing the ACAL met with President Harry Truman to push for an anti-lynching agenda. Robeson demanded that Truman issue a public statement expressing his views on lynching and recommending a set of legislative and educational measures aimed at eradicating mob violence. Truman turned down these requests, claiming that timing and political circumstances made these measures difficult to implement at the moment. Robeson was disappointed by this and found it troubling that the US government was at the time willing to actively engage in the Nuremberg Trials while it turned its head from racial injustices at home.[5] Delegations also met with US Attorney General Tom Clark as well as the Democratic and Republican national committees. The delegation's program included the creation of a federal anti-lynching bill, arrest and punishment for all lynchers, and preventing Ku Klux Klan members from joining Congress.[6] Many prominent intellectuals were members, including Albert Einstein.[7] Other notable supporters of the organization were Max Yergan, Joseph Curran, Canada Lee, Jack Kroll, Lena Horne, and Oscar Hammerstein II.[8] The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) had been long concerned about socialist and communist movements for their instigation of social and labor unrest. Having noted communist support for African-American civil rights before World War II, the FBI characterized the "Crusade" as a…

> It makes zero sense to say that some set amount of money is worth objectively more or less ... I think this is nonsense. We can't put a precise worth on it for different people, sure. But I think it's indisputable that there's a curve, we know it's rough shape, and that it's a reflection of marginal utility. The lack of labels or positions on the axes doesn't make that graph useless. > The concept of marginal utility says nothing about the relative utility of the same amount of money to different people. Sorry, but this is just completely wrong. Here's the most relevant paragraph from: https://commons.lib.niu.edu/bitstream/handle/10843/22650/12-2-373-Stei… >The linchpin of The Uneasy Case is its rejection of the principle that income has diminishing marginal utility.' Diminishing marginal utility of income (DMUI) means that the greater a taxpayer's income, the less an additional dollar of income is worth to him. If DMUI holds, the government exacts a lesser sacrifice from a higher-income taxpayer, with each dollar taxed, than from a lower-income taxpayer. Moreover, any redistribution of income from a higher-income tax- payer to a lower-income taxpayer tends to increase aggregate welfare: The lower-income taxpayer derives greater utility from each dollar gained than 4 the higher-income taxpayer derives from each dollar surrendered. Now, to be fair, there are arguments against the DMUI case for progressive taxation. For example, here's…

9 million/year have not been helped by donations, that's why the number persists. The "per year" number for COVID cannot change now, it's been a year. It is what it is. COVID, in light of other preventable deaths, and especially in terms of life years lost, is not of justifiable greater concern compared to others, and from mortality rates/demographics and seroprevalence, this has been broadly known from not long after the beginning. The dollar cost versus life-years-saved is borderline insanity. The argument lockdowns saved lives has been thoroughly debunked [0], and even the most cursory common-sense look at any per-capita chart by country and measures employed confirms that at a glance. If you want to continue killing tens of millions per year so you can save the lives of far fewer, you have no standing. Frankly, that position disgusts me. [0] https://www.aier.org/article/lockdowns-do-not-control-the-coronavirus-…

Heres polio eradicator Donald Hendersons influenza control guideline: "Experience has shown that communities faced with epidemics or other adverse events respond best and with the least anxiety when the normal social functioning of the community is least disrupted. Strong political and public health leadership to provide reassurance and to ensure that needed medical care services are provided are critical elements. If either is seen to be less than optimal, a manageable epidemic could move toward catastrophe." https://www.aier.org/article/how-a-free-society-deals-with-pandemics-a… There are issues with the paper- its 15 years out dated and influenza != covid, but the paper is still useful. Also interestingly enough, the paper also mentions the non-effectiveness of masks (Non N95 ones at least), which was likely why masks were not heavily pushed at the start of the pandemic. Overall from what I have read, lockdown as we implemented is a solely 2020 idea. We are essentially running the grandest science experiment ever, with both our lives and our happiness. Its consequences; we are only beginning to understand, and it may very well be true that the "solution" for covid is far worse than the virus itself.…

Gold seems like it was always an odd thing to pin an economy to to begin with. A resource that isn't inherently tied to value that seems to have been "chosen" by centuries of evolution towards a scarce material that could be centrally controlled. What's more, it has become less scarce as better technologies have emerged for extracting it. And just like printing excess fiat currency, early gold rushes showed the same type of rapid inflation in local economies, with money made by those selling mining tools & services to miners, and those purchasing the mined gold to arbitrage it out to other geographical regions. It was still just an abstraction layer put on top of direct bartering to solve the liquidity problems inherent to direct bartering once the # of goods and services reach a high enough level. The fundamental principal of economics that many people miss when they focus mainly on monetary supply is that the velocity of capital [0] is of equal or perhaps even greater importance. [0] https://www.aier.org/article/what-is-money-velocity-and-why-does-it-ma…

