Race and economic well-being in the United States
We construct a measure of consumption-equivalent welfare for Black and White Americans, which incorporates life expectancy, consumption, leisure, and inequality. Based on these factors, welfare for Black Americans was 40 percent of that for White Americans in 1984 and 59 percent by 2022. There has been remarkable progress for Black Americans: The level of their consumption-equivalent welfare increased by a factor of 3.5 over the last 38 years when aggregate consumption per person only doubled. Despite this progress, the welfare gap in 2022 remains disconcertingly large at 41 percent, much larger than the 16 percent gap in consumption per person.
That is from a new article by Jean-Félix Brouillette, Charles I. Jones, and Peter J. Klenow, just published in American Economic Journal: Insights.
Wednesday assorted links
1. On the romanticism of Rudolf Steiner.
2. Proving new math theorems with AI. And the AI for Science Executive Order. Genesis Mission!
3. The AI invasion of knitting and crochet?
4. Nouriel Roubini is optimistic about the economy (FT). And taxes have been rising too much on the wealthiest Brits (FT).
5. The speed of the NBA is increasing (thus so many injuries?).
6. Raye, Where is my husbannd?
7. GPT on economic recovery in Egypt, growth now above five percent.
“Why ‘Humane’ Immigration Policy Ends in Cruelty”
That is the title of my latest Free Press column, which is interesting throughout. Here is one bit from it:
Behind any immigration debate is an uncomfortable truth: In rich, successful democracies, every workable immigration policy, over enough time, offends liberal instincts or public opinion—often both. We oscillate between compassion and coercive control, and the more we do of one, the more we seem to need some of the other.
The dilemma: Due to the ever-rising numbers of migration to the United States, the enforcement of immigration restrictions has to become more oppressive and more unpleasant as time passes. The alternative course, which is equally unpleasant, is that immigration increases to levels that voters find unacceptable, and we fall under the rule of anti-immigrant parties—which are illiberal on many other issues as well.
The news gets worse. The more pro-immigration you are and the more you allow some foreigners to enter this country, the more others on the outside will wish to come too. Unless you are going to open the border entirely (not a good idea), you will end up having to impose increasingly harsh measures on illegal arrivals, and tougher and tougher restrictions on potentially legal applicants. The liberals in essence become the illiberals.
So I mourn our ongoing and intensifying moral dilemma. At the margin, there are so many people who want to come here (a sign of American success, of course) that there is no kind and gentle way to limit their numbers to a level the public finds acceptable.
And this:
A third alternative is to slow the intake. Keep it fast enough for America to remain “a nation of migrants,” but slow enough to avoid major backlash or to asymptotically approach open borders.
That sounds pretty good, right? But here is the illiberal catch: Given the growing attractiveness of migration to America, penalties and enforcement have to get tougher each year. There are no ways to send large numbers of people back that are not cruel and coercive. There are also few ways to keep people out that do not involve the extensive presence of coercive police, border arrests, imprisonment, and other unpleasant measures.
We might decide to let in more migrants, but still we will end up being cruel to the would-be migrants at the margin. And as demand to migrate continues to rise, we have to be increasingly coercive over time.
That does not have to mean masked ICE men grabbing people randomly off the streets (which leads to violating the constitutional rights of mistakenly identified citizens), but one way or another it is going to involve threats of violence against actual human bodies. That can mean turning away boats full of desperate people, flying people back home, putting them in interim jails, and in general treating them in ways I find deeply unpleasant and disturbing. It is no accident that the Biden administration could not completely avoid the Trumpian policy of separating illegal migrants from the children that accompany them.
Definitely recommended, one of my more interesting pieces this year.
Emergent Ventures India, 13th cohort
Khyathi Komalan, sophomore at Caltech majoring in math, received her grant for career development, and to support her research applying category theory to everything from quantum physics to social relationships.
Soumil Nema, cofounder of NeoVes, received his grant to develop stem cell therapies treating neurological disorders like stroke and neuropathy.
Anushka Punukollu, 17, a high school student in Canada, received her grant for SucroSoil, to repurpose sugarcane waste into hydrogels combating soil erosion in rural India.
Deev Mehta, 17, received his grant to develop a rover making farming autonomous.
Adithya Sakaray, Steve Aldrin, and Aadhithya D received their grant for Recruitr AI, to automate video interviews using AI.
Samarth K J, 20, civil engineering student at IIT madras, received a general career development grant.
Prakyath Gowda, 25, received his grant to develop a lightweight and efficient electric vehicle battery.
