- cross-posted to:
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- cross-posted to:
- [email protected]
I won the Pulitzer Prize for History for Lords of Finance, my account of how four central bankers’ decisions triggered the Great Depression. I have just completed 1873, a book on America’s railroad boom of the 1870s — the last time private capital flooded into a transformative new infrastructure technology at a scale comparable to 2%–3% of GDP. That research is why, when I look at the AI buildout today, I am genuinely frightened.
It basically is Monopoly money at this point. And if they can keep loaning dollars into existence that only the richest have access too, then the money consolidates among a handful of very rich individuals.
Even if the bubble pops, it’s the retail investors who will get screwed and the rich people will loan themselves more money to buy up the scraps.
I’m not hopeful at all about a bubble popping creating societal turnover. It will just push money into the hands of a few while increasing the sized of the impoverished class.