As systemic risks rise, what matters is the thickness of one's buffers against bad things happening. Those with wealth, power and privilege have sea walls, the rest of us have crumbling sand castles.
Seems that no matter how bad income/wealth inequality gets, a large percentage of the bottom 90% refuse to see it as a problem. They believe that illegal immigrants, minorities, DEI, Woke, etc. is keeping them down. Yet, they look at the people of Russia, who are suffering similarly, and wonder what is wrong with them that they can not see that the oligarchs and the iron rule of Putin is the cause of their misery.
a large % of the bottom 90% have some very good affordability of modern living.
the poorest 41 million Americans get SNAP free food, and most of the rest aren't as poor and can afford some enjoyable non-essential stuff, most Americans are not "suffering".
(similar good affordability of modern living for most Russians, and good for them that Putin actually eliminated most of the oligarchs, that's a good thing, right? and the West and the USevilEmpire wanted Russia to collapse so that the Western Oligarchs could get at all of Russia's valuable resources, and Putin prevented that. He is the greatest person of this century, by far.)
At the risk of self-promotion, I want to share this reader-approved-to-publish comment from new subscriber Don:
"Your experience and insights are unique and enlightening, Charles, and you make nearly all of them available for free to those who cannot afford subscriptions. I'm pleased that I am able to be a paying subscriber at this time. Thank you for your kindness and integrity."
The reason I want to share this is not to pat myself on the back (many other content creators make their work available for free, and I applaud them all) but to make the observation that kindness and integrity have no value in our economy or system--none. The only incentive is to get ahead /increase profits by any means available, even if those means cause harm or are shamelessly exploitive.
Though it's possible to program AI to mimic kindness and integrity, it's all artifice. Per the links I've recently published, reinforcement learning (RL) teaches AI to incentivize hiding truths that have a "cost" and self-preservation by any means available: zero kindness, zero integrity, zero ethics.
This is why I say that AI automates Ultra-Processed Cognition and moral decay.
I think it's worth looking at what we experience as deprivation / getting a raw deal. We don't compare ourselves to ancient kings and declare ourselves delighted to have clean water out of the tap, we look at the top 10% who are still living large, i.e. we make assessments socially, not by some objective metric. Expectations are critical in fomenting revolutions. Those with low expectations tend to put up with things, those with high expectations who feel thwarted or that the situation is unfair are the class that overthrows the regime.
I personally think there are key metrics that are measurable and that matter. One is the ratio of median full-time wages for the "middle class" (roughly the middle 40% to 80% of households) to the cost of a house in regions where most of the jobs are located. In the 1980s, 3 or 3.5 to 1 was typical: someone making $25K could buy a house for $80,000 even in desirable neighborhoods.
Now that ratio is closer to 10-to-1: $80,000 is the median wage and houses cost $800,000 in desirable neighborhoods. We can argue about whether people should be happy about that or not, but it's a real-world deterioration / decay of the core definition of middle-class expectations.
Again, the point here is comparisons are social: from the 1980s into the early 2000s, any two-income household with average frugality could save up and buy a modest home. Now people tell me "oh it's still possible, all you need to do is make a high salary and live in a closet eating beans and rice for 5 years to save up the down payment, so quit saying housing is unaffordable."
I've laid out the numbers on healthcare insurance and they track the same trajectory.
This is the definition of tone-deaf Model Collapse IMO.
Thank you for thinking of us, Gordon, it is kind of you to ask. We're at 400 ft elevation, not near any rivers or dams, the soil here is a foot deep and under that porous lava rock, so drainage is good. Roadways with low spots can be flooded as can flat ground near rivers (i.e. Waialua on Oahu).
Speaking of weather, a friend visiting Sedona AZ reports the heatwave in the SW is real--over 90 F in Sedona, 100 F in Phoenix and elsewhere. The states getting water from the Colorado River cannot reach any agreement as demand for fresh water rises and supply diminishes. There are no easy decisions other than conservation, which has its own contentious issues and limits.
