LOL... compare themselves to physists... what an elitist retard you are. This is your real problem, thinking you are special when you actually have very little value.
As for the last 8 years... wtf was free market about all that? The problems are all due exactly to the violations of the free market assumptions.
You're the type of guy that looks at say the failure of the soviet union and says that's proof that the free market doesn't work... and yet, in your arrogance and stupidity you think this is wisdom.
Look, until you can prove the fundamental theorems yourself, you are literally unable to meaningfully comment on this... My knowledge cannot compete with your ignorance, that you are so proud of.
Well, I have honours in Engineering, and studied economics afterwards for fun... I also play the guitar, and surprisingly that hasn't made me any less capable as an engineer.
Seriously, who educated you so stupid as to think that a person can only do one subject? You really got a problem, a cognitive bias that your field is the end all and be all of human knowledge... it's incredibly stupid... you are incredibly stupid... probably some autistic physics freak like sheldon and has trouble understanding the most basic aspects of human interaction... no wonder you can't understand economics.
Actually, the proof shows that you require those 'axioms' to achieve a (pareto) optimal outcome... and if any of these axioms are violated, the outcome is *not* optimal, and people could be better off without anyone else being worse off... so, your understanding of these 'axioms' and how it fits with the theory is what is wrong...
Economics then goes on to show how the real market violates these 'axioms' and how much dead weight loss those violations create...
An idiot like you thinks you could improve the world by banning designer clothes, because you have no fashion sense and assume that others should not be free to make those choices... so, you add limits to a free market that only cause social loss... You would somehow try and force physicists to get paid more than NBA players... and not realise that produces lower social utility... you are biased, because you think you are king shit because you studied physics... in reality, you are an autistic retard and don't even know it.
Actually, when I say that they aren't axioms, they are... it's just that your refutation of them is wrong... and your understanding of them is wrong.
A better analogy might be the spherical point mass moving in a frictionless vacuum on a frictionless plane and then claiming it's irrelevant because cars aren't spherical point masses moving on a frictionless plane... no shit... the market isn't a free market... the free market is the optimal market, and all markets that aren't free are necessarily worse (friction is real in physics)... and so, the majority of economics is studying the deviation from the free market, and what that costs society.
You're still an ignorant idiot unknowingly talking nonsense, but for slightly different reasons.
Problem with people like you, is that you think the solution is to create more friction, to make more barriers to entry and other such nonsense, because you reject the free market because the real world isn't a free market... and act like your knowledge in an unrelated domain makes you smarter instead of ignorant and dangerous.
> Sure, I read many of those axioms: "If market participants have all the same information..." (like, goldman sachs gangsters have no more info than my grandma) or:"If consumer utility functions are rational..." (that's why nobody wears designer clothing, ever). Very reasonable, that's why we just came out of the greatest recession since WWII. Very reasonable according to one guy who studied economics and has always been frustrated by being snubbed by those in scientific faculties.
See... none of these are axioms of the fundamental theorems of economics... You're speaking complete nonsense, and the worst part about it is that you don't even know it... and even worse, it sounds like a reasonable argument to any person as clueless as you... it's why I said I can't compete with your ignorance.
It's like claiming that physics is incorrect, because how can the speed of light be the maximum velocity when v=at? It might sound reasonable to someone with no knowledge of physics... and you think you're smart pointing it out, because you have no idea of how stupid you are being.
> And I don't really want to know what bizarre academic path might lead a (supposed) engineer to study economics.
The funny thing is, that learning another discipline removed none of my engineering knowledge... strange that, huh? That you can learn many things in this life, and learning one thing does not make you worse at the first thing... It's like you feel that if you studied economics you'd be less able to do physics... maybe that's true for you, with your limited abilities?
> And "hard" scientists don't really say that you shouldn't study economics, they just say that you should take it for what it is: something like literature or music, entirely subject to personal opinions, bias and political views, without any scientific value.
Actually the fundamental theorems are entirely mathematical in nature... there is no room for personal opinion, bias or political views... and in order to falsify a mathematical proof you must either find an error in the mathematical steps (unlikely because of the scrutiny applied to them) or reject one or more of the axioms (again, unlikely, because they are so very reasonable)... but without knowing either the axioms, the proofs or the theorems, you are no better than a chimp to judge them, and explains why your argument is bananas.
It's unlikely that those physics students have any knowledge of economics or its theorems and so they are literally unqualified to answer that question... in fact, it would only demonstrate their collective cognitive bias against economics... it's a kind of (unwarranted) elitism... a bias you apparently suffer from.
