Can The US Continue To Innovate At A Necessary Rate Without Causing Complete Social Upheaval?
from the the-question-of-the-upcoming-decade? dept
Chris Tolles points us to what I have to say is an absolute must read piece by Jim Manzi (who I haven't always agreed with in the past), exploring the biggest challenge the US faces in going forward. It's difficult to express how important and worthwhile analysis this is. I don't agree with everything, but it frames the issues in ways that are incredibly helpful. There's very little I disagree with in the first half, which highlights the basic struggle that the US faces in really clear terms: innovation is necessary for economic growth, and less government interference is key for the type of innovation we need. However, with such innovation comes social upheaval and disruption that creates a different set of problems that could be just as bad for the US:Our strategic situation is shaped by three inescapable realities. First is the inherent conflict between the creative destruction involved in free-market capitalism and the innate human propensity to avoid risk and change. Second is ever-increasing international competition. And third is the growing disparity in behavioral norms and social conditions between the upper and lower income strata of American society.There's a lot in the piece that I wanted to quote, but you should just go read the whole thing yourself. Manzi basically points out the difficulty in pulling any of the levers: if you increase the pace of innovation, you also increase social upheaval at the lower end of the pyramid. But if you work to protect social upheaval, you decrease the pace of innovation, and in a global economy, that can actually lead to another set of problems that, in turn, also could result in serious problems for the economy.
These realities combine to form a daunting problem. And the task of resolving it turns out not, by and large, to be a matter of foreign policy. Rather, it compels us to consider how we balance economic dynamism and growth against the unity and stability of our society. After all, we must have continuous, rapid technological and business-model innovation to grow our economy fast enough to avoid losing power to those who do not share America's values -- and this innovation requires increasingly deregulated markets and fewer restrictions on behavior. But such deregulation would cause significant displacement and disruption that could seriously undermine America's social cohesion -- which is not only essential to a decent and just society, but also to producing the kind of skilled and responsible citizens that free markets ultimately require. Moreover, preserving the integrity of our social fabric by minimizing the divisions that can rend society often requires government policies -- to reduce inequality or ensure access to jobs, education, housing, or health care -- that can in turn undercut growth and prosperity. Neither innovation nor cohesion can do without the other, but neither, it seems, can avoid undermining the other.
It's a really sobering picture that is inherently non-partisan, and highlights how the views and plans of both major political parties, when implemented by people who don't understand these countervailing forces, is likely to make the overall situation worse, not better.
The only thing that leaves me wondering is the claims of stratification between the haves and the have-nots is as extreme as Manzi points out, and as big a problem. I don't deny that there is a massive divide between the haves and the have-nots, and the situation for many in the lower strata of society is bleak with little chance for many to improve (there are, of course, exceptions, but the probability of those exceptions is low). My question is really about whether or not Manzi is only presenting the worst of the have nots and implying it runs across a much larger group. He uses out-of-wedlock birth rates as a proxy, but makes no clear indication of why that's the proper measure. It may be, but he doesn't present the evidence.
In fact, I'm wondering if Manzi conflates a few separate items in this part of the analysis -- suggesting that it is the upheaval and creative destruction brought about by innovation that is creating this social upheaval. I'm sure it's true in some cases, but it's not clear that it's the case across the board. In fact, in many cases, you could argue that the economic upheaval brought about by creative destruction has, in fact, created many new opportunities for those who were greatly limited before. This was certainly the case in the two historical shifts Manzi discusses: from a farming to industrial society, and from an industrial to service economy.
That said, I do think the larger issue that he raises is probably correct, and worth understanding. Increasing innovation and economic growth is absolutely key -- but such things do displace people and jobs, and those people will fight like hell to have the government protect those jobs, and will become angry when the government fails to do so, and that can create social unrest and populist political movements that do more harm than good. But those movements aren't necessarily driven by the same people that Manzi was discussing earlier as "have nots." In fact, many of those movements are often engineered by the "haves" who are seeking to just have the government prop up their existing markets in the face of competition driven by innovation.
That doesn't mean that we should ignore the displacement, or the resulting anger, but we should be careful to understand who is really impacted and how -- and also where the anger is truly coming from.
