I feel food is immeasurably better than in the 1990's when I grew up. I'd partially attribute that to faster and better communication -- i.e. if you take the Internet away from a chef or farmer, I think their universe of ideas and ingredients would be dramatically smaller.
Speakers you can get for just $500 have made a big jump since even 2015 (though this is a tiny niche; in general audio quality is worse than in the 1970's.)
Combat sports are also having a renaissance and many people attribute that to YouTube!
That said, I totally agree with this article, and with the premise. There is rising economic inequality, and regulation has a place in imposing values on the market. Markets where nobody trusts each other aren't efficient or useful.
I think the area where that really hits home and is made tangible is architecture. If you just let the market run wild with architecture, you're going to get really ugly boxy buildings that make everyone miserable. We live in a shared space, so you need cooperation to make good architecture. Unfortunately it does seem like that's been on the decline. Architecture is worse than it was in the past.
I'd also agree that computing is worse than it was 20 years ago in many important ways. I wouldn't say it's worse overall, e.g. being able to handle video is a big improvement. Wireless is pretty good although there are many flaky incarnations of it. But I'd say both user interfaces and latency are worse, products are more user hostile, and the web is filled with ads and low quality information. Hardware is now proprietary software, so a Linux system is less open than it used to be.
https://www.gwern.net/Improvements
I feel food is immeasurably better than in the 1990's when I grew up. I'd partially attribute that to faster and better communication -- i.e. if you take the Internet away from a chef or farmer, I think their universe of ideas and ingredients would be dramatically smaller.
Speakers you can get for just $500 have made a big jump since even 2015 (though this is a tiny niche; in general audio quality is worse than in the 1970's.)
Combat sports are also having a renaissance and many people attribute that to YouTube!
That said, I totally agree with this article, and with the premise. There is rising economic inequality, and regulation has a place in imposing values on the market. Markets where nobody trusts each other aren't efficient or useful.
I think the area where that really hits home and is made tangible is architecture. If you just let the market run wild with architecture, you're going to get really ugly boxy buildings that make everyone miserable. We live in a shared space, so you need cooperation to make good architecture. Unfortunately it does seem like that's been on the decline. Architecture is worse than it was in the past.
Related: https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2021/10/wh...
I'd also agree that computing is worse than it was 20 years ago in many important ways. I wouldn't say it's worse overall, e.g. being able to handle video is a big improvement. Wireless is pretty good although there are many flaky incarnations of it. But I'd say both user interfaces and latency are worse, products are more user hostile, and the web is filled with ads and low quality information. Hardware is now proprietary software, so a Linux system is less open than it used to be.