You might find a similar bias from a bunch of economics students, who would consider esoteric physics theorems useful only in as much as it can generate wealth for society... no more or less, and of no particular practical importance.
Those with double majors in physics and economics however would be qualified to answer and would likely disagree... at least as far as the fundamental theorems were concerned... as an engineer who has studied economics I disagree with your assessment... the theorems follow mathematically from the axioms, and the axioms are reasonable... the proofs are as tight as the halting problem.
No, I think he's definitely correct... the wealthy hoard their wealth and try to extract as much as possible from everyone else, always has been and always will be that way. Some things are finite (or practically so), and will remain that way.
With automation comes the possibility that a few elite owners of capital (who will own all the worlds robots and AI) will come to rule the world with everyone else starving... ie, the robots will serve only the few who will lord it over the rest of us, as they no longer need us in any way.
A free market solutions cannot solve this problem, as the wealthy will not willingly give up their wealth in the form of a tax, so the solution must be by force... however, at this time, they also own the media, and therefore consensus, and so the government, who have the monopoly on force to demand this tax... so, it's unlikely that this solution can be passed "democratically" either...
I'll leave the solution to this problem as an exercise for the reader... however, history has many examples where the wealthy ignored this problem, and it doesn't usually end so well for them... unfortunately, it doesn't generally go all that great for anyone else either. So, there is hope that they might accept this type of solution before it gets to that point, out of self preservation... but they might have other solutions too that won't be so palatable (bread, circuses and FEMA camps).
> Only when you define "free market" as something that is literally impossible. Not impossible as in "we'll never get people to do that", but logically self-contradictory. Perfect information doesn't exist, transaction costs exist, markets are not necessarily easy to enter and exit, monopolists are not impossible.
That is correct, the free market rests on the four assumptions, perfect competition, perfect information, no externalities and rational actors... and when any of the assumptions fails, the market fails, because it is no longer a free market... but, rational actors can basically be assumed, and for each of the others there are fixes, or the market approaches perfection asymptotically (at n^2 for number of competitors, for example)... So, the fact that the real market is not a free market doesn't stop us approaching it or applying regulation, taxes and subsidies to make it arbitrarily free market like.
> A one-time tax? Because the second fundamental theorem works on the assumption of a single lump-sum redistribution of wealth. A standing redistribution distorts the market.
Also correct... but I believe a wealth tax and basic income are about as close to non-distortionary lump-sum transfer as you can get... and the ways in which it isn't probably don't matter, because despite the theory in which we can't compare utilities, we actually can tell (at least there is wide ranging agreement) that bill gates is better off than rambling street hobo guy.
Or rather, I defy you to find a redistribution solution that closer fits the 2nd welfare theory... after all, it does require the impossible task of the redistributors knowing everybody's utility functions... net wealth is about as close as you can practically get.
No, you really are an idiot arguing about something you literally know nothing about.
The axioms are things like, choice making agents prefer some things over other things and there are limited number of things... concepts that can easily be expressed as formulae and manipulated mathematically to derive proofs in the forms of the fundamental theorems..
Do you really believe we would have more Einsteins if we just paid physicist more? Maybe they'd stop being NBA players and crack zero point energy or something? LOL... And you think monkeys are qualified to answer these questions?
Talking to you about economics has about as much utility as trying to talk to a monkey about quantum chromo dynamics... or trying to explain the halting problem to them.
I cannot compete with your ignorance... you win this argument.
> The rich people will consider your wealth tax and reject it.
This is quite correct, so you need to provide an economic incentive for them to accept it... unfortunately, the solution to that problem can get quite messy... if they're smart, they'd accept it voluntarily before the population gets out of control... history is full of examples
You're arguing from ignorance... The theorems are mathematical proofs based on very reasonable axioms, as good as any proof I've seen in mathematics, physics and engineering (my usual domains).
If you'd actually read microeconomics you might have some reasonable point to make, but you don't.
The fact is, there's no good reason why a PhD physicist should make more than an NBA player. Clearly there's enough incentive already to produce PhD physicists... and it's really not clear that more money would create more physics geniuses, nor that that is the best allocation of resources.
The free market maximises free choice within resource constraints after all.
Rather, for some reason, there is a propaganda amongst the "hard" sciences to not study economics... it's actually quite a shame.
No... you don't need need to remove capitalism or the current system... the free market is the most optimal way of allocating resources (vis the first fundamental theorem of welfare economics)... however, a tweak is required to allow the benefits of automation to be shared amongst all while allowing the incentives capitalism generates to operate, and I believe that is a tax on wealth (tax on the ownership of that capital) to be redistributed as a basic income (vis the second fundamental theorem of welfare economics).