He worries -- correctly, in my opinion -- about the overall impact of many of the policies put in place by the current administration as well as those put forth in the end of the previous administration. He feels -- and again, I agree -- that the efforts to "rescue" Wall Street and Detroit go way too far towards trying to limit social disruption, and in the process likely harm our ability to innovate and grow. He's also worried that the same is true of health care reform.
From there, Manzi goes into a list of four broad proposals, though I honestly felt that they didn't measure up to the broader thesis. Of his four broad proposals, I don't necessarily disagree with any of them. They include (1) getting out of owning/controlling Wall Street and Detroit as quickly as possible (2) not going too far in over-regulating Wall Street, but focusing on ways to limit fallout from failed investments by trying to prevent systemic risk in the nature of too much interconnectedness (3) reforming the public education system to make it more competitive and less process oriented and (4) reforming immigration completely to focus on targeting getting highly skilled workforces to immigrate to the US, no matter in what numbers or where they come from.
Perhaps all four need to be fleshed out much more, but given how compelling the opening of the article was, those suggestions seemed to lack the overall oomph to actually make a difference. They do little to actually impact the sectors in the US where innovation is most important. The thing that seems most absent in all of this is the transparency aspect. The biggest problem wasn't necessarily the interconnectedness of the financial sector (as Manzi states), but the lack of transparency over that interconnectedness and what it meant. The issue was that people didn't realize how a single event (or a small group of events) might funnel through the rest of the system. The interconnectedness of it all was a symptom, but the real problem was that there was no way anyone could back out the pieces to figure it out. It was the fact that the whole system relied on obscuring what was really going on by playing a weird game of hot potato.
Still, while I think there are some issues on the margins, I have to say that Manzi's piece puts a really fascinating perspective on the position the US is in today, and certainly got me thinking about the state of the economy from a different perspective. The battle between innovation/creative destruction and social cohesion is a really good point that deserves a lot more studying and thought -- though, I doubt we'll get that from those in power positions in either of the two major political parties.
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Filed Under: competition, free markets, innovation, social upheaval, us, welfare
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excellent
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Nonsense
In the real world, innovation helps everyone, ESPECIALLY the poor.
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Re: Nonsense
innovation, in general, helps everyone, to a degree, eventually.
specific innovations, however, will often also cause various types of harm to various people. typically speaking, the poorer folk have a much harder time of avoiding the resulting fall out.
not that i quite disagree with you here, Tom, just think you're making grand generalisations without a whole lot of obvious logic or thought to 'em.
(i, personally, happen to find the US government annoying at best, and i don't even live there :P )
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Another Part of the Problem
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I think he had his own solution
Ya do #3 you solve #2
When people "learn" or discover they can prosper among there competitors solves monopoly "interconnectedness" doublespeak.
Yeah politico nowadays isn't any way to actually innovate solutions. Too old. Still remembering the 2009 picket signs "You don't listen you don't hold your seat" from the Kick them out movement this country is currently seeing.
People actually waking up to what a representative actually is and getting out dead weight in the way of the innovative solutions this country so desperately needs.
Though the top voices have been ridiculed to the point of obscurity. If you cant beat them shoot at there stature. There is a list that I adhere to for the voices for myself and of Rage Against the Machine generation. Though i seldom give them out, reason being; You don't learn anything if your handed the answers.
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I would argue that this is true the overwhelming majority of the time. The "have" usually only "have" because they regard morality less than the rest of the population and so they won't let morality get in the way of their wealth. They think that lacking morality somehow makes them special and more deserving of wealth. and yes, they would and do absolutely fight for government intervention that unfairly favors them being they don't care about morality.
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Our current intellectual property laws are not conducive to innovation (ie: the terms last way too long and the laws almost always only apply to poor people and not rich people or rich corporations).
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and another purpose (not function, but INTENDED function) of intellectual property is that it can hinder innovation by allowing a corporation to patent something it never plans to develop. The purpose of this is to prevent others from innovating and creating a product that could disrupt the existing status of immoral rich people.
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Re:
On the other hand, the "middle class" probably has the most incentive to innovate. They're at about the stage where they have incentive to work more to make more money and since innovation is work and reaps more money and that additional money is marginally valuable enough to them to justify more work they are more likely to innovate (that is, they are not at the stage of the backwards bending labor supply curve that motivates them to work less).
