Adam Ozimek

Effectively all growth in corn production over the last 20 years is for ethanol. ~20 million acres of conservation land, grassland, and soybean rotation was turned into corn monoculture that effectively strip mines the topsoil. Meanwhile it’s the most fertilizer dependent crop with only a 40% uptake rate. So ~1.7 million tons of nitrogen runoff flows into the Mississippi basin annually while also polluting their own water supplies. This runoff ends up expanding the Gulf deadzone, which is also where 40% of domestic seafood comes from. It’s hard to find a worse way to create fuel, with a wicked level of waste and downstream consequences.

Since 1964, the United States has applied a 25% tariff on pickups, enabling U.S. automakers to perfect their model while boosting their global competitiveness.

Since 1964, the United States has applied a 25% tariff on pickups, enabling U.S. automakers to perfect their model while boosting their global competitiveness.

One issue when one is talking specifically about the effect of AI capex **on GDP growth** is that much of the capex being announced involves imported parts & equipment--and so doesn't directly add to GDP growth (though it *is* still represented in US final demand). Computer spending including data center construction has been adding about +1.1pp to growth gross (the final demand effect) but closer to +0.4pp net of imports (the GDP effect). If you tried to capture the ancillary power investment that complements data centers, both numbers would be modestly higher, though a good chunk of that is being imported too. To be clear, +0.4pp is solid and nothing to sneeze at but is a moderate GDP growth tailwind.

Economists may, in fact, not be *that* bad at predicting job destruction historically -- or the BLS, at least

Industrial Applications of Nuclear Explosives (1958) That's one way to make a new harbor!

United Auto Workers president Shawn Fain testifying in favor of a 32-hour workweek. "Eighty-four years ago the 40-hour workweek was established. And since then, we've had a 400 percent increase in productivity, and nothing's changed."