Comment by em500 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by em500 | Hacker News Reader

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This is a non-sensical article, relying on some obfuscating math hidden behind "Infl. Adjusted".

Inflation adjustments gets pretty fuzzy even in the same nation across a few decades, let alone between different nations across centuries.

The article equates the 1637 peak valuation of 78 million guilders with current day 7,900,000 million dollars (not the 79,000 million according to the bad math in the article!). Now consider that the initial capital raised for the company was 6.4 million guilders in 1602. That would be around 600 billion USD. (I'm neglecting inflation between 1602 and 1637 here, that doesn't change my point.) This was raised around 1800 families, with share varying from 50 to 85,000 guilders, which according to the implied inflation/currency conversion is between 5 million and 8.6 billion USD. How credible is is this conversion factor?

Consider as another reference that the nominal value increased 12 fold over 35 years. Todays elite PE/VC/incubators would probably scoff at such low ambitions. (Though the East India Co was pretty profitable and paid handsome dividends, so the returns are higher than capital gains.)

As another reference point, an annual salary for low-to-medium skilled labour in mid-17th century Holland was around 100 to 200 guilders, which would be about 20 million USD according to the implied "Infl. Adjusted" conversion in the article (upon which the entire premise of the article rests).

It does make you wonder what the inflation-adjusted figures are purported to mean even, given that they result in completely ridiculous results.

By contrast, an inflation calculator tells me that $100 one hundred years ago is worth around $2,500 now (so 25X). And according to this article https://www.jstor.org/stable/1820827?seq=1#metadata_info_tab... , a pretty typical wage back then was $0.50 per hour. 25X that is $12.50, which sounds about right as a typical median wage nowadays (perhaps a bit low; there is a real increase in standard of living over this time period too). So the inflation figures going back at least a hundred years do make sense. What causes them to break down when you try to go back much farther, then? Are the inflation figures simply wrong? Are there compounding errors that, over enough time, make the result completely ridiculous?

Inflation is usually measured as the change over time in the prices of a "representative" basket of goods (and which goods in which proportion is a pretty subjective choice). Over time, the costs of particular goods diverge a lot, especially with respect to wages, and how important those goods are to the economy also varies a lot.

The purchasing power of a typical weekly wage in 1800 or 1637 looks very different depending on whether you express it in terms of bread rolls, non-leather settees or bluetooth speakers (all of which are constituent parts of the modern UK CPI index)

Excellent point. So it sounds like the basket of goods wasn't chosen correctly, or not changed often enough to be representative across each time line, or something? Because it simply cannot be a valid result that a typical wage way back then (when standards of living were much lower) is worth millions of dollars today.

Inflation is a geometric process, so any errors will greatly compound over long periods of time.

One aspect to it is that today a smartphone costs a few hundred dollars. Back in the day, no amount of money would allow you to buy one. Maybe to compare East India to current top companies, you'd need to compare the percentage of global GDP to estimate how big they are (and how large they'd most likely be if they continued to exist.)

The base/average salary comparison also makes a lot of sense.

This is great analysis. If you think about the amount of global trade that was controlled by the Dutch East India Co, there is no modern company even close. Apple isn't even close, the have a small sliver of a small part of the global economy. Even Exxon, is only one small part of the economy.

I think using annual salary is a reasonably fair assessment. Assuming it was $50k in today's dollar, the the company's valuation is more reasonable at $20 billion.

I agree with the spirit of what you are getting at.

Except that it's not fair to simply assume that a good salary was roughly similar in terms of purchasing power across the a few centuries. In fact at that time middle income people were much poorer in terms of what they were able to consume, purchase, and barter.

As one example, the power loom didn't exist until the late 18th century. Before then, clothing was really expensive because an unbelievable amount of hand labor had to go into it. The average person did not own a lot of clothing, and the clothing they did have cost them relatively a lot of money.

Which is also where the term "selling the shirt off your back" came from. Back in the days when clothing was worth a lot more, you could actually trade your clothes for stuff in a pinch. Nowadays clothing ain't worth much.

I finally get to ask someone directly: in “the a few centuries,” are the two articles considered valid English or is it a mistake?

It is a mistake.

It's a mistake

Phew!

Now for the mystery of “the the” which I sometimes encounter...

I would assume a typography error unless it is a band name. I've typo'd "the the" more than once.

dutch architecture consisted of nothing but gold in the middle ages. post-independence we painted everything brown to fit in with the rest of europe.

From this other source [0], I see a min/max historical Guilder in 1600-1700 to 2016 Euro rate of 1 guilder to 8-18 Euro. That would be 800-3200 Euro per year for a laborer, which is comparable with the poorest nations today. That seems accurate for a pre-industrial time.

Using that source, 78m Guilders would be 624m-1.4b Euro today.

[0] http://www.iisg.nl/hpw/calculate.php

I think the best measure would be what percentage of the total world's wealth (valuation?) does a company represent at some point.

Good luck estimating both 17th-century world wealth in Dutch guilders and 21st-century world wealth in USD, both within an order of magnitude. That's at leasts several months, if not years worth of research work in there.

Oh I'm sure it's a lot of work. But that's the whole point right? Getting a proper answer. Guesstimates and half calculations are also imprecise enough to make such articles basically just an exercise in imagination rather than an accurate representation of the facts.

There is a tremendous amount of work by economists measuring these things, which is why this article is so irritating.

The point that the Dutch were an economic superpower in the 17th century is not off base: they were only country to maintain colonies in North & South America, Africa and Asia.

The point that the Dutch East India Company was probably the first company set up under a system of modern financial capitalism, that is a permanently capitalized enterprise with a professional managerial class, separate from tradable claims on the profits of that enterprise, is also well taken.

But this article is a load of twaddle.

But is it click bait or fake news?

From what I’ve seen, these claims seem to be based on the assumption that there has been an average annual inflation rate of 3% since the 1600s. That assumption works in the 20th century, but by 17th century theories on monetary policy, a 3% inflation rate would have likely been cause for panic.

Another reason for considering it a pointless measure is that it is from the peak of tulip mania. What was it valued at after the bust?

Adjust inflation down for productivity growth - there is a prize out there for this idea kids!

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