The Problem with Prosperity - Fareed Zakaria

[longfootbuddy]

the reason the world is screwed up, is because people have formed corporations.. larger and larger corporations and collective control over individuals...and fareed and many other idiots want it to continue to grow

[quiltmaster89]

@longfootbuddy wheres your evidence zakaria says that

[longfootbuddy]

@quiltmaster89 where's my evidence that water is wet

[Platewarp]

Don't trust this guy for one second. He would cut your head off while chanting to Allah

[rebeccaabdallah]

@Platewarp He's not even Muslim.

[emphaticapathy]

@Platewarp Yeah, because he's brown. Thanks for that well thought out analysis.

[drako132313]

we must stop playing games (monopoly) and start doing real work like building a machine that can build more machines to make are lives easier than focus on creating clean energy devices and build another robot to build these machine these tool that we need really what do we really need politics or technology...think about...EX: pencil cars planes ect..wake up my people my brothers and sisters we are one.

[romish12]

this guy is really realy smart when it comes to economy, politics, and foriegn policies..and yes he is muslim.. lol.. ALL MUSLIMS ARE CONTROLLING AMERICA>> HAHAH.. nice

[PersephoneSwimming]

thanks a lot for posting these and alerting us to the longer version, as well.

[thepatient08]

Gloablist scumbag. Read "The clash of civilizations and the remaking of world order" by samuel huntington, a professor at harvard. This speaker (and now CNN sunday host) helped advise on that book.

Problem-Reaction-Solution.

[psikeyhackr]

What is prosperity?

What is Economic Growth?

Economists don't talk about how much consumers lose on DEPRECIATION of AUTOMOBILES every year. But they call it economic growth if consumers buy more garbage that is designed to fall apart.

The laws of physics don't care about money or nationalism. The laws of physics don't care if people spend money for stupid psychological reasons.

But if resources are wasted because consumers are too dumb to evaluate technology, that will affect us for decades.

[offsprng46]

"Economists don't talk about how much consumers lose on DEPRECIATION of AUTOMOBILES every year."

Sure we do, the answer is that GDP is not cummulative:

NNP = GDP - DEPRcap

Only depreciation on capital goods is accounted for. Once the consumer buys something, that's the end of the supply chain, the realization of the ultimate purpose of all production. So that's it, unless it's resold.

And it's not as if companies actually engineer products TO fail; rather, they try to find the proper

[offsprng46]

balance between cost and durability that consumers demand. That said, it is widely accepted amongst all but the most rigid conservative and libertarian ideologues that individuals are only partly rational and partly informed, and because of this, there must be government intervention in markets to avert negative outcomes.

[psikeyhackr]

How many years have you spent repairing consumer technology?

How do you know plenty of it isn't engineered to fail?

I started working for Panasonic in the 70s and switched to IBM by 1980.

Vista is a JOKE. Buy used computers and just replace the hard drive. The computers are so powerful it doesn't matter any more for most people.

What reason is that to not compute and report DEPRECIATION OF DURABLE CONSUMER GOODS? Of course that helps hide any losses due to planned obsolescence.

[offsprng46]

"How do you know plenty of it isn't engineered to fail?"

It takes additional resources to increase product durability, so there's a trade off between usable life and price. Apple could engineer the iPod to last 20 years if that's what consumers wanted, but they realize most would rather have a cheaper product that lasts only a few years because, at the end of that time, most want to upgrade anyways. So I guess it's a matter of perspective, really.

[psikeyhackr]

{{{ It takes additional resources to increase product durability, }}}

It takes additional resources to retool a factory to produce a car that just looks different. Eliminate the useless changes and put the savings into durability. The laws of physics don't change style and people don't change shape.

It is economists' job to accurately measure and report the economy. They are lying to us by not talking about the DEPRECIATION OF DURABLE CONSUMER GOODS. But add the junk to GDP when we buy more.

[offsprng46]

"Vista is a JOKE."

Agreed, it's total dog shit.

"Buy used computers and just replace the hard drive. The computers are so powerful it doesn't matter any more for most people."

True - not for me, but for most. I actually just gave my parents an old P4 1.4 GHz desktop, added another hard drive and 1 GB of ram and it's far more power than they need.

"What reason is that to not compute and report DEPRECIATION OF DURABLE CONSUMER GOODS?

You can compute it if you like, but it doesn't figure in to

[offsprng46]

because GDP is merely a measure of production - not happiness, durability, or anything else - just how much stuff is produced. People have a lot of misconceptions about GDP. You could calculate depreciation of consumer durables if you wanted to, but it just wouldn't figure into GDP.

[psikeyhackr]

If junk is manufactured that falls apart then more junk must be produced to replace it.

If the discarded junk isn't subtracted from anywhere then a totally distorted picture of economic growth results.

Economists are MORONS!

tinyurl (dot) com/5j639w

[gth824c]

Governments also consists of people who are partly rational and partly informed how can they avert negative outcomes?

[offsprng46]

They can't altogether, but it's none too complicated - just division of labor; a bureaucrat responsible for food safety is going to be much better informed about potential threats than your average consumer. No one could ever be fully informed, it's always a matter of degree; but as the division of labor increases, so too do information asymmetries and thus the need for a regulatory framework.

[gth824c]

You forget how Washington works, bureaucrats are often chosen for their political clout which is a more important currency than competence. Also you have to examine the cost the regulations impose. ie, the FDA has oversight of food and medicine in this country. No doubt the FDA has saved many lives but you can also make the argument that the FDA has killed just as many if not more. Regulation introduce numerous costs which makes drugs expensive and make some research economically nonviable.

[offsprng46]

"bureaucrats are often chosen for their political clout"

In the current administration, but not when we have competent leaders. I'm pretty sure there are quite a few "old boys" in the private sector as well.

"Also you have to examine the cost"

Very true, but that's no reason to throw the baby out with the bathwater. I tend to think that the FDA's role should be limited to issuing warnings on drugs, at least insofar as experimental but potentially life-saving drugs. Food is another story.

[gth824c]

"I'm pretty sure there are quite a few "old boys" in the private sector as well."

True but nevertheless they have to be able to stand to the test of the market otherwise they will substantially lose market share or perish depending on the incompetency. Making poisoned product is a good way to go out of business. That doesn't mean that all the food supply is completely safe from poisons such as salmonella, but it means that the risk is greatly reduced from competition.

[gth824c]

"In the current administration...we have competent leaders."

Whether its this administration or the previous ones they all tend to respond to certain incentives. Lobbyist such as the farm lobby which represent a large constituency wield a lot of power and can send one of their own to one of these bureaucracies. Once in these bureaucracies they can manipulate regulatory framework in order to shutout competitors. Leaders are often forced to pander because these lobbyist have large "vote banks".

[simplybornhuman]

the self-made rich are the ones who solve the problems, the more rich, the more problems aare solved.

[offsprng46]

So I assume you support a high inheritance tax, right?

[simplybornhuman]

interesting, I am not all to sure about that, many people work their whole lives to create the life for their children that they did not have. I think that the money is simply given to them. So, no, i don't think so, but I will still say that, other jobs where people do the same thing every day, and bare no risk, and don't have to give creativity either, maybe should be taxed higher, jobs like accountants, not all but most.

[stratvic]

That is not a problem with too much propersity but a problem of too little prosperity in relation to population growth.

Unless you prefer to look at it as prosperity has brought population growth by reducing poverty, starvation, and disease and less prosperity would kill off more poor people reducing the population thereby reducing the demand for resources.