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How To Make Trillions Of Dollars

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237 pointsdreadsword141 comments

Happiness, health and stability are not core objectives of our society. The production of wealth, as measured by GDP, or by the stock markets, or consumer spending, is our yardstick of success.

I hope that in the remainder of the century we can can transition to better forms of society where the health and happiness of the general population is more important than the efficiency of our economic structures.

strangely refreshing to read this on HN

I think we would do better to follow Bhutan's lead and start using some metrics along the lines of Gross National Happiness in our analysis of how our country (and world) is doing. Ultimately metrics like GDP are only meaningful to our interests to the extent that they indicate the quality of life and sustainability of improved quality of life for people. We lose sight of where the real underlying value lies far too often.

One feature of such a better society is that it should be classless. As long as there is there are segments of society whose happiness, health, and stability are dependent upon the whims of the ruling class rather then in their own hands then these problems will persist.

People don't want a classless society because it removes the ability to attain the one thing that all people want: distinguishment. People usually want money not for its utility, but as an arbitrary measure of merit and a way to distinguish oneself. This is why the American Dream is so pervasive: the concept of economic mobility appeals to people. If anything, we've seen a regression from equality and an exacerbation of class segregation throughout the century.

People (at least in this country) don't want to be happy and healthy. They want to be richer than everyone else because that is what success is.

I think that you are right that there are some people that will not become happier or more healthy if they got more money. More money does mean "distinguishment" to them. I think we could describe American upper and middle class people in this way.

The vast majority of the people in America and the rest of the world are not upper or middle class. They want both "distinguishment" AND health, because both could improve. Look at health problems and obesity and the poverty line and education rates. Look at what happens to the birth rate when you introduce economic stability and health care access that can more or less guarantee the survival of your children.

I agree completely. Sadly this is an extension of the democratic capitalist way of life. Once upon a time a group of people we're lead by the strongest, the most intelligent, and the most experienced. It was natural selection at it's finest. Now the concept of power is based on money, distinguishment, and popularity, and not on strength, smarts, and age.

We are making progress. It used to be your class was determined by how much money your great great great grandfather had. Now it's determined by how much you have. Soon it will be determined by how much we think you will have based on your profession ("oohh a doctor"), health ("oohh she's skinny and eats right), habits (non-smokers). Eventually that bubble will pop or cancers/diabetes and other ridiculous ravagers of our species will be eliminated. Class has a real shot of being eliminated then.

This is the dream, at least.

How do you think we, as individuals who wish to change this, can do it?

Emergent phenomena don't have "objectives", mate. GDP is a derived statistic.

> I hope that in the remainder of the century we can can transition to better forms of society where the health and happiness of the general population is more important than the efficiency of our economic structures.

And your proposal is? A lot of alternatives have been tried in the past several thousand years and almost all of them suck. Real hard.

And your proposal is? A lot of alternatives have been tried in the past several thousand years and almost all of them suck. Real hard.

Don't think in terms of The Alternative System, just think in terms of the small things that can make life better. Things like reduced working hours to have more time for family, or better economic freedoms for everyone.

Those things do not represent a change in The System. In particular, they are perfectly compatible with allowing private initiative in the market. In fact, they enhance private initiative overall, in areas outside of the market (having more time outside of work can translate to becoming engaged in local community organizations, to give just one example).

If enough people say they are done with 40+ hour work weeks and only will do 35 companies will adapt. So far there has not been enough people willing to do so.

I'm done with it, and all my current and future employers know it. But I'm in a pretty privileged position to be able to meet my needs working part-time.

Its actually quite simple. We need a massive dose of social proofing amongst those that have already attained the peak of accomplishment as seen in the current system to change their behavior. We are no different now than when we were 6 watching our parents. You emulate those you think live right, and the people that live right in the eyes of those under the spell of the implications of the article look to fame, money and power. If those that wied those act a certain way, those new ways become the pinnacle. This solution is the only non forceful way.

Welcome to Europe...

By "adapt", do you mean, "move everything to Asia"?

>>>Emergent phenomena don't have "objectives", mate.

What makes you say that, mate?

Are intelligence and consciousness emergent phenomena?

Do you think intelligence and consciousness have "an objective"?

They might have a post-hoc discernible function, but that's not the same as a predetermined purpose.

Yes, because the concept of an "objective" is very useful when trying to describe emergence.

A semi-related question:

If no emergent systems have "objectives", then what things do have "objectives"?

Please, I'm too old for running down teleological rabbit holes.

If you had simply stated that you didn't believe in the concept of "objectives", instead of singling out my precious emergent systems, there would be no rabbit holes to run down. :) Also is 1 thing that has an objective too much to ask for?

I'm saying that complex systems in and of themselves don't have "objectives".

Deliberately designed systems can absolutely have purposes and objectives.

If you want to be nitpicky there's a frothing sea of philosophers smashing endlessly against the little rowboat we're in here. Feel free to dive off and swim around, I'll stay here.

I'm responding to your philosophical ideas about emergence, I don't intend on making any philosophical points here, only responding to the ones that you made. You disagreed with the idea that society can have objectives based on philosophical grounds.

>>Emergent phenomena don't have "objectives", mate.

Society may or may not have some emergent qualities, but it definitely has "deliberately designed" qualities, so therefore according to you: society "can absolutely have purposes and objectives".

Examples of deliberately designed qualities: banking system, fiat currency, stock market, credit card infrastructure, etc. All engineered to streamline economic activities and to allow those who control them to wield power(among other purposes).

>>>The production of wealth, as measured by GDP, or by the stock markets, or consumer spending, is our yardstick of success.

What is success other than the ability to succeed at wielding power, control over your environment etc?

> You disagreed with the idea that society can have objectives based on philosophical grounds.