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Re: Re:
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Faith-based statement.
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paralyses
It can't respond to changes fast enough and don't even have the capabilities to respond to old problems.
The answer will not come from the government. The solution will come from society that must change and adapt and it will be painful.
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Parallels with sport
Should we encourage grass roots sport (analogous to better education for the whole populace) or should we fund elite sporting institutes (analogous to assisting the VC funded startup with tax breaks or whatever).
I would contend that in a rapidly globalising world, USA cannot afford to sit back while their schools deteriorate and rely on the quality of privately funded higher education institutions. (Not least because these private institutions are also educating the stars of the other countries USA competes with. It's like having a US Sports institute that also trains the Russian Olympic team then wondering why there is no competitive advantage.)
For a competitive advantage, USA needs to give it's innovators an edge over their opposite numbers in other countries, that is more than just lower state taxes.
I favour pulling the grass roots lever because
- you won't find the gold medallists if they never take up the sport in the first place
- the "have nots" won't get left behind so badly if they are all educated better.
Of course, there is the argument that the US Govt doesn't care if the next google is created by an American as long as they choose to pay taxes (and employ staff) in the USA. But they'd only stay if there was a well educated employee pool.
They need to get the H1B visa numbers back up too !
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problem
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Nationalism is a shabby artifact of tribalism
This "us versus them" worldview is evolutionary baggage. It's tribalism in a cheap tuxedo. In-group altruism and out-group hostility is something chimpanzees do. We can be, should be, must be better than that. Let's get with the program.
The problems faced by the world are global problems. The human species is a global community. Welcome to the third millenium guys. Now lift your gaze up from the lines in the sand, and try thinking about how we can make things better for *everyone*.
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TWO PROBLEMS...
First, carefully aimed government intervention can create enormous leaps in innovation and economic growth. Many examples of this exist in American economic history, but let me present you with just one: NASA’s space program in the 1960’s. Government sponsorship of the program allowed for rapid advances to be made in agriculture, digital technology (huge), synthetic materials (think artificial heart), semiconductors, water purification systems, solar energy and much more. Perhaps these new innovations could have been achieved without NASA, but it’s very clear that NASA accelerated the pace of innovation. We need more NASA-like programs and the government can make this happen.
Second, it seems countries that focus on becoming consumption-based economies largely at the expense of being producers experience problems down the road. Japan’s economy, for all the things that are wrong with it, seems to be another example of this phenomenon. They allowed the sector that was responsible for securitizing speculative bets on condos and golf courses (sounds familiar) become large enough to hurt the country and the region. It seems to me we need a healthy balance here. Longer story…
The author briefly touched on this point but I want to make the point more clear – deregulation is the major cause of the recent collapse in the financial system. Sure, we can blame the crisis on those sub-prime borrowers (not that the author did so) but we were willing to create additional debt and equity products from these “bad borrowers” so that we can make more money from folks who were clearly living above their means. Revisiting the rules of leverage, derivatives, and the kinds of businesses financial institutions can play in will be needed to prevent another collapse.
One more thing – politicians and think-tanks make me laugh when they keep presenting policy options that are binary. Any organization – public or private – that lacks a focused mission and lacks employees who are disconnected from that mission are bound to be ineffective. Deregulating schools is not the magic bullet. The solution, as usual, likely sits somewhere in the middle…
song currently stuck in my head: “from the beginning” – emerson lake & palmer
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Re:
No, it's actually an evidenced based statement and it's intuitively true.
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Re: Re:
Strangely enough, though, the single biggest innovation in recent history, the internet, began as a government project.
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Re: Nationalism is a shabby artifact of tribalism
While this maybe true, this problem is better solved at a local level. Local governments and communities are more interested in themselves and they're more able to act in their own best interest than federal and international governments. and lets face it, humans tend to be self interested and I don't see that going away any time soon. This whole idea of global governments being capable of acting non self interested has failed, just look at our federal government. As its power grows, the served interests of the people diminish. People were much better off when states had much more control than they do now and the federal government was much more limited in scope. The constitution calls for a limited federal government for good reason (because the governments that those who immigrated to America came from had large federal governments and that was a disaster for the people. because history shows that large federal governments is a disaster for the people, even today. Look at China, Russia, and most other countries that have large federal governments. What makes you think a large international government will be better, it will be WORSE). Lets not assume that big federal governments are more capable at solving our problems.
