aiforecastthway (u/aiforecastthway)

aiforecastthway commented on The AI bubble today is bigger than the IT bubble in the 1990s apolloacademy.com/ai-bubb... · Posted by u/akyuu

aiforecastthway · 8 months ago

A lot of the comments here are talking about startups. But the chart in the article is the forward P/E of the top 10 companies in the S&P.

For reference, those 10 companies are: Nvidia, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Meta, Braodcom, Alphabet (Class A), Alphabet again (Class C), Tesla, Berkshire.

This isn't a pets.com situation.

These companies are ENORMOUS cash engines with incredibly well-proven moats operating in an extremely monopoly-friendly political climate. Nothing like this existed in the 90s. Microsoft, but anti-trust still had some teeth.

The author makes a comparison between these companies and the rest of corporate America, arguing (implicitly) that the forward P/E of these ten symbols is too high relative to the rest of the S&P 500 index.

So let's look at the flip side. Many of the other companies in the S&P are vulnerable to these exact players' moats and pricing power. It's a zero-sum game and the winner is clear, so of course the winner's P/E looks really high compared to the expected loser.

Every single one of them has an AWS bill. Every single one of them has a big Windows/Office install base. Every single one of them probably has a huge apple install base. Every single one of them needs to pay to play in the App Store.

And many of them are also in the unenviable position of being on the losing side of an unfair competition in their actual core business. Walmart/HD/Coca-Cola vs Amazon. IBM/Oracle vs AWS. Or other complicated market dynamics that pose only upside to the big guys and potential downside to the rest (Biotechs vs Amazon Pharmacy).

The remainders are competing margins away from one another, are vulnerable to disruption of mid-market non-S&P players (or similarly sized companies that just aren't on the public markets -- see the huge size of privacy capital relative to the 90s). Some also face significant tariff risk. Think banks, consumer goods.

What percent of the difference in P/Es between the best and rest is justifiable on the thesis that we are entering a multi-decade period of (1) tech feudalism and (2) unpredictable populist fits that wreck havoc on everyone except the tippy top of the echelon who can blow enough cash to control the narrative?

aiforecastthway commented on The Hollow Men of Hims alexkesin.com/p/the-hollo... · Posted by u/quadrin

nikkwong · 9 months ago

How could this possibly work out for her financially? To make 120k a year, she would have to be doing this with.. 200 patients; and I think the average GP makes a bit more than that in the US. That doesn't like a good bargain on her end.

aiforecastthway · 9 months ago

I do not think I have ever spent more than an hour per visit actually in the room with my GP. I have an annual checkup. For a while there my GP was world class and also a blood relative.

200 patients at one hour per is a bit more than a month of 9-5s.

If I visited my GP once per 1.5 months I’d be paying a fuckload more than $50/mo in copayments alone, in addition to my incredible premiums.

Healthcare becomes pretty affordable when you’re not paying for actuaries and other scammers.

aiforecastthway commented on The Case for Software Craftsmanship in the Era of Vibes zed.dev/blog/software-cra... · Posted by u/Bogdanp

ramesh31 · 9 months ago

Instead of asking how can we ship more code or how can we ship better code, why not "how can AI give me a better life"? Machines are supposed to make our lives easier. If I can output the same quality at a faster rate of speed, why can't I have that time back to my own life now? This is how my view on agentic coding is evolving toward. I don't want to be under the pressure of doubling my productivity for an employer. I want to capture that gain for myself.

aiforecastthway · 9 months ago

> If I can output the same quality at a faster rate of speed, why can't I have that time back to my own life now?

We have done a terrible job at allocating the net benefits of globalization. We will (continue to) do a terrible job at allocating the net benefits of productivity improvements.

The "why" is hard to answer. But one thing is clear: the United States has a dominant economic ideology, and the name of that ideology is not hardworker-ism.

aiforecastthway commented on US Trade Court finds Trump tariffs illegal bloomberg.com/news/articl... · Posted by u/master_crab

aiforecastthway · 9 months ago

> why wouldn't the trump admin use the tariff act of 1930?

Probably because they knew it'd be a losing argument.

The court that authored this slip opinion would be unlikely to be persuaded by such an argument, for two reasons.

First, the opinion spends several pages applying the non-delegation and major questions doctrine. Based upon that discussion, I am pretty confident that this court would've found your interpretation of the Tariff Act of 1930 to be an unconstitutional delegation of congressional power. A similar question was asked in the Nixon admin; grep for "Yoshida II" in the PDF.