I objected to the idea that an emergent phenomenon can be assumed to have objectives. Society wasn't "designed", it simply is.

Teleology is the name for assigning human-like motives to things. For example, saying "the hamstring muscle is designed to flex the knee and extend the hip" is erroneous. There is no designer. It evolved; we discern these functions independently of the system.

While subsystems may have designed elements, generally these too go on to have complex, emergent properties. And they're subsumed within the larger system anyway. Laws, stock markets etc are all emergent from human interactions. Nobody sat down at the start of history and designed the system we are part of today. It happened without any one guiding intelligence.

It's meaningless to say "society's objectives" because there was nobody to assign such objectives and nobody can assign such objectives. Anybody who says "the objectives for society are X" is basically saying "my personal preference for the unfolding of the emergent system are X". It's a substitution error.

Well now you've jumped off the boat into the frothy water, just like you said you wouldn't ;). Let me get us back in the boat.

I agree that the definition of the concept of emergence is that there is no objective. No one even vaguely familiar with the concept could possibly disagree with that. My questions before were not disbelief, just making sure you had some passing familiarity with the concepts before I engaged you.

This is the heart of the matter: you still have not named me one deliberately designed system that has purposes and objectives, like you said you could here:

>>>Deliberately designed systems can absolutely have purposes and objectives.

Your inability to name one thing that is not emergent makes me think this:

1-You believe that everything is emergent. From the hamstring to society, banks and currency and economics and bartering, and everything in between. If everything is emergent then obviously nothing has objectives, since that is in the definition of the concept of emergence.

Ah, I didn't realise that's what you were driving at.

Human-designed systems have a purpose. Otherwise, they wouldn't have been designed in the first place (hello, circular reasoning).

But they can also be viewed as emergent phenomena within the larger System of Everything.

If you want an example, how about an Olympic weightlifting barbell?

Its purpose is to facilitate the sport of weightlifting. Such bars are designed to exhibit properties such as flexing under load while returning to true, robustness to being dropped from overhead and having a collar spin with the right amount of resistance.

Weightlifting itself seems to have emerged from status plays between ancient greek men. "Hey Themistocles, I bet you can't lift this big rock!"

Which in turn emerges from status play, which emerges ... well. You get the idea. From the POV of "society", none of this was ever planned. From the POV of the people working for Eleiko, the bar is a piece of lovingly engineered and carefully manufactured high-grade steel.

This post isn't as long as it looks, only the first half is about our discussion. The part of this post that directly relates to our discussion is (only?) 300 words. In those 300 words I will agree with your latest post, then show why I disagree with your initial post.

>>>Human-designed systems have a purpose ... But they can also be viewed as emergent phenomena within the larger System of Everything.

I think that banks and society and weightlifting are all are examples of human-designed systems. Therefore according to you they can "have a purpose ... But they can also be viewed as emergent phenomena..."

In your opinion, is it simultaneously both, or is there some means of deciding which one? I think you answer this question when you mention POV:

>>>From the POV of "society", none of this was ever planned. From the POV of the people working for Eleiko, the bar is a piece of lovingly engineered and carefully manufactured high-grade steel.

I think this is also not controversial and I completely agree with it. But I think it reveals why I disagree with your initial post.

'From the [point of view] of "society", none of this was ever planned'. Luckily we don't look at societal problems from the POV of society....we look at them from our own POV! Which explains my disagreement with your initial post:

>>>Emergent phenomena don't have "objectives", mate.

Using the things you said above, I now think that you meant:

>>>From the POV of the emergent phenomena known as society, society doesn't have objectives, mate.

I contend that we are humans assigning objectives to society from our own POV, and therefore your comment has nothing at all to do with what the OP posted.

Saying that emergent phenomena can't hold their own objectives is a truism and I can imagine it being useful. But the truism doesn't seem to add anything to the OP's discussion. I would love for you to prove me wrong and show me the usefulness of the truism to the OP's discussion.

-------------------------------------------------------

As a show of good faith, here is the usefulness of looking at society from our own human perspective:

If we are humans looking at society from our own perspective (as opposed to society looking at itself from its own perspective...?), then we can assign it purpose and objectives willy-nilly, based on the apparent actions and tendencies of the emergent phenomena.

The tragedy of the commons is an emergent phenomena. From its POV, there is no objective. From our POV, TOTC seems to say that SOMETIMES small collective sacrifices can prevent large collective sacrifices.

From the POV of a fire, there is no objective. From our POV, fire burns things and spreads from house to house so that one neighbor's irresponsible actions can cause a city-wide fire and hurt collective society very greatly(tragedy of the commons). So we should all make a small collective sacrifice and pay some firefighters to combat the selfish and irresponsible house-burning tendencies of our neighbors. Society++ because we have traded millions of dollars of damage and constant fear of burning to death for a small amount of money.

From the POV of toxic waste, there is no objective. From our POV toxic waste hurts the environment that we all share, so we try to take actions to mitigate or prevent the damage of toxic waste. Society++.

To address the OP directly, assigning society objectives seems very useful as it has resulted in firefighting and food stamps and police and healthcare and regulations against toxic waste dumping, all of which have seemed to reduce crime and disease and fear and pain and ignorance and economic uncertainty. Reducing these things allows for more efficiency and entrepreneurship and invention and time-saving and long term planning because we aren't so busy worrying about our next meal or our immediate safety. The OP hopes we can keep making progress.

Thank you both for this thread, reading it was both enjoyable and educational. Great debate.

Radicalized revolutionary socialism? If greed and self preservation wasn't such an important factor in the common peoples agenda perhaps. The reality is that history has taught us that the usual alternatives to the capitalist-imperialist driven society we live in today is radicalization of a substancial mass of people which invariably ends up with a non-insignificant number of causalities of the human, pedagogical, religious, and/or cultural types.

