The Economy of the Unborn

The critics say you can't run government like a business. I respond, well we can't run government like a government anymore ------ Ralph Klein (Canadian Progressive Conservative Politician, 1994)

As life expectancy rises and populations age, we will need to rethink retirement and empower people to live longer, healthier lives in financial security. By 2050, the number of people aged over 60 is expected to more than double to 2.1 billion, which will have implications for the workforce and financial and care systems globally.

If you look at fertility, there are a few social trends that are the proximate causes of its decline. That includes norms around longer schooling, more parental attention paid to kids, less grandparent involvement in parenting, low religiosity, higher vanity, and moving from “cornerstone” in the past to today’s “capstone” late marriages.

Fertility and productivity are interconnected in several ways, particularly as they relate to demographic trends, workforce availability, and economic outcomes. While it may not seem like an obvious connection, changes in fertility rates can have a significant impact on businesses, labor markets, and overall economic productivity.

Some countries with declining fertility rates, like Japan or Italy, have turned to immigration as a way to boost the workforce. Immigrants, especially those of working age, help to replenish the labor pool, ensuring that businesses continue to have access to a sufficient and diverse talent pool. Immigration can help mitigate some of the adverse effects of declining fertility by increasing the working-age population and sustaining overall business productivity.

Declining Fertility Rates: In many developed countries, fertility rates are declining. When fertility rates fall below the replacement level (around 2.1 children per woman), the population ages, and the proportion of working-age people decreases. This leads to a shrinking labor force, which can result in labor shortages in various industries. As fewer young people enter the workforce, businesses may face difficulties in hiring and retaining talent. With fewer workers available, businesses may need to increase wages to attract employees, but this can raise operational costs and decrease profitability.

Aging Population: As fertility rates drop, the population tends to age, meaning there are more elderly individuals relying on pensions and healthcare systems, and fewer younger people to support them. This shift can create a growing burden on businesses to fund pensions, healthcare benefits, and other welfare systems. Moreover, an aging workforce may face challenges in maintaining high levels of productivity, as older workers may experience health issues or may be less adaptable to new technologies and methods.

Younger Population and Innovation: Younger workers tend to be more innovative, technologically savvy, and flexible in adapting to new business environments. In countries with lower fertility rates, businesses may have fewer younger individuals entering the workforce, which could slow down innovation and the adoption of new technologies. This could have a longer-term impact on overall productivity as industries face difficulties in staying competitive.

The economy of the Born is powered by human attention, human desires, human biases, human labor, human attitudes, human consumption. The economy of the unborn, a synthetic economy, is powered by artificial minds, machine attention, synthetic labor, virtual needs and manufactured desires. [...] We are not replacing existing humans with bots, nor are we replacing unborn humans with bots. Rather we are replacing never-to-be-born humans with bots, and the relationship that we have with those synthetic agents. 

The economy of the unborn will be powered by bots.

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The Idol and the Victim

The young bride was the idol, the amusement, the victim of the evening

.......Alessandro Manzoni (Italian novelist, the betrothed......1785-1873)

 

Principles are immutable until they are not; rivals are friends until they are not.

Humans make mistakes all the time. All of us do, every day, in tasks both new and routine. 

Some of our mistakes are minor and some are catastrophic. Mistakes can break trust and 

confidence of our peers but you don't have to stop trying.

Every type of thinking is best done in teams, not as individuals. There is no thinking that isn’t made 

more thorough, more accurate, and more innovative by the presence of other minds, offering 

different perspectives and together, asking even better questions.

A US startup aptly named Boom has become the first independently developed jet 

(with no government backing) to break the sound barrier. They aim to offer supersonic 

passenger flights by 2029

The Overture, which is Boom's full-scale commercial jet, is designed to carry passengers 

at speeds of up to Mach 2.2, with a goal of connecting cities like New York to London 

in just 3.5 hours, compared to the usual 7-8 hours. The Overture is also designed with 

sustainability in mind, with a plan to use sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) to minimize 

its environmental impact.

Boom Supersonic has placed a strong emphasis on sustainability in the development of its 

supersonic jets, particularly with the Overture aircraft. Some of their key sustainability 

efforts include:

1. Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF):

Boom is committed to using Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) for the Overture jet. SAF is made 

from renewable resources such as plant oils or waste products and can significantly reduce 

the carbon emissions of aviation compared to traditional jet fuel. The company has even 

partnered with several SAF producers to ensure that the fuel can be used at scale for supersonic flight.

2. Design for Efficiency:

The design of the Overture has been optimized for efficiency to reduce fuel consumption. With a more 

streamlined, aerodynamic shape and lighter materials, the aircraft will consume less fuel while 

maintaining high speeds. This will also help reduce the overall carbon footprint per passenger.

3. Noise Reduction:

One of the environmental concerns with supersonic flight has traditionally been sonic booms, the loud 

noise produced when an aircraft exceeds the speed of sound. Boom is working on reducing the intensity of the sonic boom through a combination of design and engineering. They aim to create a "sonic boom" 

friendly aircraft that could eventually be used over land without disrupting communities, thus minimizing noise pollution.

Failure shields the best opportunities from competitors, but success reveals opportunity.

The global landscape of today is less predictable and more chaotic. But it doesn’t have to 

be less collaborative.

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Spread your Wings

 "I know very well that the stability pact is stupid like all decisions that are rigid" ........Romano Prodi (Italian statesman, president of the European Commission,1999)

I hope you consume much higher quality information, and I hope you create greater distance between the social opinions and gain greater proximity to your own. 

Youth is a privilege, use it to experiment, to test the boundaries of the world, to make mistakes while Europe is boxed into excessive regulations and struggling to match the energy behind the US and Chinas economy, you should spread your wings. 

Elons Musk’s $432 billion makes up approximately 1.5% of US GDP, with time on his side he could accumulate $1trillion, just like the oil magnate John D. Rockefeller with 2.3% of America’s GDP at $900 million in 1913. 

The world’s largest tech companies have substantial free cash reserves:  Apple ($109 billion), Microsoft ($74 billion), Alphabet ($64 billion), Meta ($44 billion), Amazon ($32B) and Nvidia ($27 billion). As a result, these companies will ramp up their acquisition activities in AI, data, hardware, and energy. They all hope to face less pushback from the Federal Trade Commission.

DeepSeek at a Glance

Cost breakthrough: DeepSeek’s R-1 rivals OpenAI’s o1 in performance (not o3) at 10% the cost, enabling affordable, high-quality AI.

Open-source edge: Freely available, runs on modest hardware, sparking rapid developer adoption and open-source innovation.

Industry disruption: Big Tech (OpenAI, Google, Meta) and Nvidia’s GPU business face pressure as low-cost models challenge closed, expensive systems. Could have made a fortune from shorting NVidia's stock.

China looked at the U.S. and saw the overbearing importance of the finance industry at the expense of the real economy. Many of the top US graduates ended up in the increasingly parasitic finance industry instead of working on projects that move society forward. 

Simply put you want your best minds building real value, not just extracting it.

For Technology, The US is ahead however, China has the momentum with a more focused research brain power on Tech as opposed to wall street and just like the GDP, China still has some mileage to overcome.

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