Think one step further. When a different currency becomes the reserve currency, the currency rises in value, the holders become far wealthier, get their imports for cheaper, and suddenly they can even subsidize their local industries that rely on exports to the point that it's a smooth transition to more of a consumer economy.

I think there is too much emphasis placed on the “decline” of the US. The real decline is in the EU, which essentially has remained flat or shrank in real terms over the last 50 years. They have coasted on the Euro and past wealth and innovation, but the chickens are coming home to roost now. Notice how they pivot from the US to China when daddy war bucks stops subsidizing them. Europe has nothing. No children, no new businesses, no armies, can’t defend itself, can’t make energy. It’s a disaster. Truly decadence and no one wants to hear the truth.

The US is fine. The real strength is in its economy and government system that is tilted far more to the wealthy and business than Europe, which is too exposed to democracy and orators promising something for nothing

> no armies, can’t defend itself, can’t make energy.

Look I love dumping on the Europoors as much as anyone, but even I can see that this is a bit extreme. "Decadence?" What does that even mean here? That people are happy and secure and have good qualities of life, without worrying about everything falling apart?

The US is not fine, and is falling apart. The US is living decadently on its reserve currency status, which enable things like ridiculously wasteful and unproductive military spending. Even its military spending on things like the, say, F35, require external customers in order for it to make any sense at all. But all that decadence is at risk. Decadence is good, I want it, I don't want austerity. Give me this awesome US decadence or I'll have to settle for the fake European "decadence" which is mere economic and health security without all the extra spending that US consumers get to make.

You have it 100% backwards. The goal of Europeans is not to work. They have low productivity. The majority of the economy is tourism or bureacracy. It's just a decaying, old place. It's fine if you goal is to be a museum but as a 21st century economy they have enormous structural problems. They will continue to sell their crown jewels to the highest bidder, because no one wants to work. Look at the hundreds of thousands of young men and women flocking to Ukraine to die on the front lines... there aren't any! No one actually wants to do anything

> The goal of Europeans is not to work.

What, would you say, all these entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley are doing here?

They are all trying to invent something so that they don't have to work anymore.

> They will continue to sell their crown jewels to the highest bidder, because no one wants to work.

Is this about Europe or the US?

It’s like this: if Europe tried to seize Alaska, millions of Americans would fight to the death. But America is going to take Greenland with barely a fart from the EU. Because they don’t care. It’s a museum

That idea has been so destroyed by current events that I can only imagine that you are trolling or have been living in a cave for a few weeks. Check the news!

What? You think suddenly Europe is going to erode its safety net and actually sacrifice something? Impossible

> idea has been so destroyed by current events

To be fair, has it? The EU is talking about activating its anti-coercion thing, which would anyway only kick off a year-long consultation and voting process before anything happened. To my knowledge, there have been no consequences to America annexing Greenland put forward that would hit before the midterms.

I feel like no one has read anything I have said but you

We've asked you before not to break the guidelines. Political/ideological flamebait is not what HN is for and destroys what it is for. You can discuss these themes in curious ways, rather than inflammatory ways; indeed, you must, if you want your comments to avoid being killed by flags. Eventually we have to ban accounts that continually flout the guidelines. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

In my circles nothing I said would be considered problematic. I’m expressing opinions that are scary

HN is a community that exists for a specific purpose and that purpose is curious conversation. The guidelines are designed to keep activity aligned with that purpose, and HN is a place where people want to participate because enough people make the effort to follow the guidelines and raise the standards rather than drag them down.

What is acceptable in your circles is not relevant here. What matters here is preserving HN as a good place for curious conversations.

Duly noted that telling the truth as I see it is too scary for HN. Ban me don’t care, who gives a fuck

We don't need mini-sermons or defiant strutting. Just respect for the community and the groundrules that make this a place people care about preserving. The guidelines are simple, and have been in place and stable for nearly two decades. If we didn't uphold them, this site wouldn't exist for you to denigrate like this.

> subsidize their local industries that rely on exports to the point that it's a smooth transition to more of a consumer economy.

There's an implication here that the country *wants* to become a consumer economy, and not remain an export economy.

Furthermore, it relies on the leadership wanting to wind down that production, and not use that subsidy to further bolster their industrial capacity & crush global prices, in an attempt to wash out the others & only have their country be the sole remaining place capable of meeting demand at that subsidized point.

Why would a country want to remain a manufactured-good export economy, rather than having the stronger position of a consumer economy that lives off the wealth of the rest of the world?

Why grind away relentlessly in industries with tiny profit margins, when there are high-margin innovation-driven industries that your economy can advance to?

Why stick with producing clothing, when you can move on to cars? Why stick with cars, when you can move on to chips? Why stay with chips, when you can move on to the next new technology that the entire world wants, but which only your economy can produce because it grew the industry from scratch and everybody is playing catch up?

Dictators love autarky because it gives them complete control of the population. Populations should not love autarky, because it makes them poor and robs them of wealth and opportunity.

> Why would a country want to remain a manufactured-good export economy, rather than having the stronger position of a consumer economy that lives off the wealth of the rest of the world?

1) A consumer economy is not required to extract wealth from other countries.

2) A consumer economy is metastable by design:

(2a) It inherently requires the buy-in of other nations to want to export to you in the first place, which is not guaranteed.

(2b) The wealth of the consumer economy is primarily derived from salesmanship and not the product itself, which is also metastable.

3) Knowledge work is not barred to an export economy, and can similarly be performed there without having to become a consumer economy.

> Why grind away relentlessly in industries with tiny profit margins, when there are high-margin innovation-driven industries that your economy can advance to?

(Previous point (3) similarly applies here)

> Why stick with producing clothing, when you can move on to cars? Why stick with cars, when you can move on to chips? Why stay with chips, when you can move on to the next new technology that the entire world wants, but which only your economy can produce because it grew the industry from scratch and everybody is playing catch up?

1) None of these decisions are mutually exclusive. Why throw away the $10 you picked up just because you saw $100?

2) Establishment of a new industry is not assured. Failure can still occur, even when billions are thrown. (see Abu Dhabi & GlobalFoundries semiconductor fab venture)

2b) Not very new industrial move needs to be made. Tech leapfrogging can occur at a later date.

3) The demand for those """lower end""" products do not evaporate. Unless a sensible smartphone-like revolution comes for clothing / cars (i.e. The unification of multiple former products under a new product), the industry's products & demand will rarely change. The tastes will shift, but the fundamentals of the product & the industry will remain.

4-IMPORTANT) Margins are not obligated to trend towards zero, and can in fact increase as more people make the same mental conclusions as described and abandon their own industries, eventually leading to an oligopoly / monopoly scenario that is harder to retake back.

> Dictators love autarky because it gives them complete control of the population. Populations should not love autarky, because it makes them poor and robs them of wealth and opportunity.

Wealth does not inherently manifest from (the ether / nothing), and neither does opportunity. Even in the EU, wealth is derived from the decisions of the State to create / retain wealth.