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Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield
The bridge, the broadband, the highway, the airport... whatever you're referring to, in aggregate, I can dismantle.
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Only because you have undue confidence in your own predictive powers. Your broadband response is a case in point. You think you can project all the effects of broadband investment, and therefore are confident that they aren't stimulative. I think its silly to confidently project all of the effect, and I think, like your analysis of cities, you are merely repeating decades-old predictions of doom that haven't done very well over those decades. Better broadband access for an urban area may well attract new businesses that wish to take advantage of it (the better question is whether this is growth or merely displacement from elsewhere).
People have been predicting a future world of isolated telecommuting since at least the mid-90s. Guess how many people are telecommuting all the time? Not many. Why? Well, maybe the technology isn't there yet. Or maybe people are social animals and prefer not to be in one place at least part of the time.
But whatever the reason, looking at a world in which technology may reduce costs by easing transportation and concluding that this will leave the world poorer is strange indeed. I and just about everyone who thinks about these things think that's backward. It's the mercantilist thinking of the past.
I know, you have a strong streak of Less's overpopulation fear in you, believing that there are just lots of people that can't do anything in the modern world that's less labor intensive. Strangely for you, I think that is incredibly lacking creativity.
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Want to talk aggregate? Who's been right on the economy for years, and who hasn't? You're out of your depth. And that's pathetic, because I'm anything but an expert.
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Well, I've not seen any rioting or any of your more extreme projections come to pass (yet anyway), but dismissing those are primarily hyperbole, yes, your projections from the last few years look pretty good right now.
But remember that our primarily disagreement is about why we are here and whether it's inevitable. Which is weird because we mostly agree on what should be done about it.
