The only problem that exists is spending too much money. They could fix this overnight if people were willing to give up public entitlements and healthcare support. But they aren’t willing to so the US will eventually see hyper inflation or less likely bankruptcy
No, you can also raise taxes. The deficit is 4% of GDP. If we raised taxes by 4% of GDP, we'd still be less than the OECD average. We'd be the same as Australia, which is the second lowest-tax Anglosphere country.
We are spending 3 trillion extra dollars than we take in taxes per year. That means taxes would go up by 75 percent. Even then it doesn’t matter because we will spend even more. Everyone agrees to spend, no one agrees to cut
I must have been looking at old data, but it looks like $1.9 trillion in FY2026. So that's 6.5% of GDP rather than 4% like I said above. Taxes as a percentage of GDP is currently about 25%, so going up to 31.5% would be a 26% jump. Not great, but not catastrophic.
But I agree that if we raised taxes we would just spend more. :(
If taxes are raised then the people have to pay for the services, which is exactly what they don't want to have to do. That is the whole appeal of having those services — that they are, for all intents and purposes, free.
I mean this is the problem with half a century of global-hegemony-fueled debt binging. We could balance the budget our taxes would still be $2.7 trillion lower than what they would be if we were at the EU average.
Taxes would have to go up so dramatically that people would completely be protesting in the streets and rioting. Governments always just print more money instead. Which is why we are at the spot we are at.
That would be irrational. Even the UK and France spend 2% of GDP on defense, and they live under America's shield. Cutting our spending down to their level would save $400 billion/year. That's not peanuts, but that's only 1/3 of the deficit.
Having sufficient capacity for violence is indispensable for the existence of a state. You need a military so you can kill people in other countries, and you need police so you can maintain an internal monopoly on violence. You can't have state-funded preschool if you don't have a state. The Ukrainians unfortunately are learning this the hard way right now.
> Even the UK and France spend 2% of GDP on defense, and they live under America's shield.
You mean: America lives under the UK and France's shield. The last time that US soldiers died to defend France or the UK is a long time ago, much more recently French and UK soldiers died for (amongst others) the USA. Not that anybody seems to remember.
Oh and on a per-capita basis more people from the UK died in the Gulf war than from the USA.
But this isn't a matter of keeping score it is standing together and at least trying to maintain some kind of world order. One problem with that is that you may have to refrain from threatening your allies with invasion.
Re: "You can't have state-funded preschool if you don't have a state" - USA is protected by two immense oceans right and left and two huge, weak and pliable neighbors up and down. From all sides USA is well protected without spending hundreds of billions anually. About ballistic missiles threat - USA already has 1,200 nuclear warheads deployed in various forms (submarine, air force, ground silos) so MADD takes care of that.
With 2% of GDP USA would take care of all its defense needs. USA does not need 11 aircraft carrier groups, about 100 nuclear-powered submarines, about 2,000 jet fighters, only God knows how many destroyers, to protect itself.
I agree the US could take care of its defense needs with 2% of GDP. But that would be a 40% cut, not a 90% cut. What we wouldn't be able to do is commit to protecting Europe or backstopping global capitalism.
> What we wouldn't be able to do is commit to protecting Europe or backstopping global capitalism.
We voted "America First" just recently. The 10% of the current budget should be enough to protect us against Canada and Mexico... except of course that budget is not for defense...
Who would ever want to invade the US? You would be destroying nearly everything of value because half the US economy is based on financial services. And it would make middle eastern insurgencies seem like childs play compared to the 10x higher gun ownership rate with better and more modern firearms in the US with a far higher percentage of practiced shooters and veterans.
Effectively, no one. The CCP doesn’t have the logistics capability or manpower to manage the largest occupation in the history of the world from half a world away.
They can and do want to destabilize American hegemony, but that doesn’t necessitate an end to the American state. My read is they prefer something like the British model for ex-imperials.
I’d be more interested in this if Fred didn’t spend his entire existence on saying negative things about Tesla and Elon. They have over 40 billion in cash in the bank. That was supposedly just a made up number as well
I see it like he’s one of the only outlets not regurgitating lying press releases and actually calling out the truth.
I always see Fred attacked on HN, but I never see anyone cite false statements he’s made. He’s just a bad person for hating on Tesla. As if it’s bad for a writer to critically cover a company doing bad things.
I have not seen information that BYD is significantly down in sales.
Forbes says that BYD had lower profits last year, due to intense competition inside China, which lead to lower sale prices.
On the other hand it is said that overseas BYD expects to have in 2026 sales 50% higher than in 2025.
There has been about a half of year during which the BYD sales in car numbers have been slightly less than before, but already in March 2026 BYD reported sales of over 300 thousand cars, compared with less than 200 thousand in February.
If they will continue to grow at this pace they will easily reach their target of one million and a half cars exported outside China during this year.
In any case, BYD already sells in a month about the same as Tesla sells in a quarter, and the distance between them will only grow.
It's noblesse oblige, or rather an example of the end of noblesse oblige, that the super rich don't even have to pretend to do things for others any more. Which, I would suggest, is a short-sighted and ultimately hubristicaly stupid change...
The parts that are not hearsay from anonymous sources, which basically means any paranoid story that the FBI still has to document, or blackmailers and grifters with plenty of holes and inconsistencies to their stories, are about about elites partying with 17 and above year olds who where otherwise active already in related "work". Still shady, but hardly what's being reported in the sensationalist coverage, which ranges from abductions and rings to acid baths for murdered victims.
Valuation is not important. These are private market transactions. Ultimately all the investors made out well, and it seems the company is more profitable than it was before. At least expenses are way down and if those expenses are correct then they are paying off the debt and making a good profit.
I couldn't possibly disagree with this more. Since the acquisition Twitter/X has had far more features at a far faster pace than in the 10 years prior. They've added all sorts of great stuff, and recently have been near the top of the charts in the Apple App Store.
Rails powers nearly 15 percent of the US e-commerce. I love it. Any time I have to use another framework it feels like a huge downgrade. Rails has so many things that make it nice to use
It's terribly painful to go and have to import everything you want to use when you want to use the Elixir console. That alone makes it not worth it to me.
You can find specialized roles than Rails and usually more experienced (understandably) but most companies would be really open if you told them you have a Rails background but want to learn Elixir.
The pool size is less, but the pay is more (depending on your demographics, experience, etc) in my personal experience.
But, honestly I chose it not for the market, it's just a better programming language to build stuff, period.
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