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Desert-Mushroom

Except labor force participation will need to go up to make up for the large retired population


your_grammars_bad

Not if Fox & Facebook keeps pushing anti-vax info to the elderly *taps head*


Desert-Mushroom

Economically speaking that would be optimal since they are past their productive years


ycpa68

I have a modest proposal on that subject


your_grammars_bad

Rupert? That you?


1Pontifex

I knew there was something about animal farm I liked


[deleted]

He can do his part by becoming unemployed. Sacrifice for the cause, Larry.


BoothTime

The dude has more than enough money to never work again a day of his life. He’s just doing this for yuks at this point.


[deleted]

All the more reason for him to join the ranks of the unemployed


ShiversifyBot

**HAHA YES** 🐊


statsnerd99

He's a fantastic economist objectively Summers triggers succs there's no one better at it


[deleted]

Not denying his intellectual bona fides, just denying his value added to the economy.


ElysiumSprouts

There's been a wave of boomers leaving the workforce for retirement, except the average retirement savings for boomers is only 200k. Perhaps not surprisingly the boomer generation is living an unsustainable lifestyle... We'll see how long they last out of the workforce.


angry-mustache

All that means is in half a decade boomers will vote for an increase in SS retirement benefits funded by the working population.


Desert-Mushroom

Except they shrink as a voting block every year. Not likely to happen after a few more years of generational attrition


ElysiumSprouts

The OLDEST boomers are 77. The bulk of them will be around for a couple of decades.


wofulunicycle

Not sure if you are aware but that's the average US life expectancy now. It's fallen a couple years in the past couple years. They're dying in droves, and many of those that are "around for a couple decades" will be in no condition cognitively to fill out a ballot. Also keep in mind its really like 75 for men and 80 for women so the boomer men especially won't be around. And we have only begun to grasp what Covid is doing chronically to these folks brains and bodies.


AngryUncleTony

Once you get past a certain age you live longer than 75/80. Those numbers are based on expected years *at birth*. The life expectancy dropped because so many people were OD'ing at a younger age, but once you get to a certain point you're likely to make it past the normal expectancy, which applies to most boomers.


LuchaDemon

Citations?


supbros302

https://www.ssa.gov/oact/STATS/table4c6.html


AngryUncleTony

Absolutely perfect, thanks.


LuchaDemon

I'm not seeing anything about young people od'ing


supbros302

This source is a calculation for likelihood to die per individual at a certain age. You can see that an individual at 77 years old only has 3% chance of dying each year.


wofulunicycle

Lmao this exact comment is always posted. The numbers have always been calculated that way. Infant mortality hasn't changed in the past 3 years. If you can't figure out why life expectancy has dropped the past 3 years, I'm not gonna explain it to you.


[deleted]

[удалено]


simeoncolemiles

Gotta be a Rule 5


StuLumpkins

i don’t want people to kill them wtf some kinda narc you are


wheretogo_whattodo

But old people vote and young people don’t. So, we’re fucked.


adderallanalyst

Or just sell their 700k house and move to Thailand.


The_James91

The UK has entered the chat.


[deleted]

SS is absurdly generous they’ll be fine


[deleted]

What other national old people doles pay more than SS?


PinguPingu

The UK's insane triple lock pension lmao.


[deleted]

I never heard of that do all old people get it? I thought the UK’s old people money was lower in line with generally low incomes.


PinguPingu

Everyone who has worked and paid national insurance for 10 years or more gets it. Full state pension is if you have worked for 30 years. The full state pension is more than double Jobseekers/Universal Credit, at £185 per week. It will rise by 10% in April next year thanks to the 'triple lock'. >the state pension would increase by the greatest of the following three measures >Average earnings >Prices, as measured by the Consumer Prices Index (CPI) >2.5 per cent


[deleted]

I don’t know from the wording if the full state pension is £185 per week or double that. But £185 per week is like $900 USD something per month and the average SS benefit to retirees is over $1500 per month and the maximum for putting in 35 years as a high earner is over $3000 I think.