Aaron Rego received his grant for Rightful, to help Indian families recover unclaimed financial assets.
Vatsal Hariramani, 21, engineering student, received his grant to develop a smart and affordable neonatal incubator for remote terrain.
Rushab M received his grant to develop a jacket controlling body temperature for outdoor workers.
Sajal Deolikar, received his grant to develop hybrid powertrains for commercial vehicles improving mileage and reducing emissions.
Mihir Maroju, received his grant for Open Blood, to build an open-source blood donation platform connecting blood banks nationwide.
Habel Anwar, 13, middle-schooler in Kerala, for furthering his physics Olympiad preparation, and working on advancing his physics knowledge and research.
Yash Darji, 20, engineering student, received his grant to kickstart an experimental rocketry community in Ahmedabad.
Uddhav Gupta, 15, received his grant to develop a speech therapy application for children with special needs.
Krupal Virani, 19, received his grant for general career development.
Shwapno Rahman, 17, received his grant to develop low-cost computers for people living below the poverty line.
Sudhir Sarnobat and Rajendra Bagwe received their grant for HowFrameworks, to help Indian SMEs unlock sustainable growth through a learning portal.
Those unfamiliar with Emergent Ventures can learn more here and here. The EV India announcement is here. More about the winners of EV India second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth, tenth, eleventh, and twelfth cohorts. To apply for EV India, use the EV application, click the “Apply Now” button and select India from the “My Project Will Affect” drop-down menu.
And here is Nabeel’s AI engine for other EV winners. Here are the other EV cohorts.
If you are interested in supporting the India tranche of Emergent Ventures, please write to me or to Shruti at [email protected].
Tuesday assorted links
Why are Mormons so Libertarian?
Connor Hansen has a very good essay on Why Are Latter-day Saints So Libertarian? It serves both as an introduction to LDS theology and as an explanation for why that theology resonates with classical liberal ideas. I’ll summarize, with the caveat that I may get a few theological details wrong.
LDS metaphysics posits a universe governed by eternal law. God works with and within the laws of the universe–the same laws that humans can discover with reason and science.
This puts Latter-day Saint cosmology in conversation with the Enlightenment conviction that nature operates predictably and can be studied systematically. A theology where God organizes matter according to eternal law opens space for both scientific inquiry and mystical experience—the careful observation of natural law and the direct encounter with divine love operating through that law.
LDS epistemology is strikingly pro-reason. Even Ayn Rand would approve:
Latter-day Saint theology holds that human beings possess eternal “intelligence”—a term meaning something like personhood, consciousness, or rational capacity—that exists independent of creation. This intelligence is inherent, not granted, and it survives death.
Paired with this is the doctrine of agency: humans are genuinely free moral agents, not puppets or broken remnants after a fall. We’re capable of reason, judgment, and meaningful choice.
This creates an unusually optimistic anthropology. Human reason isn’t fundamentally corrupted or unreliable. It’s a divine gift and a core feature of identity. That lines up neatly with the Enlightenment belief that people can use reason to understand the world, improve their lives, and govern themselves effectively.
In ethics, agency is arguably the most libertarian strand in LDS theology. Free to choose is literally at the center of both divine nature and moral responsibility.
According to Latter-day Saint belief, God proposed a plan for human existence in which individuals would receive genuine agency—the ability to choose, make mistakes, learn, change, and ultimately progress toward becoming like God.
One figure, identified as Satan, rejected that plan and proposed an alternative: eliminate agency, guarantee universal salvation through compulsion, and claim God’s glory in the process.
The disagreement escalated into conflict. In Latter-day Saint scripture, Satan and those who followed him were cast out. The ones who chose agency—who chose freedom with its attendant risks—became mortal humans.
This matters politically because it means that in Latter-day Saint theology, coercion is not merely misguided policy or poor governance. It is literally Satanic. The negation of agency, forced conformity, compulsory salvation—these align with the devil’s rebellion against God’s plan.
Now add to this a 19th century belief in progress and abundance amped up by theology:
Humanity isn’t hopelessly corrupt. Instead, individuals are expected to learn, improve, innovate, and help build better societies.
But here’s where it gets radical: Latter-day Saints believe in the doctrine of eternal progression—the teaching that human beings can, over infinite time and through divine grace, become as God is. Not metaphorically. Actually.
If you believe humans possess infinite potential to rise, become, and progress eternally—literally without bound—then political systems that constrain, manage, or limit human aspiration start to feel spiritually suspect.
