I know it’s not popular to bring politics into things on HN, but… From the outside at least, White House policy sounds like at least as much of a black swan event as COVID.
> I moved all of my money out of the US the week following the election.
I did it a little more than a week following the election, but same. I even sold any ETFs with exposure to the US market I previously owned. People thought I was overreacting selling my VGRO, but the YTD returns for my ex-US portfolio are about 150% of what I could have expected with my old holdings and the peace of mind is priceless.
I've kept about 1/3 of my investments in a non-US index fund for years, basically as a hedge against some unforeseen event in the US (having 100% exposure to the economy that my job is in seemed suboptimal). In 2016, all that really changed was that the event was now foreseen -- my domestic investments still outperformed that portion until this year.
This year is the first time that fund outperformed the rest of my portfolio. Not massively, since I do have some holdings that benefited from the AI boom, but noticeably. Just adding 1 to n here. Thanks for reminding me to rebalance, and maybe find another non-AI-related hedge just in case.
Most professional financial planning would have the equity assets portion of the portfolia you at ~30% investing in foreign assets (good times and bad).
> I moved all of my money out of the US the week following the election.
That sounds pretty black swan to me, I'm guessing you never felt the need sheet any previous election? Being predictable and being unique are different things.
Black swan event: an event that comes as a surprise, has a major effect, and is often inappropriately rationalized after the fact with the benefit of hindsight.
Trump is the direction taken by U.S. politics for decades now.
I could see it post- 9/11, and I was not the most enlightened teenager. Others probably saw it coming years or decades earlier.
> Trump is the direction taken by U.S. politics for decades now. I could see it post- 9/11, and I was not the most enlightened teenager. Others probably saw it coming years or decades earlier.
While it is kinda the same direction, it also has two Black Swan components:
1) What he's doing actually matches the rhetoric, e.g. actually trying to kick out illegal immigrants even though they're the (underpaid) farm workers holding back food price inflation.
2) It definitely wasn't on my metaphorical bingo card that someone with multiple felony convictions and who had been impeached twice for trying to interfere with the democratic hand over of power, went on to become the popular choice for president.
If Harris had won, she wouldn't have sent ice to invade cities and kidnap people. She wouldn't have hugely increased tariffs, etc. see also putting political minders at network news places as part of federal sales approvals.
America has two options; either become the slave of China and enter our century of humiliation, or deny Chinese access to free trade by competing in market economics. Protectionism does not balance America's trade deficits, and US citizens cannot compete against Mexican labor (let alone Chinese prison labor). The economics of it genuinely don't get any simpler than this; American manufacturing will be for naught if we cannot compete in a free market. We already have a successfully financialized economy, throwing out Reaganomics for an even more shit deal is peak neoreactionary nonsense.
> Others probably saw it coming years or decades earlier.
I saw the signs of the beginnings of it decades ago (shortly following the Reagan era) but I had zero clue that it would (or even could) ever get as completely mad-house outta-control as it has. I've watched the situation devolve year after year for decades now, and all the while I kept foolishly believing "It can't keep getting worse forever. People are gonna wake up any second now." Well, here we are. Not entirely sure how we got here, or how we'll ever get back, but... This is how it is, I guess. :shrug:
"Rock bottom" is when the last human stands alone in their luxury doomsday bunker just waiting to die and realizes that dying with all the money means literally nothing in the grand scheme of the Universe. They didn't "win" anything of lasting value after all...
True. It must be added, that theres two wrenches in the machinery that transforms information into action currently.
Firstly - The average market behavior is average.
From experience, most people could not imagine anything of what was predicted, would come true. There is a large … debt of intellectual work that is being underwritten, allowing people to sell narratives which do not correspond to reality.
This is a direct result of a captured, unfair information environment.
As a result, the average behavior of the market is not pricing in these things, even if the plans were made clear.
That view sounds like it's coming from a position of a white person, not married to a minority, not an immigrant. That describes me too. Software engineer, more secure economically.
Even people with visas or permanent residency, or who even look like they might be Hispanic are justifiably worried about a random car pulling them over and breaking their window. If you aren't aware or concerned, I call that oblivious or a denial of reality. Or privilege (edit: corrected spelling).
It's different in some ways of course than with covid.
For (services) software people, 2020 was great: work from home, sky-high jobs demand (perhaps Zero-interest related), surging demand and revenue because by people were bored at home. Brick and mortar retail workers were screwed in 2020.
It is possible that 2025 could be the opposite, the software jobs market os already spooky for juniors, and could get much worse with an AI bust - guess what companies will do to show investors they are making up for written-off AI investments? A recession will lead to a drop in demand for online services like streaming, online shopping as people tighten their belts, upward ratcheting of subscription prices will only make the drop worse.
I think with an AI bust we're more likely to see juniors actually start getting jobs at reasonable rates... but only after short-sighted layoffs of a bunch of more senior positions as opposed to dumping AI products that so many companies have already signed year+ long contracts for in advance.