And then you have people using those ideals to strike with unnecessary violence at what they define as their enemies... and then you get the PFLP saying they're fighting for the same ideals you're fighting. And then you get a bunch of people speaking about nationalism, antisemitism, racism, and then politics, politics, politics.

I'm probably reading too much into what this discussion is actually about (it's a bit early for me), but I just wanted to contribute that I think that our current regimes are probably unsustainable if we as a world population keep growing at such expeditious rates as we are right now. That being said, I have no proposal. Bigger people than me have tried to come up with such propositions, and I'm not planning on organizing another french revolution.

> Emergent phenomena don't have "objectives", mate. GDP is a derived statistic.

Either you are nitpicking (an economic system doesn't have goals ("objectives") in the same way you do), or you're making a pretty strong claim here. If you try to do the latter, I would say you're wrong. Marx has written a good primer on the topic, which shows that the primary objective of capitalist society is capital accumulation.

Witness Bhutan's Gross National Happiness: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_national_happiness

True, but that can only work if it happens naturally.

If you force me to be happy, I will be very sad.

I always used to believe happiness was the most important thing for a society.

Then I read Brave new world. Happiness taken to extremes.

Now I'm not so sure.

I recommend reading about the Fun Theory:

http://lesswrong.com/lw/xy/the_fun_theory_sequence/

> Fun Theory is the field of knowledge that deals in questions such as "How much fun is there in the universe?", "Will we ever run out of fun?", "Are we having fun yet?" and "Could we be having more fun?"

I find that we combine too many things into our word happiness. We combine joy, pleasure, satisfaction, excitement, comfort, etc etc. Happiness to me often loses meaning since the happiness that I strive for, satisfaction at building things is completely different than that of others. Brave new world is very much a happiness of instant gratification as well as contentment in your place in society. I would say that happiness of this sort is very unhealthy for a society that has advancement as one of it's goals.

You know what, though? Roughly, people are happier in countries where they are wealthy enough to buy things they want. A lot of "alternative" measuring sticks are far more susceptible to political fiddling, or are meaningless. That doesn't make GDP the be-all and end-all of measuring how a country is doing, but it's not as bad as all that, either.

Wealth correlates with a lot of things, such as health and buying power. It's too large a stretch to say being able to buy things increases happiness. Perhaps just being wealthy enough to have good healthcare does it. Could be many things.

Wealth and good healthcare are not always correlated.

This is a classic example of the animism fallacy.

Lightning flash, terrifying thundercrack. The Invisible Skygod is mad!

All bunkum, of course. But it fits how humans usually think about the world: that every event has agency, has some directing cause which involves intelligence.

The idea that the world we see emerged from a massive, incomprehensible complex system? Bah. Can't be. I see the lightning and hear the thundercrack.

Must be the invisible trillionaires.

Incidentally, the only thing in this article that resembles classic marketing is the title. Straight out of the copywriting handbook.

I agree pretty much completely, even though the ultimate message is just fine. I found the claim that budget apartments are "designed to make you sick and impotent" particularly silly.

The author brings up ROI several times, but the ROI on subtly harming someone's health by (somehow) dictating housing design is laughably negligible. It's such a preposterously long con that any expected profit is lost in the entropy.

But if we take conspiracy theories as a constant, I do like this positive take on them.

Whilst the author pushes his point too far by declaring that there are "invisible millionaires" as you say, I think the general point is sound. We are continually pushed to consume, and the consumption is not necessary for us to be happy within society. It is the job of marketers and business to make us believe we need this stuff. By recognising this we are less likely to try and satisfy ourselves by buying the latest "whatever".

Personally, I think that people should be taught about capitalism and the actual workings of society in school fairly early on. Like, "you know when you see an advert? That may not necessarily be the whole truth. They're trying to sell you something so they can make a profit. This is not a bad thing. You should learn to do it too. This is how things work."

>But it fits how humans usually think about the world: that every event has agency, has some directing cause which involves intelligence. The idea that the world we see emerged from a massive, incomprehensible complex system? Bah. Can't be.

The two are not mutually exclusive :)

interesting thought: that the public ascribing events to incomprehensible forces is no better than cavemen inventing weather gods

never thought of it quite like that before

Consumerism dominates our culture. I used to think that pertained to the United States the most, but it is a global issue.

I have not had a job since March of 2012. You could say I lost my consumer power. I have made very few purchases outside of utilities, food, and other basics. It has been an eye opening experience to my own habits.

At first, I felt lost and out of touch with society. I could not make purchases like my friends and family. I did not have any new toys to show off or new clothing to wear this year. This past holiday season was the worst. As much as I disliked the holiday spending spree every year, being left out feels strange. The feeling that arises from lack of consumption is strange. It is as if society fixates on purchases and those purchases define your life(create milestone). I have not had any of those recently.

Today, I feel normal. Sometimes, I lust for new gadgets. But, most of the time, I never think about buying "stuff." If I was not in a committed relationship, I would be happy not being an avid consumer.

Maybe, it is just my brain adapting to the circumstances.

*My girlfriend, buys lots of things, she works in retail. I am not completely out of the consumption sphere.

How do you afford your utilities, food and other basics without a job? Freelance?

Two big events happened before I left my job. My car was taken from me, insurance labeled it a total loss. I received money from that. I was also hit by a car while riding my bike. This also provided me with some money. This money, has run out at this point.

I have done some freelancing for people, graphic design. I also help my girlfriend run her dog treat business. Arrfscarf.com

But most importantly, now that I have no income, she has been a huge help.

Even, when I go back to having spending power. Being jobless for over 8 months has given me a different perspective on consumption.

I'm an out of college CS grad that just hasn't been hired yet, but I didn't work some soul crushing service job in the meantime. I get what you are saying, though. Christmas was kind of awkward, I ended up spending more in a month than I did the rest of the year just to appease relations.

