Invisible Hands

What Hacker News says

1. chxMar 2024
   All these takes here.

   Two preambles: Y'all need to read Invisible Hands, really need to. That book is about how various losely connected sometimes even competing groups of businessmen worked to roll the New Deal back. It's not a conspiracy theory, there was no shadow cabal behind the scenes -- but the goal was common. https://wwnorton.com/books/Invisible-Hands/

   Second, Amazon was started to become a monopoly in retail and only begun with books because it was a relatively easy thing to work with.

   Similarly, while Uber started with fancy cars soon enough it became a means to destroy the protections organized labor managed to get in the last hundred or so years. Or at least what remained of them. In this the company was exceptionally successful by creating what is called the "gig economy". As people hate taxis, using that market for this purpose was the easy way. If you think past the introduction of UberX in 2012 Uber had anything to do with transportation then, pardon the pun, you have been taken for a ride.

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2. chxJan 2023
   > the lack of elevator technicians, crane operators, industrial HVAC, PLC programmers, train conductors, air traffic controllers

   Blame Reagan. Seriously. I am not joking. Blame Reagan. These need to be union jobs. These used to be union jobs.

   For a more nuanced history read https://wwnorton.com/books/Invisible-Hands/

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3. chxSep 2019
   Depends. If they lose to AB5, it's immediately over. You see, Uber is not a cab company masquerading as a tech company. No, it has become the latest attempt in a very long list of various form of attempts to essentially roll back the New Deal, undo all the progress organized labor made. Recommended reading: Invisible Hands by Kim Phillips-Fein, this covers the first few decades closing with Reagan (and almost starting with him, too). https://www.wwnorton.co.uk/books/9780393337662-invisible-han... If you consider it from that angle, then pouring billions into it is not that much of an investment. But if AB5 forces Uber to make their drivers employees then the "gig economy" is practically over and with it, Uber as well.
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4. memossyApr 2016
   I became a global multi-strategy hedge fund manager at 23 ($1bn fund) via a series of odd events so didn't have time to go through the classic CFA analyst => fund manager process.

   I get asked this question a lot and usually recommend http://www.realvisiontv.com these days, particularly if you like videos.

   Some variable quality, but some really excellent, unique viewpoints from value investors and macro managers there.

   I would also recommend the Market Wizards series by Schwager and Inside the House of Money/the Invisible Hands by the Drobnys.

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5. nickpinkstonApr 2024
   We have to understand democracy as a continuously regenerating culture and set of institutions, not just that we vote once in a while.

   The culture is about how much we actually care about democracy / believe it can actually work. I think this is still pretty strong in the US, compared to say Russia where everyone is pretty blackpilled on it, as their its completely illegitimately, whereas ours is highly flawed at the nat'l level and decent at the local level.

   However, we've been in a civic engagement decline since the 1970's. See the book: "Bowling Alone" on the waning participation in gov't, civil society, and community organizations / clubs since then. Also Putman's latest "The Upswing"

   Part of this is entropy: the post WWII solidarity was never going to last a few generations, and all orgs (US gov't) and codebase (constitution, US Code) get shittier over time.

   However, a large part of it has also been deliberate. Since the days of FDR, there was been a revolt from the leaders of American business (once literally planning a coup against FDR [3]), but usually in a more systematic way of a diverse influence campaign led by many of the same American business oligarchs [4], who created / funded the expansion of entire philosophies of neoliberalism, libertarianism, etc. to justify their positions.[5]

   The point being to create an elaborate social and philosophic system that morphed "don't tax / regulate us" into a kind of pro-social philosophy that was more political palatable, which remaining inherently anti-democratic, as their main period of operations in the 1930-1970s went strongly against the electorate's interests.

   The 80's Reagan Revolution and the Democratic Party's reaction to it in 1985, the DLC (Democratic Leadership Council)[6], essentially were the institutionalization of this philosophy into both parties, as the neoliberals had won.

   The Koch's, etc. then started a new era of even more blatant anti-democratic efforts [7] that gave us Citizens United [8], etc., which of course has changed the game in unlocking infinite money into politics, which now has essentially disenfranchised the country at the national level so thoroughly, that research by Princeton [9] clearly shows that politicians' actions are not at all correlated to the average person, whereas they are significantly correlated to wealth people / interest groups.

   [1] https://www.amazon.com/Bowling-Alone-Collapse-American-Commu...

   [2] https://www.amazon.com/Upswing-America-Together-Century-Agai...

   [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Plot

   [4] https://www.amazon.com/Invisible-Hands-Kim-Phillips-Fein-aud...

   [5] https://www.amazon.com/Road-Mont-P%C3%A8lerin-Neoliberal-Col...

   [6] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_Leadership_Council

   [7] https://www.amazon.com/Dark-Money-Jane-Mayer-audiobook/dp/B0...

   [8] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._FEC

   [9] https://www.vox.com/2014/4/18/5624310/martin-gilens-testing-...

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6. chxAug 2023
   Sometimes it's not even particularly covert just hard to see the big picture as the events unfold.

   https://wwnorton.com/books/Invisible-Hands/

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