I expect inflation to remain high for a while, and I think concerns about it (if not for self-fulfilling psychological, which are very real and significant) are overblown. I think this stimulus, and the resulting inflation, DID help the economy, relative to the alternatives. The critical thing was to avoid structural damage:
- Businesses going under
- People losing jobs
- Mortgages going under
... and so on. All of this DOES directly impact the productive output of the economy.
Inflation does distort the economy a little bit. It makes some of us poorer (those with cash), some of us richer (those with debt), and leaves some neutral (this with hard assets). But I think this distortion pales relative to the alternative.
Imagine you're a business with 5 million dollars in revolving debt, at a 2% interest rate. You have $100k in debt service costs.
If interest rates go up to 5%, you have $250k in service costs. Most businesses operate close to break-even (in efficient markets), and many will immediately go under. If businesses go under, that triggers a recession cycle: Those businesses lay off employees, who stop buying, driving down revenue for everyone else. People anticipating layoffs/furloughs/etc. stop buying. Hiring goes down too, since businesses start planning for rough times.
People buying on credit (anyone with a credit card debt) also find purchasing much more expensive, together with higher bills on existing debt.
A whole bunch of business opportunities also disappear in a poof of smoke. If a business has even a 1% expected real return, and interest rates are zero, it makes sense to borrow money to start that business (especially if inflation is also high, giving effective negative interest rates). If a business has an expected 1% return and interest rates are 12%, then I'm bleeding money. For these kinds of opportunities, think less SV startup, and more just normal businesses (e.g. I buy something and sell it a month or two later).
- We're borrowing money, and we'll need to pay it back. That's scary.
- Money is bits in a computer, and from the perspective of the US government, it's like video game currency. Debts and deficits are fiscal instruments.
Which of these is correct, or something else, is TBD. I think a big part of the question is who holds the debt. I'm a lot more worried about foreign debt, and I'm a lot less worried about debt as a financial instrument to pay interest on de facto savings accounts.
> If you aren’t interested in maintaining your app annually, don’t publish apps on Apple’s store.
That's exactly what I do. I avoid the app stores like the plaque.
> (I am not sympathetic to your situation, because as a user of apps, I am exhausted of crappy apps and bottom-of-the-barrel behaviors from developers. I understand that others may feel otherwise, and that’s fine too, just as long as those feelings do not get in the way of being a responsive app developer.)
I think the word here is 'entitled.' There are a few different groups here:
- Bottom-of-the-barrel scammers, whom I have no sympathy to
- Little kids and amateurs, who might want to put something out and move on
- Graduate students and research projects
- Little not-for-profits
- Internal-use small businesses and enterprise apps, where a they might be developed once and forgotten about for decades (yes, plural)
In my case, I don't need to have an app on the app store, and I don't care for Apple's behavior, so I don't have an app there. That hurts Apple (and you, if you're an iPhone user) more than it does me.
You're also confusing strictness with timelines. I'm all for super-strict policies. Just with:
- Backwards compatibility (e.g. grandfathering) of older apps
As much as I like the change, the 3-month window seems unreasonable. I don't currently have AppStore apps, and these kinds of whiplash changes are part of the reason.
Microsoft, for all its faults, is much better than Apple or Google here.
Businesses take planning and strategy, and these things lead to drop-everything fires.
Well, modules can be designed to protect my security, or to harm my security (e.g. to enforce DRM). I'm unclear on how "real TPM" functionality helps me. If it helps secure Microsoft, and hurts my security, that's a good reason to not use Windows.
I have not found good docs on what TPM exactly does in Windows 11, but people I trust tell me to distrust it, so I do.
You end up with a large segment of the population who sneezes a little bit, which is sort of annoying but sort of okay.
You end up with a small segment of the population with asthma attacks, anaphylaxis, and other life-threatening conditions.
Universal use of dogs would mean that there would be people who simple cannot travel, ever, anywhere beyond driving distance.
There's a small war between extremist dog-owners (the ones who believe dogs are people too, and sneak them into all sorts of places dogs aren't allowed as "activism") and people with severe allergies.
My impression is that there are rapidly rising and then diminishing returns on investment.
Going from cloth to any mask with a high filtration layer is a huge improvement. Cloth is <30% of small particles. High filtration layer is >90%. Beyond that, the benefits are questionable.
Some surgical masks include a non-woven layer, and those already do pretty well (but how would you find those? pre-COVID it was easy). From there, genuine (non-counterfeit) KN95 and nanofiber masks are a big step up, and incredibly effective. At least pre-delta, if everyone used those, combined with modest social distancing, there was very little spread.
N95 masks are a modest improvement from there in terms of filtration, but by that point, mask quality (at least pre-delta) no longer appeared to be the dominant risk factor. COVID19 can spread through other mucous membranes (e.g. eyes). While combined with a face shield, used correctly, etc. I'm sure N95 make a difference over KN95, in practical public health use, I doubt there's any difference.
I don't really distinguish between things with >90% filtration. Unless you've got an excellent seal and are otherwise protected, it doesn't matter much. Note that the measurements are performed at 300nm. There isn't much spread at 300nm (a single virus particle is unlikely to make you sick). A 90% mask at 300nm will have >>>90% at e.g. a micron. A micron particle is unlikely to have more than one or two COVID particles (a micron is 5 COVIDs wide).
