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References: <Pine.LNX.4.64.0708200401310.19265 &AElig boston.eecs.umich.edu> 	 <93EC811F-946D-4EA2-ADE3-5D43B46EA65E &AElig umich.edu> 	 <Pine.LNX.4.64.0708201324300.31118 &AElig oshkosh.eecs.umich.edu> 	 <4CE28F9E-2B6E-4834-B3FA-1C3FBF2E7341 &AElig umich.edu> 	 <Pine.LNX.4.64.0708210236400.19265 &AElig boston.eecs.umich.edu> 	 <002f01c7e492$f2a7a660$0101a8c0 &AElig HUGOGO>
Date: Wed, 22 Aug 2007 09:42:59 -0400
To: "Franz Marschall" <marschall &AElig solartekt.de>
Cc: "Daniel Reeves" <dreeves &AElig umich.edu>, "Dave Morris" <thecat &AElig umich.edu>,         improvetheworld &AElig umich.edu, steven &AElig aptigi.com, reeves-hayos &AElig umich.edu,         reeves-kalkman &AElig umich.edu
From: "Clare Dibble" <clare.dibble &AElig gmail.com>
Subject: Re: mind the gap
Status: O

I can buy Franz's notion of "intelligence" rising out of chaos, but
think that there are limits to how humans can understand their
interaction with such systems.

There are three problems:
1.  In these systems, especially as you tend toward big systems like
the stock market, the sum is not equal to its parts.  One day trader's
prediction is likely to be bunk, the idea Franz advocates is that
thousands of day traders somehow (intelligence arises out of chaos)
correctly identify value.
2.  Because we are limited, we try to understand the pieces to
understand the whole.  Franz himself gives an example of one dude to
represent the wisdom of many.
3.  One thing our brains like to do is divide people into teams... us
and them, red and blue, black and white, White Sox vs. Cardinals.
It's part of my theory of why sports is so naturally attractive to the
masses.  The question is how much of a perceived difference is
required before teams divide, and how big is a good size for that team
to be.

The thing that is funny to me is that a bunch of pro-free market
people sound almost communist when talking about the good of the many
that arises through markets.  But we don't evaluate "good" by whether
or not it is good for many (though we argue it that way in public).
We argue based on whether or not it is good for _us_, and then assume
or estimate how many others are like us.  How "like" others have to be
has to do with when we divide into teams or, as people in other
countries would say, "class".

So, if we are the farmer, who's family farm is broken apart and seeds
sold to some corporation, how good or bad the market is depends on
what else he can do.  If he moves into town, gets a car and a washing
machine, and a factory job that is much easier than plowing the fields
is, he thinks the market is good at finding value and readjusting
things.  But if he then starves, he thinks the market is bad.
Likewise, if the guy who bought the farm makes lots of money, good; if
not, bad.  "Good for society" is too big for any one of us to
understand personally (we can do aggregate measures, though, which
give us some idea so we might think we understand), much less predict,
and our perception is largely based on how good something is for our
local node in the network.

The middle class disappearing to a group of haves and have lesses
(there are not so many true have-nots in the US) is not so great in a
society that allows bunches of credit and informs people they need to
desire things outside of their class.  Middle class was a good
solution to this problem because you could live in a little
neighborhood and have tupperware parties and keep up with the Jones
one step at a time.  Little raises meant you could get the next best
thing that was 10% more expensive than the last thing and
incrementally you can get build something quite nice in a lifetime.

Making "reality" tv an almost constant lifestyles of the rich and
famous and making it seem like you personally should have that kind of
luxury (mostly defined by brand, as Graham pointed out), then
hallowing out the salaries on which you buy it is the precursor to a
surf class.  This has never worked out well in the past (for the
enslaved), and I have no reason to think that the disappearance of
1400 square foot houses into a sea of mansions and across town, a very
different sea of apartments and trailers will work out well this time
either.  This missing rung on the ladder of economic development is a
path to a stronger division instead of pulling more people into this
productive group.  The problem is the thought process and behavior of
the groups of people who do not feel utilized and productive.


