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Rallies And Epochs
It's artificial!
That's the lament from equity market bears these days. If we're being honest, that's always the lament from bears, or at least in the post-Lehman era, defined as it was by the slow death of price discovery at the hands of central banks.
In 2023, though, you can take bears' protestations about "artificial" markets both figuratively and a measure of literally. This year's gains for US equities are attributable entirely to A.I. optimism. At this point, that's not an exaggeration.
One day my only bathroom faucet died so I called my usual plumbing company. It was a Friday afternoon and the guy arrived about 1:15 (long lunch). Before he got started he “noticed” that he didn’t have the “right part” so he had to go back to the office. Back around 2:00. He spent an hour or so fixing my problem and left about 3:00. As soon as the plumber left I realized the repaired device still didn’t work properly. I called the office and told them what was wrong and they sent the same guy plumber back to fix it. He muttered and spent another hour or so “fixing” the problem. He left at four with my faucet finally working. I got the bill the middle of the next week. The owner managed to show me on the hook for the whole afternoon plus four trip charges. I told myself that was no surprise. I knew the owner well and he was a born chiseler. I went to his office, dropped the bill on his desk along with a check for an hour of time and left. He never complained. Then I got to wondering, if the first guy couldn’t do it right the first time why should I believe he could do it on the second try? The faucet failed again in a week or so and the next plumber I called took care of in in 45 minutes. He was the guy I called the next time. Mars ain’t going fix the work of the plumbers we’ve got now. We will just be sending the folks who messed up this place.
I too had a plumbing problem. My plumber came, assessed, and left to find/order a part. He had to order it. However, he surmised he could fix my leaking shower by “engineering” a new gasket. He left again, fabricated a gasket at his home, returned, and fixed the leak. Said he would return with the new part when it came in and charge me then. That’s been over two months ago. I contacted my plumber. He said he ‘didn’t remember being here.’ I jogged his memory. He said he’d pick up the part and install. I told him to take his time, all is working. Haven’t heard from him since and still no bill. My take: plumbers are under a lot of stress!
For a video version of the “planetary boundry” framework concept see David Attenborough’s “Breaking Boundries” Netflix documentary:
https://www.netflix.com/title/81336476
Johan Rockström who is listed first on the paper is also in the video.
Old man shakes fist at cloud
Too much money being spent on salaried prompt engineers, not enough on the next generation plumbers. We’re so fucked.
I had a similar situation with some “tree service” folx last year. The guy didn’t want to drive 20 minutes and get a wood splitter, and ended up splitting the wood by hand, then they tried to charge me for the extra time. When I paid the originally agreed invoice and left a note stating as such, I didn’t hear any complaints.
I would favor a slight tweak to the name of our new geological epoch — Anthro-obscene — if we’re not already locked in.