08-15-2016, 11:30 PM
In a competitive economy, prices eventually fall to such levels that there is but a small return on capital for making and distributing the object. Think of compact disc players: the first ones sold for over $1000 and were for well-heeled audiophiles who were paying $10K for a pair of loudspeakers. Now one gets them in cheap boom boxes and clock radios. We already see much the same for reader devices (basically computers limited to service as web players) and cell phones. Do you want to see the cutting-edge technology of 30 years ago? Go to Goodwill or Salvation Army.
Some people make huge amounts of money early on the invention and get to live like sultans. But those who make the money end up buying prime real estate for which one finds a nearly-vertical supply curve. Working people get priced into places like Kansas City, where there are no views and the fire-and-ice climate suggests my idea of Hell. (a hint: my idea of Heaven has the climate of San Francisco or San Diego. My idea of a climatic Hell is an Iowa winter followed quickly by an Iowa summer with no real transition except for tornadoes).
One of my contributions to Wikipedia (slightly modified):
Source: http://www.intellicast.com/Local/History...n=USIA0894
But we get imbalances. The cheap places to live have no opportunities, and the places with opportunities have no workers because the workers are priced away.
Some people make huge amounts of money early on the invention and get to live like sultans. But those who make the money end up buying prime real estate for which one finds a nearly-vertical supply curve. Working people get priced into places like Kansas City, where there are no views and the fire-and-ice climate suggests my idea of Hell. (a hint: my idea of Heaven has the climate of San Francisco or San Diego. My idea of a climatic Hell is an Iowa winter followed quickly by an Iowa summer with no real transition except for tornadoes).
One of my contributions to Wikipedia (slightly modified):
Quote:Waterloo has a humid continental climate (Köppen climate classification Dfa) of extreme summer heat and extreme winter cold, but adequate rainfall and snowfall. Places Rated recognizes Waterloo as having one of the harshest local climates in the United States of America not in a hot desert, Alaska, or a high-mountain location due to seasonal extremes and severe storms. The record low and high temperatures for April (see link) alone allow one to get frostbite and heatstroke in the same month.
Source: http://www.intellicast.com/Local/History...n=USIA0894
But we get imbalances. The cheap places to live have no opportunities, and the places with opportunities have no workers because the workers are priced away.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.