The Ledger
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Cowen: Most of Eastern Europe is depopulating and will never catch up
“Parts of the world, such as Eastern Europe you know, Poland maybe is catching up to the West, but most of it is being depopulated and emptying out. And it basically will never catch up.”
Cowen: Automation will widen income inequality while boosting consumption for the poor
“So the world will be a lot more productive because of automation and smart software, and this will give us a lot of consumer goods for free. So we'll have this super sharp divide between the rich and the poor in terms of income, but in terms of actual consumpt…”
Cowen: Autonomous vehicles could worsen road traffic congestion via errand trips
“Self-driving cars could make the problem worse, you know, because you'll send out your car or your vehicle on all kinds of errands. Oh, go to Whole Foods and pick me up some smoked salmon. I'm hungry. And there may be fewer people on the road, but the people t…”
Cowen: Millennials face a high risk of impoverished retirements
“It's much harder for millennials to save, and I fear they will have impoverished retirements. Especially since the fiscal budget on the federal side is problematic as well.”
Cowen: Minimum wage hikes raise food prices and dissipate initial gains
“So if you raise minimum wages, say that raises food prices, there's good evidence for this, and other poor people have to pay more for their food, And a lot of those apparent first round gains get given back and they dissipate.”
Cowen: Bitcoin is a legitimate, enduring asset and not a bubble
“I think it's a perfectly legitimate asset that will endure and have a high value. I'm not sure its value is going to go up any at this point but it's for real, and it's not a bubble.”
Cowen: Computers will not replace sales, marketing, or management anytime soon
“So there's always room for sales, for marketing, for management, including in the distant future. Computers will not be doing that for us anytime soon.”
Cowen: Regional economic divergence rather than convergence will continue
“I think countries and also regions within countries we won't see so much convergence. We'll see a lot of divergence. So it used to be in America, in the post-war era, America's poorer cities were essentially catching up to the wealthier cities. But nowadays, s…”
Cowen: Most newspapers will become ventures owned or supported by the wealthy
“I don't think you can fund most papers by ads. I think they will end up as ventures owned or supported by the very wealthy.”
Cowen: Local reporting will shift to blogs and expose scandals
“There'll be a lot of local reporting on blogs or blog-like entities, and if you want to find it will be there. So if you uncover a scandal about some local official, the world will find out.”
Cowen: US cities are more racially segregated, but suburbs are not
“If you mean racially segregated, cities are more racially segregated. Suburbs are not. So that's a mixed story.”
Cowen: The US is returning to 19th-century polarization and dynamism
“Maybe in some ways we're going back to the America of the late 19th century. With a polarized politics screwy media you know, in some ways, higher levels of violence, and more dynamism, too.”
Cowen: AI will soon outmatch human consumer decision-making
“Artificial intelligence will tell you what to buy and how to buy it, and at what price. People who think they can beat the algorithms will make a lot more mistakes, so know when you should defer.”