I only state that there is a positive correlation between working and money. As work goes up so does the money (in most situations).

We are compensated through S/D dynamic of the marketplace.

Doubtful. More likely you are mistaken what is relevant in the societal benefit sphere. No wonder, given the whole propaganda. Society simply deems all work equal - and then balances the payoff structure based on S/D metrics. Quality risk takers are in short supply so they are getting a bigger portion of the economy. Manual labor, for an other example, is not. (and fwiw all work is equaly important in society - you can't subsidize teachers with bakers and firefighters with nuclear physicists. You can only transfer human capital from one sector through another via S/D mechanism. People go where there is excess reward and leave jobs where relative reward is smaller based on their competence)

The whole problem with inheritance is that we tax on VAT and gains so at the end the tax has taken a decent chunk out of the original work. Inheritance tax doesn't have any merit except to take away from people what they have saved (and not spend - to point out that they sacrifice short term joy of spending) at the end of their lifetime. Rich people don't complain because the tax is small and they are pretty much dead or senile.

We do pay based on societal utility. The relevant metric for calculation is S/D. The usual thing where it goes wrong is when the market has a payoff that analyzes the short term effects strongly vs the long-term effects. But this has most to do with our inability to protect our work from being copycatted - since we are bad with that (preventing exploitation) the long term is often heavily discounted. We also, additionally, discount long-term since we need short-term gains. We need food, water, clothes etc in the short-term. Yea theory of relativity has far reaching consequences but it has no utility if we've all starved to death.

Unfortunately. The Chine - USA labor migration in "unskilled" jobs shows how people really don't want free market. It's not pleasant to know you've failed in life and are priced in to work for 2$/h. Easier to form a union and demand your "rights". Plus a little nationalism goes a long way.

You are providing utility by building (physical or intellectual) OR exploitation. Far from popular belief exploitation does provide positive benefit by providing efficiency in the market. Sufficient to say not all exploitation is created equal (killing people to provide efficient survival skills for example) and not all building also (building excessive homes gives way to bad situations - see China ghost towns). If this is not clear feel free to tell me to me explain.

Illegal activities usually have apparent negative utility - on average. But not all laws are written properly.

Lawyers are a bad example (protectionism from the state doesn't give the market to correct inefficiency in that sector) but yea lawyers have more utility the drug dealers.

Not your best post BTM, I gotta say. I'll chuck it out to New Years partying.

The Right generally argues rights but the Left and Right argue Right and Wrong, therefore I'm left thinking is it right or wrong to forget rights and focus on the Rights (and Wrongs) that we all conceptually agree on and try to apply them right. Right?

Seems simple enough!

I agree that there is a strong s/d dynamic at work. I'll add that those of us who are clever mess around with the s/d curves in clever ways, which, I think, we should to the extent we are capable.

You, sir, have no idea how lucky I am.

It is mostly s/d. We do have some very good reasons for a sort of kierkegaard levelling though. It would totally screw things up for those of us who are doing well if the masses decided to revolt. Those that gather resources well need to be careful to not anger the masses. There is a long tradition in most cultures of giving back.

My major job skills include having a nice speaking voice and nice hair and a smattering of social skills.

That is Econ 101. Econ 201: No, they actually don't do this.

The real issue that makes the entire s/d thing not quite as good as it should be is the daily problems of life issue that the vast majority of people have to deal with in a societally correct way.

I'm fairly sure the inheritance tax kicks in somewhere around death.

Obviously, the people who would fight against it are far from senile.

The merit to it is the same as any other tax. Roads, bridges, schools, armies, navies, marines, keeping poor old people fed, etc.

We base pay on s/d. Societal utility got nearly nothing to do with it.

I have no idea what you could possibly mean. I get paid purely on my ability to do a bit of real work (voice over and some simple excel coding, which is about 10% of my yearly income) and because I make some rich people a bit richer (the other 90%).

That has only recently become recognized as a problem. In times when we are more interested in societal benefit than individual benefit, we expect and laud copycatters.

I'm fairly certain that we don't need to pay masque much to keep him working.

The US did much better when it imported workers...

There are other ways of exploiting.

You find me a market in which there isn't a protectionistic moat provided by the government (copyright/patents), and I'll find you an efficient market.

You wouldn't be suggesting that we can all be lawyers without governmental supervision, are you?

You take that back, sir! I shall not allow you to sully such a grand randomly selected date. I have plenty of bad posts on any random Tuesday.

agree

All private jobs have a tendency to approach zero (or minimal wage) as time goes by. So giving back is a nice way for people that are connected to government to play Santa... (easy to give when you first just take or ramp up deficit). In the meantime manual labor is replaced by machines, traders by algorithms, teachers with online courses (a little future sneak-peak, will happen eventually)....