On 8/22/07, Franz Marschall <marschall &AElig solartekt.de> wrote:
>
>
>
>
> Sorry, I forgott to paste in my text.
>
>
>
> Dany,
>
>
>
> You are absolutely right. The stock market is smarter as most people think,
> and I explain it this way:
>
> The human brain is intelligent ( at least how we, who have this brain,
> define intelligence) because billions of neurons act in this system, where
> each neuron is counter connected to each other. If a system with counter
> connected in depended agents becomes big enough, it develops intelligence
> out of chaos. This exactly happens with the stock marked.
>
>
>
> Day traders and hedge funds are very important to regulate the market value
> of companies by  pushing hidden assets ( or any potential, be it material or
> immaterial) into daylight. It is immoral to hide assets and not using it for
> the sake of the company = the sake of the economy = the sake of the society.
>
> For example: There is a farmer who pretends or believes he was poor but has
> valuable seeds in his barn that will rot away if it is not put out on the
> field. In this case it is good to have a smart person who buys the broken
> farm with the barn full of seeds and makes profit by putting the seed out in
> the field.
>
>
>
> Franz
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Daniel Reeves
> To: Dave Morris
> Cc: improvetheworld &AElig umich.edu ; steven &AElig aptigi.com ; reeves-hayos &AElig umich.edu ;
> reeves-kalkman &AElig umich.edu
> Sent: Wednesday, August 22, 2007 2:44 AM
> Subject: Re: mind the gap
>
> Not only do I disagree with Dave, I'll go so far as to claim he disagrees
> with his own position.  If not, Dave, why not make a killing shorting
> stock of the next company to do a round of layoffs for the sake of a short
> term boost in stock price?  The market is smarter than we think.
>
> Nor do I have a beef with day traders.  Either they're providing valuable
> information to the market or they're going to get smacked hard.  (In
> expectation at least.)  In any case, they're paying a fair rate for the
> money they borrow and no matter how little time they own a stock they are,
> in aggregate, contributing to the investment in those companies. (And
> short-selling is just borrowing stock, later buying it to pay back the
> loan, so nothing slimy about that, contrary to popular conception.)
>
> I used to be like Dave, pointing to a litany of "obvious" flaws in the
> market (stock market or "the market" more generally, like microsoft being
> sucky (for me) yet rich).  But the market had a habit of being smarter
> than me and I've learned some humility in this regard.
>
> As for Dave's specific allegation (the stock market focuses on short term
> gains), I don't think that's true.  The stock price estimates (the
> per-share net present value of) the cumulative future cash flow of the
> company.  The stock market estimates that better than any other known
> mechanism.  It is of course prone to fits of hysteria but when it does
> it's taking a very *long term* (fantasy) view.
>
> That said, there are cases where markets fail and that is in the face of
> externalities. A classic example of an externality is the Tragedy of the
> Commons in which a bunch of farmers ruin a common grazing field because no
> one person has incentive to ration their use of it if no one else is.
> It's analogous to traffic congestion which is one of several reasons we
> need higher taxes (gas, roads) on driving. [1]
>
> The need to tax pollution is another classic example.
>
> Eugene's Starving Artist is an interesting example of a possible market
> failure.  That might be explained in terms of externalities (positive this
> time) if the art was of a kind that couldn't be charged for by usage
> (public sculpture perhaps).  In other words, you have free-riders.
>
> Eugene's Down On Their Luck example I believe is an argument for risk
> pooling, one form of which is the "social safety net", ie, welfare.  It
> seems that participation should be optional though.
>
> Clare's Parasite CEO example I'm still thinking about...
>
> Danny
>
> [1] See:
> http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/06/18/hurray-for-high-gas-prices/
>   and add to the list that cars are dangerous to cyclists and skaters!
>
>
> --- \/   FROM Dave Morris AT 07.08.20 15:21 (Yesterday)   \/ ---
>