More propaganda. You're ignoring the variable that matters most: excess death in the previous year. https://www.aier.org/article/swedens-dry-tinder-accounts-for-many-covi… Include that and you can find the reason for this supposed mystery: Sweden had an extremely low number of deaths in 2019 compared to its neighbours. They'd have regressed to the trend sooner or later anyway, whether it be via flu or natural attrition, but it ended up being COVID. This comparison also assumes there are somehow great differences between European countries, that Sweden and France are as incomparable as Sweden and Saudi Arabia or India. Nobody ever presents an argument for why that is, so these "don't look at France or the UK, Sweden can only be compared to Norway" argumetns end up looking like motivated reasoning. Swedish deaths are not going to be anything remarkable this year compared over the last 10 years. Probably 3-5% higher than the 10 year average, so a few thousand deaths, all of whom will have been very old. For a supposedly deadly pandemic that's pretty good.

Dr. Michael Munger of Duke was on EconTalk recently and talked about his 'Four Buildings' view of the university. I think that this lens is an incredibly useful way to look at the problem. Briefly, the Four Buildings of the University are 1) The Clock Tower - It coordinates times for shared experiences, 2) The Stadium - It gives a shared tribal identity to a group of people, 3) The Student Union - A sorting hat for people that are 'in' and further subdivides interests, great for dating and close friendship, 4) The Admissions Office - Very important, tells the rest of the world this person was evaluated and found exceptional. Note that The Classroom is not on the list. Some of these buildings can be done remotely-ish (Admissions, the Clock Tower - maybe), but the others absolutely need to be in person (Stadium, Student Union, Clock Tower - mostly). Justifying these Four Buildings, remotely, at $50k/yr, is a very hard sell, but a great idea for a social-Startup. https://www.aier.org/article/after-the-virus-universities-will-survive… https://www.econtalk.org/michael-munger-on-the-future-of-higher-educat…

Peter Boettke responds[0] by quoting Hayek’s Nobel banquet speech in which he warned about economists making pronouncements outside their respective areas of expertise [Hayek’s worry about establishing the Prize in economics] is that the Nobel Prize confers on an individual an authority which in economics no man ought to possess. This does not matter in the natural sciences. Here the influence exercised by an individual is chiefly an influence on his fellow experts; and they will soon cut him down to size if he exceeds his competence. But the influence of the economist that mainly matters is an influence over laymen: politicians, journalists, civil servants and the public generally. and pointing out the op-ed piece’s mistaken diagnosis. The problem with narratives like Appelbaum’s isn’t that he is suspicious of the pretensions of economists, it is that he is blaming the wrong culprit for the mess we’re in. Here it is important that every one of these critics read Gregory Mankiw’s very important piece[1], published before the financial crisis, on the macroeconomist as scientists (read Chicago New Classical and Monetarists) and the macroeconomists as engineers (read MIT/Harvard Keynesian and New Keynesians). [0]: https://www.aier.org/article/blame-economists [1]: https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/jep.20.4.29

> The best way to spur economic growth is to give money to people who will spend it quickly whether rich or poor. In general, it turns out most very wealthy people have little incentive to spend money quickly. Instead, they save to hedge against and profit from recessions. Right, you're talking about the velocity of money (https://www.aier.org/article/what-money-velocity-and-why-does-it-matte… which I find a fascinating concept. It does feel like money is pooling, because as corporations buy back their stock, there is also less stock for others to buy. Since a lot of retirement vehicles in America rely on buying stock, specifically the S&P500, this can really be tricky. Many companies have resisted going public, get bought out by private equity, etc. Private companies are very hard to invest in, requiring a certain amount of wealth and connections. But I think this is why we're in a huge easy VC money startup economy. The money is looking for a place to be invested, and as some analysts say, TINA - there is no alternative, that is, they need to be invested, but the price of assets they can purchase is getting worryingly high. https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2018-04-09/where-have-all-t…

