Fuck the cold metallic gloved dead hand of human chess playing technocratic ghouls who want to squelch and contain and document and track and sterilize it to death.
Tag: markets
Well Done, Billionaires
The dominant narrative that billionaires are greedy and big companies like Amazon are monopolistic, exploitative tyrants is not only misguided but deeply troubling for the future of prosperity and human progress.
On Feminism
When I think of feminine energy, I think creation. Like birth, Spring, and newness, feminity is this and many other things. As such, markets are feminine, because markets are the result of the latticework of creative actions.
From Telework to Flexible Wages?
The simplest explanation is that the current recession is terrible. Quite right; maybe it’s twice as terrible as the Great Recession. But last time around, I heard zero first-hand reports of nominal wage cuts, and near-zero such stories in the news. I can understand a doubling of incidents, but not this.
Help Businesses Prepare for the Delivery Economy
Smarter people than I have observed that delivery and direct-to-consumer companies are going to thrive in the aftermath of this pandemic. It’s the platforms and at-scale logistics companies that are going to really own it: Walmart, Amazon, etc, as well as Instacart, Doordash, and Uber Eats.
Who’s in Charge Here?
The first stage of panic (and second and third) is to scramble around looking for someone to follow. Many of us followed others into bars, but clearly most followed hoarders of toilet paper and hand sanitizer into all the dollar stores, the drugstores, and the supermarkets. But the thing that is now most scarce is information. Human beings continue to query “whadya know?”, but the answer is still “not much, you?”
Reflections on the Leiter-Caplan Debate
It was a pleasure debating Brian Leiter last week. The resolution, to repeat: “Social democracy is preferable to market capitalism, but ultimately America will need to move towards a socialist system.” Here are some thoughts I failed to fully articulate at the live event. As always, I’m happy to publish any reply my opponent wishes to compose.
The Leiter-Caplan Socialism Debate
All First World countries are already social democracies. Their governments continue to allow markets to provide most goods and services, but they heavily regulate these markets, heavily subsidize favored sectors like education and health, and heavily redistribute income. The U.S. is moderately less social democratic than France or Sweden, but the idea that we have “market capitalism” while they have “social democracy” is hyperbole.
A Good Response to Coronavirus Fears? Read More History
Every generation has its crisis: coronavirus may just be ours.
Mexico: One Failed US War Doesn’t Justify Another
After several decades of US regulatory, law enforcement, and military war on drugs, the “winners” of the war remain the cartels (who rake in billions serving customers forbidden to buy what they want legally) and US government agents (who dispose of huge budgets and earn comfortable salaries while boasting little impact on drug use at either the demand or supply ends).