The unit cost goes down with scale. A Honda Civic would be extremely expensive if they only made 2000 of them. That doesn't mean it's too flashy for the job, it just means they haven't divided the development cost over enough units.
It makes sense to develop new military tech continuously, but only scale out production when needed.
As an American, I view it as an option to start a light conversation. You can decline the option with a simple "Good, thanks", or you can genuinely answer with a light comment and see if the other person reciprocates. Answering with a particularly serious topic will likely catch the other person off guard, so people avoid that, but to say Americans don't actually mean it when they ask how are you misses some of the nuance of the situation.
There are important contextual and regional difference that apply too. You're more likely to get a genuine reply in a place like the rural Midwest than you are in NYC. You also are more likely to get a genuine reply from a person relaxing at a bar than the cashier at a fast food drive through window. There are many people who will take the question as an invitation to talk if the situation is right.
Important to keep in mind that it has a per capita income similar to Mississippi, not wealth.
Wealth can mean many things, but it is often associated with your savings more than your income. If you go by median wealth per adult, the UK is still wealthier than the US as a whole (#11 globally vs #21). The mean is another story, but that is no doubt influenced by the fact that there are many extremely wealthy people in the US.
I had a professor in grad school say that AI is just a search algorithm. I think that is an interesting way of framing things. Often times the model is just searching its training data for the right output. I don't think this diminishes the value of such models, recent advancements have shown how exciting "just a search algorithm" can be.
Agreed that context is extremely important. Income is an imperfect measure of buying power, since prices vary significantly based on geography, but it is still a measure, and in the context of globally traded commodities such as energy or fertilizer it is quite important. The price of oil or fertilizer is likely very similar (if not more expensive) in Cambodia compared to a place like the US.
There is a fairly simple way to tax wealth: inflation.
There are downsides to inflation of course, lower economic growth is a big one. But we are entering a higher inflation, higher interest rate environment whether we like it or not, and that will result in lower wealth inequality. Money will have less direct purchasing power, and assets like housing or company equity will decline in value due to higher borrowing costs.
There are many people who will retort that 'inflation hurts the poor'. Yes, it hurts everyone, but it disproportionately hurts the rich. It is no coincidence that wealth inequality increased dramatically during the low inflation, low interest rate period we have experienced over the last two decades.
Be careful using the YoY number, you need to factor in the base effect. (i.e. the change in YoY number each month factors in the new month of data but also the month 13 months ago that is no longer included)
MoM is a cleaner way to look at things in volatile times like these.
> "Any significantly above market returns of any kind are either a scam or have risks that are either not understood or not disclosed."
By definition, the market return is an average, and there must be returns above and below the average. You could say above market returns require taking above market risk, but often times the level of risk you are taking is not known for certain at the point in time you make the investment.
Also, the hedge fund industry's goal is not necessarily to beat the market, it is to provide the highest level of return per unit of risk.
I used to live in a neighborhood of Queens next to an above ground line, and it is extremely loud. One thing I found interesting was that the support beams of the train were made of steel, however, down the street a little ways the support structure was built out of concrete. The concrete section was way quieter, despite looking nearly as old.
Having an above ground train that isn't deafeningly loud is a huge improvement to the neighborhood, and I wonder why we don't think more about making new quiet above ground lines, instead of drilling +$2B per mile tunnels. I understand that people may find them to be an eyesore, but the noise is the top issue by far. With 100 years of new technology since the last ones were built, we should be able to make huge improvements in this area.