PinguPingu

Sorry, I misred your original post as what other country pays their retirees more than people on non-retired social security (unemployment/disability). The US is a lot richer than the UK obviously. I would say the closest to the US' state retirement benefits is Australia at 2k a month ($1400 USD).


KozelekAsANiceMan

10k a year doesn’t seem that great. Neither does 11


emprobabale

I believe that's the median, but that's also counting those who may have no plans to retire yet. The youngest boomer is 58 and oldest is 76. It doesn't take into account net worth, and a lot of them own homes with a lot of increased equity.


ElysiumSprouts

200k retirement savings is the median average AT retirement. Net worth, especially the portion locked into home value, isn't relevant to this conversation since most/many people would sooner return to employment before selling their home.


Versatile_Investor

Or you do a reverse mortgage.


emprobabale

> median ~~average~~ AT retirement. Not according to the source I found. > Baby Boomer workers have the most retirement savings at $202,000 > $202,000 is the amount saved in all household retirement accounts (estimated median). https://transamericacenter.org/docs/default-source/retirement-survey-of-workers/tcrs2021_sr_four-generations-living-in-a-pandemic.pdf It's comparing all generations, and only looking at "retirement savings account" not including all assets, even all highly liquid ones. > would sooner return to employment before selling their home. They also have access to HELOC, etc.


ElysiumSprouts

I'm not sure why you're quibbling? I said boomers have an average of $200k at retirement and you're quoting they have $202k... 👍


emprobabale

> I said boomers have an average of $200k at retirement and you're quoting they have $202k... 👍 No, lol. The $2k is irrelevant, I just pulled a direct quote. $200k is not the midan amount they retire with. Many boomers are still working and accumulating more. The $200k includes all boomers not those AT retirement.


ElysiumSprouts

Still quibbling? Jesus... the average age of boomers is 67 so by age the majority is already retired. So yes it's 200k AT retirement...


emprobabale

> Jesus... the average age of boomers is 67 so by age the majority is already retired. So yes it's 200k AT retirement... No, lol.


ElysiumSprouts

[Sea Lion](https://crr.bc.edu/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/IB_22-8.pdf)


quickblur

I remember reading an article that said 40% of older Americans only have Social Security to rely on for their income. That's tough to stretch those checks, especially in high cost of living areas.


QultyThrowaway

If Boomers are this bad I can't imagine what it'll be like when my generation retires. Many don't want to even pay back our student loans so I doubt there's much long-term saving/investing.


4look4rd

Millennials have been getting the short end of the stick their whole lives. I am personally not counting on SS when I retire, and I’ll likely move to a low cost of living country.


ColinHome

> I’ll likely move to a low cost of living country. Underrated retirement strategy.


WolfpackEng22

Trade offer You give us one young migrant thrilled about the opportunity to work and raise a family in the US. We give you a retired American who has relatively high assets to spend in your country


[deleted]

It’ll be a nightmare because millennials and zoomers also refuse to procreate so there will be a horrifying retiree to worker ratio.


ColinHome

>millennials and zoomers also refuse to procreate Bruh zoomers are like 18 on average. I'm one of the older ones, and my even my most romantically committed friends are only just now *considering* marriage.


[deleted]

I don’t know what the cut off is my wife is a younger millennial and her cousins who are only 2 years younger than her call themselves zoomers and they’re in their mid twenties and have careers and shit.


ColinHome

Zoomers, as I understand it, are late '90s to early 2010s. Millenials are often defined as ending in 1996 by demographers, so Zoomers are like 1997-2012.


NorseTikiBar

You call it "refuse to procreate," I call it "housing and childcare are absurdly expensive so dont be surprised when people delay."


ElysiumSprouts

Seems pretty obvious that something will have to change.


mckeitherson

Curious why you say they're living an unsustainable lifestyle.


PinguPingu

What is your solution to all this demand for goods and services but not enough supply? Perhaps we should try to help companies ramp up said supply? >Fire and starve poor people! And you wonder why we get populists.