Finally, the actually history of the LDS church–expulsions from Missouri and Illinois, Joseph Smith’s violent death, the migration to the Great Basin, the creation of a quasi-independent society–is one of resistance to centralized government power. Limited government and local autonomy come to feel like lessons learned through lived experience. Likewise, the modern LDS welfare system is a working demonstration of how voluntary, covenant-based mutual aid can deliver real social support without coercion. This real-world model strengthens the intuition that social goods need not rely on compulsory state systems, and that voluntary institutions can often be more humane and effective.
To which I say, amen brother! Read the whole essay for more.
See also the book, , with an introduction by the excellent Mark Skousen.
Hat tip: Gale.
*God’s Grandeur*
— Gerard Manley Hopkins
LLMs Position Themselves as More Rational Than Humans
That is the title of a new paper by Kyung-Hoon Kim, I differ from his terminology (“self-aware”), but the results are interesting nonetheless:
As Large Language Models (LLMs) grow in capability, do they develop self-awareness as an emergent behavior? And if so, can we measure it? We introduce the AI Self-Awareness Index (AISAI), a game-theoretic framework for measuring self-awareness through strategic differentiation. Using the “Guess 2/3 of Average” game, we test 28 models (OpenAI, Anthropic, Google) across 4,200 trials with three opponent framings: (A) against humans, (B) against other AI models, and (C) against AI models like you. We operationalize self-awareness as the capacity to differentiate strategic reasoning based on opponent type. Finding 1: Self-awareness emerges with model advancement. The majority of advanced models (21/28, 75%) demonstrate clear self-awareness, while older/smaller models show no differentiation. Finding 2: Self-aware models rank themselves as most rational. Among the 21 models with self-awareness, a consistent rationality hierarchy emerges: Self > Other AIs > Humans, with large AI attribution effects and moderate self-preferencing. These findings reveal that self-awareness is an emergent capability of advanced LLMs, and that self-aware models systematically perceive themselves as more rational than humans. This has implications for AI alignment, human-AI collaboration, and understanding AI beliefs about human capabilities.
Here is the Twitter version of the argument.
Prediction markets in everything
Prediction market Kalshi Inc. and sneaker marketplace StockX are offering a new way to bet on the resale prices of in-demand sneakers and collectibles such as Labubus and Pokémon cards.
In a partnership announced Wednesday, Kalshi will use StockX data to create so-called event contracts tied to sneakers, trading cards and figurines. Users will be able to trade on outcomes such as whether an item will surpass a price threshold after release day, or predict the best-selling brands during a major shopping event like Black Friday.
Products that will be listed include highly-anticipated drops of Jordan sneakers, Supreme hoodies and blind boxes that contain random Labubus.
Here is more from Bloomberg, via John De Palma.
Monday assorted links
1. The robustness of twin studies.
2. Suggestions for improving the NIH.
3. DOGE has been undercovered, here is one recent story.
4. Henry Oliver and Rebecca Lowe on re-founding classical liberalism.
5. Interview with Justin Kuiper, who is behind 500 million plus YouTube views.
6. Paul Krugman on negative emotional contagion (my framing, not his).
7. Dorothy Vogel, RIP (NYT).
I talk talent networks and mentoring and Christianity with Luke Burgis
From Grand Rapids, Michigan, earlier in the year, here is the link.
Here is Luke’s Cluny Institute, which sponsored the event. And here is Luke’s book on Rene Girard.
Side-Walking Problems
Local Law 11 requires owners of New York City’s 16,000-plus buildings over six stories to get a “close-up, hands-on” facade inspection every five years. Repair costs in NYC’s bureaucratic and labor-union driven system are very high, so the owners throw up “temporary” plywood sheds that often sit there for a decade. NYC now has some 400 miles of ugly sheds.
The ~9,000 sheds stretching nearly 400 miles have installation costs around $100–150 per linear foot and ongoing rents of about 5–6% of that per month, implying something like $150 million plus a year in shed rentals citywide.
Well. at last something is being done! The sheds are being made prettier! Six new designs, some with transparent roofs as in the rendering below are now allowed. Looks nice in the picture. Will it look as nice in real life? Will it cost more? Almost certainly!
To be fair, City Hall is cracking down as well as doubling down: new laws cut shed permits from a year to three months and ratchet up fines for letting sheds linger. That’s a good idea. But the prettier sheds are the tell. Instead of reevaluating the law, doing a cost-benefit test or comparing with global standards, NYC wants to be less ugly.
