How To Reconcile the Power Law with Normal Distribution
Two curves are the heart of the tension between capitalism and communism in democracy - how will authentic humanity and artificial intelligence shape the future?
Comrades: Democracy is a reconciliation of the power law with the normal distribution.
The power law is accelerating. Wealth is more concentrated than ever. Thanks to AI, smaller groups of top performers can now generate more income in shorter periods of time. The 80/20 Pareto principle has shifted even further to a world where the top 1% dominate most markets. Every sphere from Silicon Valley to Wall Street, Hollywood to Substack, energy to defense all have a relatively few companies and leaders that create the most value and gains. The highest standard deviation of the normal distribution reaps the rewards for their talent and agency.
On the macro level, Western democracies are strained by the acceleration of these trends. The wealthy have always paid more than their fair share to keep the system afloat. In the US, the top 1% pays half of the taxes. Mitt Romney was pilloried for warning us about this stat. Politicians pander to the half of the population that does not pay taxes and votes for more handouts. When they take control of governments, they still spend far more than they steal. Printing money to paper over record deficits leads to more inflation and poverty, which leads to more dependent voters and money printing. We are reaching the tipping point to mob rule with a Marxist government that has a monopoly on violence - that has never ended well. New York, London, and Hong Kong - the 3 global hubs of capitalism - are now ruled by Communists.
The Communist solution is to seize even more to redistribute to their cronies. Their utopia is to flatten all the curves. The only thing they work hard for is to steal money. Equity means “From each according to their ability, to each according to their needs.” The electorate of major cities has stratified to the point where only a few thousand families cover the entire budget. If conditions deteriorate enough, they leave and a death spiral ensues where shortfalls lead to even lower quality of life for the residents who don’t have the means to escape. Politics is downstream of culture and culture is downstream of economics. We should do everything we can do subvert their subversion across society.
On a micro level, we must optimize what we can control for. In an age of artificial intelligence, authentic humanity will matter more than ever. Raise families that will value building and beauty instead of destroying and ugliness. Have fun in real life with them and your friends. Forge high trust communities. Keep your mind and body strong. Support local craftsmanship of unique, high quality items. Adapt with agency and motivation to create a unique skill stack and network. Become irreplaceable and ungovernable. That is the key to happiness.
No one is coming to save us, but no one is stopping us either. We have the ability to thrive in whatever path we choose. The sovereign individual is the only thing we can bet on. We can either get steamrolled by what's coming or ride it like a wave. The age of institutions is dead. The age of agency is here.
Which way will we go? Here are 3 extremes:
Develop Authentic Intelligence - don’t fall in love with a bot:
How To Develop Authentic Intelligence
Comrades: Human Authentic Intelligence is far superior to machine artificial intelligence.
We stratify people in terms of income, when we should measure value.
Hilary and Trump are both rich. Hilary has produced absolutely nothing in her entire lifetime. Trump has developed real estate worth billions of dollars. Regardless of wealth, I respect productive people. People who, like Hilary, live off of other people's efforts are what is sinking our country.
For some sick reason, we are judging people by their level of income instead of their level of productivity.
I agree with a lot of what you're saying here, but I think something important is missing: Kamala raised lots of money from wealthy donors. There's a ton of very wealthy people on the left. As such, I think the marxism bit is just a ploy; the coalition is between people who want the government to hand out money to favored classes, which is the coalition partners.
Charts about 'who pays taxes' based upon income ignore the fact that for extremely wealthy people, they often don't have a lot of income. Income comes from working, and the wealthiest people aren't working as employees.
So I think the real dichotomy here is 'productive' vs 'plundering.' When you have a high level of income, it's because you're working for someone else; income taxes do indeed represent a form of plunder. But the plunder isn't just going to the poor - it also goes to very wealthy and well connected people as well.
Yet we also have things like a massive tax deduction for owners of giant sports teams, which everyone agrees is deeply unfair, but nobody does anything about. SALT deductions effectively subsidize crazy blue state tax policies, because the direct effects of that taxation aren't felt by the people voting for them. And when it comes to money printing and inflation - this is GREAT if you've got a bunch of financial assets, especially if they are levered. So I think the actual divide here is something like what Thomas Pikety calls the "Brahmin Left" and the "Merchant right."