• 11 Posts
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Joined 7 years ago
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Cake day: May 15th, 2019

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  • Chinese economy is successfully reorienting away from real estate towards high tech

    functional government

    Speaking of functional government, provinces rely on land use sales of various lengths. Many of them heavily overborrowed to build out infrastructure in anticipation of future land sales that are now lower or non-existent. And meanwhile, the real estate crisis is still quite active.

    If the Chinese government was so special, it should have learned from the US’s issues with companies that posed a systemic risk with inadequate oversight. Instead, they let Evergrande and others become way too large with too little oversight. They should have taken a cue from the financial regulators in the US, which identify systemically risky companies and imposes onerous regulations. Then at the height of the real estate bubble, Xi introduced a new set of policies that immediately popped the bubble instead of trying to ease it down. Too often, Xi in particular seems to work on principles like “people should invest wisely” instead of “if I introduce this policy, it will cause problems.” The good news is that China does seem to be listening more lately, but it’s already done damage.







  • I’m going to say the same thing that I said about the Polish incident. That incident only happened because Russia chose to attack Ukraine in an area directly bordering on another country. Izmail is also right across the border. I’ll wait on more dependable sources for an investigation, and I’m certainly not agitating for an escalation on NATO’s side. At the same time, if Russia’s bombing campaign ultimately results in foreseeable casualties outside of the country, I put the blame on Russia. Ukraine has the right to defend itself.




  • If you look at Hillary’s broader statements, she has always favored universal single-payer healthcare. She worked her ass off to get a plan passed in 1994, and she was relentlessly attacked for it.

    The last time Democrats got successful movement on healthcare was March 2010 with a filibuster proof Democratic majority in the Senate, a majority in the House, and a popular new president in the White House. Even then, only a relatively tepid compromise bill was passed, with even the “public option” stripped out (thanks Joe Lieberman).

    Will conditions change in the future? Quite possibly, especially as our health care becomes increasingly unaffordable. Maybe it’s not so helpful to have senior politicians telling voters something is impossible and potentially affecting the Overton Window. But Hillary’s warning, that Bernie Sanders’ plan hadn’t a chance of getting passed, was a good reality check.





  • Are we replacing infrastructure or are we just adding capacity?

    They are ultimately going to wind up as one and the same. We need to add more capacity before we can rid ourselves entirely of fossil fuel. Using grid power for things like HVAC, cooking, and electric vehicles means those devices get more CO2 efficient as the grid generation gets more efficient.

    What is this number if you exclude China?

    According to this source, largely unchanged. China’s a touch above the average, but relies heavily on fossil fuel, with a large share of that being very dirty coal. Its campaign to install renewables is encouraging, though.