Put. That coffee. Down. Coffee's for closers only.

Mobility is not efficient but new people entering the job market are certainly assessing the possible payoff matrix. It usually goes by looking who the cool people are. (hint: the one with the money). But they usually get fooled by randomness.

Lets tax your air. Hey, it's keeping poor old people fed....

oh, oh..... wait!! I got a better idea. Lets take money from people that are not born. We'll, like, borrow money, and let the toddlers repay that.... shhhhh. I know, I'm so cool...

Not all obligations to society are ok. Ok?

s/d = Societal utility (in efficient market)

I mean the market is inefficient when the perception is heavily skewed into analyzing only short term. Think market bubbles.

Copyright/patents have some merit in preventing that. Because the logic does not apply. Society is always better off in the short term just taking everything from you and copycat. It's also better off protecting private property to stimulate people to work -> better utility in the long run for you and society.

A sucker is born every minute. Scientists, pffff.

Would need to think about that, but at first looks right

Not sure you get me, or I get you. I was stating that some exploitation gives benefit to society but some exploitation doesn't. Taking someones misallocated capital is ok but someones life is not.

US futures market.

I wouldn't speak of such foul ideas.

I see.

I find this to be fairly true (except where the fairly clever people mess with the s/d curves in clever ways).

The whole giving back thing nearly always becomes popular with whoever is winning after a while. Legacy sort of thing, a la Carnegie and darn near everyone else who makes more than their share. This makes me relatively unconcerned about the current backlash against giving back. They will come around when they feel comfortable doing so.

Very funny. My main job function is to close deals (I did forget sparkling smile above). Parachute in to some god-forsaken town, steamroll over the competition and anything that resembles a detail, and leave the engineers to clean up after me.

I'm fond of telling the engineers that they wouldn't have a job if it weren't for me when they cry that I sold something that doesn't actually exist.

You are paying too much attention to just the finance field. Very passe (nearly as passe as accent marks above the letter e).

If you are just implying that those entering college are chasing last year's money, you are correct to a point.

Ahhh. We finally get to philosophy. We should make sure not to lose track of that, yet make sure we talk in code so it gets burried.

Completely true. I will remember that the next time I am on a planet in which has an efficient market (the theoretical definition, not Chezlaw's. For entertainment purposes, Chezlaw thinks that an efficient market is one in which the cantaloupes are priced by the pound, not per each).

Labor (broadly speaking to include all work-a-day people) is never an efficient market. Nearly all products cannot be forced into an efficient market model.

The market is always efficient because the market participants don't follow economic theory very well. Apparently, they never got the manual on how they are theoretically supposed to act.

Intellectual property rights are silly. <-I do have a copyright on that sentence, so if you want to quote it, I want $3.95.

I agree that taking someone's misallocated capital is generally allowed (except for little old ladies' capital), and that taking someone's life generally isn't.

That doesn't quite make the leap to taking someone's misallocated capital gives benefit to society. I sold loads of stuff to companies at the end of the year because they had to spend xxx on capital expenditures or they'd get a smaller capex budget in 2013. I see very specific benefit to me, and little to society at large as this was inefficient for all involved.

In real life I don't even glance in the general direction of the gift horse.

I will grant you the point, if you grant me the larger point that it is a zero-sum game as far as societal benefit is concerned.

Any real world examples of clever ways?

You shouldn't make a mess.

Interesting note: the whole engineer vs salesperson layer-cake seems to completely rest on the first mover advantage. (and some negotiation skills that engineers usually don't have). Engineers hire a salesperson and get the bigger part of the cake, salesperson hires engineers he gets the bigger part of the cake.

I was stating that there are two forces in the s/d price formation: new workforce and old workforce. Where the old one lacks in mobility to make the market efficient the young one usually doesn't. Plus people prefer to hire younger people/ but not inexperienced.

More like an artistic generalization. Inheritance tax is the one where I see only confiscation from private to public. And a lot of pretty words to mask it up.

We usually try to have a theory and then analyze the real situation. Something in the line of: find the equilibrium, then compare real examples to theoretical equilibrium. Try to fix the real world so to be more like theoretical and reduce inefficiencies.

So usually we should assume s/d = social utility + rand(), and then look for ways how to make the world a better place where this equation excessively doesn't hold.

To bad. Market will correct that by brute-forcing them via random function. If they don't want that for themselves I suggest they pick up an e-book* (*save the planet and all that).

