blair_fix

blair_fix, 6 months ago to random

Peter Thiel says that competition is for losers. He's right of course.

The best way to concentrate wealth is to limit competition and buy your way to power. Here's a look at the evidence.

https://economicsfromthetopdown.com/2023/11/23/stocking-up-on-wealth-concentration/

pluralistic, 6 months ago to Toronto

Metro Ref

#Toronto #TorontoPublicLibrary #MetroRef

The grand, modernist atrium of Toronto's Metro Reference Library
The grand, modernist atrium of Toronto's Metro Reference Library

blair_fix, 6 months ago to random

The disturbing thing about oil company's profit is that it's surprisingly dependent on war in the Middle East.

Bichler and Nitzan have been showing this fact for decades, but it's still not widely know. Here's an update.

https://capitalaspower.com/2023/11/bichler-nitzan-blood-and-oil-in-the-orient-a-2023-update/

blair_fix, 6 months ago to science

Here's the first in a two-part post in which I reflect on the philosophy of science, and the difficulties of challenging academic orthodoxy.

From the archives: "The Challenges of Doing Revolutionary Science"

#science #philosophy

https://economicsfromthetopdown.com/2020/03/22/the-challenges-of-doing-revolutionary-science-part-1/

blair_fix, 6 months ago (edited 6 months ago) to random

Cory Doctorow (@pluralistic)
comments on the business definition of IP:

"When a business person says they have – or want – IP, what they mean is “any law, rule or standard that allows me to control the conduct of my competitors, critics and customers.”"

https://capitalaspower.com/2023/10/how-trade-secrets-swallowed-your-right-to-know/

blair_fix, 6 months ago to random

When it comes to the stock market, who benefits?

Surprisingly few people, it turns out.

Here is the correlation between income share and the stock-market-to-gdp ratio for every US income percentile.

For a shocking 87% of people, a rising stock market comes with a declining share of income.

https://economicsfromthetopdown.com/2023/10/28/when-stocks-go-up-who-benefits/

blair_fix, 6 months ago to random

Man this is a great title:

"‘Work is the blackmail of surviving’: Majority of Canadians say they’d be happier not working"

https://www.thestar.com/business/work-is-the-blackmail-of-surviving-majority-of-canadians-say-they-d-be-happier-not/article_5dca8fd5-6c13-582c-ae76-54395b1083c3.html

blair_fix, 6 months ago to random

When stocks go up, who benefits?

Spoilers: not everyone.

Double spoilers: the stock market is a tool for taking from the many and giving to the few.

#inequality #stockmarket

https://economicsfromthetopdown.com/2023/10/28/when-stocks-go-up-who-benefits/

blair_fix, 6 months ago to random

This is becoming my go-to way to decline peer review:

"Thank-you for the request to peer review this paper, which is indeed within my area of expertise. However, I must decline your request, as I don't peer review for journals that are published by Elsevier."

blair_fix, 7 months ago to random

Over the last few decades, the Forbes 400 has been topped by a familiar gang of tech bros.

Turns out this is a new pattern. Looking at the 50 richest Americans, I find that wealth has become steadily more immobile.

https://economicsfromthetopdown.com/2023/10/13/the-great-gatsby-curve-among-americas-uber-rich/

blair_fix, 7 months ago to random

Here's the reign and net worth of America's third richest person. It's a rat race to the top.

https://economicsfromthetopdown.com/2023/10/13/the-great-gatsby-curve-among-americas-uber-rich/

blair_fix, 7 months ago to random

Here's the reign and rising net worth of the richest American since 1983.

#billionaires #TaxTheRich

https://economicsfromthetopdown.com/2023/10/13/the-great-gatsby-curve-among-americas-uber-rich/

blair_fix, 7 months ago to random

Did you know that when inequality rises, social mobility tends to decline? The pattern is called the 'Great Gatsby curve', and you can find it everywhere.

It turns out that you can even find it among the the über rich — aka the Forbes 400.

https://economicsfromthetopdown.com/2023/10/13/the-great-gatsby-curve-among-americas-uber-rich/

tomstafford, 7 months ago to random

Hello all, please can you help me test whether substack records mastodon referrals?

Currently substack suggests NO ONE has ever read my newsletter because of mastodon

Here's a link to latest https://tomstafford.substack.com/p/radiation-laced-chapatis-as-a-test

If you have time, please click it. I will report the results.

Or, if you know the answer about substack traffic tracking just reply here instead

Thanks!

blair_fix, 7 months ago to random

Here's the words vs. code for my last post on the Forbes 400. The analysis sat on the back burner for a few months, then led to some furious coding to scrape the Forbes data.

https://economicsfromthetopdown.com/2023/09/24/how-the-rich-get-richer/

blair_fix, 7 months ago to random

Although Forbes will never admit so, its rich list is basically an index of wealth inequality.

For example, here's the average wealth of the Forbes 400 relative to the American median (blue). It tracks tightly with the wealth share of the top 0.1%.

https://economicsfromthetopdown.com/2023/09/24/how-the-rich-get-richer/

blair_fix, 7 months ago to random

Jerry Cayford's guns-a-blazing critique of cost-benefit analysis is a must read:

"Cost-benefit analysis does not approximate the measuring of welfare any more than casting chicken bones approximates predicting the future."

https://capitalaspower.com/2023/09/the-costly-betrayal-of-cost-benefits-promise/

blair_fix, 7 months ago to random

Some perspective.

In 1983, the richest American (Gordon Getty) had 75,000 times more wealth than the median American. By 2019, the richest American (Jeff Bezos) has 2 million times more wealth than the median.

Filthy rich.

https://economicsfromthetopdown.com/2023/09/24/how-the-rich-get-richer/

image/png

blair_fix, 7 months ago to random

Here's the net worth of every member of the Forbes 400 since 1983. The wealth of the richest American has increased one-hundred fold.

#billionaires

https://economicsfromthetopdown.com/2023/09/24/how-the-rich-get-richer/

pluralistic, 7 months ago (edited 7 months ago) to random

Hey folks! I've got a folder of 100+ HTML files; I'd like to get a word-count of the rendered text (e.g. excluding tags). Is there an ubuntu utility I could use for this?

ETA: I figured it out. I just did

> cat * > merged.html

then I opened the file in Firefox, copied the text, pasted it into Gedit, and used the Document Statistics tool.

Dirty and ugly, but it got the job done.

blair_fix, 7 months ago to random

Here's more fun with Forbes data. I use the Forbes 400 to chart how the American rich have gotten (obscenely) richer over the last four decades.

The rise of inequality in a rainbow chart!

https://economicsfromthetopdown.com/2023/09/24/how-the-rich-get-richer/