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Re: Re: Nationalism is a shabby artifact of tribalism
Don't countries like Sweden and Denmark have expansive national government power? So why would you talk about China/Russia instead? Could it be that you are ideologically opposed to a big federal government (nothing wrong with that) and you're just cherry-picking data that supports your ideology?
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The following article is an example of issues.
For the West, 'Game Over' in Central Asia
Andrea Bonzanni | 08 Jan 2010
World Politics Review
http://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/keeping-americas-edge
Last month, the West officially lost the new "Great Game." The 20-year competition for natural resources and influence in Central Asia between the United States (supported by the European Union), Russia and China has, for now, come to an end, with the outcome in favor of the latter two. Western defeat was already becoming clear with the slow progress of the Nabucco pipeline and the strategic reorientation of some Central Asian republics toward Russia and China. Two recent events, however, confirmed it.
For the rest see the article and then google China vs India vs Korea vs Russia vs Burma vs Iran for issues concerning natural resources in Central Asia and Africa plus WMD.
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No, what counts as evidence is the fact that innovation occurred more where patents were less, for one thing (ie: the tech sector has traditionally stayed away from patents and that's where the most innovation has occurred whereas the medical sector had many innovations (ie: vaccines (ie: smallpox)) until patents took over and now there really isn't that much innovation and in fact the FDA often bans perfectly good natural solutions just to help promote more dangerous and less effective patented synthetics. Swedens Chem industry was among the most innovative until patents got involved. Israel is one of the most innovative nations and they're one of the most lenient when it comes to intellectual property. Hollywood was founded on piracy. Study after study shows that intellectual property harms innovation). Also note, the Internet is privately controlled, imagine if the government intervened and got or granted broad patents on the Internet or various aspects of it. And it's the government's intervention that slows down broadband rates and increases price in the U.S. and increases cable prices while lowering the quality of cable (ie: more commercials) for one thing, the fact that they grant unearned monopolies on who can use existing and who can build new infrastructure. Yes, the government can be good for some innovation but the point is that when they "interfere" with others who innovate (ie: via patents and monopolies, etc...) they harm innovation. There is nothing wrong if the government itself innovates to some extent, but the article discusses their interference with others who innovate.
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Re: Re: Re: Nationalism is a shabby artifact of tribalism
Not saying that all small countries serve their people well. Of course the size of the federal government isn't the only factor, there are many other factors (ie: the extent that authority and laws are elected by the people vs a totalitarian government). Just that there is a tendency for big national governments to be less receptive to the specific needs of each individual.
First of all you need an elected government (or people who elect the laws or representatives). Elections are what help encourage governments to serve those it governs. Otherwise you have a government that poorly serves its people.
However, as the amount of people that an elected government serves increases the ability of elections to encourage a government to serve its people decreases and the governments ability to serve its people approaches the ability of an unelected government. The power of elections to encourage a government to serve its people decreases as the number of people governed by a government increases.
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Re: Re: Re: Nationalism is a shabby artifact of tribalism
Of course I'm sure.
"Could it be that you are ideologically opposed to a big federal government (nothing wrong with that) and you're just cherry-picking data that supports your ideology?"
Nope.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Nationalism is a shabby artifact of tribalism
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Nationalism is a shabby artifact of tribalism
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Nationalism is a shabby artifact of tribalism
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
No, I've decided to focus specifically on things that governments do to interfere with others who innovate and patents are one of those things.
A lot of innovation comes from universities and such at taxpayer money and that's fine too (to some extent).
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Chrysler gone. GM gone. Half of Wall Street gone. Major banks gone. FDIC broke. You can imagine all the fall out.
One only has to look at Japan, who's forward progress was essentially stopped when their bubble economy burst. Even today, they are still paying the price of a system that is effectively stopped cold by the weight of unpaid loans and overvalued real estate.
Effectively, what has happened in the last couple of years would have been disruptive on the same level as the great depression, which isn't beneficial to anyone. It would be all but fatal.