So... free market with wealth tax and basic income would give us an automated post scarcity utopia.
The trading karma for bitcoin isn't necessary... Though it does allow people to make a little bit of money from the content they create, and it also allows those with unpopular opinions the ability to purchase their right to have those opinions heard.
We only allow trading of kr5dditz (karma) for bitcoin... So, the conversion of one type of utility to another... there's nothing that says they have to build sites as karma mills... they can buy bitcoin for cash, and then kr5dditz for bitcoin directly... Though money is a kind of social karma, if you like.
Whether karma must be earned or if it can be purchased is really dependent on the application... Kr5ddit itself is not aiming at producing any sort of universal truth... it's just a public discussion forum... and if you want your unpopular opinion to be heard, you can pay for that... rather than having to go along with the crowd before having the right to be controversial or publish downright minority opinions.
Anyway... thanks for replying... create an account and try out the system, and come discuss the concept, pros and cons and the problems of moderation in general with us.
I seriously recommend you check us out... I have put the last 4 months of my time into this project... I have a background in software engineering, and have a pretty good grasp on the fundamentals of micro-economics.
I have tried to apply principals from micro-economics to the site... Realising that posting and moderation are both really externalities... meaning that they suffer from tragedy of the commons type problems... and the solutions to externalities is (pigovian) taxes and subsidies... So, actually, I subsidise (by generating kr5dditz) moderation, splitting the rewards with the moderated content item creator, and the moderator.
I also identified that the problem with sock puppets leads to what I call the sock puppet limit... If user's can game the system by using sock puppets, then the system will generate users who game the system with sock puppets... so the sock puppet limit says that a user cannot gain more rewards by using sock puppets than they can their own account... which leads to the unintuitive result that users MUST be able to moderate their own content up AND gain ALL the rewards they would be due from being moderated up... Not something I've seen anywhere else.
On the other hand... a bad user with many kr5dditz modding themselves up could overtake the site! So, this leads to the downvote limit... which says that a user with a small amount of kr5dditz must eventually be able to suppress a user with many kr5dditz... or, in other words... downvoting must have a much stronger effect than upvoting!
This could lead to people downvoting everyone else to gain control of the site... except that the downvoting would have to be targeted at the right users... So, by not revealing user's kr5dditz balance, such a user does not know where to aim their limited moderation points at... but many users with a few kr5dditz would quickly identify a problematic poster with many kr5dditz, so it should have the desired effect.
I have many more ideas, and I'm getting around to implementing them and working out the fine details and maths involved... but I think it's on the right track.
The major problem with kr5ddit, as far as you are concerned, is that it is a very new site, far from complete, and with only a handful of users... so, it's hard at this stage to judge actually how correct my ideas are in practice... and obviously I'm very biased.
Still... I highly recommend you join us, register, and make a post... you might get some unique ideas... and you might have some ideas for me.
Our tagline is Free Speech as in Money... and we treat kr5dditz as money (literally being able to buy and sell them for bitcoin with other users on our exchange), but where we apply micro-economic principals that 'fix' the problems with markets to make them more like free markets, in ways that are generally recognized by economists as solutions to market failures.
My hope is that by doing this we can avoid having special classes of admin users to enforce site policy, and where user's self interest (ie, their utility, which kr5dditz are a proxy for) is aligned with the site as a whole.
Instead of one user one vote, we have one kr5ddit, one vote.
We use kr5dditz, which are like karma, to determine how much you can moderate. You earn kr5dditz by moderating and and by being moderated. You can also buy and sell kr5dditz on our exchange for bitcoin.
I believe that this system should be robust in the face of sock puppets and bad actors... but time will tell.
Anyway, feel free to pop over and register, and talk with me about how it works. The site is under development, so lots of stuff is still very rough, and it is missing features I still plan to add, etc. Also, I've limited new user signup to about one every two hours or something... so, if you get rejected because of too many new users, please try again in a few hours.
kr5ddit.com (still under development), where advertisers can buy moderation power directly from users so they can promote their stories to the top of the front page.
What problem are the FTC trying to fix here? Nobody is forced to read articles or visit any website... If user's don't find native adverts interesting, they will shy away from the websites that do that. Why do we need regulation here when the free market can sort this problem out? Making false claims about your product is already illegal, no?
> I don't see why being professional is so complicated:
Why is everyone trying to change linus? He's the god that gave us this fucking kernel, but everyone thinks they have the right to change how he communicates with the people he works with on his kernel?
