For what it's worth Pettis thinks tariffs would be beneficial for the American economy: https://www.foreignaffairs.com/united-states/how-tariffs-can...
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https://archive.ph/2025.04.07-072352/https://www.foreignaffa...
Readit Newscatothedev commented on US Administration announces 34% tariffs on China, 20% on EU bbc.com/news/live/c1dr7vy... · Posted by u/belter
catothedev commented on Joe Biden stands down as Democratic candidate twitter.com/JoeBiden/stat... · Posted by u/jsheard
Putting politics aside …
Why don’t they have an age limit on the president (or any elected office)?
E.g., you must be younger than the average life expectancy (currently men: 73yo / female: 79) - while in office.
Bear in mind that your life expectancy is higher as you get older. E.g. the life expectancy for a 72 yr old is not 73, its higher. But I agree with the general point about an age cap.
catothedev commented on Apple hit with over 1.8B euro EU antitrust fine in Spotify case reuters.com/technology/ap... · Posted by u/nopakos
There's a big geo-political component now at play, at least when it comes to Europe (I live in Europe). Meaning that the Europeans can try and upset the big American corporations up to a point (almost 2 billion euros as in this case), but not any further, because at the end of it all the security of the continent depends on American hegemony, on American guns and ultimately on American money.
From that point of view the situation back in the '90s was a lot more fluid, as at some point there were even talks of an Europe that would have extended "from Lisbon to Vladivostok" (so leaving the Americans out of it altogether).
The other element at play is that if the EU fines become so egregious that US companies pull out of offering certain products in the EU, then what would fill the vacuum? Answer: Chinese tech companies with CCP control - essentially building a direct pipeline of EU personal data that CCP can weaponize.
catothedev commented on Apple hit with over 1.8B euro EU antitrust fine in Spotify case reuters.com/technology/ap... · Posted by u/nopakos
what is actually the difference in this case?
I thought the function of fines WAS the deterrent effect? or is some aspect of this restitution? I thought this was payable to the EU itself, not spotify.
Honestly, these multibillion dollar fines from the EU against US tech companies always have an air of 'Since we don't really have a domestic tech industry, these judgements don't really set a precedence for domestic companies, therefore let's just systematically use fines to collect cash'. An extra tax for big US tech companies doing business in Europe. Is there some truth to this?
catothedev commented on Vice website is shutting down writing.exchange/@ernie/1... · Posted by u/colinprince
They ran out of dangerous places to do designer drugs.
In all honesty, Vice was a cool outlet for out-there stories for teens and adults alike. Shame it’s shutting down but then again I never supported it.
Back in the aughts I thought Vice felt legitimately edgy, surprising, adventurous. Then, they realized they could get boatloads of money from 'traditional' media companies, that desperately wanted to look not-traditional and thats when the character changed IMO. Then numerous sexual misconduct cases, key leaders replaced, and it was dead.
catothedev commented on Google Cuts Jobs in Engineering and Other Divisions nytimes.com/2024/01/11/te... · Posted by u/gumby
When it comes to large shareholders that wouldn't actually do anything. Nobody sells in these new blue chips; they just borrow against their positions.
I've thought about this for a long time. If we wanted to actually tax this wealth, we should just make people pay capital gains on marked-to-market positions every 10 years. Now before everyone starts shouting "yea, but the valuations aren't value," you could easily tax them on the lowest reasonable marked-to-market nominal value over the last decade, and you'd still get that tax revenue, just a decade later. It's just a way to have a property tax on a very speculative type of property.
I've been a casual investor my entire life, and I still think it's ridiculous that you can just hold an asset forever and never pay a property tax on it, but some guy scraping together a life for his wife and kid has to pay property taxes on his house every year.
Derivatives would make what youre talking about not work. Or lead to very convoluted rules which is bad.
catothedev commented on John Riccitiello steps down as CEO of Unity venturebeat.com/games/joh... · Posted by u/AndrewKemendo
If they bring back Unity's original co-founder and CEO (David Helgason) and restructure/debloat the company, they might have a chance of reacquiring some of the goodwill. People still want the "old", pre-IPO and pre-Riccitiello Unity back.
It would really turn the energy around to cut the bloat, bring in Helgason as CEO w $1 salary but boatload of call options, have him explain a model that encourages indie devs while milking cash from gaming giants, and works towards a sustainable income statement for Unity.
catothedev commented on Amsterdam to use “noise cameras” against too loud cars nltimes.nl/2023/08/11/ams... · Posted by u/cactusplant7374
Need them here in the UK. There are so many cars modified to have explosive sounding exhausts it's unreal. I get woken up regularly in the night when they drive them around at 2AM making a lot of noise. I still don't get why anyone would want to drive around sounding like that. There is no reason other than you want to look like a complete wanker and at that point society should crush your car to a fucking cube instantly.
Edit: turns out we do have them and they have been fining people. But it's mostly supercars. The problem is with shitty little cars with stupid exhausts which outnumber the supercars by at least two orders of magnitude.
My old high school friends put noisy exhaust systems on because the unrestricted systems promised to increase the hp of their 100hp honda civics by 5-10hp. BMW actually used to play fake engine noises through the speakers bc they were afraid the cars had become to quiet. Harley Davidsons whole reason for existence is to be noisy. Wankers everywhere.
The license for this is pretty hilarious and it's something you should pretty obviously never accept or use under any circumstances.
Am I an "extractive industries" "affiliate" if I just fueled my hatchback up with fresh tank of gasoline?
While there’s going to be a lot of growth a lot of the same things can be said about Vietnam. Foreigners will never win an argument against locals, some locals will die on a hill defending the 150-200 AQI for 5 months out of the year. I don’t mean this as advice to avoid Vietnam, but just that 1/2 the bad things said about China apply to most Asian countries.
In many major Chinese cities you literally cannot see the sun bc of air pollution. No major city in VN is this bad. Will it get worse? Maybe but I wouldn't necessarily expect it. VN people actually do get quite concerned about the quality of their food and, if air pollution started to become a visible problem, in places like HCMC, I doubt people (govt officials included) would be OK with that. The drive for money is hard but not quite as no-holds-barred as PRC.