I've done freelance IT and did some community service since I graduated, but nothing making real buck. My total income in 2012 was like $6,000.

> But most importantly, now that I have no income, [my girlfriend] has been a huge help.

Ah, you must play bass...

I wish I played an instrument.

I intern for startup in Chicago. We help nonprofits receive donations. Zealousgood.com

> At first, I felt lost and out of touch with society......

Thank you for that perspective. It's extremely interesting to hear, and I hope others can experience the same.

If you are enjoying it, I suggest you go and live outside America for a few years. There are many developed countries that don't focus on consumerism like America does.

This is hands–down one of the best pieces I've ever read on the Internet.

I love the message of not hating "The Man". I've noticed in the past years more and more energy being wasted on hating things which are beyond our control (at least, they are if we only spend our energy on hating).

To focus instead on building our self-reliance (and creativity, etc.) is a brilliant take-away.

This is one of those bits of writing that didn't add any knowledge but reminds me of things I forget on a day-to-day basis.

This is a great post. My only disagreement is with the insinuation that the lack of universal healthcare in the US is there to intentionally trap people in unfulfilling jobs. While I agree that it sometimes has this affect, I think universal healthcare may actually make people even more dependent on the system the author is writing against, all while decreasing the quality of the health care we receive.

Great article though.

--Written from my budget apartment, while working on stuff I love

From my experience living and working in multiple countries, some with and some without universal healthcare - I'm shocked that a person's health can be tied to their employment. It's a disgrace, and it absolutely, 100% has the impact of trapping people to their job.

After 7 years in a country where health care is tied to employer, my brother moved to the other side of the world to a country with universal healthcare and within 3 days said "the biggest cultural difference I've noticed is how employees are treated... so much better here"

Without further information, your second paragraph sounds like a straightforward correlation/causation fallacy. Can you add context which might dispel that impression?

Sure. The more we talk about it, the more he notices the differences when an employer has to actually compete for employees, not the other way around.

People in that country get the same level of care if they have been employed full time for 10 years, or have never had a job, or whatever. Because of this, people are free to move between jobs, or even outright quit if they want, because they know their health will not suffer.

Nobody in that country discusses health or healthcare like it's an issue, because it's something they take for granted. It's a given.

With that in mind, imagine how differently the conversation goes when someone says something like "I'm thinking about working for a non-profit" or "I'm thinking about taking 2 years off to explore my creative talents", etc.

I know a woman who moved from the US to the Netherlands in part because she has severe asthma. There are periods when she cannot work for a month or three, and in the US she'd have trouble keeping her job during those, and then she'd have trouble paying for necessary healthcare. In the Netherlands paying for treatment is a non-issue.

The US economy lost a smart woman with good skills both as a programmer and a project manager because of this. Her contribution to the economy easily outweighs the cost of her health care...

I've lived in both situations (currently in the US) and I would say universal healthcare is absolutely essential for a first world nation to have. Tying it to your employment is most certainly a form of keeping people dependent.

The biggest concern I have is that there are many people in the US like you who simply cannot see this. It's a disgrace that a country as large and dominant as the US cannot take care of it's own. I honestly believe that the healthcare situation adds a strong undercurrent of stress to everyone's lives here in the US. It detracts from personal flexibility and makes things like extended travel or entrepreneurship even more risky.

Unless you've had the fortune of living with universal healthcare, it's difficult to understand the feeling of security knowing that no matter what happens to your health, you will be looked after without needing to go bankrupt in the process.

"I think universal healthcare may actually make people even more dependent on the system the author is writing against"

Please explain why you think that is, and why you think that universal healthcare is of lower quality. It sounds very much like an assumption fuelled by the sort of people (and "propaganda") the article speaks of.

From a global perspective, I'd argue that the relationship between employees and employers should be kept nice and simple, with employees being paid only cold hard cash, and using that cash to buy things like health care, nice lunches and equity.

Complicating the relationship starts to reduce the mobility of labour. In turn that introduces inefficiency and detracts from national productivity. Granted that reducing labour mobility may have local, short-term benefits for a single company, but averaged out it is a negative.

I agree completely. Health insurance from employer vs. health insurance from government is a false dilemma.

For a young, single, healthy person, independent health insurance is not an issue.

Once you have a whole family living under your umbrella and multiple medical history trails 10 years long to explain on your application, it can easily become your largest recurring expense.

Barring personal catastrophe and unless they fall into the consumption pattern described in the article, most continually-employed professionals are entirely capable of reaching a cash-only, everything's paid-for state by the age of 50, sooner if they don't go the marriage/family route.

Health insurance isn't one of those things to ever check off though. Your age increases your risk premium and all rates inflate every year so it costs more and more until you reach the Medicare age, and even then, it still doesn't go away.

If the US matched the rest of the civilized world with respect to healthcare, you can bet we'd see professional people more mobile and retiring sooner.

Amazing article. The most powerful method of marketing I've seen is that which blurs the line between "want" and "need", or between pain and discomfort. Then they put their product on the "need" side, or categorise your discomfort as real pain.

"You don't want a cell phone, you need it. Look, everyone around you has one, so it must be necessary!"

"Hey, that minor discomfort you have with [whatever]? You have every right to be in pain from it. Heck, you should go out right now and get diagnosed with a disorder we invented/coined last year. Oh by the way, we also have a drug that relieves the symptoms."

Concrete supporting example, deodorants: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/How-Advert...

Or Edward Bernay's "Torches of Freedom" campaign that made smoking cool for women.

Fuck the police, kill your television, and Like us on Facebook.

Originally posted on the author's blog, about 2 years ago

http://www.raptitude.com/2011/01/how-to-make-trillions-of-do...

Great resource. Thank you for sharing.

