Making America Great Again (Really)

How much of the greatness will trickle down to everyone else, and how much will stay in the hands with all the capital? I think that is what most people think of when they think MAGA. The elites of this country can literally go anywhere in the world for the most part, and make that part of the world great or better than it is. America is still expensive, so I don't know why they choose invest here.

And I am curious, where is this domestic oil coming from, Texas, or North Dakota? As for the Primary (agriculture) driver, we are what? Planting more GMO corn which everyone loves to hate on. Or almonds and pistachio which is dominated by one guy (or a few), grown in the California, and causing a lot of water issues for the people living there that aren't rich. And what kind of scientific development are we doing that cannot be hacked, rip-offed by China?
 
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No it is not. Come visit me in Oklahoma and I will show you the proof. 'Red necks' in Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas. 'Hillbillies' in West Virginia. California, God bless them, I don't even know what to call them...

Let's go back to the American Civil War days. The Confederacy had the better and smarter officers. Not really sure why. Both sides had West Point graduates, and the South was winning that war for the first 3 years. Both sides made mistakes. The North could have won the war in the first year. In the end, the industrial North beat the agricultural South. The South ran out of men to fight in the war. But the South did have the smarter officers. Today I think it would be a different story. Definitely too many idiots in the South today. The water? Inbreeding? I'm not sure...

Actually, the north back then was pretty agricultural too. Most of the world was. The south was primarily cotton and tobacco though, and I guess pig farming. The north had more abundant type of crops and still does to this day.

And I have heard the take that the South had the better officers, but I have also heard the counter arguments to that. I mean the North had plenty of fine officers. We had guys like Philip Kearny, the one armed General. Judson Kil-cavalry Kilpatrick, Sherman, Grant, Chamberlain etc, etc.
 
Arable land doesn't mean land that is suitable for farming. It means land under current cultivation right now. Yes, it sounds weird and it's not even the main point of your thread but I had to point it out, but the point is that the US doesn't own the best or the most land. They just use a lot of it through heavy subsidies.
The same can be said about the oil. The US can drill as much as they want, their wells are not as profitable as these in Saudi Arabia.

The US will not collapse or anything, but it's inevitable that China will surpass it in GDP.
 
Arable land doesn't mean land that is suitable for farming. It means land under current cultivation right now. Yes, it sounds weird and it's not even the main point of your thread but I had to point it out, but the point is that the US doesn't own the best or the most land. They just use a lot of it through heavy subsidies.
The same can be said about the oil. The US can drill as much as they want, their wells are not as profitable as these in Saudi Arabia.

The US will not collapse or anything, but it's inevitable that China will surpass it in GDP.

But that is precisely what is meant by it in this instance and yes, it does.

https://worldview.stratfor.com/article/geopolitics-united-states-part-1-inevitable-empire

American geography is an impressive one. The Greater Mississippi Basin together with the Intracoastal Waterway has more kilometers of navigable internal waterways than the rest of the world combined. The American Midwest is both overlaid by this waterway and is the world's largest contiguous piece of farmland. The U.S. Atlantic Coast possesses more major ports than the rest of the Western Hemisphere combined.

Two vast oceans insulated the United States from Asian and European powers, deserts separate the United States from Mexico to the south, while lakes and forests separate the population centers in Canada from those in the United States. The United States has capital, food surpluses and physical insulation in excess of every other country in the world by an exceedingly large margin.

Climatically, the continent consists of a series of wide north-south precipitation bands largely shaped by the landmass' longitudinal topography. The Rocky Mountains dominate the Western third of the northern and central parts of North America, generating a rain-shadow effect just east of the mountain range — an area known colloquially as the Great Plains. Farther east of this semiarid region are the well-watered plains of the prairie provinces of Canada and the American Midwest. This zone comprises both the most productive and the largest contiguous acreage of arable land on the planet.

The most distinctive and important feature of North America is the river network in the middle third of the continent. While its components are larger in both volume and length than most of the world's rivers, this is not what sets the network apart. Very few of its tributaries begin at high elevations, making vast tracts of these rivers easily navigable. In the case of the Mississippi, the head of navigation — just north of Minneapolis — is 3,000 kilometers inland.

The network consists of six distinct river systems: the Missouri, Arkansas, Red, Ohio, Tennessee and, of course, the Mississippi. The unified nature of this system greatly enhances the region's usefulness and potential economic and political power. First, shipping goods via water is an order of magnitude cheaper than shipping them via land. The specific ratio varies greatly based on technological era and local topography, but in the petroleum age in the United States, the cost of transport via water is roughly 10 to 30 times cheaper than overland. This simple fact makes countries with robust maritime transport options extremely capital-rich when compared to countries limited to land-only options.