So the guys main points (as Mike highlighted)?
Number 1 had to happen, the choices were less than desirable. That doesn't mean it is something that is going to exist for long, and in fact many of the companies that received funds are working hard to pay them back (in part because until they pay back TARP money, they can't over pay their executives). Much of this kept the US from becomes a second world nation overnight.
Number 2? Well, there has to be some regulation to make the system work. The lack of regulation in a very narrow area (repackaging and reselling slices of loans) is one of the key reasons that the US is in it's current situation. Back off regulation would in the end just create more of these sorts of situations, which aren't just toxic for the companies involved, but for all of us.
Number 3? The education system in itself isn't the problem, the problem lies in the people using it. When a student's day is more about not getting shot on the way to school, not getting forced into a street gang to survive, and not going home to an uncaring home environment, perhaps the school experience would be better. The system has been corrupted to go from one of education to one of group survival, and the end result is uneducated students who do know how to hotwire a car, how to make a crack pipe, and how to avoid getting the "5-0" up their asses. Otherwise, they learn little. But that goes back to the issues of home life and social situation, not of the education system itself.
Number 4? Well, it seems a little in contradiction to number 3, doesn't it? If Americans have to spend their time competing with people from outside the country, who absorb the better paying jobs (and tend to lower the pay for those jobs), then there is little to aspire to for the people having trouble in number 3.
Immigration is the US's biggest problem, the large latino population is making this a political football that nobody wants to carry. Quite simply, a hard push needs to be made to move illegal aliens out of the US. California is going bankrupt trying to provide services to people who work under the table and send their money out of the country. They are educating children who have no right to be here. until that issue is resolved, number 3 isn't going to get any better, and there will be little support for number 4.
My feeling is while the writer is very well intentioned, he looking at trying to "flip this house" without addressing the real structural issues of the US. Paint and a nice green lawn seem nice, but if the building is still falling over, you have fixed nothing, just passed the problem to the next sucker. That isn't helping.
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Innovation and Regulation
Pegging on an extreme again - doesn't anyone understand that extremist attitudes are negative? Innovation is encouraged by policies that build a strong middle class - witness the boom of innovation and progress after World War Twice. That requires a "middle of the road" mentality.
As to unrestricted, uncontrolled immigration; that is the dumbest of all the proposals! Destroy our social fabric in the naive hope of encouraging innovation! DUMB! We should encourage immigration, but we need to control it, or we will have so much social disruption that chaos could result!
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Re: Innovation and Regulation
If the sentence read
"innovation is necessary for economic growth, and NO government interference is key for the type of innovation we need."
then I would agree with you. However, that's not what the sentence says.
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Re:
We would be better off because the free market would replace them.
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Re:
...No, I got it...it's too short.
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Re:
You mean when teacher unions have a good 12 page long process of trying to get a teacher fired? Where sex offending teachers sit in rooms away from students still getting paid? Where teachers care more about churning out A's and B's than how much a student really knows? Where unions seek to stop any sort of competition because they claim its bad when it has been shown over and over to be good? Where the system is more about how much information can be crammed into your head than how much you can understand and use. That appears to be a SLIGHT problem with the system itself.
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Re: Nationalism is a shabby artifact of tribalism
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Re: Re:
yeah, that place.
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Re: Innovation and Regulation
Gene is using a term he is unaware has another meaning.
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=pegging
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Re: Innovation and Regulation and War
Actually it was the wars themselves that created the boom in innovation.
The war forced the allied governments in to practical policies driven by necessity.
Political and commercial and commercial "horse trading" were suppressed on both sides of the atlantic (and in the Soviet Union for that matter).
Given a sufficiently large and credible external threat people will pull together and the kind of selfish lobbying we see from the IP industries will be quickly stamped on.
Most of the innovation that we see today is still running off the legacy of WW1, WW2 and the cold war.
WW1 produced effective IC engines and aircraft.
WW2 produced the the jet engine, nuclear technology and the computer.
The cold war produced microelectronics and the internet.
All of these were the product of war driven government policies.
These are the seed innovations - what we see since is simply the working out of these technologies.
The role of governments is threefold.
1. Fund the innovations that are too long term or expensive for private capital to afford. (Hopefully we will learn to do this without a war someday.)