> > I'll rephrase my claim:
> > "Playing the stock market with the objective of short term gains does not
> > contribute to society, and in fact actively harms it."
> > But I do think that is true. The stock market has some benefits, and there
> > are good reasons to have such a thing around, but ours needs help.
> >
> > Stock prices can be a measurement of a companies performance, but it can
> too
> > easily be influenced in the short term for short term reasons. I feel like
> it
> > has become common for companies to trim benefits packages, switch CEOs,
> cut
> > R&D, and do other things which provide a benefit the company for one
> quarter,
> > and thus make the stock market evaluation bounce when their profits look
> good
> > for a moment, but which have serious long term costs. The CEOs in charge,
> and
> > the investors, like this strategy because they can profit from it, then
> get
> > out before the stock goes down again in the long run.
> >
> >
> > Many people lose from this- not only those holding the stocks when the
> > company goes down in general, but the employees of the company, and those
> > using the services of the company. The stock market encourages short term
> > thinking for short term gain and our country has become swept up in this.
> I
> > personally know people who have had their companies destroyed this way. I
> > feel like people invest not so much with an idea for building long term
> > stability and high probability of reasonable returns, but as more of a get
> > rich quick theme. And furthermore computer trading and other features have
> > made it easier to trade shorter and shorter term with little understanding
> or
> > analysis of the companies involved. So stock values become influenced by
> more
> > trivial surface things, because that's all these day traders have time to
> > see. So now companies are making trivial surface changes to satisfy the
> whim
> > of short term investors, at long term cost.
> >
> > There was a big discussion on NPR about hedge funds, stock market trading
> of
> > mortgages, and how it led to the creation of, and current bursting of, the
> > housing market bubble. Part of the problem was that stock market investing
> > had become too disassociated from the things being invested in and the
> real
> > long term values thereof.
> >
> > Meanwhile most people, who work for the companies thus traded, suffer.
> > Ironically it's their own investment in stock market based IRAs that helps
> > drive the process.
> >
> > So I would argue that the system needs to change. Not that we need to get
> rid
> > of the stock market entirely, but that we need to shift the way it works
> to
> > put the focus back on valuing companies that have good long term
> strategies,
> > and less on valuing get rich quick schemes. What if you had to own a stock
> > for at least a month before you could resell it? Or a week? Or a year? I'm
> > not sure where the right number would be, but it really seems to me that
> > traders who sign on in the morning, borrow $10M from a bank, trade all day
> > back and forth, return the $10M at the end of the day having made $100k,
> they
> > aren't really helping society, and could be actually harming it in some
> real
> > and significant ways.
> >
> > Of course part of this also is changing the attitudes of people and
> whether
> > they should be looking to get rich quick at any expense, or whether they
> > should be looking to help themselves, and incidentally also society, in
> the
> > long run. But from a top down approach at least we can put in mechanisms
> that
> > are designed to encourage the latter instead of the former. We can't force
> > anything, and I wouldn't want that level of government control, but right
> now
> > I feel like we strong encouragements to the opposite of what we want.
> >
> > In the meantime I'll make sure that my company is never publicly traded so
> I
> > don't have to worry about it. :-)
> >
> > Dave
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > On Aug 20, 2007, at 1:29 PM, Kevin Lochner wrote:
> >
> >>
> >> I have to take issue with Dave Morris re: "Playing the stock market does
> >> not contribute to society."
> >>
> >> Not only does a company's stock price influence its access to capital,
> but
> >> the respective stock prices of all companies provide information about
> the