If you don't like linus, or the way he communicates, fine... don't listen to him, ignore him, don't work with him, go make your own kernel and mailing lists etc... why does every PC idiot out there think they have the right to tell others how to communicate... especially someone who's communication and technical style and ability have created one of free softwares best examples.
> As someone who has a degree in this goop. I can safely say most of it is bunk. When you show me how to measure 'happiness' and 'utility' (real variables in economics) will be the day I think you are onto something.
I'd be very interested where you believe the flaw lies in standard microeconomics. I'm sure you know that the theory pretty much excludes the ability to measure utility directly... so, that's not a flaw in the theory. Like you suggest it is... a flaw in your understanding maybe?
I mean, do you believe there is a flaw, are the fundamental welfare theorems incorrect? If so, is the flaw in the logic, or the axioms? Or are those theorems correct, do you think... and the problem of hand waving applies to macro-economics... something that I don't think micro economics has much to say regarding overall effects?
If I ever had to punt at the flaw in micro-economics... it is the theory that we can't measure or at least compare utility... humans have a pretty innate sense of who is better off and who is worse off... though I'm not sure assuming that is a good idea for other reasons? Other than that I've not been able to find a flaw in the theory or practice of micro-economics.
You are correct, the scientific validity of a paper does not rest in where it is published or who has reviewed it... but simply in its repeatability.
It should probably be made part of degree progression (somewhere between honors and doctorate) to show or not show the repeatability of existing papers... and only those papers that are shown to be repeatable become part of the accepted knowledge, the unrepeated papers to be considered speculative at best, and the unrepeatable to be abandoned.
I know it sounds a bit crazy, but not all thieves are drugs users and not all drug users are thieves. Seems like we should concentrate on the actual crime and not your preconceptions and prejudices.
I mean, we could lock up niggers too if they're gonna be black, because we know they all eventually steal from good white folks... makes about as much sense as your argument.
I pretty much agree with your analysis... The only thing I wanted to give you to think about was the source of revenue used to pay the Basic Income.
You suggest income taxes... and capital gains taxes, which similarly to income taxes are based on the flow of wealth transfers... mostly they are convenient because mostly people don't notice the money they aren't getting that didn't have already...
BUT such taxes aren't really ideal, because you can have a great income and not have much wealth... and you can have a lot of wealth and not much income (especially if you're creative)...
So... I think Wealth itself should be taxed...Take money from the top... a small percentage of the richests people's total net value... and redistribute that as a basic income.
The main advantage of this is that it rewards those that use their wealth to provide value to those who demand their products and services... It recognises that wealth 'trickles up'... and corrects for that... it puts the tax burden on those who can most afford to pay it... so that everyone can benefit from the productivity gains inherent in free market capitalism.
Dude.,. If you've studied economics then you know that by the Second Welfare Theorem, it is possible to redistribute endowments to achieve alternative pareto optimal distributions... Ie... a tiny few super-elite ultra wealthy with millions or billions in poverty subservient to them is only one possible free market allocation.
You don't have to give up capitalism, free market, or assume the end of scarcity or any other such nonsense... just standard economics... though implementing this is difficult precisely because it goes against the interests of the wealthy.
Money is SIMPLY a tool to indicate the balance between demand and supply... and we don't need to finish with money either.
Wealth Tax and Basic Income should be implemented to redistribute the efficiency gains that have been achieved over the last few decades, but that have only been benefited the wealthiest members of society, and not all of us.
I think you'd agree that a Wealth Tax and Basic Income are about as close as practical implementation of Lump Sum Transfers required by the Second Welfare Theorem... That it maintains the value of money, free market and capitalism in general... and redistributes the benefits of productivity increases to all, not just a handful...
You should at least do an introduction to micro-economics MOOC so you don't keep on sounding like a complete moron.
And for everyone wondering, the problem of the robot overlord capital ownership elite having everything and leaving everyone else unemployed and hungry... to cut straight to the answer, we should implement a wealth tax and redistribution like basic income... then let the free market operate as it does so well... regulating where it needs it, to counteract fraud, externalities and monopolisation.
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LOL... compare themselves to physists... what an elitist retard you are. This is your real problem, thinking you are special when you actually have very little value.
As for the last 8 years... wtf was free market about all that? The problems are all due exactly to the violations of the free market assumptions.
You're the type of guy that looks at say the failure of the soviet union and says that's proof that the free market doesn't work... and yet, in your arrogance and stupidity you think this is wisdom.