Second, even if your interpretation of the Tariff Act of 1930 were found to be constitutional by this court, the argument you suggest would still hit a brick wall.

Around page 35, the court cites the President's executive order in finding that the WaRTs are addressing a balance-of-payments issue. The court then notes that Congress specifically delegated narrower presidential authority for actions addressing balance-of-payments deficits. So even if the president were allowed broad emergency powers, and were allowed broad discretion in defining what emergency means, that finding would be irrelevant, because Congress has specifically curtailed the delegation of authority to the President in the case of tariffs addressing balance-of-trade issues.

Specifically, the opinion notes that Section 122 of Trade Act of 1974 limits Presidential authority to response to balance-of-payments problems, such as "a 15 percent cap on tariffs and a maximum duration of 150 days".

The conclusion also specifically addresses your question about emergency powers: "Congress’s enactment of Section 122 indicates that even “large and serious United States balance-of-payments deficits” do not necessitate the use of emergency powers and justify only the President’s imposition of limited remedies subject to enumerated procedural constraints."

(These are not my opinions; I'm just applying the legal reasoning in the slip opinion to your question.)

aiforecastthway · 9 months ago

Update: on appeal, the government is sticking to its original argument (see page 15 of the motion). So it appears that on appeal the government continues to believe the path of least resistance does not pass through the 1930 Act argument about which OP is asking.

aiforecastthway commented on US Trade Court finds Trump tariffs illegal bloomberg.com/news/articl... · Posted by u/master_crab

curt15 · 10 months ago

> (other than being almost 100 years old)

Age alone shouldn't disqualify a law. The law above all other laws, aka the Constitution, is more than 200 years old.

aiforecastthway · 9 months ago

In this case, age is not what disqualifies the law. Rather, what renders the law inapplicable to this situation is some combination of:

1. another statute that super-cedes the 1930 statute because it specifically limits Presidential emergency powers in the context of balance-of-trade issues. See around p. 35 of the slip opinion.

2. The Constitution itself, which limits Congress's ability to cede its own powers.

aiforecastthway commented on US Trade Court finds Trump tariffs illegal bloomberg.com/news/articl... · Posted by u/master_crab

mangoman · 10 months ago

I'm not a lawyer or even close to it, but why wouldn't the trump admin use the tariff act of 1930? quote:

"Whenever the President shall find as a fact that any foreign country places any burden or disadvantage upon the commerce of the United States by any of the unequal impositions or discriminations aforesaid, he shall, when he finds that the public interest will be served thereby, by proclamation specify and declare such new or additional rate or rates of duty as he shall determine will offset such burden or disadvantage, not to exceed 50 per centum ad valorem or its equivalent, on any products of, or on articles imported in a vessel of, such foreign country"

it does cap it at 50%, but I mean it seems like a much easier way to justify the tariff. is there something else about it that isn't as practical (other than being almost 100 years old)

aiforecastthway · 9 months ago

> why wouldn't the trump admin use the tariff act of 1930?

Probably because they knew it'd be a losing argument.

The court that authored this slip opinion would be unlikely to be persuaded by such an argument, for two reasons.

First, the opinion spends several pages applying the non-delegation and major questions doctrine. Based upon that discussion, I am pretty confident that this court would've found your interpretation of the Tariff Act of 1930 to be an unconstitutional delegation of congressional power. A similar question was asked in the Nixon admin; grep for "Yoshida II" in the PDF.

Second, even if your interpretation of the Tariff Act of 1930 were found to be constitutional by this court, the argument you suggest would still hit a brick wall.

Around page 35, the court cites the President's executive order in finding that the WaRTs are addressing a balance-of-payments issue. The court then notes that Congress specifically delegated narrower presidential authority for actions addressing balance-of-payments deficits. So even if the president were allowed broad emergency powers, and were allowed broad discretion in defining what emergency means, that finding would be irrelevant, because Congress has specifically curtailed the delegation of authority to the President in the case of tariffs addressing balance-of-trade issues.

Specifically, the opinion notes that Section 122 of Trade Act of 1974 limits Presidential authority to response to balance-of-payments problems, such as "a 15 percent cap on tariffs and a maximum duration of 150 days".

The conclusion also specifically addresses your question about emergency powers: "Congress’s enactment of Section 122 indicates that even “large and serious United States balance-of-payments deficits” do not necessitate the use of emergency powers and justify only the President’s imposition of limited remedies subject to enumerated procedural constraints."

