Tag
Economics
Every article tagged Economics across the Atmosphere.
29articles
Articles
Publications
Another test the ATmosphere
"The implications of all this are profound. First, our understanding of political risk has to change. We are no longer dealing with actors who are constrained by norms, expectations, or even basic human decency. Second, the institutional safeguards that we assumed would provide protection look increasingly fragile. If those in power are willing to ignore...economicsarticle
BRIDGES ARE SOCIALISM
The great MetLife Stadium walking debate, why a bridge is not about crossing a road, but because bridges are socialism.AMERICACAPITALISM
Clinging on to sanity
"The implications of all this are profound. First, our understanding of political risk has to change. We are no longer dealing with actors who are constrained by norms, expectations, or even basic human decency. Second, the institutional safeguards that we assumed would provide protection look increasingly fragile. If those in power are willing to ignore...accountabilitycapitalism
The Iran economic shock is coming. How to protect yourself
https://youtu.be/Oi265I48MdI?si=xFJEEFLBd3XMjGUg "Here's me in the UK, which is probably the least prepared country in the world for an energy price crisis, right? Massively dependent on imported energy, hasn't built up its own energy storage, doesn't have an enormous amount of reserves of energy like other countries like Japan or Korea have, which it probably should...affordabilityausterity
The SaaS Landscape in 2026
Risks, Global Challenges, and Strategybusiness modelscloud computing
Social media’s dirty secret: they don’t use it
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ebMm8stexM "But when you frame it that way, you understand that social media isn't the problem: the extractive profit motive is the problem. And then, banning under-16s is like putting a plaster on a bullet wound. Sure, maybe it helps a bit, but you're still bleeding out. The real question is, how do you stop...algorithmsbluesky
AI Won’t Create Beautiful Art
Artists Should Tap the Potential of New Technologyartartificial intelligence
AI nie stworzy pięknej sztuki
Artyści powinni wykorzystać potencjał nowej technologiiartartificial intelligence
AI and the corporate capture of knowledge
"A society cannot meaningfully debate policy, science or justice if information is locked away behind paywalls or controlled by proprietary algorithms. If we allow AI companies to profit from mass appropriation while claiming immunity, we are choosing a future in which access to knowledge is governed by corporate power rather than democratic values." Bruce Schneier...aaronswartzai
The Jevons Trap
AI is creating more demand for knowledge work even as it makes workers obsolete. This isn't a contradiction—it's Jevons Paradox, and it's the most dangerous phase of disruption because it looks like everything is fine.AIfuture-of-work
How These 3 Powerful Economic Ideas Nudged My Career In A Better Direction!
Why Switching Costs, Loss Aversion, and the Sunk Cost Fallacy can hold back your career and how to push past them.writingeconomics
The White Collar Disruption
For two centuries, automation displaced blue collar workers while knowledge workers remained safe. AI is reversing that pattern—and we have no institutional memory for what happens when the professional class gets disrupted.AIfuture-of-work
We're All Software Developers Now
After 30 years building software, I've never seen anything like the current pace of AI-driven change. What does it mean when 900 million people have access to tools that make them developers?AIsoftware-development
SaaS is Becoming Restaurants
On the commoditization of software and what persists when building gets cheap.technologyeconomics
Chip War
God decided where the oil reserves are, we get to decide where the fabs are. Chip War offers many interesting anecdotes about the state of the global chip industry, it's founding and development. It spends much of its time laboring over not only the technology but the interdependence of all the players in it. It is a war, perhaps, but a cold one and one fought via IP theft, sanctions, government subsidies and a détente that exists by virtue of everyone being dependent on TSMC . There's a distinctly American political undertone to this whole book, however. The author repeatedly calls out government subsidies that advantaged foreign chip makers, while having no expressed qualms about American chip makers working with the US military and government. Technology is core to national security, economic growth and the modern digital hellscape in which we find ourselves. I understand the thesis, the motivations of all players and learned quite a bit about the creation of modern chips. I'm less convinced about the geopolitics. Reading this made me think back to reading Apple in China which illustrates Cupertino's reliance on China, but Chip War makes that position on Apple's part look less clear cut (at least where chips are concerned). This is a worthwhile read, but I could've done with more objectivity and less American political boosterism.economicstech
Fight Oligarchy
Fight Oligarchy is both brief and direct. Bernie Sanders, while imperfect, is one of the more inspiring political figures on the left in the United States. (The actual left, not the center occupied by a democratic party that's more akin to where the republican party was in the 80s.) What he presents here is the rapid-fire identification of the problem of rising global oligarchy and wealth inequality (which everyone can plainly see growing worse and worse at a rapid clip), a handful of anecdotes about his tour that shared a name with his book and some suggested solutions. How we achieve these solutions, I'm not so clear given the barriers that money can buy and put in place of their enactment. I find Sanders' relentlessness inspiring (if only we'd elected him when we had the chance) and his proposed solutions of guaranteeing basic human needs, capping individual wealth, enacting fair tax schemes to all be honorable goals. I'd start there, however and go further in developing a society that actually works for the vast majority of people that it's comprised of. Sanders urges working class solidarity and local political involvement. I agree that those are essential. I'd love to see all of this change, but I'm not sure I can see the light on the horizon no matter how much I squint.economicspolitics
The Last Class
Pessimism is fine, cynicism is not. This is such a thoughtful and touching documentary given its brief runtime. It's scoped to Robert Reich's final semester teaching at UC Berkeley and works incredibly well in showing how the class comes together and the students take it all in. Reich is undeniably charming and charismatic, cares deeply about his students and refuses to have his optimism blunted. This made me miss going to class at the small CSU I attended. I had a wildly different college experience, but that nostalgia is hard to shake. I envy the students who got to take his class (my wife being among them).economicspolitics
Enshittification
