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Comment by rags2riches | Hacker News Reader

"Do you not know, my son, with how very little wisdom the world is governed?"

Written by Axel Oxenstierna, Lord High Chancellor of Sweden, to his son, a delegate to the negotiations that would lead to the Peace of Westphalia, who worried about his ability to hold his own amidst experienced and eminent statesmen and diplomats.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axel_Oxenstierna

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Written in 1648, which gives you a sense for how long this has been the case.

I think it’s pretty safe to assume this quote is apocryphal, but it’s a good quote nonetheless. Swedish historian Dick Harrison wrote about it briefly here: https://www.svd.se/a/a23oL/vem-myntade-uttrycket-an-nescis

This is almost exactly what I tell my younger folks who are concerned they're not authoritative enough to share an opinion or lead a project. I cured my Imposter Syndrome not by gaining confidence but realizing that everyone else was just guessing too. My guesses were at least as good as theirs.

My version was more general: I'm in a race with people convinced they cant win.

After that realization even a tiny amount of effort put me miles ahead. Again and again I found situations screaming: This is where others would give up.

You shouldn't be satisfied with guesses as good as the self proclaimed imposters. Your effort should further convince them they are!

This may have been more true during the times of nobility. With modern democracies and market economies, we at least try to have some form of meritocracy. Obviously, we fall short in a lot of ways, but the goal is to bring to best to the fore.

Two words: Liz Truss

Liz Truss fall the victim of higher level party struggle and intrigue, not because she was dumb.

I'm interested why you say this. The perception in the UK is absolutely that she was not up the job and was removed for that reason.

Well, you never get that high in politics if you don't have some traits for that, or you are pushed there by others on purpose. Either way it means she fell victim to intrigue - by getting ousted from PM position or by being installed there on the first place.

All it proves is that she was good at climbing the greasy pole. She was and remains as thick as two short planks.

Her ideas weren't necessarily bad, or her logic flawed, but her execution was bloody terrible.

Growth is exactly what the UK economy needs and she recognised that. Now all we're going to get is austerity, higher taxes and misery under Rishi

In Obama's memoirs he talks about this. How when he was a community level, then city, then state, then federal level politician how he kept expecting the quality of people/decisions to improve in the big leagues, but that instead it was the same (poor quality) at each level.

Is "A Promised Land" a good read? I've had bad experiences in the past reading books by politicians.

The Peter Principle applies to government, too.

I think what's often behind the Peter Principal is the temperament and skills to gain/hold a job are often/usually not the same skills needed to do the job. And often there is conflict and tension between the two.

It's interesting to compare/contrast that, with thoughts like these: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/CKpByWmsZ8WmpHtYa/competent-...

I think both authors can be correct, and both sets of experiences are valid. But I think it's a sign that politics selects for political-competency, which has nearly nothing to do with general intelligence or other forms of competency/expertise.

When listening to podcasts where EU politicians are interviewed it seems like this is less of a problem there. EU politics have a high impact but a low "fame" aspect. Maybe the people that care about impact and not about fame are higher quality politicians?

I'm surprised by this comment. As an outsider (from Australia) but someone who follows European politics pretty closely, the quality of European politicians is noticeably low. Not that I would say Australian politicians are better, but I'm simply surprised that any European thinks that there is a higher standard in Europe.

I don't know a lot of them, there are quite many. I believe at least Frans Timmermans, Mohammed Chahim,Diederik Samsom and Bas Eickhout are very capable and have a high opinion of EU politicians.

This sounds logical and hopeful, but even a casual survey of the current lot of political leaders on all sides is very disappointing. Donald Trump, Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, Hillary Clinton, George Bush, Barak Obama, Pete Buttigieg, AOC, and even the once heralded Bernie Sanders (just to name a few) have turned out to be massive failures and disappointments.

Are there political leaders you feel were not disappointing?

Very few come to mind actually. I’ll mention a few and accept the resulting criticism ;)

2016 version of Bernie Sanders; Jimmy Carter; Dennis Kucinich; and almost any politician willing to stand up against needless wars, as avoiding war is a top priority for me.

Well, I don't know that it's much of a criticism, but I do note which way all those people lean politically. Mostly I just think that the modern world is ungovernable, but then again, I'm not really the optimistic type.

What way do you think they lean politically? Many of them would no longer be considered modern Democrats. For example, 2016 Bernie was for strong borders, avoiding unnecessary war, and breaking away from trade agreements that were unfavorable to American workers. Modern Bernie votes to fund a war in Ukraine and no longer cares about securing the border. The Democratic party of today is socially far more left, but their foreign policy, free speech stances, and economic agenda resembles the old (pre-Trump grenade) Republican party. Weird times.