Look, until you can prove the fundamental theorems yourself, you are literally unable to meaningfully comment on this... My knowledge cannot compete with your ignorance, that you are so proud of.
Good luck with autism dude.
Well, I have honours in Engineering, and studied economics afterwards for fun... I also play the guitar, and surprisingly that hasn't made me any less capable as an engineer.
Seriously, who educated you so stupid as to think that a person can only do one subject? You really got a problem, a cognitive bias that your field is the end all and be all of human knowledge... it's incredibly stupid... you are incredibly stupid... probably some autistic physics freak like sheldon and has trouble understanding the most basic aspects of human interaction... no wonder you can't understand economics.
Actually, the proof shows that you require those 'axioms' to achieve a (pareto) optimal outcome... and if any of these axioms are violated, the outcome is *not* optimal, and people could be better off without anyone else being worse off... so, your understanding of these 'axioms' and how it fits with the theory is what is wrong...
Economics then goes on to show how the real market violates these 'axioms' and how much dead weight loss those violations create...
An idiot like you thinks you could improve the world by banning designer clothes, because you have no fashion sense and assume that others should not be free to make those choices... so, you add limits to a free market that only cause social loss... You would somehow try and force physicists to get paid more than NBA players... and not realise that produces lower social utility... you are biased, because you think you are king shit because you studied physics... in reality, you are an autistic retard and don't even know it.
There's always a way... you don't need armies... just a few bullets in the right hands.
But with bread, circuses and FEMA camps, you are right, they might be able to avoid this fate forever.
Actually, when I say that they aren't axioms, they are... it's just that your refutation of them is wrong... and your understanding of them is wrong.
A better analogy might be the spherical point mass moving in a frictionless vacuum on a frictionless plane and then claiming it's irrelevant because cars aren't spherical point masses moving on a frictionless plane... no shit... the market isn't a free market... the free market is the optimal market, and all markets that aren't free are necessarily worse (friction is real in physics)... and so, the majority of economics is studying the deviation from the free market, and what that costs society.
You're still an ignorant idiot unknowingly talking nonsense, but for slightly different reasons.
Problem with people like you, is that you think the solution is to create more friction, to make more barriers to entry and other such nonsense, because you reject the free market because the real world isn't a free market... and act like your knowledge in an unrelated domain makes you smarter instead of ignorant and dangerous.
> Sure, I read many of those axioms: "If market participants have all the same information..." (like, goldman sachs gangsters have no more info than my grandma) or:"If consumer utility functions are rational..." (that's why nobody wears designer clothing, ever). Very reasonable, that's why we just came out of the greatest recession since WWII. Very reasonable according to one guy who studied economics and has always been frustrated by being snubbed by those in scientific faculties.
See... none of these are axioms of the fundamental theorems of economics... You're speaking complete nonsense, and the worst part about it is that you don't even know it... and even worse, it sounds like a reasonable argument to any person as clueless as you... it's why I said I can't compete with your ignorance.
It's like claiming that physics is incorrect, because how can the speed of light be the maximum velocity when v=at? It might sound reasonable to someone with no knowledge of physics... and you think you're smart pointing it out, because you have no idea of how stupid you are being.
> And I don't really want to know what bizarre academic path might lead a (supposed) engineer to study economics.
The funny thing is, that learning another discipline removed none of my engineering knowledge... strange that, huh? That you can learn many things in this life, and learning one thing does not make you worse at the first thing... It's like you feel that if you studied economics you'd be less able to do physics... maybe that's true for you, with your limited abilities?
> "If consumer utility functions are rational..." (that's why nobody wears designer clothing, ever).
HINT: rational in a mathematical sense... there's nothing irrational about desiring designer clothing... only you.
Also, there's a deep link between AI and economics... economics studies choice making agents, AI is about creating choice making agents.
> And "hard" scientists don't really say that you shouldn't study economics, they just say that you should take it for what it is: something like literature or music, entirely subject to personal opinions, bias and political views, without any scientific value.
Actually the fundamental theorems are entirely mathematical in nature... there is no room for personal opinion, bias or political views... and in order to falsify a mathematical proof you must either find an error in the mathematical steps (unlikely because of the scrutiny applied to them) or reject one or more of the axioms (again, unlikely, because they are so very reasonable)... but without knowing either the axioms, the proofs or the theorems, you are no better than a chimp to judge them, and explains why your argument is bananas.
It's unlikely that those physics students have any knowledge of economics or its theorems and so they are literally unqualified to answer that question... in fact, it would only demonstrate their collective cognitive bias against economics... it's a kind of (unwarranted) elitism... a bias you apparently suffer from.