> >> state of the economy that a ceo or entrepeneur may use in making
> strategic
> >> corporate decisions.  Stock prices are determined primarily by people who
> >> are "playing the stock market".
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Investing in new companies does. It's a fine line, but
> >>> I think we've gotten too much separation of rich and poor in our society
> >>> because of the way our stock market currently operates, and that could
> use
> >>> some correction.  I agree that inheritance taxes are good as well, to
> help
> >>> prevent too many generations of people staying rich for free.  But we
> >>> should try to reign in the various tricks which exist to leverage large
> >>> sums of cash into even larger sums via short term tricks in business and
> >>> stocks without actually contributing anything.   Not only do they take
> >>> funds from people with less, they hurt the country overall.
> >>>
> >>> But he is also correct- there's a wide variance of skill and motivation
> in
> >>> people, so there should be a wide variance in income levels. I'd accept
> a
> >>> factor of 100 variance from top to bottom in salary as a reasonable
> >>> maximum in relative value to society that a person could be. Some people
> >>> bust their asses continuously to help the world. Some people actively
> try
> >>> to live off of others without contributing anything.    I do have a
> >>> problem with the factor of 1000 or 10000 variances that sometimes occur,
> >>> but those are obvious flaws that are difficult to correct.
> >>>
> >>> Interesting to consider. :-)
> >>>
> >>> Dave
> >>>
> >>> On Aug 20, 2007, at 10:16 AM, Daniel Reeves wrote:
> >>>
> >>>> We've been debating this essay
> >>>> http://www.paulgraham.com/gap.html
> >>>> and I thought I'd move it to improvetheworld...
> >>>> I'll start:  Graham is so right!  The income gap between the rich and
> the
> >>>> poor is wonderful!
> >>>> Actually it started more as a debate about the nature of capitalism and
> >>>> interest ("why should money 'grow'?").  Here was the gist:
> >>>> * [the economy] is a zero-sum game, isn't it?
> >>>> - no
> >>>> * those earning money are taking it away, even if only indirectly, from
> >>>> other people, no?
> >>>> - no, not if you think in terms of wealth (wealth = stuff you want,
> >>>> money = way to transfer wealth)
> >>>> * Or am I totally simplifying the haves vs. the have-nots with my pie
> >>>> metaphor?
> >>>> - yes, that's precisely the Daddy Model of Wealth!
> >>>> * Is it THEORETICALLY possible for no one to owe any money at all in
> this
> >>>> world, i.e., that everyone just has money that "grows"? Or does money
> >>>> only grow if it is taken away from others?
> >>>> - You're right, not possible, but for the opposite reason of what you
> >>>> seem
> >>>> to be suggesting.  You grow money by giving it to someone (lending it),
> >>>> not by taking it away.
> >>>> It even got a bit heated, along the lines of "Trixie, I don't think
> it's
> >>>> right for you to lash out against capitalistic/yootlicious ideas
> without
> >>>> grokking the answers to your questions [above]".
> >>>> Oh, and I offered a yootle to the first person who could answer the
> >>>> quasiphilosophical question why money *should* grow, with the hint that
> >>>> it has to do with human mortality.  I believe that's the only reason
> that
> >>>> holds in all circumstances.
> >>>> In any case, Trixie wanted to resume the debate and this is clearly the
> >>>> place to do it!
> >>>> DO NOT CHANGE THE SUBJECT LINE WHEN YOU REPLY (so it's easy for those
> not
> >>>> interested in this debate to delete the whole thread).
> >>>> Ok, go!
> >>>> Danny
> >>>> --
> >>>> http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/dreeves  - -
> search://"Daniel Reeves"
> >>>> "Everything that can be invented has been invented."
> >>>>  -- Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, U.S. Office of Patents, 1899.
> >>>
> >>> Dave Morris
> >>> cell: 734-476-8769
> >>> http://www-personal.umich.edu/~thecat/
> >>>
> >>>
> >>
> >>
> >
> > Dave Morris
> > cell: 734-476-8769
> > http://www-personal.umich.edu/~thecat/
> >
> >
>
> --
> http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/dreeves  - -
> search://"Daniel Reeves"
>
> "Try identifying the problem and then solving it."
>    -- suggestion from Dilbert's boss
>
>