Hacker News Books

Have you read "The Accidental Superpower"? Highly recommended.

It covers the demography, geology and geography that guarantees the USA will continue to be the predominant power for the next 25 years, if not longer.

Not sure I buy all his arguments, but definitely worth a read.

Good point, "The Accidental Superpower" is wondrous in scope and ideas. The "Absent Superpower", the sequel, is OK; had some interesting insights about shale and the coming removal of the USA from the world. But the first book is timeless.

His Twitter feed is high signal as well: https://twitter.com/PeterZeihan/

The demographic problem. Highly recommend reading "The Accidental Superpower" as it explains how this, as well as a few other geopolitical considerations, will shape the next few decades. (Hint: it's not pretty.)

Suggest you read The Accidental Superpower for why this structure is now breaking down.

Agreed. The US is in a tough spot, but the rest of the world is in an even tougher spot. Definitely with regards to geography, but also with regards to demography (the only continent where population is continuing to grow is Africa). Worth reading: "The Accidental Superpower", https://www.amazon.com/Accidental-Superpower-Generation-Amer...

>For certain definitions of “marginally,” I suppose.

The choice isn't just "manufacture in China" or "manufacture in the US". According to Peter Zeihan's The Accidental Superpower (2014), manufacturing in China has gone from being one quarter as expensive as in Mexico to 25% more expensive. He expects that the US shale and natural gas boom will further reduce costs in Mexico and the US.

Also see "[Why China should follow Trump’s example and cut taxes](http://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/2056874/why-ch.... Quote: "As far as manufacturing is concerned, according to Cao, everything is cheaper in America apart from manpower."

According to Peter Zeihan's The Accidental Superpower (2014), manufacturing in China has gone from being one quarter as expensive as in Mexico to 25% more expensive. He expects that the US shale and natural gas boom will further reduce costs in Mexico and the US.

Also see "Why China should follow Trump’s example and cut taxes" http://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/2056874/why-ch... . Quote: "As far as manufacturing is concerned, according to Cao, everything is cheaper in America apart from manpower."

>Eventually, China may lose the labor cost advantage; it's already declined quite a bit as wages go up.

According to Peter Zeihan's The Accidental Superpower (2014), manufacturing in China has gone from being one quarter as expensive as in Mexico to 25% more expensive. He expects that the US shale and natural gas boom will further reduce costs in Mexico and the US.

Also see "Why China should follow Trump’s example and cut taxes" http://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/2056874/why-ch... . Quote: "As far as manufacturing is concerned, according to Cao, everything is cheaper in America apart from manpower."

This is interesting to consider in the context of Zeihan's "The Accidental Superpower"[1] which says that
- geography is destiny, and
- the U.S. won the geography lottery.

The idea that geography has some input to the rest of the cultures values, as shown in TFA, sounds plausible.

Whether Zeihan actually has the right of it isn't clear, however.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Accidental-Superpower-Generation-Amer...

Yes, the world is a chaotic reflexive system and trying to manipulate it always creates unintended consequences. The US absolutely does dumb stuff all the time, and power always gets abused.

But for a contrarian view on the “US Bad” narrative, check out a book called The Accidental Superpower

Here’s a good summary of the book: https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/your-book-review-the-a...

It presents an interesting case that the relative peace of modern society is entirely due to US military over-investment brought on by the Cold War—which allows for uninterrupted global supply chains, safe global trade, and enforces the intertwining of economic interests through global markets.

Absent the US existing, the world doesn’t suddenly become a utopia of people living happily ever after. Humans don’t have a great track record of being nice to each other. Unfortunately the alternative options to US power don’t look all that great.

First off let me clarify that I'm no Trump supporter either. :) That said, I've been reading a book called "The Accidental Superpower" that I find very insightful, and the author makes arguments similar to the ones you mentioned. He argues that since WW2 the US has defended free trade around the world (through "the Bretton Woods system") essentially "for free" - even though we shoulder the defense burden for the rest of the world we haven't used this to negotiate treaties that are biased in our favor. The author sees this system ending in the next 20 years (i.e., the US will no longer defend the world's commerce for free) and he spends a large portion of the book discussing how different countries around the world will have to adapt.

A couple interesting notes: the author predicts that in a world with less free trade the US would do relatively well thanks to shale oil and our other natural resources (like rivers and rich farmlands).

He also talks a lot about demographic changes. He says in the US this will cause some pain from ~2020-2030 as the baby boomers retire, but we'll recover as millennials enter the most productive years of their careers (40s-early 60s).

However he also predicts much more dire consequences for Russia due to demographic changes, and suggests they might not recover from a decline starting around 2020.

Compare:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Russia_Sex_by_Age_2015010...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:USA_by_Sex_and_Age_2015-0...

I can't repeat the entire analysis from the book in this box but I've found the author's comments to be thought-provoking so far. :)

Of particular interest to the HN crowd, the author also argues that demographic issues mean that right now there is an unusually large amount of investable capital available, but this will soon change as baby boomers begin to retire and switch from accumulating and investing their money to trying to stretch what they've already earned to last the rest of their lives. He predicts we'll see much less money available for risky investments starting in the next few years, due simply to demographic changes around the world.

I'd recommend "The Accidental Superpower" - Peter Zeihan.

To summarize, he views the world economy as entirely enabled by the US Navy. The protection and projection of this naval forced has allowed an unparalleled level of relatively free global trade.

With the population bust, he predicts the US will turn inwards. The world economy will fragment. Less rigid economies will collapse. Global investment will all but dry up. His argumentation style is compelling whether or not you want to accept or debate his conclusions.