Several co-related factors affecting this: Worker productivity increases cannot be legislated. Such productivity increases can only come from workers improving their skills or technology that increases their productive output (as simple as an electric drill to as advanced as an exoskelleton with a HUD). Minimum wage laws are effectively bans on low-productivity workers. By making labor artificially expensive through legislation, demand for it drops, total economic output decreases, production costs increase. There's no reason to believe that the home-production industry would be able to reduce costs / increase output with minimum wage increases; in fact that opposite is the case. Legislation can only reduce the permitting costs of housing production IFF it becomes more permissive. In the regions of the US that I'm familiar with, all the areas that have high housing costs pass legislation that increases permitting costs or transactional costs to bring housing to market. This can only result in a price increase globally with some politically-connected group receiving a benefit. Legislation and corporate-bank policies artificially increase the money supply to the greatest degree with housing loans. Typically these workers are not minimum wage and in addition to the above effects, the Cantillon effect gives an undue subsidy to these higher wage workers https://www.aier.org/article/sound-money-project/cantillon-effects-and…

I wonder if the models were as bad as the one used by that London scientist to promote the Covid lockdown? https://www.aier.org/article/the-failure-of-imperial-college-modeling-… It was so bad, even the author didn't believe his own work: https://thehill.com/policy/international/496366-top-uk-health-adviser-…

Nobody paid the 80% tax rate btw, tax system was very diff back then. https://www.aier.org/article/the-rich-never-actually-paid-70-percent/

Yeah, and dossier.today is Jordan Schachtel's substack, who is also an interesting person: https://thefederalist.com/author/jordanschachtel/ https://brownstone.org/author/jordon-schachtel/ https://www.aier.org/people/jordan-schachtel/

I certainly do not support eugenics applied to humans but let's note that we are absolutely apply it to all other life forms on Earth to produce advantageous variants for our various purposes. It works to the extent allowed by genetics and is in effect settled fact for plants and animals. Highly respected public intellectuals in the 1920s and 30s thought it was a good idea to apply it to humans. We all know the results. https://nordics.info/show/artikel/eugenics-in-the-nordic-countries/ https://www.aier.org/article/j-m-keyness-dreams-of-a-eugenic-future/ https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-forgotten-lessons-of-t…

> Boomers tanked the economy No. Reckless spending by the Federal Government tanked the economy: https://www.aier.org/wp-content/webpc-passthru.php?src=https://www.aie… Started under Bush after 9/11. Trump took it to a new level under Covid. Biden got behind the wheel and floored it.

> Given that none of these are growing more abundant (except perhaps labor, depending how hard you squint) While that sounds obvious, it’s not necessarily true. Empirically the real price of many commodities has come down, even in the face of growing population. https://www.aier.org/article/review-of-superabundance-by-marian-l-tupy…

A discussion of the issue you may find interesting: https://www.aier.org/article/esg-as-an-artifact-of-zirp/ TLDR, tech bubble and ESG likely correlated to a common confounder

don't forget that most meat is also subsidized on many levels[1]. Cost would probably be the same or more compared to the normal supermarket price without these subsidies[2]. 1. https://jia.sipa.columbia.edu/removing-meat-subsidy-our-cognitive-diss… 2. https://www.aier.org/article/the-true-cost-of-a-hamburger/

This is a political talking point, pretty far from established fact. It comes from the article you sited specifically. Here's another partisan article debunking it: https://www.aier.org/article/did-tipping-come-from-slavery-the-1619-pr…

If you factor in beef subsidies, then plant-based "meat" is already at or nearly competitive... > The United States federal government spends $38 billion every year subsidizing the meat and dairy industries. Research from 2015 shows this subsidization reduces the price of Big Macs from $13 to $5 https://www.aier.org/article/the-true-cost-of-a-hamburger/

And yet... "The United States federal government spends $38 billion every year subsidizing the meat and dairy industries. Research from 2015 shows this subsidization reduces the price of Big Macs from $13 to $5 and the price of a pound of hamburger meat from $30 to the $5 we see today." https://www.aier.org/article/the-true-cost-of-a-hamburger/#:~:text=The…

Isn't the reduced cost of regular meat due to subsidies? https://www.aier.org/article/the-true-cost-of-a-hamburger/

It's more expensive because the cost of meat is heavily, heavily subsidized by the government (at least in the US). The actual cost to produce meat is much higher than Impossible or Beyond [1]. > The United States federal government spends $38 billion every year subsidizing the meat and dairy industries. Research from 2015 shows this subsidization reduces the price of Big Macs from $13 to $5 and the price of a pound of hamburger meat from $30 to the $5 we see today. 1. https://www.aier.org/article/the-true-cost-of-a-hamburger/