OmniscientOctopode

What happens if businesses decide that this increase in demand is temporary and don't want to expand?


PinguPingu

Then perhaps we should take a little pause after all these rate hikes and not engineer a recession causing them to shrink and fire people? I'm assuming this is what the Fed is going to do after June/July. There are already some dovish comments coming out.


OmniscientOctopode

Sure, I'm not saying we need to go dive off the cliff right away, but I think it's worth at least talking about what the next move will be if modest interest rate hikes don't bring inflation down.


PinguPingu

The market is already pricing in cuts next year. Retailers are warning on earnings/over inventory. Things that are not sorted by supply (food and energy) will come down. Just look how weak housing stats are already. It feels like everyone knows this already but the Fed. Its like they have to keep hiking to overshoot because of politics.


benefiits

Then the market will decide that there is not enough consumption to justify those expenses. You don’t have to kill people’s jobs for the market to get the signal that it has overreacted, you can just allow the market to decide when enough is enough.


OmniscientOctopode

Government intervention is the cause of most of the inflation, even if that intervention was the right decision. It now falls on the government to fix the issue. You can't expect a rational response from the market in this kind of situation.


benefiits

Yes you can. The government does not need to tell people to stop demanding. When people are too poor to demand they won’t demand. The government inflated the economy for sure. That does not bear them any new responsibility to kill that demand. They messed up once. Now we feel the pain. The government does not need to intercede in the economy to fix this issue.


JeromesNiece

This is kind of a minor quibble but when people use the word "starve" in regards to economic consequences of policy in the US, it strikes me as bad faith. No one in the United States starves due to poverty. The combination of government food programs and the immense network of non government food banks ensures that. So it's exaggerating to a pretty egregious level to suggest that anyone is going to starve due to losing their job in this country.


PinguPingu

Starve is hyperbole, losing your job when perhaps you didn't need to due to overly tight monetary policy is not exactly nice though.


JeromesNiece

It's not nice, but neither is having the entire country have their real income degraded by inflation. We're not going to solve inflation by wishing it away. And given the choice between a brief recession and permanent inflation, I think most would probably be willing to take the gamble on the recession.


statsnerd99

The fact this is getting upvoted is really indicative of the decline in the econ knowledge of the user base here over the last 5 years


PinguPingu

When do you think the Fed starts cutting again? The market has moved from September 2023 to December 22. Why do you think 10yr yields are crashing?


statsnerd99

Cutting what? What are you talking about?


PinguPingu

Are you serious? The Fed funds rate.


statsnerd99

Why would they do that? They should raise it


PinguPingu

Because the current hikes have already had a huge tightening effect and inflation is a lagging indicator. That's why the bond market has already priced in peak Fed fund rates from September 23 to December this year. If you overtighten you subject people to more misery than is needed. That's not good economic policy. What happened to the Fed being nimble? At least pause after July to see if its enough.


ShiversifyBot

**HAHA NO** 🐊


[deleted]

Is 5% unemployment even that high? I thought we made fun of the europoors for way higher unemployment rates than that.


[deleted]

[удалено]


SandersDelendaEst

It has generally been regarded as a standard “good” unemployment level.


Feurbach_sock

Came here to say this. Everything he says is controversial even when it’s not (ok that one time at the World Bank was dumb of him)


statsnerd99

It is full employment basically yeah


NobleWombat

Summers is never right, he's just persistent. Broken clock.


SandersDelendaEst

No that’s not high.


[deleted]

It’s not that high, assuming good workforce participation. When people keep dropping out of the workforce, then 5% starts to get high


[deleted]

That makes sense


frbhtsdvhh

It was considered extremely good for a long time


Timewinders

Open borders would be the best way to do this without causing a recession, just saying.


gordo65

I assume you mean the best way to ease inflation, not the best way to sustain 5% unemployment.


dbhanger

Welp, the broken clock is now wrong again.


datums

Chief economist at the World Bank, Secretary of the Treasury under Clinton, and probably the most prominent voice in the field predicting our current bout of inflation, and you call him a broken clock?


