I think your point is very apt: throwing people to make complex decisions they are not trained to make leaves them worse-off. An analogous example would be democratizing medicine where everyone (trained or not) should be allowed to practice (on themselves and others). We don't need to think that far in the future to imagine how disastrous this would be.
Thank you Vic! The doctor analogy is a great one: then imagine that you were giving yourself medicine that only worked 10% of the time but when it failed helped a really healthy person get even healthier at your expense, and you might have something close to the zero-sum game of day trading.
At the same time, I'm wary of gatekeepers that only let "professionals" do the job—people should be able to make their own decisions, I think. But platforms are eager to incentivize them to make *bad* decisions with the understanding that helping educate them might actually hurt their own business model. Lots of personal stories here I'll save for next time we speak!
Hey David, Looking forward to hearing more about the personal stories. They always put concreteness to abstract topics.
Your comment makes me think of Nicholas Taleb's writing on centralized governance and skin in the game. He argues many of those professionals or experts (especially in economics and politics) are okay making bad decisions because they don't have to suffer the consequences (i.e. no skin in the game). I'm curious to hear what you think of Taleb's ideas (if you've read his work).
Another great article, David!
I think your point is very apt: throwing people to make complex decisions they are not trained to make leaves them worse-off. An analogous example would be democratizing medicine where everyone (trained or not) should be allowed to practice (on themselves and others). We don't need to think that far in the future to imagine how disastrous this would be.
Thank you Vic! The doctor analogy is a great one: then imagine that you were giving yourself medicine that only worked 10% of the time but when it failed helped a really healthy person get even healthier at your expense, and you might have something close to the zero-sum game of day trading.
At the same time, I'm wary of gatekeepers that only let "professionals" do the job—people should be able to make their own decisions, I think. But platforms are eager to incentivize them to make *bad* decisions with the understanding that helping educate them might actually hurt their own business model. Lots of personal stories here I'll save for next time we speak!
Hey David, Looking forward to hearing more about the personal stories. They always put concreteness to abstract topics.
Your comment makes me think of Nicholas Taleb's writing on centralized governance and skin in the game. He argues many of those professionals or experts (especially in economics and politics) are okay making bad decisions because they don't have to suffer the consequences (i.e. no skin in the game). I'm curious to hear what you think of Taleb's ideas (if you've read his work).