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Error comments on The Onrushing Wave - Less Wrong
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I am increasingly skeptical of people who claim that technology is going to "deliver enormous benefits". I feel that this model of socioeconomics creates a large number of unexplainable (under the model) anomalies, such as the fact that half of Europe and many American cities seem to be in absolute decline, in spite of having about as much technology as the rest of the world, or the fact that places like Hong Kong and Singapore are astoundingly rich and successful, in spite of not having any special technological proclivity.
My model now is that socioeconomic well-being is a function of several factors. Technology is a factor with a relatively small weight. Institutional quality is a far more important factor. My view of the US is that we've experienced a rapid uptake in technology alongside serious decline in institutional quality, and these two effects have more or less cancelled each other out, so that the well-being of people in the US is about unchanged over the last 1-2 decades.
What is your estimate of how much of Hong Kong's current wealth and success it would preserve if it were unable to make use of technology developed after, say, 1990?
Two answers, under different assumptions about what you're asking. If HK had no post-1990 tech and neither did the rest of the world, then it would maintain about 95% of its wealth. If HK was stuck in 1990 tech while the rest of the world wasn't then it could maintain about 85% of its wealth - it would still be richer than most of Europe. If this seems high to you, consider that a basic idea of economics suggests that countries will use trade to make up for their relative deficiencies and maximize their comparative advantage, and HK is an global center of trade.
I asked mostly because I wanted a concrete reference point for the claim you were making; it's easier to avoid talking past each other that way.
So, the last 20-25 years of technological development accounts for 5% of Hong Kong's current wealth? Sure, that seems plausible enough.
What sorts of numbers do you think the people who talk about the enormous benefits technology delivers have in mind for that question?
Well, the snippet from the article compares current technological advances to the first era of industrialisation, so they're probably thinking 100-200% range.
Gotcha. Yeah, the idea that we've doubled or tripled our real wealth in the last 25 years seems implausible.
I upvoted the whole chain of comments leading here because it shows how a rational discussion should go: Establish reference points. Elaborate. Agree!
I did the same. I wonder if it would be a good idea to document such cases as Examples of Best Practices.