What terrifies me is what happens after a truly competent leader leaves.

A competent system would be preferable.

We haven't had an honest president since Carter, and we haven't had a good president since Eisenhower. The math and process of our U.S. electoral system guarantees poor results.

I wonder if they're reputations would have stood up to the media scrutiny of today.

Probably they actually would. But neither of them would get their party's nominations today.

I read one of Eisenhower’s biographies and he actually had some problems with the press especially thanks to Montgomery. At the same time, he was also one of the first US presidents to recognise that news can be leveraged to spread your message. Unlike earlier presidents, Eisenhower actually cooperated with the press and gave them news directly. That together with him winning a major war for America makes me suspect that his reputation would have also stood up with the media scrutiny of today. Assuming that there even is more scrutiny today? Maybe because there are more journalists nowadays so yes it could be

You think Obama was dishonest?

Yes, definitely. I was infuriated by many of W's policies regarding war and domestic spying, and Obama said he would stop those abuses, but instead continued on as was, or worse.

I think generals have an important advantage in honesty. No matter how political an officer's life is, it pales in comparison to the amount of lies needed to be a career politician.

Grant was also known for his unlacquered honesty. And for his desire to serve the nation. Whereas Lincoln changed opinions when favorable to him and was happy to suspend rule of law for the same reason.

> massive failures and disappointments.

Compared to whom and what?

What was the standard to which you decided they should be measured against that led to your conclusion?

> we at least try to have some form of meritocracy

lolol

I always preach for "lies we can believe in!", this one would have been nice if it worked.

With modern democracies, we have people gaining power who are the most willing to do whatever it takes to acquire it.

In Athens, they selected by random lot. A much better system.

> In Athens, they selected by random lot. A much better system.

IIRC, an important corollary to that was they designed their official positions so literally anyone could do the job. That would also have certain benefits regarding oversight, because with simple jobs anyone can check if they're being done correctly (without corruption or incompetence being hidden behind jargon).

The impossible puzzle is that our most competent men have so many ties to so many businesses that a career in politics becomes impossible.

Be that as it may, the point in our bureaucracies is precisely to make sure that the decisions we make are based on what we learned over the years and not what some “10x” SWE is throwing a hissy fit about in the daily standup.

but if he's a 10x then his 5 years of experience is actually 50 years!!! :O

Yeah jumping ship to a new company every 2 years is really valuable.

And they master the code at the new company in a few days!

Considering that's how people tend to get raises... he might be very smart for doing that!

2.5 years was the industry average like 5 years ago. Probably shorter now

Why do we keep getting subjected to rent control, then, which never works?

Because it actually often works and there has been research that has found benefits. The question is whether or not the benefits are worth the drawbacks and that's highly sensitive to your actual objectives, to the local conditions, and extremely sensitive to the details of how your rent control is implemented.

For example, it is an empirical fact that rent control greatly decreases the number of people that leave a city, which especially for poorer people means that they get to keep an invaluable support network.

At the same time, there have been publications that straight up found that rent control did not reduce housing stock meaningfully and yet reduced rents.

So the assertion that it "never works" cannot be supported by the evidence because we have evidence of cases and dimensions in which it definitely worked. And that is part of the reason why some of us are subjected to rent control.

I find that this post https://jwmason.org/slackwire/considerations-on-rent-control... is a good start, the video by Unlearning Economics on the subject is also pretty good, which IIRC also touches on the issue that in the rent control debate an increase in the exact same metrics (for example, mobility) is interpreted by some as good and by others as bad.

I think there is a solid case to be made that when used carefully rent control can be a good tool to use in keeping housing costs under control, though of course if used as the only tool then things are likely to end up disastrously.

> there have been publications that straight up found that rent control did not reduce housing stock meaningfully

Really? Would you build an apt building that rent control ensured would be a poor investment? How do you measure investors being reluctant to build more housing in a rent controlled area?

Rent control is good for the few people who get a below market rate. It's bad for everyone else, including those who can't find a place to rent because of it.

Rent control generally only controls increases, not absolute prices, and is relaxed for newer constructions, so developers care less. At the same time, it may reduce the cost of land zoned for high density housing if locative uses are judged to be less profitable, thereby reaching and equilibrium. It also often lowers market rent for everyone, when implemented correctly.