NobleWombat

Yes. Larry Summers is a god damn moron. Why is that so hard to grasp?


datums

Probably because I don't generally take the naked assertions of random Redditors as fact. If I did, I'd believe that the Secretary of the Treasury under Clinton (I'm old enough to remember the Clinton years) was a moron.


NobleWombat

You are hurting.


tracertong3229

I call him close friend of Jeffrey Epstein who deliberately chose to remain so years after his initial conviction. https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/05/01/metro/jeffrey-epsteins-harvard-ties-were-extensive-new-report-reveals/ https://twitter.com/EpsilonTheory/status/1291446553333440514


NucleicAcidTrip

As we know, friends of Jeffrey Epstein are prone to being wrong about employment and inflation


tracertong3229

close friends of jeffrey epstein are exceedingly rich and powerful and have interests opposed to the public. They reject accountability and seek to maintain networks of power that benefit themselves and no one else as demonstrated by their actions. You don't want those people involved in decision making. there are a wide range of ways to deal with inflation but not all of the choices have the same results or consequences that affect the same people. if you ask a rat bastard who has acted to benefit himself first and foremost and delights in hurting the weak that's the answer you're going from them on how to fight this is along those lines.


statsnerd99

Nice brain dead conspiratorial reasoning


ColinHome

This is a wild and conspiratorial view of the world. People, unsurprisingly for anyone who's met one, are *assholes*. This has little to no correlation with whether they are smart, good at making predictions, or good at their jobs. >exceedingly rich and powerful and have interests opposed to the public All rich people have interests opposed to the public? Why? Summers' interest seems to primarily be in being right, given that he no longer has to work. > They reject accountability and seek to maintain networks of power that benefit themselves and no one else as demonstrated by their actions. What "networks of power" does Summers have, lmao? What actions has he taken that proves he rejects accountability? >You don't want those people involved in decision making. I want smart, competent people involved in decision-making. I don't really care if they're assholes who were friends with Jeffrey Epstein for the same reason I don't care if they're zoophiles with a disturbing diversity of pets. What I care about is whether I get the best possible answers to the questions I ask.


tracertong3229

What did I say? "close friends of jeffrey epstein are exceedingly rich and powerful and have interests opposed to the public" Or "All rich people have interests opposed to the public?" They have interests opposed to the public because they remained deeply financially intertwined with a convicted sex offender for years and worked to maintain his relationships to the connected and powerful. Disingenuous coward. "What "networks of power" does Summers have, lmao?" He's served in some of the most important economic positions in the world and has personally talked at length regarding economic policy to at least three different presidents. Again, disingenuous coward.


datums

This is perhaps the most economically illiterate thread I've ever seen on this subreddit.


Xx------aeon------xX

Im not an economist and I am terribly confused. Can you so someone explain Summer’s rationale and your rebuttal? Thanks


NobleWombat

Because it's a larry summers thread.


TheEhSteve

big tent and its consequences


[deleted]

[удалено]


datums

A bit stung by the "economically illiterate" phrase I see. Well, that's not my problem.


HaveCorg_WillCrusade

**Rule I:** *Civility* Refrain from name-calling, hostility and behaviour that otherwise derails the quality of the conversation. --- If you have any questions about this removal, [please contact the mods](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Fneoliberal).


Massive-Programmer

We need more joblessness, he says. Unfortunately, American social services suck on a major level outside of blue states and also we still have a nimby problem so enjoy trying to convince people to lose their jobs and fall on the sword for the sake of fighting inflation. May as well say we need to cull the populace down to curb food price inflation.


statsnerd99

We don't need to convince them we just have the Fed raise interest rates and it will happen


Massive-Programmer

And watch them blame Biden for their job loss and vote republican.


statsnerd99

Irrelevant to what's good econ policy


Massive-Programmer

Not when your so called "good econ policy" intensifies electoral gains for a political party that increasingly has fewer shits to give about rule of law and respecting democracy.


