America may be in the "blow off" stage of something, that moment of maximum crazy. We sometimes get the extreme of an extreme just before reality comes crashing in the door. We realize later, when we are cleaning up, that we let something get out of hand. Excess is easier to see in hindsight.
There was a period in Holland when a single tulip bulb sold for more than a grand house. It is the point in the concert where the rockstar begins smashing his guitar.
For example:
1. Astrology Twin Celebrity Decorating. I was struck by this advertisement for a current article in Architectural Digest. Maybe I am over-reacting, but it seemed to me to exemplify a moment of astonishing triviality.
This isn't a parody. It's a real article. The article offers decorating tips that match the reader's astrological birth sign with the home decoration taste of a celebrity with the same birth sign. If you are a Gemini, there is this. Troye Sivan walks you through his home decor:
 |
| Click here |
2. Or this: Jeff Bezos' new yacht. He commissioned a half-billion dollar sailboat yacht that is too tall to leave the boatyard without destroying an historic bridge. The bridge has a 131-foot clearance, but the masts are too tall, and they go on before yacht leaves the building site. Apparently the Rotterdam authorities are dismantling the bridge at Bezos' expense so it can leave. Maybe this isn't crazy. Bezos can afford to replace a bridge. Still, this problem strikes me as an epitome of maximum excess, like the Hearst Castle at San Simeon, something in later months or years we will see as a sign a party is over.
3. Or this: NFTs. That stands for Non-Fungible Tokens. People are buying NFTs in America and treating them as serious investments. A person buys a digital image of no special interest or value and hopes to sell it later more money. Transactions are done in cryptocurrency. Therefore, digitally created non-money is used to buy items that exist as computer bits, transacted on a digital exchange with a home base web address in the British Indian Ocean. It seems weird to me. Although, to be fair about it, the U.S. dollar is also imaginary and digitally created. Dollars do have have one giant anchor, though, which link them to the real world. They are how we denominate wealth and income in this country, and we can use those U.S. dollars to pay U.S. taxes. Taxes are real and paying them is real. That gives them value
This computer-generated image is offered at $34,000, and it had previous transactions at $13,000. The bidding will close in a week.
This one below is offered at $11,400, and there were prior transactions at $9,000 and $10,000.
The website handling the transactions calls these images Meebits. They explain: "The Meebits are 20,000 unique 3D voxel characters, created by a custom generative algorithm, then registered on the Ethereum blockchain." Sounds great! Readers can shop and buy here: https://opensea.io
I get the willies when I see these things. Every 15 or 20 years events go catastrophically wrong in money, politics and world affairs. There are tipping points catalyzed by little things, straws that break the camel's back. These things happen when something builds up: Straw, snow on a steep mountain, European alliances, debt financings of buildings in Manhattan, valuations of internet companies, mortgages made to subprime borrowers.
We are at a moment of extraordinary concentration of wealth. People can spend with trivial abandon while others look on. That might be a stable equilibrium in a monarchy, but not in a democracy. We are at a moment of extraordinary willingness of the public to speculate. I think there is a reason for this, and it is a fragile one. It is because asset appreciation in a home, stocks, NFTs, or stock options have become the popular, accepted way to get financial security. Earned income is not.
This all seems dangerous. I feel like the world has been here before. Stuff happens.
7 comments:
Rx: Revolution.
Although it remains debatable, there are plenty of studies that show a correlation between income disparity and revolution. American income inequality may be more severe today than it was in 1774 — even if you factor in slavery. Perhaps that accounts for some of the extremist violence we've witnessed. When Trump became our so-called president, sane people 'woke' to a reality where crazy is the new normal.
You forgot to mention that Bezos is having second yacht built, to act as a landing pad for the helicopter. Apparently they forgot to allow for it on that first monster.
Oh, and he is going to pay for having the Bridge rebuilt.
I used to think there was no such thing as having too much money, but no longer.
Didn’t Wally in Dilbert get a bunch of money during the run up of the tech stocks? I believe he got the money because he was a tech guy who wore a ponytail. Makes about the same amount of sense as those pictures to me.
As a followup; in your opinion, Peter, what happens if the Russian Economy completely collapsed, as seems increasingly likely?
Robert Heinlein predicted a lot of this in his “future history“ science fiction series. He called our current time “the disorders,“ and predicted that once the chaos got really bad, veterans would take over and eventually create a new government system where only veterans could vote because only veterans gave enough of a rip about the country to put their lives on the line. Plus, veterans have combat skills that the rest of the populace does not, so they could enforce order.
I am not a veteran, so this would disenfranchise me, but I see the logic in it.
I hope that things won’t break down so far that this prediction comes to pass. But I see in our current society way too much emphasis on rights and nowhere near enough emphasis on responsibility.
There is no shortage of con artists, and there never will be.
If you want to see how many gullible people there are, just look at a church's parking lot on Sunday.
Post a Comment