You might find a similar bias from a bunch of economics students, who would consider esoteric physics theorems useful only in as much as it can generate wealth for society... no more or less, and of no particular practical importance.
Those with double majors in physics and economics however would be qualified to answer and would likely disagree... at least as far as the fundamental theorems were concerned... as an engineer who has studied economics I disagree with your assessment... the theorems follow mathematically from the axioms, and the axioms are reasonable... the proofs are as tight as the halting problem.
No, I think he's definitely correct... the wealthy hoard their wealth and try to extract as much as possible from everyone else, always has been and always will be that way. Some things are finite (or practically so), and will remain that way.
With automation comes the possibility that a few elite owners of capital (who will own all the worlds robots and AI) will come to rule the world with everyone else starving... ie, the robots will serve only the few who will lord it over the rest of us, as they no longer need us in any way.
A free market solutions cannot solve this problem, as the wealthy will not willingly give up their wealth in the form of a tax, so the solution must be by force... however, at this time, they also own the media, and therefore consensus, and so the government, who have the monopoly on force to demand this tax... so, it's unlikely that this solution can be passed "democratically" either...
I'll leave the solution to this problem as an exercise for the reader... however, history has many examples where the wealthy ignored this problem, and it doesn't usually end so well for them... unfortunately, it doesn't generally go all that great for anyone else either. So, there is hope that they might accept this type of solution before it gets to that point, out of self preservation... but they might have other solutions too that won't be so palatable (bread, circuses and FEMA camps).
> Only when you define "free market" as something that is literally impossible. Not impossible as in "we'll never get people to do that", but logically self-contradictory. Perfect information doesn't exist, transaction costs exist, markets are not necessarily easy to enter and exit, monopolists are not impossible.
That is correct, the free market rests on the four assumptions, perfect competition, perfect information, no externalities and rational actors... and when any of the assumptions fails, the market fails, because it is no longer a free market... but, rational actors can basically be assumed, and for each of the others there are fixes, or the market approaches perfection asymptotically (at n^2 for number of competitors, for example)... So, the fact that the real market is not a free market doesn't stop us approaching it or applying regulation, taxes and subsidies to make it arbitrarily free market like.
> A one-time tax? Because the second fundamental theorem works on the assumption of a single lump-sum redistribution of wealth. A standing redistribution distorts the market.
Also correct... but I believe a wealth tax and basic income are about as close to non-distortionary lump-sum transfer as you can get... and the ways in which it isn't probably don't matter, because despite the theory in which we can't compare utilities, we actually can tell (at least there is wide ranging agreement) that bill gates is better off than rambling street hobo guy.
Or rather, I defy you to find a redistribution solution that closer fits the 2nd welfare theory... after all, it does require the impossible task of the redistributors knowing everybody's utility functions... net wealth is about as close as you can practically get.
No, you really are an idiot arguing about something you literally know nothing about.
The axioms are things like, choice making agents prefer some things over other things and there are limited number of things... concepts that can easily be expressed as formulae and manipulated mathematically to derive proofs in the forms of the fundamental theorems..
Do you really believe we would have more Einsteins if we just paid physicist more? Maybe they'd stop being NBA players and crack zero point energy or something? LOL... And you think monkeys are qualified to answer these questions?
Talking to you about economics has about as much utility as trying to talk to a monkey about quantum chromo dynamics... or trying to explain the halting problem to them.
I cannot compete with your ignorance... you win this argument.
> The rich people will consider your wealth tax and reject it.
This is quite correct, so you need to provide an economic incentive for them to accept it... unfortunately, the solution to that problem can get quite messy... if they're smart, they'd accept it voluntarily before the population gets out of control... history is full of examples
You're arguing from ignorance... The theorems are mathematical proofs based on very reasonable axioms, as good as any proof I've seen in mathematics, physics and engineering (my usual domains).
If you'd actually read microeconomics you might have some reasonable point to make, but you don't.
The fact is, there's no good reason why a PhD physicist should make more than an NBA player. Clearly there's enough incentive already to produce PhD physicists... and it's really not clear that more money would create more physics geniuses, nor that that is the best allocation of resources.
The free market maximises free choice within resource constraints after all.
Rather, for some reason, there is a propaganda amongst the "hard" sciences to not study economics... it's actually quite a shame.
No... you don't need need to remove capitalism or the current system... the free market is the most optimal way of allocating resources (vis the first fundamental theorem of welfare economics)... however, a tweak is required to allow the benefits of automation to be shared amongst all while allowing the incentives capitalism generates to operate, and I believe that is a tax on wealth (tax on the ownership of that capital) to be redistributed as a basic income (vis the second fundamental theorem of welfare economics).