Here's the natural history of enshittification: First, platforms are good to their users. Then they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers. Next, they abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves. Finally, they have become a giant pile of shit. Cory Doctorow is an invaluable tech critic, writer and advocate (he also spells his name correctly). Enshittification isn't cliché, it's simply pervasive and Doctorow lays out a clear, easy to understand argument for this, having originated the term. Everything is getting worse as companies twiddle and extract rents. Apple has gone from selling devices, to spying on their users, advantaging their services over those of their rivals, hindering the adoption of web technology to push software distribution threw its app stores and fighting necessary, corrective regulation at every turn. Streaming services promised value and a better experience only to claw that back into what amounts to cable over a different delivery mechanism. Everything we've relied on has gotten worse. You aren't allowed to repair anything. Any media you once owned is now forced through channels where you have to rent it in perpetuity. It's all increasingly difficult to escape. Repair and interoperability should be fundamental rights, but these companies use every lever available to them to fight both. Doctorow advocates for these solutions, he advocates for right to repair, for unionization, for adversarial interoperability, for freedom from these decaying, extractive platforms. All of this will be difficult to achieve, but all of this is necessary as the unacceptable alternative is to remain trapped in these platforms as they get worse and worse. This is an essential read for the moment we find ourselves in.economicstech
Apple in China
This was a fascinating read not necessarily for the details of the centralization of Apple's decision to move nearly all of its manufacturing to China, but for the context, pressure and politics caught up in that decision. What it lays out is a step by step retelling of how the process started as Apple fought for its life in the 90s, to efforts on the part of Chinese manufacturers and government officials to capture it. This isn't about intellectual property theft, strictly speaking, its about Apple willingly transferring that knowledge willingly to advance its business ends. The author repeatedly mentions Cupertino and Washington's interests diverging, but the former doing that is a product of the latter's historical drive to deregulate and allow private companies to do whatever the hell they like in pursuit of profit. That regulatory pattern has waxed and waned, but the overwhelming trend has been towards allowing private companies at all costs. What this policy trend failed to grasp was that welcoming China to the world trade organization and broader global economy as a means to move it towards a more open democracy would fail so spectacularly. The CCP understood the opportunity and exploited it. Their grip on power strengthened, their long term plan to transfer knowledge to local industry worked masterfully and Apple's been both a willing and naive partner. I'm writing this on a MacBook Air, using an attached Apple bluetooth keyboard and trackpad, an Apple Watch on my wrist, an AirPod in my ear and an iPhone resting atop an iPad next to my keyboard. My desk is routed with Apple cables. I don't rely heavily on Apple's services but I'm buried in their hardware. I knew where it came from, I didn't understand the finer points and Apple in China brilliantly lays out the case that — outside of extraordinary profits — China's Apple strategy is an existential risk that wasn't always well understood internally. Apple's trying to diversify their manufacturing but, at their scale, that's a truly massive task. Should they succeed, they may simply diversify their dependency on foreign manufacturers. That's an improvement. It spreads risk around, but they're certainly in a precarious position for the foreseeable future.economicstech
I BUY, THEREFORE I AM
Neoliberalism Sale: Buy Now! - Why not borrow against a future you’ll never own?CAPITALISMECONOMICS
Chokepoints
This was a thorough, engaging and — at times — dry explanation of sanctions and modern US and western economic warfare. The author builds a compelling case for the use of economic weapons, but makes a compelling case that they need to be used cooperatively and timed appropriately. There are isolated cases where this isn't true, such as the US taking action to shut a bank facilitating money laundering off from the broader financial system in a targeted act of financial warfare against North Korea. But, broadly speaking, the weapons in question are at their most effective when properly coordinated with allies to help squeeze a given target and prevent end runs around sanctions or other workarounds to mitigate their impacts. Sometimes this cooperation was willing, in other cases it was coerced as when the US threatened any and all banks doing business with Iran in an effort to damage its economy. Fishman also lays out a detailed case explaining the use of sanctions and controls aimed at curbing China's influence by targeting both Huawei and ZTE. Trump engaged in quite a bit of unilateral economic action against China in his first term targeted specifically at their tech industry. He spent a lot of time ranting about trade deficits like the bellicose idiot he is, but the practical focus was on tech. The section on the effort to curtail Russia's military ambitions with respect to Ukraine is particularly detailed and compelling. In this case the US had time to prepare their choice of economic weapons as Russia had broadcast its ambitions well in advance via both intelligence failures and its theft of Crimea. So, where does one find leverage with a country as vast and powerful as Russia? The US elected to sanction its central bank while also cutting it off from SWIFT, severing it from international banking. From there, it carefully crafted measures to drive down Russia's oil and gas income, while trying not to disrupt the global economy. To do this, the US and its allies sanctioned companies supporting the sale of Russian oil and gas in cases where the price exceeded $60/barrel (specifically insurance and shipping providers). Has this stopped the war? No, not hardly, but it's certainly tamped down the financial muscle Russia can put behind it. Sadly, the book concludes before the return of the mad king and his wanton application of tariffs and related policy failures. Said failures are borne out of economic illiteracy and all of the lessons learned during a life spent failing upwards while slapping your stupid name on trash products. Tariffs on. Tariffs off. Tariffs on. Tariffs off. Turns out this time the target of the warfare is the voting public.economicspolitics
Everything flows from economics. It shouldn't.
In the US, at the very least, everything flows from economics with market and financial concerns placed first. It's always been that way. It shouldn't. It's led to a societal death spiral. Selfishness is treated as though it's a virtue. Perhaps not explicitly, but certainly implicitly.economicspolitics