The Sovereign Individual: Mastering the Transition to the Information Age

If the past is a guide, the most violent of the terrorists of the early decades of the new millennium will not be homeless paupers but displaced workers who formerly enjoyed middle-class incomes and status.

The easiest way to obtain permission to invest funds in activities with little or no direct financial return, like tax payments, is to ask for permission from someone other than the person whose money is coveted.

Those who pay for democratic government seldom set the terms of government spending. Instead, government functions as a co-op that is both outside of proprietary control and operating as a natural monopoly. Prices bear little relation to costs. The quality of service is generally low compared to that in private enterprise. Customer grievances are h

The weakening of the Church’s monopoly and the increased megapolitical power of the rich led to a sharp reduction in income redistribution. The peasants and urban poor who were not immediate beneficiaries of the new system were bitterly envious of those who were. Huizinga described the prevailing attitude, in what could well be an important paralle

On the dimension of technology, the conflict has two poles: AI and crypto. Artificial Intelligence holds out the prospect of finally solving what economists call the “calculation problem”: AI could theoretically make it possible to centrally control an entire economy. It is no coincidence that AI is the favorite technology of the Communist Party of

Rising real incomes allowed governments to adopt a strategy that placed more resources under their control. Small sums taken in taxes from millions could produce more revenue than larger amounts paid by a few powerful people. What is more, the many were far easier to deal with than the few, who were generally unwilling to give their money away and

Say not, the struggle nought availeth, The labour and the wounds are vain, The enemy faints not, nor faileth, And as things have been they remain. If hopes were dupes, fears may be liars; It may be, in yon smoke concealed, Your comrades chase e’en now the fliers, And, but for you, possess the field. For while the tired waves, vainly breaking, Seem

Societies that reconfigure themselves to become more complex adaptive systems will indeed prosper. But when they do, they are unlikely to be nations, much less “political superpowers.” The more likely immediate beneficiaries of increased complexity of social systems will be the Sovereign Individuals of the new millennium.

The emergence of digital money will not only defeat inflation once and for all; it will also contract leverage in the banking systems of the world. The ability of people everywhere to bypass regulatory authorities and shift their funds directly through the Internet is an entirely unprecedented consequence of the globalization of markets. It will be