Sry, no tm sign so no moneyz. Intellectual property rights are not silly. They are just poorly implemented.

Yes it does, it moves energy on a path of least resistance and prevents wasteful energy dissipation. Society is better off if I take grannys money and invest in firms that research genome sequencing. Granny is better off buying roses for here garden. Money is simply moved into an area of biggest growth = biggest benefit the society. Exploitation moves energy from weak to strong/ stupid to smart etc. and by that makes the society more likely to increase in growth and robust against unknown risks. Some exceptions do apply.

Sry no can't do.

Futures market reduces risk so business can hedge against unknown adverse volatility. Money flows from people that can better asses future prices vs competition. It is also used as a early warning sign when **** hits the fan (backwardation vs. contango). Additionally it makes prices efficient, shakes out weak speculators (the majority) and gives ability to lock on delivery of assets. It is zero sum in the sense that for all the money that is put in the market it will simply redistribute that money from one participant to another. But this redistribution is net positive to society. The same as all insurance is -ev when you analyze the money. But it is positive for you to have a healthcare insurance as a hedge against rare tail risk.

Giving only a few examples of the generally allowed rules here...

Cleverly suppress supply:
Become the company guru in some outdated process (particularly important is making it too expensive to change to a better process).
Get patents or copyright.
Be part of the hiring team.
Crush competition while it is still in the crib.
Team up with others to develop a moat.
Get government support in developing a moat.

Cleverly increase demand:
Hire good sales and marketing people to make it better than it really is.

Cleverly make your own s/d graphs:
Get on the compensation team.

Companies nearly require it of salespeople. If they wanted otherwise, they'd not pay based on revenue.

Smart people glance at their job description for an amusing read, chuck it in the bin, and then just act based on their compensation plan.

No different than any sort of coming together with others in order to win. Unionization, working in a company, and being part of a country all have precisely the same goals: get more of a share than you'd get on your own.

Companies are just groups of people. As such, they tend to prefer to hire whoever makes their day easier to get through.

It is all just pretty words to get people to do what the speaker wants. From both sides, all I hear are a bunch of emotional pseudo-philosophical pleas that have nearly no rational content.

One side says "stealing" and the other says something about "fairness." All BS intended to make people take sides without thinking.

Nah. What we have is theory about how people work that doesn't describe how people work.

Smart people chuck a theory in the bin when it doesn't fit reality. I guess we could try to make people start working within the bounds of inbalances of blood, yellow bile, black bile and phlegm, but I don't see much point to it.

That is the same as saying that centralized economic control isn't silly, just badly implemented.

If it doesn't work, it doesn't work.

Hogwash. If I spend all of my money on crack and hookers (for sake of argument, we will take this as a bad allocation by me), that doesn't mean that the crack dealers and hookers will spend it poorly. Presumably, they will do the same sorts of things regular folk do with the profits. They will pay rent or mortgage, buy milk and eggs and maybe a nice flat screen tv. In other words, there is no such thing as a bad spend of money.

Or, to put it into econ 101 terms, you don't want to centralize money in the hands of the smart people. You want it to be spent as the people want to spend it.

This would be nice if it were true. 99.9%* of companies don't participate in the futures markets.

*completely made up number that I'm nearly certain is an underestimate of the truth.

This seems implausible.

Its quite possible that for example, spending money on high quality research or stuff that supports such research is better than spending it on other things.

For you to be correct then the spending on such research would have to be fixed however people spend their money. That doesn't sound anything like true.

tnx, this I don't understand...

all people fall into their nature to conserve energy - they take the carrot and avoid the stick. No carrot no need to do it.

I don't see how that is relevant to the topic. Not to say it isn't true. And to clarify I was wrong in the previous post, it did sound logical but I figured I better check the facts and upss.

Using quick classification is pretty good way to save energy and time. People take sides based on small set on information all the time - it doesn't mean it is a wrong thing to do. These things makes us exploitable but there is no other way. I can't buy time. Stupid people get exploited with patriotic speeches and smart people with nonlinear complexities.

What we have is a perfect theory how S/D and auction works.
Smart people don't simply chuck a theory in the bin when it doesn't fit reality. Flat Earth BMT???

lol, I'll just skip this. No it is not the same. As frogs and asteroids aren't. USA makes ideas, Chine steals them. Ezy game. lol intellectual property. (irony in this part)

see chez post

If you don't own a health insurance it is your right. You save money. Just don't say it is -ev for me and my friends when it obviously isn't. (Obv I'm using both systems (futures market and insurance) as an example of similar zero-sum systems.)