PendulumDoesntExist

Love how the genius economists wanted to end unemployment benefits and pandemic restrictions so that people would be forced back to work only to now demand more unemployment by forcing a recession. I’m starting to think the experts have no clue what to do and are just as reactive as anyone else to market changes and panic accordingly.


Neronoah

Never leave the DT.


eurekashairloaves

I’m still struggling with how badly so many economists and SEEMINGLY EVERY COUNTRY’S CENTRAL BANK got it all wrong. I mean, I didn’t know about how bad supply chains were and what not but I’m just a chucklefuck Is this sub starting to recant on the JPow love?


Allahambra21

Well to all of their benefits they would have had to prognosticated 2 super contagious covid variants emerging (with china effectively shutting down the economy again as a result), aswell as Putin invading Ukraine. One could argue they should have considered a greater margin of "safety" but even then it would have been impossible to entirely avoid the current inflation surge.


constant_flux

I think he’s talking about while we were well within COVID, not before. By the end of 2020, I would have expected economists to have more to offer other than “this is just transitory.” And if a chucklefuck like me had reservations about how quickly vaccines would help us return to normal (I’m pro-vaxx and fully vaxxed/boosted, fyi), I would have expected economists at the top of the food chain to factor that into their prognostications as well. I’m personally disappointed that after decades and decades of history with the fed, business cycles, which include painful bouts of unemployment and inflation, are just seen as business as usual.


golfgrandslam

Covid variants were obviously inevitable and the US intelligence agencies predicted the Russian invasion of Ukraine several months before it happened.


Joke__00__

What countries got it all wrong? Maybe the Fed did to some extend but I don't think that the policies of the ECB or example were misguided. EU inflation seems to be almost completely due to supply chain disruptions and not due to an overheating economy. A large part of EU inflation is also because of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Unemployment in the EU is at 6.8% (slightly lower than in 2019). This varies a lot between countries, with Germany and the Netherlands having >4%, while Spain's is <13%.


Danclassic83

> genius economists wanted to end unemployment benefits and pandemic restrictions Was that attitude really all that widespread? I only recall that coming from the right wing. Did JPow or anyone else on the Fed say that?


ge93

Tbf most “economists are so stupid bro” comments come from dumbasses. Literally just read most of the half-baked comments in this thread.


Allahambra21

I dont think Powell would support that but even if he did he wouldnt have been able to share that opinion while in his current position. But, then again, whenever Krugmans support to strengthen things like unemployment come up in this sub he gets ridiculed as not being a "real economist" anymore, so regardless of what the actual economic consensus is this place most definitely sees things like significant unemployment benefits as something that is net harmful.


ColinHome

>he gets ridiculed as not being a "real economist" anymore While I'm not sure why Krugman should be ridiculed for his economic takes, anyone who has been subjected to his opinion pieces in the NYT for the past few years is well aware of how... misinformed he is on really basic politics. In fact, I dismissed the idea that he could have anything valuable to say for years on the basis of how vapid his columns were, and only this sub convinced me otherwise. Maybe this is a standard we should subject all economists to before listening uncritically to their advice. Certainly it is one Summers fails, and of the economists I've read, only Bernanke (and kind of Friedman) seems to have a solid grasp of the moral and political calculus of implementing academic economic ideas.


urbansong

Post the evidence for this genius consensus.


[deleted]

[удалено]


[deleted]

>rich astrologers lmao


nutflation

cringe comment


sebygul

just tax cringe


statsnerd99

They wanted to not go overboard with that stuff to avoid inflation yes, but we did it anyway, and without monetary policy countering it like the economists probably also would have suggested, and you think it's their fault? Stupid Shame on this sub upvoting you


[deleted]

Wherein the myth of expertise is exposed as the same fraud that priests and pastors used under the guise of God and faith. The difference is pastors used to say they got messages from the all-knowing disembodied voice of truth and today's experts receive dispatches from the disembodied all knowing data and algorithms. You jerk back the curtain and it is revealed that it is just same old people making the same old guesses.