Second, the watershed of the Greater Mississippi Basin largely overlays North America's arable lands. Normally, agricultural areas as large as the American Midwest are underutilized as the cost of shipping their output to more densely populated regions cuts deeply into the economics of agriculture. The Eurasian steppe is an excellent example. Even in modern times Russian and Kazakh crops occasionally rot before they can reach market. Massive artificial transport networks must be constructed and maintained in order for the land to reach its full potential.

Not so in the case of the Greater Mississippi Basin. The vast bulk of the prime agricultural lands are within 200 kilometers of a stretch of navigable river. Road and rail are still used for collection, but nearly omnipresent river ports allow for the entirety of the basin's farmers to easily and cheaply ship their products to markets not just in North America but all over the world.
 
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But that is precisely what is meant by it in this instance and yes, it does.

https://worldview.stratfor.com/article/geopolitics-united-states-part-1-inevitable-empire

American geography is an impressive one. The Greater Mississippi Basin together with the Intracoastal Waterway has more kilometers of navigable internal waterways than the rest of the world combined. The American Midwest is both overlaid by this waterway and is the world's largest contiguous piece of farmland. The U.S. Atlantic Coast possesses more major ports than the rest of the Western Hemisphere combined.

Two vast oceans insulated the United States from Asian and European powers, deserts separate the United States from Mexico to the south, while lakes and forests separate the population centers in Canada from those in the United States. The United States has capital, food surpluses and physical insulation in excess of every other country in the world by an exceedingly large margin.

Climatically, the continent consists of a series of wide north-south precipitation bands largely shaped by the landmass' longitudinal topography. The Rocky Mountains dominate the Western third of the northern and central parts of North America, generating a rain-shadow effect just east of the mountain range — an area known colloquially as the Great Plains. Farther east of this semiarid region are the well-watered plains of the prairie provinces of Canada and the American Midwest. This zone comprises both the most productive and the largest contiguous acreage of arable land on the planet.

The most distinctive and important feature of North America is the river network in the middle third of the continent. While its components are larger in both volume and length than most of the world's rivers, this is not what sets the network apart. Very few of its tributaries begin at high elevations, making vast tracts of these rivers easily navigable. In the case of the Mississippi, the head of navigation — just north of Minneapolis — is 3,000 kilometers inland.

The network consists of six distinct river systems: the Missouri, Arkansas, Red, Ohio, Tennessee and, of course, the Mississippi. The unified nature of this system greatly enhances the region's usefulness and potential economic and political power. First, shipping goods via water is an order of magnitude cheaper than shipping them via land. The specific ratio varies greatly based on technological era and local topography, but in the petroleum age in the United States, the cost of transport via water is roughly 10 to 30 times cheaper than overland. This simple fact makes countries with robust maritime transport options extremely capital-rich when compared to countries limited to land-only options.

Second, the watershed of the Greater Mississippi Basin largely overlays North America's arable lands. Normally, agricultural areas as large as the American Midwest are underutilized as the cost of shipping their output to more densely populated regions cuts deeply into the economics of agriculture. The Eurasian steppe is an excellent example. Even in modern times Russian and Kazakh crops occasionally rot before they can reach market. Massive artificial transport networks must be constructed and maintained in order for the land to reach its full potential.

Not so in the case of the Greater Mississippi Basin. The vast bulk of the prime agricultural lands are within 200 kilometers of a stretch of navigable river. Road and rail are still used for collection, but nearly omnipresent river ports allow for the entirety of the basin's farmers to easily and cheaply ship their products to markets not just in North America but all over the world.

So our water supply is our advantage? Lots of places are very wet like India, Indochina. And not all crops that we like eat require a wet environment. California for example makes a wide variety of produce we eat, and they have water issues.

Our wet areas are mostly for producing grains, and livestock. and the livestock feed. And they plant the same thing over and over again, which is bad for the soil. Also how much livestock are we suppose to produce? The more livestock, the more farts, and that is horrible for the climate.

We really ought not to farm more food than we need. The soil and the land can only take so much farming. If there are people who need food, they need to better utilize their own land and resources better. If they still can't feed themselves, then they have reached carrying capacity, and need Thanos to wipe out half their population.
 
So our water supply is our advantage? Lots of places are very wet like India, Indochina. And not all crops that we like eat require a wet environment. California for example makes a wide variety of produce we eat, and they have water issues.