2. Keep the commercial playing fields level. Unfortunately governments seem to believe that you can do this by listening to what successful industrialists say. In reality they all want to be monopolists so really you should do the opposite of what they ask for.
3. Protect the ordinary people from the fallout of change.
Maybe someday we can achieve the benefits of competition without the downside. A slogan for that:
Co-operation between people - competition between ideas.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Nationalism is a shabby artifact of tribalism
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Rounded out
What did they get for testing the boundaries..laws that make you feel like a criminal for acting on their natural given right of choice. Truancy, tardiness and what you can wear HAHAHA what a joke, but I digress. At a stage of a kids life they have to be able to be free and not feel incorporated to something they never bought into other than a jack boot in the back of their mind. An incentive should exists or even multiple to encourage them to trust your "school" instead they get the gray area of the law shoved in their face.
They need places than can go so they have a choice and hell WHY not have a choice at school!?!? Like the ability to choose what you want to learn at 8th grade you being taught the same crap and irrelevant garbage you did when you left 5th grade. Same subjects same rules nothing changes EVEN after you get into college its a distraction and you even have to pay for it now. Why can't they just choose.."Hey screw algebra I have NO passion for that I'm gonna drop it." or if you are to dictatorial to hear that then don't make it an important stage in their life no grades nothing just attendance and give incentive just like artist have had to learn RTB the music they make well..I think its a source of broader interpretation. Its not enough..never was, things have to change..and they will always change and I guess they will always have to fight and perhaps if they heard a few more aligned words they would not go to such extremes as "Anti-mike" put it, to the great wide world of the hustle. But then again some always want that other world(whatever it might contain) that's human.
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TO BBT
You forgetting your history on a few aspects on tribalism. The USA is tribal. States rights are supposed to supersede the federal level on all but commerce. Or is your history101 not up to snuff?
If you care to live by the red book of socialism count me out! And there in lies your falsehood. Nobody lives the same as you do, this group-think of the lets follow our leader over a cliff has got to stop. My grand-kids will thank you to WAKE UP!
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False premise => false conclusion
Some of the poor social statistics (unwed mothers) coming from the lower classes is because our society is so much richer. Behavior that would have led to abject poverty or early death 100 years ago is now quite survivable. It is hardly a wonder that irresponsible behavior has increased. More people can "afford" it.
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innovate=steal
You mean "copying", and when you say "we" I gather you are referring to Microsoft and other such firms who rely on the innovations of others and then steal them.
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innovate=steal
When you say "innovation" you mean "copying" and when you say "we" you mean Microsoft and other such firms who rely on the innovations of others and then steal them.
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"The proposition that to get more innovation the US needs less regulation is unsubstantiated and probably untrue."
Yes, because your mere proclamations, and lack of evidence, overturns all the evidence that disagrees with you.
Jan 9th, 2010 @ 6:01pm
"You mean "copying", and when you say "we" I gather you are referring to Microsoft and other such firms who rely on the innovations of others and then steal them."
Yes, because you can read minds and are better able to ascertain what others mean than they are.
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Wow you have some insane commenters
As for many commenters that say reduction of government intervention is necessary for regulation, you've obviously never had a decent economics or business course on the college level. Quick fact, complying with government regulation costs American businesses $46 for every $1 spent on regulation. So, if the US Gov would reduce regulation by just $10billion dollars (a number made minute by recent administrations), then private business would have an additional $460,000,000,000 to invest in employment of engineers, spurring innovation (and reducing unemployment). I was originally writing regarding the stance on immigration that was quoted, but there were even juicier no-facts to deal with lower on the page. I could comment all day just on the comments - GO BACK TO SCHOOL PEOPLE!
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Microsoft's Sticky Fingers
That is why they demanded Patent Deform five years ago and helped form the Piracy Coalition.
It is interesting how many members of the Piracy Coalition are associated with TechDIRT.
Inventors innovate while Piracy Coalition members claim that they innovate. The only area they innovate in is propaganda and the types of vehicles they use to propagate their propaganda. Now the question is TechDIRT one of those vehicles?
Ronald J. Riley,
I am speaking only on my own behalf.
