Although I disagree with the malthusian view on the world I still think there is a more important quantitative argument against this viewpoint. A fertility rate significantly below 2 results in an exponential decline in…
Every time fertility decline comes up I consistently see the same arguments about why fertility is declining: people are just not comfortable enough to want to have children. I just don’t buy this. I have seen reasons…
Here is an example of how people in the military making policy decisions think about it[1]. This guy in particular worked as national security advisor. My take is that it comes from nations avoiding war if they don’t…
I strongly agree with your statement. Free sex and love are fine as long as there are no consequences. But sadly even with all our technology there must be consequences since we don’t know of any other way to propagate…
That’s a nice idea but how do you do credit assignment for childrearing purposes? Sadly even in modern society, sex is not entirely unliked from reproduction and we still expect, often legally demand, fathers invest…
My understanding is that this is largely the reality already in the dating marketplaces we can measure (dating apps). At least every study with dating app data I have seen shows a small minority of men get the vast…
I always see people mentioning better employment benefits and more flexibility to increase fertility in working women. Unfortunately, I think this misses a fundamental problem with working and motherhood: opportunity…
I like your approach and I agree that it should lead to better outcomes. Sadly for the less socially adept, it’s not clear to me how to get social interactions from random strangers without having both sides of the…
An element that is often missing from the conversation is the opportunity cost of the employee. A significant portion of a worker’s compensation should to go paying his opportunity cost. I think that despite similar…
I agree with your approach to the point I think it’s the only way to really tackle loneliness and making friends. You just have to talk to strangers, often about nothing. Unfortunately for the less socially trained, the…
1. I doubt we have the technology to automate deer hunting yet; however, it would be very useful to have drones hunt the deer and have humans pickup the spoils. I did say it would be great if we could buy hunted deer as…
I frankly don’t understand why we would want to reintroduce a predator like this. From the article it seems the only benefit they bring is to control deer populations at the expense of farmers and causing discomfort to…
I also forgot to mention the insane amount of resources wasted lobbying to complicate the tax code so every company and sector gets their loophole. This doesn’t just have the same human capital cost but it also gnaws at…
I still don’t understand corporate income taxes. These are just pass through entities. All the money goes to actual people which are a lot easier to tax than a corporation. I think it’s such a waste of human capital…
I mean disposable plastic bags benefit the poor more than they hurt the rich. For example, perhaps the poor use those plastic bags as trash bags for other waste instead of buying proper trash bags. I know I often did.
I find there is a worrying lack of thorough quantitative analysis with these types of bans and attempts to internalize externalities. This law is a statement by lawmakers predicated on the cost of single use plastic…
I think the government can definitely fund certian types of research but in most developed countries the private sector commands so much more wealth that it would be a waste not to allow companies to develop drugs for…
This sentiment I don’t understand. What’s the problem with aggregating most of the population in a few urban centers? It makes sense to me from an economic point of view where the productivity of clusters benefits…
It’s also probably explained by the increase in single motherhood [1]. I suspect since women no longer need men for financial sustenance they can pick any father they want and raise the child alone if need be. Since…
I think he is implying they dont work well for low-status males. Males in particular are known for getting violent in desperate efforts to accrue the status necessary to secure a mate. It’s not like marriage is perfect…
On the other side of the polyamory issue, I am not sure the weakening of marriage is all that good. Single parenthood doesn’t seem to be that good for the children and I also dont see how polyamory solves the issues of…
One problem I have noticed in the field is that many existing professors are operating at a reduced capacity because of the incentives to work in industry (consulting etc) and do startups. Many end-up taking many less…
I love dropbox but one of their biggest problems is their refusal to support more than 300,000 files in their sync clients. I have considered moving to google but I need local copies since I often don’t have internet…
I am very curious to see what this will do to Chinese style capital controls. They probably have started cracking down on exchanges but even with an outright ban it sounds like a more powerful method to get money of of…
Seeing young americans accept communism is terrifying to me. They are showing the same level of historical ignorance that Bernie Sanders showed when he claimed the american dream was more alive in plces like Venezuela.…