Our wet areas are mostly for producing grains, and livestock. and the livestock feed. And they plant the same thing over and over again, which is bad for the soil. Also how much livestock are we suppose to produce? The more livestock, the more farts, and that is horrible for the climate.

We really ought not to farm more food than we need. The soil and the land can only take so much farming. If there are people who need food, they need to better utilize their own land and resources better. If they still can't feed themselves, then they have reached carrying capacity, and need Thanos to wipe out half their population.

The biggest advantages of the interconnected navigable waterway network are the ease and cost of transport as illustrated by the (extensive) Stratfor analysis. It's maintained by the US Army Corps of Engineers, moves 600+ billion tons of goods on an annual basis, supports 550,000 jobs and significantly reduces congestion and strain on other infrastructure such as roads and bridges.
 
The biggest advantages of the interconnected navigable waterway network are the ease and cost of transport as illustrated by the (extensive) Stratfor analysis. It's maintained by the US Army Corps of Engineers, moves 600+ billion tons of goods on an annual basis, supports 550,000 jobs and significantly reduces congestion and strain on other infrastructure such as roads and bridges.

The Mississippi/Missouri River/Ohio is an awesome river system. But the delivery, and transportation are service jobs. Our economy has been service dominated for a while now. So I don't see how having this great river system will improve anything. It just keeps everything the same as it is. Not saying it is really bad as it is now though.
 
I just love how rustled the media still is about Trump calling them out on their shit. I literally just heard a guy on MSNBC say it is an attack on our constitution and culture.

The recent word out of China is making me believe the PRC possibly got hosed behind closed doors and the joint statement was for the sake of saving face as they gradually cave. What the hell is WaPo doing running pieces about how we "lost" before anything tangible had even taken shape? Forget about China's multitude of WTO violations, it's the United States that is acting hostile.

If the US continues to block the appointment of WTO judge replacements as terms expire, it will effectively be the end of the World Trade Organization. It's the only country on the globe with the veto power to execute something like this: It built the fucking thing, beginning with its previous incarnation known as GATT. America is playing extraordinarily nasty right now and acting in a manner everyone seemed to think it always did. That was pure benevolence by comparison.

Reuters: China Signals To State Giants: 'Buy American' Oil and Grains

BEIJING - China will import record volumes of U.S. oil and is likely to ship more U.S. soy after Beijing signalled to state-run refiners and grains purchasers they should buy more to help ease tensions between the two top economies, trade sources said on Wednesday.

China pledged at the weekend to increase imports from its top trading partner to avert a trade war that could damage the global economy. Energy and commodities were high on Washington’s list of products for sale. The United States is also seeking better access for imports of genetically modified crops into China under the deal.

As the two sides stepped back from a full-blown trade war, Washington neared a deal on Tuesday to lift its ban on U.S. firms supplying Chinese telecoms gear maker ZTE Corp and Beijing announced tariff cuts on car imports. But U.S. President Donald Trump indicated on Wednesday that negotiations were still short of his objectives when he said any deal would need a “different structure”.

China is the world’s top importer of both oil and soy, and already buys significant volumes of both from the United States. It is unclear how much more Chinese importers will buy from the United States than they would have otherwise, but any additional shipments would contribute to cutting the trade surplus, as demanded by Trump.

Asia’s largest oil refiner, China’s Sinopec will boost crude imports from the United States to an all-time high in June as part of Chinese efforts to cut the surplus, two sources with knowledge of the matter said on Wednesday.

China has been one of the top buyers of U.S. crude exports since Washington lifted a 40-year ban on shipments in late 2015. Since then, U.S. crude exports have risen rapidly as output from shale fields hits record highs. Exports are straining U.S. pipeline and port capacity, and may be reaching a limit until capacity expansion underway are completed, one of the sources said.
 
This is the biggest problem.

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What's the reason for their productivity increase? Are they really being more productive or is it because they have better tools at their disposal? I once read about workers having some kind of magic "productivity" box on their desk.
 


18:45-19:45 is almost chilling:

"Today courtesy of the millenials the United States is the top consuming power, and courtesy of the boomers we're the top investment power. But by 2030, we're the only consumption power and only investment power. We are in the midst of the great transition: The United States is becoming the only country in the world that can absorb global exports at the same time we have lost all political interest in doing so, and that will force catastrophic change everywhere... but here."