We can measure this reluctance by looking at construction rates and general supply in similar groups of cities or neighborhoods with or without rent control, of course controlling for other variables. This has been done in multiple studies, which are listed in the link I provided.

A recent video on co-op and social housing, that makes simlar points, with the somewhat clickbaity title of:

The Non-capitalist Solution to the Housing Crisis

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sKudSeqHSJk

The video seems to switch to "non-market" as a description.

You don’t need the tools at all. If everyone is at (roughly) the same level of decision making ability as the post implies then it follows that disallowing certain decisions (like the price of rent) will always be suboptimal.

This is just pure and simple logic.

What ‘successes’ rent control had are hyped to an abnormal extent, since obviously those with rent controlled apartments are most keen on keeping them, and often they are not the ‘poor’. Again the poor are used here as an excuse for upper middle class bad behavior, locking people out of the city.

Turnover in a city is a good thing btw, not a bad one. But cities do seem to design themselves on keeping people out.

This is not true. Rational actors acting in their own self interest does not always approach a global optimum. An external actor limiting choices can trivially lead to better outcomes, the prisoner's dilemma being an obvious example. The tragedy of the commons is another, where the government historically either intervened to maintain good behaviour, or intervened to enclose the commons, in either case limiting the options of rational players.

Turnover in a city can be argued to be good or bad. Turnover across a city is more clearly bad, but as a said it's still arguable. In any case, I believe you're not making a great case as your basic argument that limiting choices of rational actors can never lead to better outcomes is incorrect, and I think it would be a good idea to read/watch the material I linked or referred to in order to get a better idea of what I'm arguing and so you can directly try to refute the rebuttals of points I'm going to be making. It's going to be faster than relitigating most of this conversation up until that point.

Please demonstrate that it "never" works.

Can't prove a negative. But you can show a counterexample.

What is your definition of rent control working? There are some studies showing that rent control does work to minimise displacement of tenants [1] and that tenants seek more repairs [2], even more of lower income classes.

If you define as achieving market efficiency, maybe that's not the objective.

It's like unionising, it may make companies less market-efficient by giving more power and control to the workers. Rent control affects landlords by giving more power to tenants.

Building more houses, etc., is an orthogonal issue to rent control.

[1] http://www.socsci.uci.edu/~jkbrueck/course%20readings/gyourk...

[2] https://www.policylink.org/sites/default/files/RentControlMy...

What about the non-tenants who now cannot find a place to rent, because it's less profitable to build more apartments?

You could always [raise taxes and] subsidize apartment-building... the G.I. bill would like a word.

Government does plenty of things that are unprofitable for the benefit of all.

Switzerland has a pretty good policy for rent control and tenant housing [1].

This kind of policy needs to be a multipronged approach in policy to provide both new construction and long-term leases (usually 20 years).

[1] https://housingpolicytoolkit.oecd.org/www/CountryFiches/hous...

Rent control can, and sometimes does work. However, it has faltered in recent years, in large part because property management companies are using software to aid in pricing rents as high as the market can bear (to the heavy detriment of tenants), and are willing to evict and retain an unconscionable amount of empty units if overall profits rise, even at the cost of human suffering, rather than keep tenants around.

The latest "Behind the Bastards" podcast "Part One: Why is the Rent So Damn High?" explores some of this, if you have the time and inclination to listen.

> Rent control can, and sometimes does work

Only if you ignore the secondary effects, which are legion.

> retain an unconscionable amount of empty units

A secondary effect of rent control

There are thousands of empty units around without rent control. People cannot afford rent in them.

"Secondary effects" - please educate us on what they are, and their magnitude.

There are 48.5 million rental units in the US. A few thousand empty ones is miniscule.

I guess to put a finer point on it: this isn't exclusively a market problem, and it's incorrect to reduce/redirect all forms of market manipulation down to 'rent control'.

Certainly rent control distorts the market unnaturally, but it does so in favor of tenants and human rights, and proportionally speaking, I don't think it's the biggest distortion by a long shot. The much larger distortion causing the market problems is the optimization of rent prices at the expense of human rights.

If the market is to be distorted, I personally would pick the one that prioritizes continuity of housing over the one that maximizes rent income over total units rented.

I wouldn’t go so strong as this.

The civil service is mostly designed to provide some level of basic stability and functioning so that no matter what flavor of the month politician gets elected you still get your trash picked up, and other services. (If politicians directly target something, though, all bets are off.)

Thank you for translating the analogy.

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