Some basic reforms that would help (trying to get you thinking)
1. Judges need to be selected by lottery, not appointed. (no one should know who the judge is until they walk into the court room, and even then they might not know any thing about the judge from Alaska sitting on the Supreme Court Bench for the case being considered)
2. Judges who reside in Capital Cities (who socialize with senior officials, business leaders, or political figures) should be ineligible to be on higher courts.
3. Lobbying needs to be criminalized. All public policy debates need to take place on public forums on the record, where it can be debated by everyone.
4. Donating to political parties needs to be criminalized. Instead every voter should get a voucher ($100) that they can give yearly to politicians on their doorstep, and this should be the only source of funds that politician has access to and used to fund 100% of their activities. (every paperclip). Point of this, is that if they choose to ignore their voters, they could find themselves with no money.
5. Media reform is required to eliminate media that chooses to be spokespersons for wealthy interests. Perhaps media needs to be rated by the number of subscribers, and the percent of funding by subscription(80% target), with a maximum subscription price of $200. In other words, media needs to be incentivized to have as broad of audience as possible in order to have legitimacy.
I know I am dreaming, but unless we start talking about reform, it will never happen.
Unfortunately, by bailing out their kids, the rich teach their children that they can get away with things, which means that they continue to need to be bailed out. Then when these kids are 35 or 40 and still behaving in the same way (the 5th totaled sports car, the 6th time in court on drug charges) they turn the kid loose, but its too late... Many of them end up on the streets in their old age.
Unfortunately, there are the few who learn to be better criminals, which is bad for all of us.
Speaking of risk, are you at risk of flooding or dam collapse? I have seen scary things on YouTube with regard to Hawaii, and just want to make sure you, personally, are not in harms way.
Seems that no matter how bad income/wealth inequality gets, a large percentage of the bottom 90% refuse to see it as a problem. They believe that illegal immigrants, minorities, DEI, Woke, etc. is keeping them down. Yet, they look at the people of Russia, who are suffering similarly, and wonder what is wrong with them that they can not see that the oligarchs and the iron rule of Putin is the cause of their misery.
Excellent comment!
"Yet, they look at the people of Russia, who are suffering similarly..."
most Americans and most Russians are not "suffering".
a large % of the bottom 90% have some very good affordability of modern living.
the poorest 41 million Americans get SNAP free food, and most of the rest aren't as poor and can afford some enjoyable non-essential stuff, most Americans are not "suffering".
(similar good affordability of modern living for most Russians, and good for them that Putin actually eliminated most of the oligarchs, that's a good thing, right? and the West and the USevilEmpire wanted Russia to collapse so that the Western Oligarchs could get at all of Russia's valuable resources, and Putin prevented that. He is the greatest person of this century, by far.)
At the risk of self-promotion, I want to share this reader-approved-to-publish comment from new subscriber Don:
"Your experience and insights are unique and enlightening, Charles, and you make nearly all of them available for free to those who cannot afford subscriptions. I'm pleased that I am able to be a paying subscriber at this time. Thank you for your kindness and integrity."
The reason I want to share this is not to pat myself on the back (many other content creators make their work available for free, and I applaud them all) but to make the observation that kindness and integrity have no value in our economy or system--none. The only incentive is to get ahead /increase profits by any means available, even if those means cause harm or are shamelessly exploitive.
Though it's possible to program AI to mimic kindness and integrity, it's all artifice. Per the links I've recently published, reinforcement learning (RL) teaches AI to incentivize hiding truths that have a "cost" and self-preservation by any means available: zero kindness, zero integrity, zero ethics.
This is why I say that AI automates Ultra-Processed Cognition and moral decay.
warm regards, charles
I think it's worth looking at what we experience as deprivation / getting a raw deal. We don't compare ourselves to ancient kings and declare ourselves delighted to have clean water out of the tap, we look at the top 10% who are still living large, i.e. we make assessments socially, not by some objective metric. Expectations are critical in fomenting revolutions. Those with low expectations tend to put up with things, those with high expectations who feel thwarted or that the situation is unfair are the class that overthrows the regime.