Who the fook is that guy? Pulls up to 40 G's a pop to speak.

https://www.bigspeak.com/speakers/peter-zeihan/

Peter Zeihan is a top keynote speaker in geopolitical strategy who specializes in global energy, demographics, and security. Before founding his own firm, Zeihan on Geopolitics, Peter worked for the U.S. State Department and private think tanks. Zeihan’s worldview marries the realities of geography and populations to a deep understanding of how global politics impact markets and economic trends, helping industry leaders navigate today’s complex mix of geopolitical risks and opportunities. With a keen eye toward what will drive tomorrow’s headlines, his irreverent approach transforms topics that are normally dense and heavy into accessible, relevant takeaways for audiences of all types.

I’m curious to know if productivity is increased due to tools that employers have invested into their employees to make them more productive and therefore they aren’t actually doing more work theyre just more efficient at the work they are doing. Should you be paid more because employers have mad you more productive?

What's the reason for their productivity increase? Are they really being more productive or is it because they have better tools at their disposal? I once read about workers having some kind of magic "productivity" box on their desk.

Well, economics isn't exactly a science (at all) but you'd probably have to imagine tech and tools have played an extensive role in boosting worker productivity, so the question becomes how much that should even matter and is largely dependent on your ideological slant I guess. Regardless, this is playing with fire and practically begging for societal chaos if it continues unabated. When is such drastically disproportionate wealth distribution enough?

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Below is the global 2018 forecast estimate for Total R&D expenditures - academia, government, industry, npo/ngo - and encompasses all three types of work: basic, applied and development research. The reason the US remains the sole scientific superpower is for its dominance within the realms of basic (I prefer to call it fundamental) and applied research but since science is a global enterprise it also tends to be the sort of material published in academic journals. There's open access to the research and methodology, which essentially grants a 'free ride' to industrialize and/or commercialize new products and processes in the form of devices, systems, materials, methods, etc.

The lone exception tends to be in regards to direct military and space applications (partially) which is why our national FFRDC laboratories such as Los Alamos, Sandia, JPL, Lincoln, LLNL, LBNL, SLAC and others publish so little academic research. These are government funded labs with department sponsors (Defense, Energy, NASA) but they're managed by independent non-profit 'contractors' - not the likes of Lockheed, Boeing, Northrop Grumman and such but rather MIT, Caltech, Stanford, UC who just so happen to be the top research universities in the United States (and world) aside from Harvard, which has its own collaborations with another FFRDC managing contractor in Massachusetts known as the MITRE Corporation.

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I’m curious to know if productivity is increased due to tools that employers have invested into their employees to make them more productive and therefore they aren’t actually doing more work theyre just more efficient at the work they are doing. Should you be paid more because employers have mad you more productive?

Well there isn't much of a good excuse to be paid less relative to your less productive father is there? If we were truly advancing wed all be getting some of our time back seeing as we can meet our needs more and more efficiently. That's not exactly the way we tend to break though is it ?

Double it this year? Great ! Now triple it the next !
 
Trends. How do they work?
 
What was the date when America was great before?

It's a silly political campaign slogan and this thread is a play on it but for the fun of it, I guess that depends on what you're talking about in conjunction with personal perspective (race, ethnicity, gender, socioeconomic status, etc.) but also relative to whom and what? Not to mention conditions have and do differ drastically from state-to-state, nevermind region-to-region.

On another front: As a geopolitical entity, a country, it's done a lot more for the advancement of humanity than all of its wars combined have detracted from it but people tend to only focus on one side of the balance sheet. America has been very Fritz Haber-ish like that.

Trends. How do they work?

Some tend to last quite a while. The United States is the longest running democracy on the planet - that is, the oldest existing nation with a constitutional government in which the people elect their own government and representatives. It's had the largest economy in the world (nominal gdp) since the end of the 1870s Reconstruction. It's been the de facto global leader in science, technology and innovation post-1945. From how it's looking, the shale boom is likely to hold for at least several decades. The geographical advantages aren't going anywhere and the demographics have a profoundly better outlook than the rest of the developed world for the next couple of generations.

QZ: US Oil and Gas Production Is Leaving Saudi Arabia and Russia Behind

For seven straight years, the US has pumped more oil and gas out of the ground than any other country. That lead will only widen, states the US Energy Information Administration (EIA).

The independent energy statistical agency describes the US as “the undisputed oil and gas leader in the world over the next several decades.” It comes as Russia and Saudi Arabia are constraining production to lift prices, while new technology is making vast new pools of once unprofitable hydrocarbons economical to extract in the US.

In an analysis released May 21, the EIA estimates that the US pumped the equivalent of 30 million barrels of oil per day in 2017, a record high. (The figure includes all hydrocarbons such as natural gas, crude oil and others.) That puts the US well ahead of other major producers, including Russia and Saudi Arabia.

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NoDak's Legacy Fund going to be so swole.
 
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