Very good article ! I am genuinely surprised that HN's positively reacts to blog posts like this while massively reacting against ad blocking initiatives. For example this HN news thread: France’s second-largest ISP deploys ad blocking via firmware update [1].

Can someone that like this article and dislike [1] explain me.

[1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5004621

As much as it burns my nose hairs to admit this ... HN is not a hivemind.

Different people will react to different things.

I agree with this, but I have the feeling that some people have mixed feelings regarding this problem. Hence my (rather precise) question: Can someone that like this article AND dislike [1] explain me.

Well, I agree with almost everything in this article that the system is designed to keep people unhappy & unhealthy, so that they're constantly buying things to rid themselves of both issues.

At the same time, I will never accept the idea of internet-content being filtered at the ISP level. I want 100% of the web-content to reach my computer. There, I will make the decision of what I want to see.

I am perfectly okay with adblocking, and run a very aggressive adblocker as well as requestpolicy and a click-to-play plugin blocker. That said, I really do not want my ISP to be making these decisions for me.

It's been a long time since I read an article I agree with so much.

The author makes a good introduction and really gets to the point about halfway through. Should have ended there. The rest is just repetitive.

I disagree. The first half explains the situation, the second half gives you options as far as dealing with it.

But the "explaining the situation" is a striking exposition of a relatively original perspective, whereas the "options for dealing with it" are the same shtick we read every week here on HN.

But looking at "the same schtick" given a new and original perspective is still worthwhile. You may notice aspects that weren't apparent earlier.

I loved everything about this post. Very enlightening

I didn't. Its a person with too many first world problems and a dash of conspiracy theories. ( high level marketers created the world we live in...ect)

+1 We live in a consumption economy, this is hardly a groundbreaking realisation.

> dash of conspiracy theories.

It doesn't matter if it's a conspiracy or not, the fact is it's a reality of the world we live in.

Acknowledgement of a problem is the first step to fixing it, or at the very least minimizing it's impact.

The conspiracy theory is central to the larger theory.

If you believe that the world we live in has one, or a few, central intelligences directing how it has unfolded, then it's relatively easily changed. Find those people, usurp their levers of power.

If it's bullshit and nobody anywhere has that kind of influence, then it's impossible to usurp the Secret Masters and use their mechanism.

So. Yeah. It matters to the argument if there's a conspiracy.

> it's relatively easily changed. Find those people, usurp their levers of power.

If it's so easy, could you please do us all a favor and usurp the levers of power of the Rothschilds, the Rockefellers, and Goldman-Sachs to start with? Waiting patiently, thanks!

If it's unclear, I am not a supporter of the Secret Masters interpretation of history or modern society.

> It matters to the argument if there's a conspiracy.

I don't believe it does. Taking the dot-points as fact (People work almost all the time, etc.), which I believe they are, then we accept that as the reality of our world, and we can make a choice to do something about it as individuals (i.e. stop buying stuff), or not (i.e. keep buying stuff).

For an individual to make that choice and take action, it makes no difference why that is the current reality of our world. It only matters that it is.

We don't need to usurp any powers from anybody (real or imagined), or use any kind of mechanism as you suggest, we just need to change our actions as individuals (if we decide we're not happy with the way things are) or keep doing what we're doing (if we're fine with the way things are)

While there may not be individuals out here masterminding the system the way the author describes, there are definitely people that know they are benefiting from our collective addition to consumption.

> (high level marketers created the world we live in...ect)

But... they did. That's the entire idea behind marketing and consumerism. They're paid to make us need a certain product or service. It's not paranoia.

God Complex. It's impossible to narrow down the cause of today's complex society to the work of marketers.

Yep, strictly college freshman dorm room BS.

The reality is, everybody working and consuming so hard makes it fairly easy for the occasional rebel to disengage, given the massive productivity of society overall. So quit complaining.

The article is a bit silly but there is an interesting tidbit. The observation that people can afford seemingly limitless trinkets that they don't really need while the necessities of life are quite expensive. Shouldn't something that literally everyone needs and thus is guaranteed a ubiquitous market and thus obscene rewards for innovation be cheap? Is there some iron rule of technology/market that says that innovations in these areas is impossible or prohibitively expensive?

There are multiple answers to this question, and I think it is worth meditating on.

Note that people who are outside the American madhouse, those who live in developing countries like the Philippines or China, very much want to adopt American customs.

Few of them want to live a monastic or back-to-nature lifestyle. These people can learn from Americans' experience, yet there is no mass movement to adopt the good part while staying relaxed, centered, and happy.

I'm not saying that they prefer employer-linked healthcare to single-payer, or that they want to be stressed-out and depressed, but they very much want TV, possessions, yuppie-style jobs, etc., without worrying too much about the alleged misery that we Americans experience.

And why is that? Where I live most of the year, on a mountain in nature, I see young people moving away all the time and their parents and grandparents wanting 'something better' for them. What is that something better? If you ask them, they all, without fail, come with examples from American tv shows on how they want to live or how they want their offspring to live. Nice suits, phones, cars, houses, etc. Why do people living of fantastic fresh fish, veg, olive(s) oil, cheese and people who saw their parents/grandparents walk up the mountain every day to get groceries or work the land so desperately want to grow incredibly fat on Burger King and have as highest goal to 'not do anything every again'?

I know they want this because they see it in tv shows because they tell me; it's considered 'being rich' to act and look like that. People who are complaining all the time to us that they cannot possibly pay the next month rent have huge flatscreens and DID buy another game console or phone with christmas. I don't know about the Philipines or China, but this is southern europe and it's very real. I think it's more or less the same there; you see people 'having fun' (it's a sitcom yo!) and believe that kind of wealth is something to go for.

