170th Edition
Hope restored, faith renewed
In today’s blog, I am going to briefly summarize the primary points in three different recent essays from the Wall Street Journal, then I hope to find common threads. So please bear with me. Here goes. The first essay is titled, “Bezos, Billionaires and the Age of AI Abundance.” This article is based on an interview with Jeff Bezos conducted by Andrew Ross Sorkin of CNBC. Bezos basically repudiates the ludicrous ideology touted today by progressives that wealth creators, AKA billionaires, didn’t earn their wealth, at least not through their own initiative, personal sacrifice, and determination. He goes on to express his belief in American capitalism, another target that progressives despise. Bezos states, “America is the greatest country in the world. We have more entrepreneurial dynamism here than anywhere else in the world. This is the best time to be alive in America…” Essentially, when it comes to various issues in our economy and society, Bezos sees government overreach as the problem while progressives view expanding government control as the solution. These two fundamentally opposing ideologies are on a collision course and the outcome will go a long way to determining the future of our country.
The second essay is “The Panic Industry’s New Target,” by Barton Swaim. In the first part of his essay, Swaim chastises tech titans like Microsoft’s Bill Gates and Goggle’s Eric Schmidt for the role they played in spreading fear about catastrophic climate change over the past two decades. Since their prediction of a climate apocalypse has largely been proven false, many of these tech icons have restated their view on climate change, admitting they were misguided and inaccurate. More recently, these same tech innovators have expressed their frustration with the fear that so many people seem to have about the disruptive potential of artificial intelligence. As Swaim states, “Call it the Busybody Economy. Organizations designed to worry about future calamities can be counted on to find new calamities to worry about.” First, it was climate change, now it is AI. As it turns out, the same non-profit activist groups that exacerbated the fear of climate change are now promoting fear of AI. The reason offered by Mr. Swaim is that “The prospect for annihilation keeps the money flowing.” In short, fear sells.
The third essay is “Falling Birth Rates Are a Mystery,” by Louise Perry. According to her article, fertility rates are declining almost everywhere. For every possible reason why, the author states statistics from one country that invalidate that specific reason. Whether it is legalized abortion, rising housing costs, self-absorption through social media, or people postponing marriage, Ms. Perry offers conflicting evidence to conclude that there isn’t one specific reason why fertility rates are falling. She concludes, “The truth is that we don’t really know what is going on, and we certainly don’t know when the fertility decline might end… Whatever is going on, my hunch is that it doesn’t fit neatly into any mainstream political ideology. When – or if – we work out the answer, I expect that we will find it strange, surprising, and quite possibly unwelcome.”
Are there common threads to these three interesting essays? What might those be? In each of these situations, there seems to be clear evidence of the following emotions; fear, pessimism, anxiety, a lack of self-confidence, and a void of hope and faith. It seems logical to me that a person overwhelmed by these destructive emotions would prefer that some ruling body would alleviate their suffering and restore some notion of justice. Hence today’s growing interest in socialism. It also seems reasonable, and I have seen this firsthand, that fearful people are adept at finding the next issue of which to be fearful after their perception changes regarding their current fear. They might be thinking along these lines; just because this fear didn’t materialize, doesn’t mean the next one won’t.
Conversely, confidence, hope, and faith seem to be absent in all these situations. Importantly, it takes all three for entrepreneurship to thrive. Individuals only take risks when they possess these attributes. Wealth creators exude self-confidence and prefer to control their own destiny. They are aware of the risks, but focus more on opportunities, and are willing to put in the work necessary to achieve success. They prefer limited government. Meanwhile, they understand that faith is the antithesis of fear. For many, to alleviate fear, they rely on their faith.
What might make fertility rates rise? Could it be a restoration of hope, a renewal of faith, and a repudiation of the polarizing and isolating impact of social media? Perhaps that would be strange, surprising, and unwelcome to Ms. Perry and some other people, but I can’t think of anything that symbolizes hopefulness and faith more than the commitment to experiencing the miracle of birth and the gift from God of a newborn baby.
Please help me grow my readership by forwarding this to a friend(s). In the meantime, stay tuned for my next newsletter. Thanks
Michael Kayes
*These views are my personal opinions and are not the viewpoints of any company or organization.