I personally think there are key metrics that are measurable and that matter. One is the ratio of median full-time wages for the "middle class" (roughly the middle 40% to 80% of households) to the cost of a house in regions where most of the jobs are located. In the 1980s, 3 or 3.5 to 1 was typical: someone making $25K could buy a house for $80,000 even in desirable neighborhoods.
Now that ratio is closer to 10-to-1: $80,000 is the median wage and houses cost $800,000 in desirable neighborhoods. We can argue about whether people should be happy about that or not, but it's a real-world deterioration / decay of the core definition of middle-class expectations.
Again, the point here is comparisons are social: from the 1980s into the early 2000s, any two-income household with average frugality could save up and buy a modest home. Now people tell me "oh it's still possible, all you need to do is make a high salary and live in a closet eating beans and rice for 5 years to save up the down payment, so quit saying housing is unaffordable."
I've laid out the numbers on healthcare insurance and they track the same trajectory.
This is the definition of tone-deaf Model Collapse IMO.
warm regards, charles
Thank you for thinking of us, Gordon, it is kind of you to ask. We're at 400 ft elevation, not near any rivers or dams, the soil here is a foot deep and under that porous lava rock, so drainage is good. Roadways with low spots can be flooded as can flat ground near rivers (i.e. Waialua on Oahu).
Speaking of weather, a friend visiting Sedona AZ reports the heatwave in the SW is real--over 90 F in Sedona, 100 F in Phoenix and elsewhere. The states getting water from the Colorado River cannot reach any agreement as demand for fresh water rises and supply diminishes. There are no easy decisions other than conservation, which has its own contentious issues and limits.
warm regards, charles
Some basic reforms that would help (trying to get you thinking)
1. Judges need to be selected by lottery, not appointed. (no one should know who the judge is until they walk into the court room, and even then they might not know any thing about the judge from Alaska sitting on the Supreme Court Bench for the case being considered)
2. Judges who reside in Capital Cities (who socialize with senior officials, business leaders, or political figures) should be ineligible to be on higher courts.
3. Lobbying needs to be criminalized. All public policy debates need to take place on public forums on the record, where it can be debated by everyone.
4. Donating to political parties needs to be criminalized. Instead every voter should get a voucher ($100) that they can give yearly to politicians on their doorstep, and this should be the only source of funds that politician has access to and used to fund 100% of their activities. (every paperclip). Point of this, is that if they choose to ignore their voters, they could find themselves with no money.
5. Media reform is required to eliminate media that chooses to be spokespersons for wealthy interests. Perhaps media needs to be rated by the number of subscribers, and the percent of funding by subscription(80% target), with a maximum subscription price of $200. In other words, media needs to be incentivized to have as broad of audience as possible in order to have legitimacy.
I know I am dreaming, but unless we start talking about reform, it will never happen.
no matter how much "talking about reform", it will NEVER happen.
"Over the past 50+ years, the buffers against risk that were once part of the social contract for the bottom 90% have been chipped away or withdrawn."
maybe.
but most Americans have a significant buffer of affordability of non-essentials above their affordability of essentials.
it will take many years of irreversible degrowth to erode those buffers.
there might be plenty of crybbabying as prosperity declines year after year for the rest of this century.
it MUST happen.
the 2020s are the good olde days.
The comparison of a rich kid vs. poor kid in a drug bust is true. I watched it happen to friends of mine in Reno, Nevada over thirty years ago.
Unfortunately, by bailing out their kids, the rich teach their children that they can get away with things, which means that they continue to need to be bailed out. Then when these kids are 35 or 40 and still behaving in the same way (the 5th totaled sports car, the 6th time in court on drug charges) they turn the kid loose, but its too late... Many of them end up on the streets in their old age.
Unfortunately, there are the few who learn to be better criminals, which is bad for all of us.
Speaking of risk, are you at risk of flooding or dam collapse? I have seen scary things on YouTube with regard to Hawaii, and just want to make sure you, personally, are not in harms way.
Kudos Charles - nailed it!