I was thinking about this today. I think this is fundamentally different than the situation during the pandemic recession or the 2008 crash. In both of those cases there were parts of the US economy that were growing and the crash occurred elsewhere, not affecting them directly. Once the capital/labour problems were resolved, the growing parts of the economy kept growing, the stock market recovered reflecting the expected future profits from those growing parts. This time around the only thing that's growing is the thing that's under threat of destruction. Thus once it dies, there's no obvious other bit of the economy to throw money at that could expand and grow productively. So I think given Trump and his sycophants predispositions, this one is gonna last significantly longer than the previous two before a growing part of the economy emerges and recovery is seen. I don't think they'll have the ideological predisposition to begin massive infrastructure projects with public employment, which is a known working solution. I think if the AI bubble pops they're in for a bad time for a while, and anyone else who's hitched to this wagon, like us (Canada), and it might look more like 1929 than 2008.
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It's almost as the good old real work where you produce goods and services has been forgotten. I mean since a long time, but it worked out okay because people still worked and ofset the bullshit jobs (office, lots in finances, rich parasites etc), maybe we're at the cusp of something new?
Personally I think we're about to get another reminder that Marx was right. But we'll see.
People will try to push the old stuff that didn't work like communism etc. I hope there will be something new, like take the best of the known systems sort of thing. One can dream eh ☺️
Oh I'm not even talking about him regarding communism. I'm referring to Marx'es most significant work - the analysis of the workings of the capitalist system. He (they) created that work (Das Kapital and related works) in the mid-1800s. I'm reading and it describes in striking accuracy what's happening around us today, often with uncanny predictive ability.
So, any new fresh ideas 😁 ?
Ima ask AI and get right back to you.
One other theory I've heard is that the oligarch class are searching for a radically disruptive tech in terms of economic impact (mass market home computers, internet, smartphones), but there is no guarantee that "AI" will be as disruptive or offer the same ROI values.
Oh yeah, they are def doing that. I think this theory answers the question of why they're doing what they're doing. Why they piled up money in various tire fires since the Great Recession, the latest one being AI. And if the ROI doesn't show signs that there's ungodly money to be made in AI, the money would move elsewhere, by selling off AI assets, thus crashing AI asset prices (NVIDIA stock, OpenAI valuations, etc.) Once that occurs, if it occurs, is where my hypothesis begins. I'm basically saying that there isn't an obvious thing for them to throw money at, at similar rate they're throwing it to AI. If there's nowehere for them to throw money at as they take it out of AI. Nothing will grow until they find something new, since we know the rest of the economy isn't growing.
BTW, perhaps less obviously, if AI actually shows it would return the huge ROI the market is expecting, I really don't see how that ROI actually going to materialize. At first there will be high returns as firms displace workers with AI, partially (more work per worker, layoff some) or fully. But as more and more firms do this, I highly doubt the economy would be able to quickly find jobs of equivalent pay for all those laid off workers. That means rising unemployment and/or deskilling/downward mobility/lower pay. Which means lower aggregate demand. Which means at one point there won't be enough demand to buy the output of the firms displacing workers with AI. At that point they won't be able to get further returns on their AI investment. That would also likely produce an economic crisis and social unrest as it has in the past.
Agreed, much of the American-style faux-optimism is based on the ignorance of history.
Push the plebs too far and there is some risk that they will rebel. No LLM or smartphone is going to change that.
We’re a lot more comfortable these days though. I think more people are struggling and stressed, but what counts as poverty is still better than the poverty of 1900s recession, as living standards have risen. It’s when people get hungry that violence begins and I don know that enough people are hungry to cause violent upheaval. It’s a good thing, but a lesson to the ruling class about the limits hey can push.
However, with Trump in control, I don’t know that those limits will be as precise or as considered. So, we may speedrun to it.
As a counter arguement (not necessarily in the US context), commoners in say 1100 had it way worse than than commoners in 1900.
By 1900 there were already certain moral standards and expectations, nothing like we have now especially in more developed countries, but in comparison 1900 is much closer to 2025 than to 1100.
Yes, and it's all relative to what we see and expect. There has been a general trend of improving living standards. However, since the boomer generation, there has been a continued rise in standards but their kids are the first, in the west, that didn't necessarily have a step up in standards apart from technological advances. Food and shelter being huge and sanitation being effectively solved.
This time around the only thing that’s growing is the thing that’s under threat of destruction. Thus once it dies, there’s no obvious other bit of the economy to throw money at that could expand and grow productively.
Tariffs are expanding and growing productively.
☠️
Totally not a bubble. Trust me, bro!
Everyone involved knows it's a bubble. They're just banking on not being left holding the bag when it pops. Remember, the survivors of the dotcom crash made out like bandits.
"It's a good bubble."
This time, it's different!
Just one more data center bro, I promise we'll get AGI there bro, trust me.
The US likely has many years of recession to look forward to. There might even be a civil war. The country is utterly broken and the ones to blame are capitalists and useful idiots preaching and implementing their propaganda (neoliberalism and its even more degenerated derivates).
This is the exact type of shit you read near the peak of a bubble.
it's this the first bubble, where investment is done not due to speculation.
but because we all know we're in a massive financial crisis but they continue to invest in order to pretend it isn't there?
I think it's still speculation. They're speculating that the naysayers are wrong and that AI will allow firms to produce a lot more with less people.
Honestly I'm not even sure half of them are speculating. They're just thinking themselves smarter than the others, that they'll be able to ride the wave and exit just when the bubble bursts.
And I guess that they'll probably manage thanks to having their noses glued to the screens and the bagholders will be pension funds and regular people.
You're probably right, especially for the fattest cats. They will survive and probably prosper as they buy up parts of the economy they don't already on at a discount.
it has been so obvious that it won't.
so many major glitches, companies rehiring their programmes.
it is so obvious that we are in a massive crisis, but investment is still going so they can pretend it isn't
Well, yeah, when management is made up of dumbasses, you get this. And I'd argue some 90% of all management is absolute waffles when it comes to making good decisions.
AI can and does accelerate workloads if used right. It's a tool, not a person replacement. You still need someone who can utilise the right models, research the right approaches and so on.
What companies need to realise is that AI accelerating things doesn't mean you can cut your workforce by 70-90%, and still keep the same deadlines, but that with the same workforce you can deliver things 3-4 times faster. And faster delivery means new products (let it be a new feature or a truly brand new standalone product) have a lower cost basis even though the same amount of people worked on them, and the quicker cadence means quicker idea-to-profits timeline.
the reason they are investing so much. it's because LLM are really good at brown nosing executives
What they include and exclude when deciding recessions, inflation and other economic issues is really a black art. Investment in data centres and dodgy sw really affects the economy 🤭
Jason Furman, Economist and former Deputy Director of the US National Economic Council, estimated in a New York Times podcast that 92 percent of the economic demand in the first two quarters of this year came from information processing equipment and software.
"Ultimately, what we're really hoping for is that AI shows up on the supply side of the economy, actually helping us do more with less," he said. Some of that is happening, he claimed, "but there hasn't been anything particularly special about productivity growth to date."
I am assuming that the 92% refers to "net new" economic demand, not total.
This is damning for AI hucksters and conmen. The worse thing is that since many of them are based in the US, not a single one will be prosecuted (how many financial fraud conmen were prosecuted under Obama?)