dead cat bouncing, page-28

Good thought provoking post for a for a Sunday night Volt. Some responses:

"Yet I believe those with knowledge of history understand that earth shattering changes to nations and the world in general do happen."

Yes I agree - however we also have a tendency to magnify the events of our day to make them appear more earth shattering than they actually are. Take the Iraq war for example - how can that possibly compare to World War I and 2 (unless you are Iraqi)? Total coalition deaths in Iraq are less than 5000 - in World War 2 there were tens of millions of deaths and the suffering of the civilian populations incomparable. Vietnam and Korea were also relatively insignificant yet still have a strong influence on our sense of history. You aren't seeing starvation and internal displacement as a result of recession in the US, and aren't likely to. Comparisons to the great depression are way overblown. I expect this is the result of our increasing "connectedness" and exposure to the media. It will be interesting to see how much of a self-reinforcing feedback loop can be generated and how much of a crisis manufactured, as our current worries are trivial compared to those faced by previous generations. I know that EWers will say that the the social mood will create the reality - but I'm yet to be convinced.


"I suspect that the day of the boasting Porsche driving money fiddler will succumb to the producer of goods or services as it should be."

The modern world provides a twist: perhaps the Porsche driving money fiddler may have been a hedge fund manager who has been making his cash shorting the stocks owned by the worker's superannuation fund? The market is amoral, "workers" have been co-opted into the capitalist system and are willing participants in the markets.