7/ everyone talks about how capital is taking a bigger slice of the rewards pie now than labor, but a 50% death rate pandemic acts sort of like UBI / yang bucks / whatever, by making same capital chase after much rarer labor. Labor is scarce, returns go up.
-
Show this thread
-
8/ but getting back to economic / technological collapse, if we lost ~ 40% of the population, I think we'd do OK. At that level, networks still heal, is my hunch. But at some level, maybe around there, certain types of tech get abandoned. We likely stop launching satellites.
4 replies 0 retweets 17 likesShow this thread -
9/ Chip fabs, at least some of them, close. Chip fabs and software depend on economics of scale. Ship half as many units, and you can't run at a profit. Not all of them, tho. I think we'd stay in the 21st century. ...but maybe not advance processor or RAM tech for 50 years.
3 replies 0 retweets 19 likesShow this thread -
10/ Software sector probably shrinks ... but maybe not? with labor scarce, perhaps returns to automation CLIMB ? Fewer coders working on websites, more on robots ?
4 replies 0 retweets 19 likesShow this thread -
11/ This is all at some number - I'm saying 40% death rate, world wide. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe these effects are at 25-30%, and 40-50% is actually a whole new level / type of reaction Instead of falling back to ~ 2005 tech, maybe the next level causes us to fall back to 1960?
3 replies 0 retweets 12 likesShow this thread -
12/ One thing to think about is that technology level in 1960 wasn't merely defined by "what we've discovered / invented by 1960", but also "what the economies of scale of the 1960 customer base allowed". Look at action movies or video games. US population in 1960 was 180 M.
1 reply 0 retweets 13 likesShow this thread -
13/ So a movie would have to cover its budget by selling tickets to ~ 180 M people, max. Today an action movie sells to US, EU, China, India. So the same movie can sell tickets to ~1.5 B people. 7x the market means 7x the budget.
2 replies 0 retweets 14 likesShow this thread -
Replying to @MorlockP
Would you want to go to the movies, sit in a theater with other people, during a pandemic? It all goes to TV
1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes -
Replying to @_Real_DougG
I ... you realize that the entire discussion of movies was explaining economies of scale, and not literally about movies, right?
2 replies 0 retweets 1 like -
Replying to @MorlockP
Oh, yeah, but the whole entertainment industry collapses in a way that software doesn't
2 replies 0 retweets 0 likes
if only there was some way to distribute entertainment digitally
-
-
Replying to @MorlockP
But the money doesn't drop to 1/7th, it drops through the floor. Theaters and concert venues close, but internet service grows as people stay home
0 replies 0 retweets 0 likesThanks. Twitter will use this to make your timeline better. UndoUndo
-
Loading seems to be taking a while.
Twitter may be over capacity or experiencing a momentary hiccup. Try again or visit Twitter Status for more information.