So... free market with wealth tax and basic income would give us an automated post scarcity utopia.
The trading karma for bitcoin isn't necessary... Though it does allow people to make a little bit of money from the content they create, and it also allows those with unpopular opinions the ability to purchase their right to have those opinions heard.
We only allow trading of kr5dditz (karma) for bitcoin... So, the conversion of one type of utility to another... there's nothing that says they have to build sites as karma mills... they can buy bitcoin for cash, and then kr5dditz for bitcoin directly... Though money is a kind of social karma, if you like.
Whether karma must be earned or if it can be purchased is really dependent on the application... Kr5ddit itself is not aiming at producing any sort of universal truth... it's just a public discussion forum... and if you want your unpopular opinion to be heard, you can pay for that... rather than having to go along with the crowd before having the right to be controversial or publish downright minority opinions.
Anyway... thanks for replying... create an account and try out the system, and come discuss the concept, pros and cons and the problems of moderation in general with us.
I seriously recommend you check us out... I have put the last 4 months of my time into this project... I have a background in software engineering, and have a pretty good grasp on the fundamentals of micro-economics.
I have tried to apply principals from micro-economics to the site... Realising that posting and moderation are both really externalities... meaning that they suffer from tragedy of the commons type problems... and the solutions to externalities is (pigovian) taxes and subsidies... So, actually, I subsidise (by generating kr5dditz) moderation, splitting the rewards with the moderated content item creator, and the moderator.
I also identified that the problem with sock puppets leads to what I call the sock puppet limit... If user's can game the system by using sock puppets, then the system will generate users who game the system with sock puppets... so the sock puppet limit says that a user cannot gain more rewards by using sock puppets than they can their own account... which leads to the unintuitive result that users MUST be able to moderate their own content up AND gain ALL the rewards they would be due from being moderated up... Not something I've seen anywhere else.
On the other hand... a bad user with many kr5dditz modding themselves up could overtake the site! So, this leads to the downvote limit... which says that a user with a small amount of kr5dditz must eventually be able to suppress a user with many kr5dditz... or, in other words... downvoting must have a much stronger effect than upvoting!
This could lead to people downvoting everyone else to gain control of the site... except that the downvoting would have to be targeted at the right users... So, by not revealing user's kr5dditz balance, such a user does not know where to aim their limited moderation points at... but many users with a few kr5dditz would quickly identify a problematic poster with many kr5dditz, so it should have the desired effect.
I have many more ideas, and I'm getting around to implementing them and working out the fine details and maths involved... but I think it's on the right track.
The major problem with kr5ddit, as far as you are concerned, is that it is a very new site, far from complete, and with only a handful of users... so, it's hard at this stage to judge actually how correct my ideas are in practice... and obviously I'm very biased.
Still... I highly recommend you join us, register, and make a post... you might get some unique ideas... and you might have some ideas for me.
Our tagline is Free Speech as in Money... and we treat kr5dditz as money (literally being able to buy and sell them for bitcoin with other users on our exchange), but where we apply micro-economic principals that 'fix' the problems with markets to make them more like free markets, in ways that are generally recognized by economists as solutions to market failures.
My hope is that by doing this we can avoid having special classes of admin users to enforce site policy, and where user's self interest (ie, their utility, which kr5dditz are a proxy for) is aligned with the site as a whole.
At kr5ddit.com.
Instead of one user one vote, we have one kr5ddit, one vote.
We use kr5dditz, which are like karma, to determine how much you can moderate. You earn kr5dditz by moderating and and by being moderated. You can also buy and sell kr5dditz on our exchange for bitcoin.
I believe that this system should be robust in the face of sock puppets and bad actors... but time will tell.
Anyway, feel free to pop over and register, and talk with me about how it works. The site is under development, so lots of stuff is still very rough, and it is missing features I still plan to add, etc. Also, I've limited new user signup to about one every two hours or something... so, if you get rejected because of too many new users, please try again in a few hours.
Yeah... but (according to TFA) this affects much more than just download buttons that aren't.
This would basically make it illegal for advertisers to use kr5ddit to promote their product in the way that kr5ddit was designed to be used.
It seems to me that it would also make these comments themselves illegal too, in as much as they can be seen as advertising for kr5ddit.
Seems to go against free speech rights.
kr5ddit.com (still under development), where advertisers can buy moderation power directly from users so they can promote their stories to the top of the front page.
