This varies wildly by industry. Some are zero-sum, some are positive sum. And the age of an industry is usually the defining factor for this, which means most industries turn into zero-sum. Take for instance nuclear fuel pellets. A company who takes part in such an industry is in a zero-sum one because of how limited the demand is for it. And the demand for nuclear fuel pellets doesn't change much at all because of how long it takes to build new reactors, how much political force it takes to build one, etc. A company in such an industry can't expand the total demand much at all, so there is no new value they can add.
I'm not formally trained in economics or game theory, but this doesn't seem right to me. Anyone employed in the manufacture of nuclear fuel pellets adds value to the economy simply by virtue of showing up for work, and doing whatever it is they do.
An MIT graduate with past business experience and their foot in the door a decade and a half ago isn't really evidence that just anyone can start a new business today to compete with google.
Again, entrepreneurs usually need to fail, and build upon those failures, before finding success. It's normal.
The fact that he's an MIT grad doesn't mean much. Anyone can start a Google competitor, but the kind of people who do are the same kind of people likely to want to attend MIT.
Not everybody can afford to have a failed company on their hands.
Almost everyone can, though not everyone wants to. It's stressful and time-consuming, though also rewarding in a variety of ways. Even if it fails.
I think that is a fun idea and I would fully support it. I think you'd be surprised at the amount of "socialist" policies that are widely popular. It would be a difficult thing to pull off though given that most people don't really know how to write in leagalise, and how many policies need to be rather complicated or need a high level of understanding to make sense.
Thanks! I wouldn't be at all surprised by the popularity of socialist policies. Kids are naive. There'd be a ton of things like "Free ice cream for everyone!" As a serious policy proposal it would be objectionable, but as a playful idea it's fun to imagine. As for legalese and complications, you could make suggestions to improve someone else's idea.
Food + Housing + Basic utilities + Transportation + Healthcare (if not already universalized) + Maybe a 5-10% on top for discretionary spending.
What kind of food? Caviar? What kind of housing? McMansions? What kind of basic utilities? All 800,000 TV channels? What kind of transportation? A Bugatti? What kind of healthcare? Cosmetic surgeries for pets? It's very hard to draw the line anywhere above $0, which is the technically correct number.
If everybody owned land, it would be much closer to $0. But you still need to buy/get/pay for fertilizer, water, heating, taxes etc. Those things aren't free. I would love to own my own self-sufficient homestead and have been rather obsessed with videos about it. I wish everybody had the money/land for it, but that's not how things are.
You can make your own fertilizer with compost. You can haul your own water up from the stream. You can chop your own wood for heating. Property taxes are a racket. Yes, this presumes everyone owns property of suitable acreage, and with a stream, and that's unrealistic for everyone. But it's entirely possible for some.
I love those videos too. I try not to spend much time on YouTube, but on occasion I can easily lose an hour or two to My Self Reliance.
But to your point about a "living wage", it's going to vary from $0 for some people on up to — I shudder to think what the upper bound of that range is.
And additionally, everybody having their own homestead isn't generally a good thing for efficiency, because economies of scale probably also applies to food production, and therefore it is more efficient to have industrial farming as the main food source.
True, but as I mentioned I think economic efficiency is overrated.
We aren't all Jesus and are therefore subject to the negative effects of poverty.
We can all strive to be more like Jesus. I know it's not easy, but there's so much value in trying.