I'm not saying we have to go back to nature; internet, mobile devices etc is fine. But to think that 2 SUVs, a huge house (what's on the top floor again? yeah no-one goes there ever) or two, almost certainly living on debt (it's one of those things designed to buy perceived happiness in exchange for money for the MAN) will make you happy is a delusion which is set forth by the media. If media for some reason would not put some much positive weight in consumerism, a lot of people here would be content doing what their parents/grandparents did. Now they are not; they have a hardpush drive to 'get what Americans take for granted' without really knowing why they want that.

Everything you're saying is true. But note that these people have had the opportunity to learn of the harmful effects of consumerism -- even if they watch TV shows, there are other sources of information that tell them the truth. Is everyone that stupid?

Have you ever thought about why they want that life & those things?

After spending 2 years in Central and South America, I honestly believe Hollywood is the best marketing department in the world.

In countless dirt-street shanty towns I would wander into the village store to find the locals crowded around a small fuzzy TV watching blonde-haired, blue-eyed Jennifer Anniston lament about her love life or some such, which driving a convertible down the sunny California coast, seemingly without a care in the world.

Who doesn't want that?

Never do you hear about the millions of homeless in America, the unacceptable percentage of children born into poverty, the millions without healthcare or the staggering number of people living on food stamps, just to name of few of the crippling problems facing America today. It's a marketing lie, and it works very, very well.

It was always enjoyable to meet locals that had been to America (mostly illegals), who knew to their core it was all a crock of shit. Every single one said "I don't ever want to go back, that place is horrible" - while living in a small farming town in rural South America.

The "culture of narcissism" wasn't invented after WWII and it's not even western. You could see the modern kind of moral decay even in Tokugawa Japan 200 years ago.

Great points. But: How do you make a living while combatting this?

I am torn on the question of universal medical coverage, for complex reasons that I imagine no one here wants to hear. I am wondering, though, if anyone has any ideas on how America could implement government funded, universal healthcare, what pitfalls we should look out for, etc.

I am a Canadian who has lived for several years in the U.S., and I now live in Australia. I can say unequivocally that despite its problems, socialized medicine (the Canadian system) is far superior to what I experienced in the U.S.. In Canada, I need health services, I go get it. Period. In the U.S., I have to make sure I go to the right doctor, deal with the insurance company, worry about weather the insurance company will actually pay, pick the right health plan in advance when I have little idea what I will need, et cetera. All of this when I am sick or injured and have bigger things to be worrying about.

I am not absolutely certain that socialized medicine is better than free market medicine, but the U.S. does not have a free market, they have a complex socialized system run by private insurance companies. The easiest thing to do would be to cut out the insurance companies and fund health care on a state or federal level (i.e. make a state run insurance company the single payer). Yes, taxes will go up, but again, in my experience, the percentage of my paycheque that was withheld was exactly the same in Canada and the U.S.. In Canada, it was called taxes while in the U.S., it was called an insurance premium. There was effectively no difference. Now, I know this solution is politically difficult as it puts private companies out of business, but it is far better for the people both individually and collectively to just plain not have to worry about healthcare.

Oh, I am abundantly familiar with the good points of federally funded healthcare. I have never* had to deal with health insurance as a consumer, though I paid insurance claims for five years. My father and ex husband were both career military and are both military retirees. I have been a military dependent my entire life. Given the length of my marriage, as long as I don't remarry, I am entitled to free medical coverage for life.

But: I nearly died twelve years ago. I am clear my excellent medical coverage, which helped me get good dental care, helped poison me. I have spent the last twelve years getting well instead of politely dying from my genetic disorder like the world would like me to do. I used to have an extremely good friend in Canada and I am abundantly familiar with the fact that Canadians who live along the border sometimes drive to the U.S. and pay out of pocket in order to get around the sometimes months long waiting lists common in Canada, and there is a complex relationship between the American system and the funding of drug research globally. As I understand it, in general terms, the U.S. takes the brunt of the costs of new drugs and pays crazy high brand name prices for a decade to cover the sunk cost of research and then after we have covered this essential cost, it becomes a generic and is marketed globally at much more reasonable prices. So it is possible that drug research could come to a virtual standstill if the American system changed.

Furthermore, military members, military retirees, and government employees operate under a very different system from general civilians. There isn't just one American system. And military service is, from what I gather, far more common in the U.S. than in many other countries.

So as I said initially: I am conflicted. I think it is far more complex than most people realize. But having worked for an insurance company, I am inclined to believe that if the world decided "health insurance" (edit: of the "major medical" variety) was the Darth Vader of our galaxy and should be hunted down and made extinct, most likely the world would be a better place. So I return to my original question: Anyone have any thoughts on how to accomplish that in the U.S.?

Thanks for replying and have an upvote.

* Except briefly when my husband was a recruiter and we were stationed somewhere without a base, but it was still different from what civilians live with.

It's already implemented. Medicare is accepted almost nation-wide, there's no system to build. The main opposition isn't logistical, it's ideological.

With the enshrinement of private insurance as a legal mandate, this will never change. That's a padlock on the coffin of universal healthcare.

This article didn't actually give useful information on how to make trillions of dollars or on how anyone else has done so.

Am I the only one who finds irony in the fact that he recommends throwing out the things with a low ROI yet at the bottom of the article he recommends "liking" the blog on Facebook?

The original article on the author's blog asks for an email address at the bottom of every article. http://www.raptitude.com/2011/01/how-to-make-trillions-of-do...

Different people have different goals in life. Just because others chase GDP or work all day doesn't mean that you have to.

Poster here - just to be clear, I'm not the author - I just came across it on Reddit, and figured it would resonate here.

Is this an homage to the Rothschilds?

great points on life skills, understanding marketing motivation, worthless hate. i don't believe the author is implying a conspiracy theory - but maybe i'm missing it - do we need conspiracy for each marketer to do their job?

if you liked this post I'd recommend reading Prosperity without Growth - http://www.sd-commission.org.uk/publications.php?id=914

Good article. Counter-cultural without being conspiritorialist.