Management usually doesn't have the knowledge to make compensation decisions on occupations outside of their field of expertise, or in markets in which they are unfamiliar. They will set up (usually informally) compensation teams to find out what they need to pay for recruitment/retainment.

Being part of the compensation team ends up indirectly paying very well. It is like having the boss ask you how rare your skills are and how much people in your position are generally paid.

I meant that you were wrong. Hiring managers make safe decisions. Don't hire young, don't hire inexperienced, don't hire people who have job hopped.

We are in a world where patriotic speeches are the norm. Both sides pull on the heart strings and do little else. Just mention a shared moral sentiment and people nod their heads.

It is particularly easy to see so when the opposite side is doing such a thing. A bit more difficult when they are preaching to the choir you happen to sing in.

In real life, S/D and auction don't work as the economic theory states they should.

If you are simply stating that you should act according to s/d and auction economic theory, I'd state that you should probably pay more attention to how everyone else is playing the game before assuming such a simple strategy is optimal.

The smartest people steal ideas. The slightly less smart people will come up with new ideas whether they are properly compensated or not.

Everyone should act in their best interest. If, for China, stealing ideas is their best play, they should steal ideas. If we don't have an effective counter-strategy, then they win, as they should.

Also, Germany makes the ideas for the USA nowadays. We outsourced thinking and problem solving a couple of decades ago.

I was only stating how companies actually behave. How people/companies actually behave is more important than how they "should" behave. Or at least it should be understood before settling on how you should behave.

And not purchasing health insurance is only a right in certain jurisdictions.

Are you calling Adam Smith's ideas implausible?

The research dollars will go toward what the people want purely through natural means: If there is a problem that needs solving, then someone will work to profit by solving it.

It is the only option that isn't horrific. What people want is the only thing that matters. Given that they youngest generation seems to be purely interested in making their earlobes larger is a small problem.

The do-gooders always **** things up if they are allowed to run rampant. If you are interested in having a healthy heart (and/or think it is potentially profitable), you are more than welcome to invest your money in a health r&d company rather than the cutting edge ear-gauging r&d companies.

Interestingly, imo, there is a solution to self-evaluation problem in our immune system. But can't precisely remember how.

wp, but I think my song lyrics are the best. Even when the music gets out of tune on occasion.

S/D and auction = nash equilibrium, if they don't work there is an exploitative strategy to be implemented.

On a side note I do find that life itself is by definition out of equilibrium. By that Fight Club was right, on a long enough timeline the survival rate for everyone drops to zero. This game can't be won. No point in playing.

I do pay attention to how everyone else is playing. I label them as beta and look to find a possible alpha return. Fell free to point out interesting strategies in other players that would contribute to that...

This only has to do with EV and reward-to-variability ratio. Since steeling ideas has the best score of all, currently, it is the best way to play. I think this has something to do with us not protecting R&D properly. On the other-hand robbing banks (physically) has its long term ev reduced below other jobs in the last 25 years. (if you are wondering )

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http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/1...12.00570.x/pdf
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indeed

Both are equally important. But we digress, futures market ev>0 for society, agree?

ultra poor jurisdictions and ultra rich, imo (polarized range itt)

I dont think so. Never read his work and I assume he is as abused as Keynes but afaik he says the reverse to your claim. Which is that how money is spent makes a massive difference.

Is this your coming out as an ultra-extreme AC fanatic?


I'm a very extreme person who thinks extreme thoughts like tax and spend on education is a pretty good idea. I'm obviously confused about what you said as you cant really believe its horrific and makes no difference.

Gutenberg project has Wealth of Nations for free, I think.

He thought that if people try to do well, they will naturally largely improve society. If you note that there is a shortage of beef, raising cattle looks good to make money.

Nah, just stating the argument.

I'm fairly certain that they are perverting the way things work a wee little bit. Strange lot. Want to have pure individualism and the benefits of society.

I think you already know that I'm all for such things as education and roads. I'm of the very very extreme position that those who benefit most from those sorts of things should pay a premium.

Although cortisol looks like a self-destruct sequence, it is far from one.

All I hear is cacophony from all sides. They all ignore complexity and the lyrics are all akin to whiney emo music.

You and your opponent(s) both (all) have to know the other person's strategy (and technically, they need to know all possible strategies and counter-strategies) for a nash equilibrium to exist. I hinted at that when I said earlier that you have to know how people actually act, not how they "should" act.

Wasn't that a soft-porn movie? Half-naked men touching each other, right?

Hire people who don't understand (or care) how much profit they generate.

I wasn't thinking about robbing banks for a living, but thanks.

