Vibe check
We seem to be in the midst of a pretty significant disconnect between vibes and reality, at all levels of our society.
Look at the national economic policy. The government is erecting trade walls and telling us all that this is going to be great for the resurgence of US manufacturing — but even the WSJ is calling this bluff — U.S. Manufacturing Is in Retreat and Trump’s Tariffs Aren’t Helping.
We are pouring money into Homeland Security and trying to stamp out immigration, while even right-leaning thinktanks are admitting that immigrants are net positive for the economy — “For each year from 1994 to 2023, the US immigrant population generated more in taxes than they received in benefits from all levels of government.”
All of this trade and immigration policy is pushing corporations to move R&D to the rest of the world, rather than investing more in the US — Alphabet Plots Big Expansion in India as US Restricts Visas.
Or consider crypto. We are decades into crypto, and government policy is more friendly than ever — yet crypto holding strategies are unraveling because crypto is not actually useful for anything.
In Washington State, the legislature is proposing a massive income tax increase to create a “fairer tax system”, which will raise taxes on the very wealthy and give everyone else a break on shampoo and toothpaste taxes. Shouldn’t a fairer tax system result in large tax savings for everyday people?
The software industry is going through a massive AI transition, and the vibes are all over the place. Maybe software development is dead, and we should be sad or happy about that. Or maybe we are entering the next golden age of software development.
It is human nature to ping-pong between vibes and reality. We admire the stories we wish were true, but then we claim to be realists and focus on the facts. We admire status, but then claim we don’t care about it, even though that claim is in service of achieving status. Sometimes the vibes are in style, sometimes reality is, and flipping between them can happen at a rapid pace.
It seems like a great time to really focus on grounding oneself. Talking to people, talking about tangible issues, seeing what is really happening in the streets, building real things, practicing and learning durable skills.
Shorts
Mass market paperbacks are going the way of the dodo. Kind of sad, I became a huge reader in part because of the mass-market paperback format. I still have the Edgar Rice Burroughs' Mars series in the paperbacks I bought as an early teen.
I am dubious that data that is 5, 10, or 15 years old will be that valuable. Or that anyone will be able to find amidst the haystacks of cat memes and dance videos.