Where is our modern day Victor Lebow to set a new paradigm?

It's amazing to me how much expense comes out of fear.

For example, one of the reasons why Manhattan real estate is so expensive is that people feel a need to live here in order to keep up their professional status. Not to limit their commutes, but because the really evil law and financial firms stop promoting you as soon as you move off the island. So they spend $5 million on a house, as opposed to, for example, not working for douchebags.

Where this is worst in New York is in the private school industry. $40,000 per year is market now, and it starts in nursery school. On no data whatsoever, parents now spend half a million out of fear that if their kids go to public schools, they won't be able to get into the top colleges and get good jobs. New Yorkers, take note that people in the rest of the country think you're a giant douchebag if you spend $40,000 on a nursery school.

The Bush years were awful for political reasons-- curtailment of civil liberties, illegal wars, disastrous morale-- but, economically, this past decade would actually be a fairly good time for the U.S. if the Satanic Trinity-- healthcare, housing, and tuition-- of costs were better controlled.

> It's amazing to me how much expense comes out of fear.

If you are amazed by that, I suggest you spend a chunk of time outside America. The rest of the world is not run by fear.

I spent last week in America, and was amazed by how pervasive that culture is there.

The distinction is unclear to me. What test can I apply when observing someone taking an action to determine whether or not they did it out of fear?

You can monitor the inputs to their decision making to see if fear is a factor.

In the rest of the developed world the news, TV, radio and media in general do not talk of things that create fear. Advertising is not based on fear. People do not talk of losing their job. People do not talk of going bankrupt (or financial trouble) because of health care/university loans. People do not talk about home invasions or terrorist attacks like they are a real thing.

In short, fear is not an input to the decision making process in developed countries. It is an extremely strong input in America.

So people in France, Israel, UK do not talk about terrorism as if it's a real thing? Wow, interesting, did not know that. So, people in Greece don't ever have economic stresses? Interesting. There are some really great points here that have no basis in reality. :) This is just ridiculous. The vast majority of Americans do not live in Glenn Beck level paranoia but Europe is not immune to the same stress producers that exist in the U.S.

> The vast majority of Americans do not live in Glenn Beck level paranoia but Europe is not immune to the same stress producers that exist in the U.S.

Are you speaking from your own experience, or just guessing?

I just spent a week in America, and I was dumbfounded by the amount of fear the media generates, daily.

It's a survival mechanism. The rest of the world is in denial.

survival from what?

I'm not sure that's the whole story. There are lots of reasons to live in Manhattan. Being able to walk or take a quick bus to work is one. Wanting to live in a modern building is another (although there are finally some coming up in Brooklyn). By far the overriding thing keeping Manhattan real estate prices high is housing regulation. Given the density of Manhattan, it should look like Hong Kong in terms of high rise construction. But instead, there are vast tracts of land below 96th street wasted on low-rise, pre-war apartments that have zero historical value (former tenement housing).

As for schooling, I think it's about fear but I think you're incorrect about the subject of the fear. These days, basically the only kids left in public schools are the kids whose parents can't afford to send them somewhere else. High-income city dwellers do not want their kids going to school with recent immigrants, poor minorities, etc. It's ugly tribalism, but when it comes to housing and schooling choices it's a driving force.

By far the overriding thing keeping Manhattan real estate prices high is housing regulation.

I'd argue it's actualy the proximity to wealth. Hamptons is not regulated, and look at their prices. Finance, Law, medicine, and Media are all either pyramid pay or actual legal monopoly businesses. The rest is made on inside information, that stems from access that wealth brings to political, academic, and philanthropic circles. Not that there is anything wrong with that, its just how the 'world works' in many ways.

In any event, real estate is the ante to play the game. The proximity to power breeds value for two reasons: lust (in those who lack power) and practicalities (for those who have power, and want to keep it). Its worth noting that owning real-estate is about excluding other people from using it. High real estate prices force out competitors that migh otherwise use the assets to create a competing culture.

That's a plausible explanation, but I'm not sure I totally buy it. Chicago is the #2 financial center in the country, arguably the #2 legal center, home to major pharma companies, and just chock full of old industrial money. Yet, real estate in the Northside is a lot cheaper than many cities that are far less dominated by finance/law/medicine money. Houston is full of oil and CEO money and is also quite cheap. What's the difference between Chicago/Houston and say Seattle? Wealth? Or housing regulation?

Yeah, it's always appeared to me that the main driver is geography. And housing regulation is pretty much the same thing—having more high-rise housing on Manhattan would keep prices down in the same way that being able to build further and further out does for DFW.

I'm very interested to see what DFW looks like in a couple of decades if it keeps growing rapidly. Will it be a sort of sprawl of still-low-density suburbia for over a hundred miles E/W or N/S? Will a significant density increase in the core eventually come after hitting some kind of "maximum suburb distance" for most people? Currently it's at about half the number of people as the LA area in a similar footprint, but unlike LA it's not surrounded by mountains and ocean and could keep growing outward forever.

I wouldn't say regulation is the same as geography. For one, it's self-imposed. Second, it costs a lot less to build up than to build out. Note that Chicago has a very densely built core, even though it has no real barriers to sprawl to the north, west, or south. That's the result of (lack of) regulation plus good urban planning.

Right, I overstated the equivalency, I should've said something like "plays a similar role."

But, does it still cost less to build up than out, in a city with nearby land for the cheap, taking into account that you have to build your upward development in a way to be competitive with 2000+ square foot houses and yards? There's definitely some upwards building being done in the cores of the cities in Texas, but a whole lot more building out. Overcoming the lack of urban planning in the past is where it would get pricey, and need a lot of buy-in.