Affiliations:
President - www.PIAUSA.org - RJR at PIAUSA.org
Executive Director - www.InventorEd.org - RJR at InvEd.org
Senior Fellow - www.PatentPolicy.org
President - Alliance for American Innovation
Caretaker of Intellectual Property Creators on behalf of deceased founder Paul Heckel
Washington, DC
Direct (810) 597-0194 / (202) 318-1595 - 9 am to 8 pm EST.
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US Society
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/05/opinion/05herbert.html?em
Could it be true?
I can't imagine not having Health care in place as a fundamental public function. It is as foundation of a moderns society similar in necessity to literacy.
The US leads in technologyinnovation however in social progress the investment seems unprincipled. The free market capitalist system is a means to an end not an end in itself.
US leadership in the last 50 years has been a net benefit to the world lets hope the current trends corrects. continues.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Nationalism is a shabby artifact of tribalism
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Re: TO BBT
I am aware of my history, and aware that the federal government has slowly become more powerful over time since the country was founded. So what? Does it surprise you that things change over 200 years?
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Re: Re: TO BBT
I think the point is that we don't want them to change for the worse and that's what they're doing.
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Re: Re: Nationalism is a shabby artifact of tribalism
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Re: Microsoft's Sticky Fingers
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Re: Wow you have some insane commenters
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution
So unless the powers are specifically granted to the federal government or prohibited to state governments by the constitution itself then those powers are granted to the state.
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Re: Microsoft's Sticky Fingers
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Re: Parallels with sport
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dynamic definition and solution making in real time
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I would love to use corn fed midwestern school kids and teachers as the "average", but they just are not what is really happening for many of the students of today.
It ain't the dark 1%, that much is for sure. I think we wish it was 1%, but those are only wishes...
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Re: Microsoft's Sticky Fingers
However I would say that Microsoft are innovative (or at least their employees are. They do employ some very bright people - but maybe - as you say - they don't get their just rewards.
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Re: Re: Nationalism is a shabby artifact of tribalism
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Government Interference
The biggest interference your (US) government seems to make is locking people up. Do you realise you have 5% of the worlds population and 25% of it's prisoners and the numbers are still growing?
Add that to all the commercial litigation coming out of the IP industry and before long your economy will be dominated by the justice system....
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There was no lack of transparency. There were reams of documents and information about any aspect of what people consider to be the problem instruments. The fact that they are complicated does mean the process was less "transparent." In addition, there are volumes of regulations as to what and how this information must be disclosed.
The fact that only a handful of people were able to accurately foresee the consequence and fewer still were actually willing to put their money where their mouth was and invest accordingly, shows that the issue was not lack of transparency, but lack of ability to predict the future. A few guys saw the warning signs and acted. The fact that what happened was so counter to conventional wisdom at the time shows a problem that is more indicative of cognitive dissonance than transparency.
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Innovation is not the answer
Regulation that imposes dead weight loses on the economy by making it inefficient under the current state of knowledge can be removed. Generally regulations that create artificial monopolies or protect producers from competition are counterproductive but they have little effect on innovation per se.
Most of our so called cutting edge technology is OLD and comes from a much more regulated era. The transistor was invented 60 years ago by that bad old monopolist AT&T through Bell Labs. The integrated circuit is fifty years old. The microprocessor is 40 years old. The computer was invented under government contract as was the internet. The US is much less regulated now than it was in the 1960s and 1970s - where are the big new inventions?
New innovation that expands the boundaries of what is possible by creating new knowledge would give the US only fleeting advantages since the knowledge will leak out to the rest of the world in short order.
To improve the lives of Americans it would be better to try to pick the low hanging fruit and make the economy more efficient in using the knowledge we already have: eliminate farm subsidies and agricultural protection; refocus the criminal justice system on prevention, rehabilitation and re-integration; improve the schooling opportunities for the children of poor Americans rather than relying on third world governments to satisfy America's educational needs.
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Now after 30 years no manufacturing industry to speak of, no money a huge debt, inflationary tendencies and more bad things people still believe it was inevitable?
Are you people serious?
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Re: Innovation is not the answer
Problem solved!
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Re: Innovation is not the answer
Oh, you can add an mp3 player, a digital camera, or a wifi connection to almost anything and you are innovating.