I do distinguish based on pressure drop. Lower means more air goes through the mask, rather than around.
I also do distinguish based on technology. The nanofiber ones don't degrade the same way as N95. The N95 nonblown layer will theoretically beat nanofiber for the first couple of hours of use, but once it's moist from your breath, nanofiber beats it. Personally, I use a disposable nanofiber mask, and I consider it a better (e.g. safer) option. I'm not in a controlled cleanroom/hospital setting, and life happens. Masks do get reused, abused, rained on, and generally exposed to life. Nanofiber have much better durability.
I also supply chain. Amazon and eBay are rife with counterfeits. I like masks where I can order direct. Especially 3M tends to be mostly fakes, unless ordered through authorized distributors.
I distinguish on fit. In addition, a well-fitting 90% masks beats a poor-fitting 99% mask, since with a good fit, all the air goes through the mask. Order yourself a variety pack and see what's comfortable and fits.
The biggest thing you can do is limit yourself to settings where everyone uses reasonable precautions. All parties wearing KN95 masks, having reasonable social distancing, favoring outdoors, vaccinated if >12, etc. is pretty safe. If you have a mixture of extreme precautions and no precautions, everyone is at risk.
Homes don't even need to be that small. Buying a chunk of land with enough trees to build a home is <$5k, if you're willing to live in the middle of nowhere.
You need the equivalent of a Ph.D in zoning, permitting, and municipal regulations to do that, though.
And if each high school class, as a year-long class project, build a home, I think my kid would get a better education and we'd have more homes.
Plus, most people need to bring in specialists to do all the maintenance because we have no idea how our homes work. I'd like to run ethernet in my house, and I have no idea what's inside my walls, how to get in there, or how not to break things. That's embarrassing.
I don't think this represents most studies, but the far lower end. If we're going to cherry-pick, here's one which shows more than half of kids show at least one symptom 120 days out:
My best guess is that it's around 10%-20% -- that's sort of in the middle where studies land.
I suspect a big part of the problem is which child and which COVID. I would speculate alpha, delta, mu, etc. all have different rates.
I think the second question is the distribution of symptoms. None of the studies are sensitive enough to pick up a 5% loss in IQ, lung capacity, or similar. Do some kids get it and others don't? Or is there a bell curve of symptoms, and we're picking up kids with the more extreme versions?
If it's a bell curve, it's pretty scary. All kids could be harmed to the level of e.g. lead exposure, and we wouldn't notice.
If a side effect of COVID19 were getting rid of flu and colds, I'd be very very happy.
It doesn't look like it will be, but it'd be nice.
I actually think all the contact tracing stuff would do it. If we had zero tolerance for colds and flues -- we quarantine everyone who gets them and their contacts -- we'd end up at close to zero cases, and close to zero actual quarantines.
I actually think steady-state, we'd need fewer quarantines than the number of people flu kills. Flues kill 60k per season. I think 60k quarantines would be more than adequate for containing it.
If you define "risk" as "hospitalization," that's largely true. If you define "risk" as months or years of bizarre symptoms, reduced lung capacity, brain fog, etc., then children are at risk too.
But perhaps you don't care about that sort of thing.
Investment in the housing market drives up supply of buildings, and drives up the cost of the land underneath them. In high-cost markets, most of the cost is the land, not development on that land.
You can waive the higher taxes for very high density developments. Skyscrapers to require investors, and that is beneficial.
I'm not sold on the Economist article. I do believe in home ownership. The idea that a person spends a lifetime in the same home and community is a good one. We're tribal creatures, and you want a tribe -- you want people to know their neighbors, have community BBQs, and live in real communities. You want enough of a vested interest in municipal politics that democratic structures work. You want kids growing up with the same friends in school.
The flips side can be pretty dark too. For example, there are are plenty of stories of poorer communities, especially African American tenant ones, being broken up and priced out by gentrification of rental markets.
Ownership is less economically efficient, but much more resilient. Once a mortgage is paid off, you've always got a roof overhead. You just need to earn enough for food, clothing, and medicine.
I think the trick would be to implement significant differences in land tax based on:
* a home you live in; versus
* an individual investment property (e.g. if you own 2-3 homes); versus
* an institutional investment property (e.g. investment fund owns hundreds of homes)
I'm saying that there are internals problems and there are external problems. Whenever I've had mental health issues, there were clear external causes, and therapy ain't gonna do a thing about that. Therapists will tell you the same thing. Removing the root causes will do something.
Unfortunately, there isn't a magical get-help fairy which helps with external problems. Sometimes, your life just gets f-ed up, and there's nothing you can do about it.
... anxiety is a natural biological response, and there isn't a magical therapy trick that will help you get rid of it. Perhaps that time and money is better spent on managing immigration or job issues than on therapy.
And if you're in a new country with no savings and no contacts, continuing with the same example, there might not be friends or family whom you can turn to for help.
- Businesses going under
- People losing jobs
- Mortgages going under
... and so on. All of this DOES directly impact the productive output of the economy.
Inflation does distort the economy a little bit. It makes some of us poorer (those with cash), some of us richer (those with debt), and leaves some neutral (this with hard assets). But I think this distortion pales relative to the alternative.