Personal Finance Topics / Macroeconomic Trends and Risks
No. of Recommendations: 5
No. of Recommendations: 5
There are a couple of things which I find disconcerting:
“Spending by upper-income households was buoyed by high stock-market valuations.”
Yet, (while it also might be the usual case of kleptocracy often seen in private capital takeovers), the Saks Group of Bay, Saks, Bergdorf Goodman and Neiman Marcus has just declared Chapter 7 bankruptcy.
While there is currently a boost in employment to build the data centers and power infrastructure for the AI build-out, it is important to contemplate that the function of actually making a return on that investment is by the recovery of the savings of cutting payrolls.
Investors care about profits, but there seems to be little political will to consider the social upheavals which will be caused by the general adoption of far more effective AI’s in the foreseeable future.
People should be careful what they wish for.
Jeff
No. of Recommendations: 0
While there is currently a boost in employment to build the data centers and power infrastructure for the AI build-out,
The rush to build "data centers" reminds me of the rush to build "EV battery plants", plants that GM and Ford are trying to pivot to building house scale backup batteries, so they don't need to write them off. There are now four, or five, "data centers" being pushed through local planning commissions and zoning boards, just here in metro Detroit.
Do you know how many automobile companies there have been in the US, from the days when cars were the new hotness?
Steve
No. of Recommendations: 4
Do you know how many automobile companies there have been in the US, from the days when cars were the new hotness?
No, but I do remember AOL, MSN, Excite, Yahoo!, CompuServe, Prodigy, Genie, Netcom, PSInet, and others as were marketed by AT&T and Sprint. Gold rush! Everybody gets rich!
No. of Recommendations: 3
The rush to build "data centers"
It is fairly easy to fix the "demand to supply data centers" when the risks are appropriately allocated.
1. No increase in local electric rates for consumers and non-data center businesses.
2. No per capita reduction in supply of electricity to consumers and businesses due to need to supply power to any data center for any reason other than lessening demand per capita for power by consumers and non-data center businesses.
3. All risk of loss for data center participant(s) shall be carried by the:
a. participating electric company(ies) and shareholders of same,
b. data center owner(s), and
c. party(ies) seeking to profit (directly or indirectly) from their use of a data center.
No. of Recommendations: 0
>>Do you know how many automobile companies there have been in the US, from the days when cars were the new hotness?<,
No,
The Wiki article estimates about 1900 auto companies, in the US alone. And, of the three still standing, only Ford has survived without a government bailout.
Steve
No. of Recommendations: 11
The Wiki article estimates about 1900 auto companies, in the US alone. And, of the three still standing, only Ford has survived without a government bailout.
Nope. While GM & Chrysler got money from TARP, Ford took $6 billion from the DOE in the form of a loan. It’s a distinction they played well as “without a government bailout”, and which consumers and much of the media bought, but “government money” is still government money. They took the loan in 2009. Ford used the money to upgrade facilities, and finally repaid the loan in 2022.
No. of Recommendations: 0
Ford took $6 billion from the DOE in the form of a loan.I had forgotten about that one. I remember the local media talking about Mulally mortgaging everything, including the blue oval logo, to raise money to clean up the dumpster fire that was Ford.
Do we call the DOE program a bailout, or normal corporate welfare? Apparently Nissan, Tesla, and a couple others, received loans from that program.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Technology_...Steve