Actually, where we are right now is the reaping what was sowed 40 years ago. In the same manner that past generation profited from the major changes of the train, the industrial revolution, radio, television, etc... we are currently in the position to reap the benefits of ICs and computer technology. We aren't in an innovation phase as much as a narrow refining stage.
I afree with you, most of what is innovation right now are unsupportable business models or new ideas that work only if you stop paying all the other participants in the deal.
IMHO, the next dot bomb with be the folding of much of the dot advertising business, and the unsupportable models that created internet page views but little actual benefit for anyone. Think of it as the dot adbomb. Much of it will happen because the people who create the content are not getting paid enough to keep creating it, leaving many of these sites with no content to work with. If they actually had to pay for content, most of them would be broke.
We have long since stopped trading dollars for quarters, most of them aren't even getting nickles anymore.
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Re: Re: Innovation is not the answer
IMHO, the next dot bomb with be the folding of much of the dot advertising business, and the unsupportable models that created internet page views but little actual benefit for anyone. Think of it as the dot adbomb. Much of it will happen because the people who create the content are not getting paid enough to keep creating it, leaving many of these sites with no content to work with. If they actually had to pay for content, most of them would be broke.
We have long since stopped trading dollars for quarters, most of them aren't even getting nickles anymore.
Except that there is no sign of this happening. More content than ever is being produced.
What we do see is companies that were failing anyway using "piracy" as an excuse.
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http://www.msxnet.org/orwell/print/1984.pdf
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401k
Or maybe the medical assistance to people because as it is today is not sustainable it may take 30 years but it will happen eventually.
Or maybe it will be the internal expending from states that will lead to a total government infra structure of basic services meltdown.
All of those things are really transparent right now.
Raising taxes only goes so far, after that they will have to shed services and jobs and that will further fuel economic problems.
Some say that the U.S. has a leverage in that it produces the worlds currency, well think again countries everywhere are changing that to a basket of currencies and maybe in a decade there will be no people who want to be part of a bad debt financing such an irresponsible country.
Right now there are people trying to protect themselves from the government using anonymous money and LLCs.
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Re: Re: Re: Innovation is not the answer
If you consider horrible home produced music, crappy home movies, and meaningless blog posts as content, then yes, you are right. We have entered an era of content masturbation, where we do it by ourselves, for ourselves, and pretty much all of it fails to accomplish anything except giving the "creator" a warm feeling.
On the other sides, magazines are getting thinner, online news sources run the same stories for days, and we are left to get informed by bloggers and muck rakers.
So if you are looking at it as "how big is the mound of pooh", then you are right, the pooh pile is getting higher. If you are trying to find the gold in the pooh, I would say that it's getting rarer and rarer every day.
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Better government policy is what we need. In some places, that could mean less inteference. In some, it could mean more.
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Re: Another Part of the Problem
The only way this is true is if everyone has a perfectly equal chance to pass on their genes. Since that is not the case, there are still selective pressures, and therefore evolution. In fact, some research shows we're evolving faster than ever, due in large part simply to our huge population.
That has nothing to do with the article, I just had to say it. :-)
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XKCD - Penny Arcade - The Daily Show - Adult Swim - Strong Bad - Drudge Report - Banksy
Some of it's generated by a small group (or even 1 person), some by many. Some self starters, some obviously still tied very closely to old media. But regardless all available for free online with new content on a very regular basis.
I'm amazed at the depth and variety of our increasingly connected culture, and I'm excited for what the future holds if we encourage this sort of thing. It's disheartening that so many are closed off to even consider the opportunities and beauty that is there. There's too much crap and it's just impossible to find anything good in there is a very defeatist attitude.
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Major sites like Facebook and Myspace, etc, even with all of their free, user-generated content, still can't find a way to monetize their sites and make profits...
Content is becoming worthless and therefore no one is going to take the time to create unique, quality content. At least not with any hope of making a profit from it in the long run.
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"Content is becoming worthless and therefore no one is going to take the time to create unique, quality content."
How "content" is valued, and the best ways to make money with it are changing, but to argue that it's worthless, and that no one is making a profit in new ways? I mean, I'm not sure how else to say it except that they are.
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Cooperation vs. Competition
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