The guy who invented the wheel didn't keep it a secret. I'm fairly certain that he, like most tinkerers and innovators, was just happy that he solved a problem that he had. Tinkerers and innovators are amongst the cheapest people to hire.

I'm not sure. They have their place in reducing beta for specific companies, but they seem to fail at actually reducing beta in real life.

Specifically, the futures market in aluminum is very much society -ev. Tons of metal sitting around because of the future's market. Buying aluminum for immediate shipment at the market rate is impossible currently.

but not because it makes no difference how they spend their money. Their is no claim that different patterns of spending wont produce different rtesults or that some of those results are better than others.

I dont think you did AC any favours They generally dont claim some spending is bad but rather they insist some spending is very very bad. (on this they are correct)

I have a lot of sympathy with them (though not with you portrayal of them). The key defense of AC imo is not that good government wouldn't make things better but that good government is a mega oxy-moron.

I did know the former I think. As a liberal I have I disagree with the later but that's politics I suppose.

Adam Smith gives a cute synopsis of this five books that make up The Wealth of Nations in the Introduction to same. A sweet three easy pages that rivals the first three chapters of Genesis. Smith's writing can be plodding but he makes his points well. But the devil is in the details. And this always confuses people that read important works while completely sober.

I have the Everyman's Library edition. It is a clean and dense book that feels good and fits the hand just right and is well made by the division of labor, and it even has a sassy ribbon marker to keep your place while reading. Superior Opulence. Adam Smith would be proud.

Of course not. The current trend towards making large holes in earlobes is a small problem.

It is the do-gooders vs. the masses.

I drove on an downtown LA roadway that had a bike lane today for a specific instance of do-gooders gone wrong. Even the bike riders are smart enough to not over exert themselves in the wrong atmosphere.

It is as (we all tend to forget), an exercise in either teamwork or individualism or an awkward combination of the two.

Okay well I was addressing you saying hogwosh to the 'of course' part of that 'of course not'

We now seems to agree that some spending is better than other spending.

I dont really agree with the rest of your post but its politcs and I'm not that drunk yet. I suppose if you really want to go there I could open another two bottles.

You were implying wrong. Wiki nash equilibrium and look how your post differs from actual equilibrium. You are saying what I would need to know if I wanted to maximize EV not equilibrium optimal play...

such a Negative Nancy

not sure if you are correct about Al spot market, I would be suppressed if I couldn't buy metals at LME at spot price but have no incentives to check it out so our dialog stops here. Was interesting while it lasted (several nice observations from you)....

If you have any final words feel free to address the court. The prosecution rests.

As I said, I am more worried about ear gauging, but it is true that a bad spend is not nearly as bad as people generally think since the money will be spent again in short order on average sorts of things. I'm sure that the people who sell stuff to stupid teens and young adults support education and the arts around the same amount on average as most people do.

And good spends are not nearly as helpful as people generally think. I'm sure you have noticed that road improvement crews don't actually do any actual road improvement. Mostly they set up and take down traffic cones.

We already agreed on that to a point. I just worry about it a bit less. If people find education to be important, then the money will flow to education. If they find roads to be important, then the money will flow to traffic cone manufacturers.

What we are looking for is people being happy, and we have to presume that they spend on what makes them happy. We might encourage them to not spend their food money on hookers and crack (or ear gauging), but if that is what they want, there isn't much we can do about it. People largely (and correctly) ignore pleas to improve themselves.

Drink up, mon frere.

what people generally think is irrelevent unless the subject of the topic is about what people generally think.

You are confusing 'good' with 'good'. One means better expected outcomes and one means with worthy intentions.

That's far too narrow a horizon. Much of the happiness will be for other people. Most of my happiness is due in necessary part to the spending of people long dead.

for example organising matters so that those who most benefit from education pay the most for education is a bad idea (same with most things) hic

By definition, a nash equilibrium cannot exist without all participants in the game knowing the strategies of the other players. This is somewhere in the first couple of sentences of the wiki page.

It also can't exist if a better unilateral strategy exists to counter the other participants' strategies. This is also hidden in the first couple of sentences, but you have to think for a couple of seconds about when an equilibrium can exist.

Current premium for immediate shipment is $140/ton and you will actually wait 59 weeks for your shipment to arrive. I clearly have more free time than you.

What people want is clearly different than what people think, I think.

What people want is the closest thing I am smart enough to foist on them, or willing to have foisted on me.

I'm assuming that people want to have an enjoyable life. What else could be more important?

One doesn't get the first without the second being somewhere in the room.

Did they not profit from their efforts? Were they not (at the very least) trying to profit?

I'm fairly certain that we are defining "who benefits most" differently. Name who benefits most so we can move on, please.