Would you say the relative cheapness of housing in a lot of Chicago compared to more mountain- or water-locked cities has more to do with the planning/regulatory environment or with the open geography on the non-lake sides?

I guess my point is there is more to it than just geography. Clearly the availability of cheap land lowers the price of housing, but Chicago is more densely built than say Seattle or Portland while also being cheaper. The downtown core is comparably dense to San Francisco but much cheaper.

it costs a lot less to build up than to build out

This is another fair point, but consider the land is massively more expensive. The dynamic is relative scarcity and bargaing power. The more scarcity, the more the economics look like monopoly on the underlying asset. At that stage, the cost of building out is sort of second order.

The other examples, such as London, Geneva, and SF have a combination of massive wealth (in both flow and assets stocks) combined with constraints on the ability to build due to geography/history/etc.

I agree some of ths (like greenbelt and listed buildings in london) is by way of law, but most rent control follows from the combination of scarcity/wealt co-existing prior to legislative means to "provide access". In other words, those laws follow the sort of self-evident understanding that if left unchecked, the dynamic of quasi-monopoly rents being extracted from the real-estate market will lead to all kinds of bad things down the road (social tension, and its variants, primarily).

The other counter-example perhaps to chicago or LA is tokyo (which is pretty spread out). But again, there is a social dynamic of scarcity (JP is very hiercarchial/aristocratic society) and Tokyo is both the financial/business and political capital of JP. Even in the 80's the somewhat absurd cost/ft did not hinder people from needing to be in Tokyo for their careers. Rather, the all just gave up having more than 1 kid to afford the astronomical cost of living. A generation later, the population growth is almost not feasible given the entrnched cost structure of real-estate and the need for the few young (workers) to support the many old (retired).

After the 3/11 quake, I did a lot of thinking about what would happen if Tokyo became unlivable .. It, basically, freaked me out. There's a lot of Japan stuck in just one spot..

There's only so much Manhattan land, whereas Chicago is enormous and spreads out for hundreds of miles. Same goes for Houston and Seattle, but more importantly is the distance from New York or Los Angeles.

You're absolutely correct in your analysis of the housing situation. I was only citing the prestige factor as one of the contributing causes.

It's a mixture of regulatory corruption and price inelasticity. Prestige is just one of many Manhattan's demand drivers that, due to the inelastic nature of the price curve, drives it up.

Regarding school, I think it's both. The question is why these rich people don't want their kids going to school with such people. I think it still comes down to college (and possibly prep high school; nothing before HS matters from a connections perspective) admissions. If college admissions gave as much of an advantage to white, middle-class students of NYC public schools as they do to Andover and Dalton grads, these people would quickly change their strategy.

What "white, middle-class students of NYC public schools?" The school system in Manhattan is only 14% white, and almost three-quarters of students qualify for free or reduced price lunches. It goes a lot deeper than just college admissions.

>If college admissions gave as much of an advantage to white, middle-class students of NYC public schools as they do to Andover and Dalton grads, these people would quickly change their strategy.

That's the kicker, the average white, middle class student in NYC can't compete with the public school kids @ Stuyvesant and Bronx Science where minority enrollment is 70%+, they are getting their asses handed to them by Asian students. Hence the flight to private schools where tuition is the same as private universities to keep the immigrant kids at bay. I should know, I was one of those immigrant kids in prep school and would've been eaten alive if I attended public HS.

I'd read somewhere that the pattern of where skyscrapers can and cannot be built in Manhattan has to do with the depth of the bedrock at various places on the island.

EDIT - Apparently this has been 'debunked', although the debunking might just be an alternate theory. http://observer.com/2012/01/uncanny-valley-the-real-reason-t...

The Satanic Trinity-- healthcare, housing, and tuition. 3 markets that are subject to massive government intervention and subsidization. Just saying.

Utter nonsense. I used to work for an "evil" financial firm in Manhattan and almost every executive I knew that had a family lived outside the city.

Not all financial firms are evil. Not all evil firms have that prejudice. However, there are evil firms that do.

Are you just making this up as you go? You're completely wrong. Getting in/out of Manhattan is painful from just about anywhere. It's usually a minimum of hour door to door. If you're working 10-12hr days, you'll pay for the easy subway commute. However, there are plenty of very successful people that do commute from NJ, CT, and Westchester.

The solution to expensive Manhattan real estate is better mass transit. Imagine getting on a train 30 miles from the island and arriving at your office 30 minutes later. What kind or a miracle would this take?

There's no doubt that the commute is hellish, but the people who can afford to buy housing in Manhattan are not working 10+ hour days. The IBD analysts and associates are bidding up rents, for sure, but price-rent ratios are ridiculous (35+ years) and they have no part in that.

The solution to expensive Manhattan real estate is better mass transit.

That would be a huge win.

Thanks for this enlightening article. I now know hot to make my first million.

Thanks again mate for posting this here on Hacker news.

Only one way to make trillions of dollars, be born into the Rothschild family or marry into them. They are worth trillions and own banks and own a lot of nations' debts. Because they own a lot of debt, they charge huge interest rates on them, and profit from them a lot.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rothschild_family

I was under the impression that a Government sells a bond, with a interest rate the Government sets. How would the Rothschild family buy bonds (Government debt) and ask for a higher interest rate than that was set in the first place?

Government goes to market wanting to sell ~6b of bonds at as low an interest rate as they can achieve. So if the market buys at 1% they take it, if the market only offers 7% then they take it (if it is below the rate threshold at which they won't sell)

If the Gov doesn't sell enough then it defaults as most debt buys are in part to pay off old debt, we saw this within the Eurozone where Spain has to buy at a much much higher rate than it would like.

Rothschild can simply refuse to buy below a set rate, and if the Gov needs their money at that rate then they buy. But it is not really demanding a higher rate?

(I am not an asset manager)

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