cabalamat comments on New Year's Predictions Thread - Less Wrong

18 Post author: MichaelVassar 30 December 2009 09:39PM

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Comment author: mattnewport 31 December 2009 01:21:29PM 6 points [-]

Next Year

  • Holiday retail sales will be below consensus forecasts leading to some market turmoil in the early part of the year as the 'recovery' starts to look shaky (70%).
  • A developed country will suffer a currency crisis - most likely either the UK, US or one of the weaker Eurozone economies (60%).
  • A new round of bank failures and financial turmoil as the wave of Option ARM mortgage resets starts to hit and commercial real estate collapses including at least one major bank failure (a 'too big to fail' bank) (75%).
  • A major terrorist attack in the US (50%) most likely with a connection to Pakistan. The response will be disproportionate to the magnitude of the attack (99%).
  • Apple will launch a tablet and will aim to do for print media what it has done for music (80%).
  • Democrats will lose seats in Congress and the Senate in the elections but Republicans will not gain control of either house (70%).
  • One or more developed countries will see significant civil unrest due to ongoing problems with the economy (50%).

Next Decade

  • US will undergo a severe currency crisis (more likely) or sovereign default (less likely) (75%).
  • Developed countries' welfare states will begin to collapse (state retirement and unemployment benefits and health care will be severely curtailed or eliminated in more than one developed country) (75%).
  • UK will undergo a severe currency crisis or sovereign default (90%).
  • One or more countries will drop out of the Euro or the entire system will collapse (75%).
  • A US state will secede (30%).
Comment author: cabalamat 01 January 2010 06:41:59PM 1 point [-]

A US state will secede (30%).

I don't see that happening -- which one or ones do you think are most likely to leave?

Scotland may well leave the UK (10%), or the UK leave the EU (15%).

Comment author: mattnewport 06 January 2010 07:44:38AM 1 point [-]

Texas is probably the most likely but I can imagine a number of other possibilities. MatthewB's post above outlines a plausible case for California for example.

Comment author: MatthewB 06 January 2010 08:03:44AM 2 points [-]

Being from Texas (I was born in Texas, but moved to CA in my mid-20s), I agree with you.

I noticed, when I went to school in Europe in the mid 80s that people there acted as if Texas was almost a different country from the rest of the USA. It was also easy for Europeans to recognize. When a foreign citizen, in Europe, was asked where they were from, Texans would usually answer "Texas", yet if a person from Louisiana, Alabama, Montana, Idaho, or some other more obscure state attempted to explain where they were from in the terms of their home state, it would usually devolve to "I am from the Southern USA" or "I am from the Northwest/Midwest USA".

Only New York and California seemed to enjoy this same recognition in Europe.

But, for Texans, they would consider themselves from Texas, first, and the USA second. Whereas most of the other US citizens from other states seemed to identify as USA citizens first, and then by their state.

Texas has a really strong independence from the USA, and it is pretty much the only state with an active Federal movement (movement to recognize the state as its own Nation). California also have one, but it is not nearly as diverse nor as active as that in TX.

However, despite the strong state recognition of its citizens, I think that there are other states that might lead the pack in an attempt to secede. Most of the former Confederate States still seem to have Very deep grudges against the federal gov't, and when I lived in GA for a few years back in 91/92, I was stunned at how many people I encountered who really believed that the Civil War was still not finished, and that The South Shall Rise Again!

Many Republicans seem to be fomenting this sort of thinking as well, with things like the Tea Baggers, or trying to force the recognition of the USA as a Christian Nation

Comment author: knb 08 January 2010 04:17:03AM -2 points [-]

Referring to a (presumably) disfavored political group by a crude sexual dysphemism earned you a vote down. This is not how discourse is done here, please make a note of it.

Comment author: AdeleneDawner 08 January 2010 04:28:57AM 2 points [-]

Relevant wikipedia link

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