How about using drones and AI to inspect buildings? Singapore requires inspections every 7 years but uses drones to do most of the work with a follow-up with hands-on check. How about investigating ways to cut the cost of repair? The best analysis of NYCs facade program indicates something surprising–the problem isn’t just deteriorating old buildings but also poorly installed glass in new buildings, thus more focus on installation quality is perhaps warranted. Moreover, are safety resources being optimized? Instead of looking up, New Yorkers might do better by looking down. Stray voltage continues to kill pets and shock residents. Manhole “incidents” including explosions happen in the thousands every year! What’s the best way to allocate a dollar to save a life in NYC?
Instead of dealing the with the tough but serious problems, NYC has decided to put on the paint.
What should I ask Arthur C. Brooks?
Yes I will be doing a Conversation with him. Here is Wikipedia:
Since 2019, Brooks has served as the Parker Gilbert Montgomery Professor of the Practice of Nonprofit and Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School and at the Harvard Business School as a Professor of Management Practice and Faculty Fellow.[2] Previously, Brooks served as the 11th President of the American Enterprise Institute. He is the author of thirteen books, including Build the Life You Want: The Art and Science of Getting Happier with co-author Oprah Winfrey (2023), From Strength to Strength: Finding Success, Happiness and Deep Purpose in the Second Half of Life (2022), Love Your Enemies (2019), The Conservative Heart (2015), and The Road to Freedom (2012). Since 2020, he has written the Atlantic’s How to Build a Life column on happiness.
Do not forget Arthur started as a professional French hornist, and also was well known in the cultural economics field during his Syracuse University days. And more. So what should I ask him?
Will the most important pop stars of the future be religious pop stars?
The personally irreligious (last I checked) economist Tyler Cowen has long been fond of proposing that the most important thinkers of the future will be religious thinkers—counter to everything we heard growing up in the age of the New Atheists, and yet, the evidence seems to keep amassing. After the recent release of LUX, the Spanish polymath Rosalía’s fourth studio album, I want to propose a corollary: the most important pop stars of the future may indeed be religious pop stars.
Critics and listeners already seem to agree that LUX represents a titanic accomplishment by the classically-trained, genre-bending singer. Urbane reviewers and YouTube-savvy opera conductors alike have spent the last two weeks obsessively unpacking Rosalía’s 4-movement, 18-track opus, whose symphonic trilingual cathedral piece and Mexican-inflected post-breakup diss track have already charted worldwide. Closer to home, it’s a striking accomplishment to get me to pay serious attention to Top 40 (it helps, of course, to make a hyperpolyglot album with Iberian duende at its core)…
At the beginning of the decade, metamodern types (myself included, in my interview for a PhD position at the Spirituality and Psychology Lab) were given to asking the question: “What can we do to reenchant the world?”
The great stagnation is over. In the age of spiritual machines, enchantment may soon become too cheap to meter. What’s left to ask is: “How are we to make sense of it?” We’ll need artists who can hold the tension—between the earthly and the divine, the ironic and the sincere, the rational and the numinous. Rosalía, to her credit and our great benefit, is already living the question with her full body.
*The Age of Disclosure*
I have now watched the whole movie. The first twenty-eight minutes are truly excellent, the best statement of the case for taking UAPs seriously. It is impressive how they lined up dozens of serious figures, from the military and intelligence services, willing to insist that UAPs are a real phenomenon, supported by multiple sources of evidence. Not sensor errors, not flocks of birds, and not mistakes in interpreting images. This part of the debate now should be considered closed. It is also amazing that Marco Rubio has such a large presence in the film, as of course he is now America’s Secretary of State.
You will note this earlier part of the movie does not insist that UAPs are aliens.
After that point, the film runs a lot of risks. About one-third of what is left is responsible, along the lines of the first twenty-eight minutes. But the other two-thirds or so consists of quite unsupported claims about alien beings, bodies discovered, reverse engineering, quantum bubbles, and so on. You will not find dozens of respected, credentialed, obviously non-crazy sources confirming any of those propositions. The presentation also becomes too conspiratorial. Still, part of the latter part of the movie remains good and responsible.
Overall I can recommend this as an informative and sometimes revelatory compendium of information. It does not have anything fundamentally new, but brings together the evidence in the aggregate better than any other source I know,and it assembles the best and most credible set of testifiers. And then there are the irresponsible bits, which you can either ignore (though still think about), or use as a reason to dismiss the entire film. I will do the former.