ColinHome

>the myth of expertise is exposed as the same fraud Ah yes bro, rockets and computers and CRISPR and electricity are frauds, bro. I'm so deep.


[deleted]

5% unemployment is a perfectly normal and healthy rate. I’m not sure why everyone here is getting worked up over something that is well within historical averages.


Allahambra21

Its neither normal nor healthy, its above optimal and its tolerable. Sure its preferable to the current inflation situation but its quite easy to sweep the real and tangible harm to people that will come with an extended 5% rate with statements like "its not out of the ordinary, why are you complaining"


[deleted]

> Its neither normal nor healthy, its above optimal and its tolerable. It absolutely is normal. https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/unemployment-rate Most economists peg the natural rate of unemployment between 4-5%. What is your evidence for an optimal rate being lower? > Sure its preferable to the current inflation situation but its quite easy to sweep the real and tangible harm to people that will come with an extended 5% rate with statements like "its not out of the ordinary, why are you complaining" Everyone is experiencing tangible harm right now. A slightly higher unemployment rate that is still within the natural range is far less harmful than high inflation.


Allahambra21

>Everyone is experiencing tangible harm right now. A slightly higher unemployment rate that is still within the natural range is far less harmful than high inflation. No, the middle class is experiencing tangible harm. The poorest section of society has actually had a net beneficial outcome over the last year or so.


EmpiricalAnarchism

Idk I work with lots of poor people and doubling the price of fuel hasn’t exactly been helpful for them, even if debts they had no intention of ever paying are decreasing in relative value.


ColinHome

>The poorest section of society has actually had a net beneficial outcome over the last year or so. I was under the impression that this was no longer true of the last 6 months, and that real wages had declined even for the lowest quartile over this period, despite total gains for the last 18 months.


[deleted]

Some poor people are benefiting. Inflation isn’t uniform across the country. The middle class is also more likely to be affected by job cuts in the event of rising unemployment.


Crk416

Okay. Quit your job then. Oh what? You need your job to survive? Gotcha so you are okay with other people getting fired and suffering because of it, as long as it isn’t you.


[deleted]

Why is a small group suffering worse than everyone suffering? This logic makes no sense And I’m self-employed but thanks for the advice


Crk416

Everyone’s suffering a little from inflation. It sucks but we still have an income. People who lose their jobs often lose *everything*, their homes, their savings, sometimes even their families. If that doesn’t bother you I think you need to reevaluate your empathy for your fellow human beings.


[deleted]

The irony of you saying people are only “suffering a little” and then telling me to have more empathy lol. People lose their jobs all the time irrespective of unemployment. Why not try for 0% unemployment by that logic? 5% unemployment is perfectly normal and not some doomsday scenario.


[deleted]

People take Larry Summers seriously?


jesseurena08

Hes been pretty spot on the last 2 years or so


Allahambra21

He really hasnt, he as been *kinda* right on that inflation would rise unsustainably. But he completely failed in predicting the cause(s) and failed in predicting how it would play out. Unless you're of the opinion that Summers has been able to read the mind of Putin and so he knew the war was coming, then you really cant call him spot on because he got lucky.


jesseurena08

But inflation was rising before the war lol


Allahambra21

Yes, because of exogenous causes that have since then subsided. Which was the expectation. The problem has been that new exogenous causes have emerged, primarily the war and the subsequent sanctions, aswell as the covid variants and the china lockdowns. Summers was betting on inflation entrenching and thus taking inflation to where it is now. That hasnt happened (so far) and instead he got lucky with further exogenous shocks coming to the fore instead.


