[HN Gopher] Welcome to the Zero Sum Era. Now How Do We Get Out?
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Welcome to the Zero Sum Era. Now How Do We Get Out?
Author : throwaway13337
Score : 20 points
Date : 2025-03-11 18:56 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.nytimes.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.nytimes.com)
| hiatus wrote:
| gift link: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/01/world/asia/trump-
| zero-sum...
| doinkmun wrote:
| From a zero-sum perspective, wouldn't it be an effective tactic
| to convince your competitors to avoid zero-sum thought?
|
| It's also worth remembering that in democracy, the demographics
| of voting blocs necessarily creates a zero-sum distribution of
| power.
| cjs_ac wrote:
| Let's consider a positive-sum economy. Over time, the total
| amount of value in the economy grows. That additional value comes
| from innovation, but _whose_ innovation?
|
| I grew up in Australia, in the state of New South Wales. In the
| end-of-secondary-school exams, the most popular subject in NSW is
| English, because it's compulsory. The second most popular subject
| is Business Studies. There's an awful lot of entrepreneurial
| spirit there.
|
| But the reality of the Australian economy is that its complexity
| is declining: the economic activity is ever more concentrated
| into fewer and fewer industries. Sure, there are some industries,
| like hospitality, where you can start your own business, but the
| bulk of the economy is dominated by a small number of large
| companies: a handful of mining companies, two supermarkets, and
| so on. Every now and then, there's a new government initiative,
| like the National Disability Insurance Scheme or the opening up
| of vocational training to private providers, and a few years
| later, there's a big scandal, because most of the companies
| providing these services turn out to be fraudulent. So much of
| Australia's economic activity is tied up in pre-existing
| businesses that it seems that the only way to do anything novel
| is to rip off the government.
|
| There was a time when Australians started innovative businesses:
| Victa lawn mowers, the Hills Hoist clothes line, and so on. Ford
| Australia and Holden (owned by General Motors) competed to build
| the best cars for the Australian market. This was a time of
| optimism and increasing living standards, when impoverished
| workers were enticed to emigrate to Australia by the Great
| Australian Dream: a detached house and a car of your very own!
|
| But now that airfares a cheap, talented Australians emigrate to
| the UK, the US, or the EU, and do their innovative work there.
| Thanks to tax breaks, the best possible investment you can make
| in Australia is to own someone else's home. The population is
| increasing faster than ever, but housebuilding is slowing down.
| The housing crisis has been building for twenty years now; anger
| turns to ennui. A belief that Australia has no future is slowly
| starting to coalesce. Australia has entered a zero sum death
| spiral.
|
| The solution is to create an economy where the old bootstraps
| analogy actually holds: where simple, honest hard work actually
| improves one's lot in life. An economy where anyone can innovate,
| not just university graduates with millions in venture capital
| funding: the economy that the Baby Boomers grew up in.
|
| If only we knew how to create those conditions without having to
| fight a world war first.
| doinkmun wrote:
| "If only we knew how to create those conditions without having
| to fight a world war first."
|
| Funnily enough, zero-sum thinking would provide a solution for
| this.
|
| In order for your society to thrive, opportunity must be
| created. If nobody knows how to create sustainable (read, not
| based on subsidy) opportunity, it can always be manufactured at
| the cost of a target group. (Ethnic groups, 'the rich', other
| countries, etc. Pick your favorite.)
|
| In terms of a housing shortage, you can create housing for your
| 'team' by taking existing houses from those who aren't on your
| 'team'.
|
| In business or in academia, you can force hiring or admittance
| practices/rules/quotas that prioritize your 'team' over other
| 'teams'.
|
| There lies the crux. There is always gain to be had by those
| who simply choose to take it. Even the promise of a world order
| where such choices are unthinkable isn't protected. All it
| takes is one group who chooses to prioritize themselves, and
| then if the remaining group is not strong or numerous enough to
| fight them off, a new order is established and equity is
| abolished in favor of a new dominance hierarchy.
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