@Riggerjack - I largely agree with short-term/local analysis that "We're not gonna die". Tripartition or "checks and balances" really REALLY does work remarkably well, perhaps even better than it does in other western countries because the US system was built on this concept ab initio unlike the European nations where it was organically tacked on top of existing culture and power structures (I base my blanket comments on my experience with the Danish system and various indoctrinations wrt France and Germany during my secondary ed. in the late 80s and early 90s). The US now has existing power structures that reinforces the robustness of this system, like the "deep state".
However, I worry about the potential long-term fallout in terms of US leadership on the tech and culture front/innovation as well as national security risks because the US does not exist in isolation independent of the rest of the world. Most of this will go unseen and not be directly attributable, so in some sense it's "all theory", but let me give an example that's pertinent to anyone reading this, I think.
To grok this, it's crucial to have a good '
theory of mind' of both Americans and not-Americans so maybe this won't make sense to very many people ... I'll offer my perspective as one of those international student/researcher types who came to America almost 15 years ago under similar (in kind, not degree) circumstances .. and so maybe this will give some idea on the potential/complex/adaptive long-term consequences 10 years from now... and also put those foreign student surveys I talked about above in perspective... and illustrate how serendipity works at the 3+ sigma level of the tail distributions.
So ... You guys (mostly Americans, maybe 70%) are here on this forum because of ERE and because I run and pay for its continued existence. If it wasn't for ERE, you wouldn't be here talking to each other and if not... where would you be? It's interesting that both ERE and MMM are run by immigrants. I know that gocurrycracker was inspired to "step it up" because of ERE and I know that MadFI was inspired to start by ERE. (Both these guys are born-in-America.) So I conceitedly claim that immigrants (and immigration policies) have had a large influence on FIRE in the US.
It is possible that someone else (born in the US) would eventually have done something similar in a parallel universe... but look around ... if it wasn't for ERE, what would the FIRE scene look like today? Who would be running it? Would it exist? MMM came in from regs. that are likely related to ancinet NAFTA (cf. modern TPP). I'm too lazy to look that up but I think Canadians have an easier time getting work in the US thanks to NAFTA than otherwise. So take either one away .. or at least ponder the possibilities. If you're reading this you were affected by a couple of immigrants doing their "American Dream" and writing about it.
What are the parallel universe options? In which year would the previous David Bach style latte-paradigm otherwise have been broken? 2013? 2018? 2024? How would that have affected Americans? Anyone reading this? Not a lot of "average Americans", probably, ... but prob. a very high fraction of anyone reading this? Yes? You think you would have been reading about FIRE from a European, Russian, or Asian blog?
Now... so... anyway ... back to the serendipity/idiosyncracy, I did a research stay to the US for 5 weeks in 2003 as part of my grad studies. After I finished my PhD in 2004, I had two immediate done-deal/just-ask offers. One from a US university and one from a German university. As a European born within two generations after WWII, I had learned [in school] that the excessive flag waving that I observed at US airports in 2003 was to be associated with really bad potential outcomes as well---and I saw flags in abundance when I visited in 2003. Absolutely spooked me! If we look at the foreign student list concerns from my posts above, I would have put "political instability" at the top with all other issues being of no concern.
The current concerns (see my post above) about visa hassle and unwelcome attitudes would have been the least of my concerns back in 2004. Didn't even think about it. With some slight trepidation, I picked the US option figuring that if nothing else I could go back, but everything proceeded splendidly. I met DW and got integrated/other perspectives. Yes, the rest world wondered why GWB was re-elected in 2004 and was initially very judgmental of American voters but got over it. Whereas, Americans understood that presidents always get re-elected unless the domestic economy goes bad. Hence the importance of theory of mind.
Now, subsequently I've learned that such overt displays of flags, etc. has more to do with patriotism (good) than nationalism (bad). The US is a young country comprised of many different cultures so things like flags, symbolism, and pledges of allegiance are a good thing to create a kind of unity that otherwise would not naturally follow... whereas overseas, those behaviors would be way too much of a good thing as WWII history attests. [Years later, I can explain this now: "There, there, foreigners, when Americans wave flags around, it doesn't mean that they're going full speed totalitarian." But back then, I did not understand the American frame of mind. I was judging by WWII standards, but now I get it.]
Back to the story --- leading to my eventual point about serendipity and cross-cultural benefits ... what I adopted from America was the capitalist default and the appreciation/acceptance of individual behavior (most other places, the nail that sticks out get hammered) and what I brought was a lifestyle of not consuming. Combine those and you get FIRE. Add an interdisciplinary physicist and you get ERE.
Had I gone with Germany ... it's conceivable that I would have ended up as a school teacher talking about rocket stoves and Arduinos living out the rest of my life in relative anonymity (no ERE forum, blog, or book anyway ... ). But here we are, so at least you guys [reading this] got affected.
This is an example of what and where long-term effects matter!
If the current 2017 environment had been present in 2004, I think it's likely that I would have gone for Germany rather than the US because of visa fears and not wanting to risk the inability to go to conferences because of capricious travel bans or hassles (those are career killers to young researchers because it's all about presentations and connections. If you end up with 10 appearances because you can't go and your competitor who went with a Canadian group end up with 40 ... you're done for. Career is over.). Similar barriers stopped me from going to conferences (Israel, invited speech, big deal) subsequently. The reason may just be that I really dislike filling out paperwork or being afraid to walk around in certain countries (please, dear family member, don't bring your handgun when you come visit us in Chicago ... the Risk/ROI is just shite). Even simple stuff like that affects choices. I don't like chaos! That's why I spend a lot of time thinking about long-term consequences....
Now, I've been in the US so long that I "get"/grok both sides so I learned both sides and so I'm staying ... but that's not how most people judge things because they lack the experiental knowledge. Those of you who are in stable positions figure you can ride this out because it wouldn't affect you personally so you don't care ... but many people will be in tenuous early-career short term positions and thus need to make decisions on a 2-3 years basis ... and here volatility/chaos does matter! History is made at the points of contact where things change. Not where people hunker down and wait it out.
So in terms of seeing the consequences 10 years down the line the answer is ... we'll never really know. But more importantly, that outcome comes down to serendipity and tail risk/opportunity.
This is what I think about when it comes to tail events.
More importantly ... I worry about how many innocents fell through the cracks and got burned sofar because some bureaucrats in the system were encouraged to go above and beyond. The equivalent of Obama's "We tortured some folks"-apology. "Shit happens" and "mistakes were made". That's all fine but the problem is that such happened to real humans, so what's the eventual fall-out of that? Just multiply the numbers and the probabilities and consider the resulting narratives. That's the national security concern. My point is .. this is not a simple system of independent "me"'s who can ignore everything else because it doesn't concern their personal lives. It's a complex system of coupled interactions which may or may not eventually blow back on the entire system but most likely will eventually in some form. If that's not obvious already, see Europe.
How many visas got canceled in those few days of the initial Travel Ban as "the system" corrected? About 60000 or so! How many of those afflicted got pissed off? And who did the they subsequently talk to and how did they relative their experience. Dunno .. but it only takes a few, because of the long tail. If you start with a big N number ... you need really low probabilities to drive the impact below one [bin Laden-type stuff]. The consequences if this may or may not come about several years from now.
And such long-term consequences are what we need to look out for. I think.