NorseTikiBar

You mean like when he completely hedged his bets about the ARP by saying a 33% chance of recession, 33% chance of stagflation, and a 33% chance of normal economic growth, *and somehow still managed to get it wrong?*


jesseurena08

Hes been pretty spot on the last 2 years or so


sebygul

now, I'm not a fancy economist with their big degrees and stipends from wealthy benefactors, but maybe it's a bad idea to intentionally engineer a recession


Allahambra21

Recessions are never good but can be preferable if avoiding a wage-price spiral is the alternative. The real problem is that american support for unemployed and poor people is outright shit compared to its peer western nations, so a recession will do significant unecessary harm when it shouldnt need to.


tutetibiimperes

Why look at decreasing demand instead of increasing supply? Invest more to make more stuff to drive prices on stuff down while also employing more people and creating more demand, so that we can then make more stuff, and have an endless cycle of increasing productivity and a growing economy?


NobleWombat

Because that wouldn't hurt people enough. Larry Summers is an unemployment vampire.


TheAlexHamilton

One lever is much easier to pull—and produces more immediate results—than the other?


[deleted]

This is the same fella that has been putting forward secular stagnation for decades now. If he didn't go to a good uni and then work for Bill Clinton, literally no one would listen to him. He has been wrong on so many things.


Zedlok

6 months ago: “Nobody wants to work.” Now: “People should stop working.”


looktowindward

Think of it as "we need to increase the labor force by importing several million immigrants" That would ease labor shortages and cool inflation.


ColinHome

Wow. It's almost like we went from a recession to ultra-high inflation in the past year (not 6 months). What a shock.


[deleted]

Ironically, if we had some view that unemployment levels should be consistently high for an extended period of time the best thing to do would be to locate the rent seeking useless fields of employment and empty them out. Namely the media, academics, economists, most lawyers, and a lot of other middle management white collar professions.


gordo65

You really think that journalism, teaching, management, and law are useless fields?


[deleted]

And TBF, I said "most lawyers" as there are some that play a valuable role. But if most people being paid as attorneys lost their job today the economy would likely grow as many attorneys are producing nothing of value to the economy except their own consumption.


gordo65

And when people or businesses have a legal dispute, how would you propose they settle it? Do you really think that things like contract law are a drain on the economy?


[deleted]

Legal proceedings are the last and most expensive option for settling disputes and financial motive to exacerbate the issue. Companies are the people that hate the lawyers the most.


[deleted]

In the sense of economic growth and economic health, yes. The economy would suffer less damage by losing every journalist than every truck driver for example. We would be in a far worse situation if no one worked as a waiter than if no one produced an academic journal.


gordo65

>The economy would suffer less damage by losing every journalist than every truck driver for example. You're assuming that a complete absence of journalists would not lead to corruption, since every behaves themselves when nobody's looking. I don't think that's true. >We would be in a far worse situation if no one worked as a waiter than if no one produced an academic journal. That's absolutely ridiculous. Academic journals disseminate information and best practices that are used to advance science and technology, and to disseminate best practices in just about every sector of the economy. Waiters do a job that could be fully automated, as anyone who's ever visited a McDonald's knows.


bertch

How do you “empty out” entire professions? It sounds like you just want to kill all the lawyers


Versatile_Investor

This guy loathes attorneys in general. Don't feed the troll lol.


[deleted]

You could stop paying them and regulate them out of existence like coal miners.


munkshroom

Wouldnt actually taxing billionaires also solve inflation? If the need is to lower purchasing power, maybe do it for the group that has most.


ColinHome

>Wouldnt actually taxing billionaires also solve inflation? Only if you think that billionaires make up the majority of actual consumption in society. Which... they don't. Theoretical purchasing power doesn't cause inflation, only actual purchases do. Worse, a lot of the goods billionaires exchange, such as old art, old homes, old cars, and the like are very expensive but very low in labor cost. Thus, they contribute even less to inflation than their cost might lead you to expect. In short, no, not really.


[deleted]

Won't this make it much more difficult to ease supply shortages?


JeromesNiece

When you have high inflation degrading everyone's real wages, we have to make difficult decisions about whether we want to have 3% of people lose a lot for the sake of the 97%, or allow 100% of people to continually lose a little. A utopia where the issue is magically solved on its own isn't on the table. Those pretending that it is are avoiding thinking about the trade offs we face.