Although I disagree with the malthusian view on the world I still think there is a more important quantitative argument against this viewpoint. A fertility rate significantly below 2 results in an exponential decline in…
Every time fertility decline comes up I consistently see the same arguments about why fertility is declining: people are just not comfortable enough to want to have children. I just don’t buy this. I have seen reasons…
Here is an example of how people in the military making policy decisions think about it[1]. This guy in particular worked as national security advisor. My take is that it comes from nations avoiding war if they don’t…
I strongly agree with your statement. Free sex and love are fine as long as there are no consequences. But sadly even with all our technology there must be consequences since we don’t know of any other way to propagate…
That’s a nice idea but how do you do credit assignment for childrearing purposes? Sadly even in modern society, sex is not entirely unliked from reproduction and we still expect, often legally demand, fathers invest…
My understanding is that this is largely the reality already in the dating marketplaces we can measure (dating apps). At least every study with dating app data I have seen shows a small minority of men get the vast…
I always see people mentioning better employment benefits and more flexibility to increase fertility in working women. Unfortunately, I think this misses a fundamental problem with working and motherhood: opportunity…
I like your approach and I agree that it should lead to better outcomes. Sadly for the less socially adept, it’s not clear to me how to get social interactions from random strangers without having both sides of the…
An element that is often missing from the conversation is the opportunity cost of the employee. A significant portion of a worker’s compensation should to go paying his opportunity cost. I think that despite similar…
I agree with your approach to the point I think it’s the only way to really tackle loneliness and making friends. You just have to talk to strangers, often about nothing. Unfortunately for the less socially trained, the…
1. I doubt we have the technology to automate deer hunting yet; however, it would be very useful to have drones hunt the deer and have humans pickup the spoils. I did say it would be great if we could buy hunted deer as…
I frankly don’t understand why we would want to reintroduce a predator like this. From the article it seems the only benefit they bring is to control deer populations at the expense of farmers and causing discomfort to…
I also forgot to mention the insane amount of resources wasted lobbying to complicate the tax code so every company and sector gets their loophole. This doesn’t just have the same human capital cost but it also gnaws at…
I still don’t understand corporate income taxes. These are just pass through entities. All the money goes to actual people which are a lot easier to tax than a corporation. I think it’s such a waste of human capital…
I mean disposable plastic bags benefit the poor more than they hurt the rich. For example, perhaps the poor use those plastic bags as trash bags for other waste instead of buying proper trash bags. I know I often did.
I find there is a worrying lack of thorough quantitative analysis with these types of bans and attempts to internalize externalities. This law is a statement by lawmakers predicated on the cost of single use plastic…
I think the government can definitely fund certian types of research but in most developed countries the private sector commands so much more wealth that it would be a waste not to allow companies to develop drugs for…
This sentiment I don’t understand. What’s the problem with aggregating most of the population in a few urban centers? It makes sense to me from an economic point of view where the productivity of clusters benefits…
It’s also probably explained by the increase in single motherhood [1]. I suspect since women no longer need men for financial sustenance they can pick any father they want and raise the child alone if need be. Since…
I think he is implying they dont work well for low-status males. Males in particular are known for getting violent in desperate efforts to accrue the status necessary to secure a mate. It’s not like marriage is perfect…
On the other side of the polyamory issue, I am not sure the weakening of marriage is all that good. Single parenthood doesn’t seem to be that good for the children and I also dont see how polyamory solves the issues of…
One problem I have noticed in the field is that many existing professors are operating at a reduced capacity because of the incentives to work in industry (consulting etc) and do startups. Many end-up taking many less…
I love dropbox but one of their biggest problems is their refusal to support more than 300,000 files in their sync clients. I have considered moving to google but I need local copies since I often don’t have internet…
I am very curious to see what this will do to Chinese style capital controls. They probably have started cracking down on exchanges but even with an outright ban it sounds like a more powerful method to get money of of…
Seeing young americans accept communism is terrifying to me. They are showing the same level of historical ignorance that Bernie Sanders showed when he claimed the american dream was more alive in plces like Venezuela.…