(These are not my opinions; I'm just applying the legal reasoning in the slip opinion to your question.)

aiforecastthway commented on Ask HN: Hackathons feel fake now · Posted by u/sepidy

krrishd · 10 months ago

I mostly agree with the premise, but to point out something kinda funny: these complaints are basically identical to the ones I remember from a time I personally remember as the "heyday" of hackathons (early/mid 2010s).

I think:

- they've had this degree of fakeness for almost the entirety of their existence (as long as they've needed "sponsorship" / been 6+ figure events)

- at its best, there also was a scene/subculture _surrounding_ hackathons that did care about building genuinely "cool" / "impressive" things, had an earnest interest in actually starting something longer term (there are some really successful founders that "incubated" in the hackathon scene). these folks frequented hackathons, and eventually moved on as the scene saturated with careerism / they "grew up" professionally

aiforecastthway · 10 months ago

I have never heard the term "Hackathon" used in any context other than a recruiting/sales event targeted at early-career types.

Meatspace get-togethers focused on hacking, either for a specific project or for a clique, never used the term "Hackathon". At least in my circles. Those were just "get togethers" or maybe "hacking weekends". But with small caps. I.e., not "Hacking Weekends" or "Hackathons", but "a weekend we're scheduling the purpose of which is to hack on something; i.e., a hacking weekend".

Less of an "event for the public" and more like "a group of friends planning a weekend get-away". I think for one of them we managed to get a few thousand or something from someone's employer to cover some costs. But "sponsorship" would be a strong word.

I've never lived in SF so maybe it was more of a thing there.

aiforecastthway commented on Censorship concerns rise over Texas bill; Abilene bookstore pushes back bigcountryhomepage.com/ne... · Posted by u/hn_acker

codeddesign · 10 months ago

Again…I don’t see the argument. There are already laws at federal and state levels..in every state.

Are you saying that while a company would be responsible (current laws), an employee should not because of free speech?? (proposed law)

aiforecastthway · 10 months ago

> Are you saying that while a company would be responsible (current laws), an employee should not because of free speech?? (proposed law)

Absolutely. Circumscribing liability in civil actions is one of the fundamental purposes of commercial legal structures; to wit, the two L's in "LLC" stand for "Limited Liability".

The basic principle of limited liability has been deeply embedded in the USA's system of free commerce since its founding. Historically, there has always been a high bar for exceptions to this general principle. I think that should still be the case.

I have two reasons for this.

The first is selfish. The legal exposure risked by an hourly employee working at a bookstore would be far too great to justify the wages earned. The lines of "obscenity" are blurry enough that the risk to any employee would be substantial.

If the business chose to indemnify their employees and owners -- which they likely would need to do in order to employ anyone -- then that indemnification would be part of a larger legal insurance policy.

I do not own a book store, but I do own a large stake in a business. I carry a legal insurance policy (actually, two). These bookstores are probably part of the same risk pool that I'm buying into. Which means that if some random Karen is angry that a character in a book had two moms, my insurance premiums get to pay for that bullshit.

The second reason is more principled. The intent of the proposed exception is to establish a statutory framework that would allow conservative religious groups to use civil courts to harass their ideological enemies. I do not find common cause with that purpose, because I do not believe in bullying people into silence via the State's courts, because I am a proud American.

BTW: if the employee's actions are criminal, then the state can already prosecute that individual employee. Allowing private civil actions is extraneous, unless the ultimate goal is coercive or political. Weaponizing our system of commerce to wage culture wars was a bad idea when the intolerant left was doing it a decade ago, it was a bad idea when the intolerant evangelical right was doing in two decades ago, and it is a bad idea now that the new right is doing it.

aiforecastthway commented on Censorship concerns rise over Texas bill; Abilene bookstore pushes back bigcountryhomepage.com/ne... · Posted by u/hn_acker

codeddesign · 10 months ago

It drives me crazy when people make argument like this without pointing to the actual legislation.

https://legiscan.com/TX/bill/HB1375/2025

After reading the bill, I don’t see the argument.

The bill is around expanding the current laws involving directly selling or distributing media to minors where not only the business but also the employee would be held responsible.

aiforecastthway · 10 months ago

> It drives me crazy when people make argument like this without pointing to the actual legislation.

The first sentence of the article reads "A bill set to be heard by the Judiciary and Jurisprudence Committee at the Texas House is sparking criticism from small business owners across the state. ".

The text "Judiciary and Jurisprudence Committee" is a hyperlink. That hyperlink takes you to the bill tracker.

> After reading the bill, I don’t see the argument.

Introducing civil liability has a chilling effect on commerce (and, therefore, speech). From the article:

"The biggest concern that we have is that for small businesses, first of all, we can’t afford the lawsuits."