What problem are the FTC trying to fix here? Nobody is forced to read articles or visit any website... If user's don't find native adverts interesting, they will shy away from the websites that do that. Why do we need regulation here when the free market can sort this problem out? Making false claims about your product is already illegal, no?
> I don't see why being professional is so complicated:
Why is everyone trying to change linus? He's the god that gave us this fucking kernel, but everyone thinks they have the right to change how he communicates with the people he works with on his kernel?
If you don't like linus, or the way he communicates, fine... don't listen to him, ignore him, don't work with him, go make your own kernel and mailing lists etc... why does every PC idiot out there think they have the right to tell others how to communicate... especially someone who's communication and technical style and ability have created one of free softwares best examples.
> As someone who has a degree in this goop. I can safely say most of it is bunk. When you show me how to measure 'happiness' and 'utility' (real variables in economics) will be the day I think you are onto something.
I'd be very interested where you believe the flaw lies in standard microeconomics. I'm sure you know that the theory pretty much excludes the ability to measure utility directly... so, that's not a flaw in the theory. Like you suggest it is... a flaw in your understanding maybe?
I mean, do you believe there is a flaw, are the fundamental welfare theorems incorrect? If so, is the flaw in the logic, or the axioms? Or are those theorems correct, do you think... and the problem of hand waving applies to macro-economics... something that I don't think micro economics has much to say regarding overall effects?
If I ever had to punt at the flaw in micro-economics... it is the theory that we can't measure or at least compare utility... humans have a pretty innate sense of who is better off and who is worse off... though I'm not sure assuming that is a good idea for other reasons? Other than that I've not been able to find a flaw in the theory or practice of micro-economics.
You are correct, the scientific validity of a paper does not rest in where it is published or who has reviewed it... but simply in its repeatability.
It should probably be made part of degree progression (somewhere between honors and doctorate) to show or not show the repeatability of existing papers... and only those papers that are shown to be repeatable become part of the accepted knowledge, the unrepeated papers to be considered speculative at best, and the unrepeatable to be abandoned.
How about we just lock up thieves?
I know it sounds a bit crazy, but not all thieves are drugs users and not all drug users are thieves. Seems like we should concentrate on the actual crime and not your preconceptions and prejudices.
I mean, we could lock up niggers too if they're gonna be black, because we know they all eventually steal from good white folks... makes about as much sense as your argument.
I pretty much agree with your analysis... The only thing I wanted to give you to think about was the source of revenue used to pay the Basic Income.
You suggest income taxes... and capital gains taxes, which similarly to income taxes are based on the flow of wealth transfers... mostly they are convenient because mostly people don't notice the money they aren't getting that didn't have already...
BUT such taxes aren't really ideal, because you can have a great income and not have much wealth... and you can have a lot of wealth and not much income (especially if you're creative)...
So... I think Wealth itself should be taxed...Take money from the top... a small percentage of the richests people's total net value... and redistribute that as a basic income.
The main advantage of this is that it rewards those that use their wealth to provide value to those who demand their products and services... It recognises that wealth 'trickles up'... and corrects for that... it puts the tax burden on those who can most afford to pay it... so that everyone can benefit from the productivity gains inherent in free market capitalism.
Dude.,. If you've studied economics then you know that by the Second Welfare Theorem, it is possible to redistribute endowments to achieve alternative pareto optimal distributions... Ie... a tiny few super-elite ultra wealthy with millions or billions in poverty subservient to them is only one possible free market allocation.
You don't have to give up capitalism, free market, or assume the end of scarcity or any other such nonsense... just standard economics... though implementing this is difficult precisely because it goes against the interests of the wealthy.
Money is SIMPLY a tool to indicate the balance between demand and supply... and we don't need to finish with money either.
Wealth Tax and Basic Income should be implemented to redistribute the efficiency gains that have been achieved over the last few decades, but that have only been benefited the wealthiest members of society, and not all of us.
I think you'd agree that a Wealth Tax and Basic Income are about as close as practical implementation of Lump Sum Transfers required by the Second Welfare Theorem... That it maintains the value of money, free market and capitalism in general... and redistributes the benefits of productivity increases to all, not just a handful...
You should at least do an introduction to micro-economics MOOC so you don't keep on sounding like a complete moron.
And for everyone wondering, the problem of the robot overlord capital ownership elite having everything and leaving everyone else unemployed and hungry... to cut straight to the answer, we should implement a wealth tax and redistribution like basic income... then let the free market operate as it does so well... regulating where it needs it, to counteract fraud, externalities and monopolisation.