On the other hand, a lot of those jobs were offshored to places where labor is cheaper. It would be interesting to compare how many people work in the textile industry in Bangladesh today compared to the US 50 years ago.
I believe this is a major part of it. People cannot fathom what the industrial countries look like because basically nothing is made in the west anymore. There are literally hundreds of millions of people, maybe billions that work towards making the western economies profitable who get paid nothing to do it and live in filthy polluted slums for everyone else's benefit.
Looms might speed up the process but I guarantee there are thousands of people working in the poorest countries on earth to make it all happen.
Interestingly, AI seems to be massively polluting and while the west has absorbed some of it, it's probably not long until we see more of the data centers being built in poorer countries where the environment can be exploited even harder.
This was always the undelivered promise of "tech" in my opinion. I remember seeing the Apple advertisement from the 80s (??) when a guy gets a computer and then basically spends his afternoon chilling.
Some how I've found myself living in a fairly rural place, and while farming can be hard, I don't want to downplay the effort of it, the type of farming people do around me is fairly chill / carefree. They work hard but they finish at 3pm and log off and don't think about work. Much o my career is just getting crushed by long hours, tight deadlines, and missing out on events because even though my job has always been automation focused, there is just so much to automate.
I agree, but if you enjoy the art, why does it really matter who made it, like I enjoy looking at sea shells, no one made them, but they are nice to look at?
You're assuming infinite knowledge. Infinite intelligence does not imply infinite knowledge. There are real philosophical problems with that. Many of the basic information for the standard model may be wrong or build on incorrect data. Which would be all the information an infinitely intelligent AI would have to work with.
It’s the stress around it, not the current price. That’s what people are replacing.
If I’m trying to plan for the future in a world where conflicts this destructive are permanently on the menu, I’m not going to ever buy an ICE car again. No one wants to be at the mercy of anyone else where possible and as someone who only owns ICE cars, it’s been very stressful few weeks.
I think you are on to something here. But it would mean that sentiment could change on a whim: a serious blackout somewhere in Europe that makes continent-wide headlines, and EV demand might crash.
Given the lack of blackouts around here, I've not bothered to investigate if home PV systems can still charge batteries, or if the inverter dependence on the grid for phase-locking the AC prevents that.
There's already been news stories about people powering their homes from their EV during blackouts, the oldest example I know of this from 2012 albeit with a hybrid and it was burning petrol: https://cleantechnica.com/2012/11/10/man-lights-house-with-t...
> Given the lack of blackouts around here, I've not bothered to investigate if home PV systems can still charge batteries, or if the inverter dependence on the grid for phase-locking the AC prevents that.
The technology is called "islanding mode". It adds a little extra cost to the inverters, and you have to specifically request it, but the tech exists.
10% is the bog-standard minimum, so you're more hoping for 12-15%, and the houses in Japan are knocked down and rebuilt between essentially every occupant, so they're pieces of garbage meant to last a decade or so, and about as environmentally unfriendly as one can get.
So yeah, it's extremely rough when there's nothing valuable to invest your money in.
I live in Japan by the way. It’s no where as dire as you make it sound. The houses are mostly knocked down because of the cultural attitude towards them and people’s lack of DIY knowledge when it comes to renovations. Many young people in the country side a slowly changing attitudes but the bones of many of their houses are no less garbage than anywhere else in the world. If your house costs $6k USD, then it leaves you a lot of left over money for renovations.
I’ll agree it sucks you can’t have a really cheap house an 15% return on your money (which seems like an exaggeration). But with some ingenuity I think people could make the lower property and house prices work for them a lot more than they do.
My internal Brandolini's Law alarm is sounding loud and clear from this post.
If you think real investors should make 12-15%, you are essentially bankrupting the next generation. (Even 10% annualised would do it.) That is enormous intergenerational wealth transfer, ensuring the next generation cannot own a home before they are 50 years old or they rent forever.
Outside of central Tokyo (the most central ku's surrounded by Yamanote train loop line), there is almost no capital appreciation for homes (and apartments) because NIMBYism does not exist (quite literally through the national building code). As a result, they build enough for the demand, and home prices are relatively stable, roughly rising at the rate of inflation. France is pretty similar outside of central Paris. Before post-COVID inflation got out of control, Germany was also similar.
The center of Tokyo and Osaka are a bit special because they are the largest job centers in the whole country, and there is very (insanely?) high demand and not enough land to maintain low capital appreciation for homes. That said, there is still constant tear-down/rebuild projects in Tokyo to build denser housing. It is hard to walk 10 mins in central Tokyo and not see a tear-down/rebuild project. Fortunately, they have incredibly strict noise controls at construction sites, so you rarely hear it, but you see it.
> the houses in Japan are knocked down and rebuilt between essentially every occupant
This is absolutely untrue. This is a near-perfect Internet Brain/Terminally Online type of comment. Houses are normally only knocked down in Japan when they are 50+ years old. (The "30 year rule" from the 1980s just won't die on the non-Japanese Internet.) The stuff that I see knocked down looks like it is from the 1950s -- pure wood, rotted to the core, and paper-thin windows. It makes no sense to restore these homes when there is no legal restriction for tear-down/rebuild. There are lots and lots of second hand single family homes that change hands between owners. All of the people that I know who own single family homes bought them second hand. There is a whole segment of the real estate construction market that does home restoration. It is pretty common to buy a second-hand single family home, then do X currency amount of restoration. Sometimes, these companies buy the used homes themselves, do restoration, then sell at a price for profit. Apartments are similar in wider Tokyo area.
> they're pieces of garbage meant to last a decade or so
Again: Internet Brain/Terminally Online type of comment.
> So yeah, it's extremely rough when there's nothing valuable to invest your money in.
Have you seen the Nikkei 225 stock index in the last 10 years? (How does the total return compare to your country of residence?) Also, Japan does not enforce capital controls, so regular people are welcome to invest their money in foreign stock markets, such as the S&P 500 stock index. They can do so using numerous domestically-listed mutual funds and ETFs.
Agree, most homes have been built to strict codes since the 80s, due to earthquakes and typhoons, which means by default, they're not "rubbish". There are many places with a crap finish, poorly insulated etc, but as I said in another comment, they're not by default trash.
I don't think you can have Japanese zoning rules without Japanese culture. They have a lot of respect for other people and their property. Not always, but I just I can't think of many other places in the world where it would work.
I believe this is a major part of it. People cannot fathom what the industrial countries look like because basically nothing is made in the west anymore. There are literally hundreds of millions of people, maybe billions that work towards making the western economies profitable who get paid nothing to do it and live in filthy polluted slums for everyone else's benefit.
Looms might speed up the process but I guarantee there are thousands of people working in the poorest countries on earth to make it all happen.
Interestingly, AI seems to be massively polluting and while the west has absorbed some of it, it's probably not long until we see more of the data centers being built in poorer countries where the environment can be exploited even harder.
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