Question about fundamental societal construction

[wufwugy]

Are governments not in competition with each other wuf? States compete for businesses, residents, tourism, and more. No state wants to be "50th in education" or "1st in crime". National governments are clearly in competition, ie the cold war. So the point that governments are not incentivized to work hard doesnt seem to hold merit.

They are in competition with each other, but it's very subdued. The small amount of competition they do have has been very good for us. It's not so much that the different governments provide better benefits for certain things, but that the different governments may allow more things to be legal. It's for reasons like this that the Sunbelt was able to yank so much economic activity away from the Midwest.

The incentive for government is to please the voter. The incentive for companies is to please the customer. Voters have no choice but this or that representative, and the representatives are all thrown into a quagmire where change is mucked down to a snail's pace and the message is a mishmash of all things imaginable. This isn't by design but by innate structure of unchallengeable monopolies. Customers are directional and swift. If companies can't entice customers, they go bankrupt. If governments can't please the voters, they, um, they do the same thing they've always been doing.

I find it a little ironic that people always say the government never listens and never changes, yet they still support it. Contrasted to everybody having loads of different companies they love, who provide great service and product, yet few people think that organizing principle would work for anything the government currently does.

Government has very little reason to please people. Companies have all the reason to do so. The only companies we have who don't do so are ones granted pseudo-monopolies by governments (like Comcast)

[wufwugy]

I've been wanting to respond to this thread for awhile, but couldnt really see how to approach it. I think I know why.

When you talk about abolishing police and replacing them with paid security, you're talking about a massive change to the way society is run. As in, hundreds of thousands of things would need to be changed/adjusted in order for such a switch to occur, much less work. Problems like organized crime, corruption, the reach of such a system on small towns, and the effect on the poor are just the tip of the iceberg here.

That is true, but I'm also saying that the change should be gradual and that the change isn't so much that we would be "changing how society runs" but that we would be "running society the same way we do most things". The overwhelming majority of commerce and interactions between people could be called free market as is. I'm not sure why we don't think this would work for more things

Imagine how terrible it would be for the government to be highly interventionist in the software industry. Well, we can use the same logic to claim that there is reason to believe that the government is creating just as much terribleness by being involved in security. Granted, we don't know, but it's a starting point for the question

Im not sure what would stop a monopoly of security either, and im not sure what would prevent them from creating their own society / government.

I think paramount to this would be the cultural belief that government is not the answer. It's like how entrepreneurship didn't catch on until northwestern Europe had a cultural movement towards it. We have government because we believe in it. We have chosen it for ourselves, yet that choice strips us from the ability to make many other choices.

I think there are logistical and economical reasons why all things that government does could be transformed into the markets, but we'll never get that until we stop looking at problems and saying "there should be a law about this". When that law is backed by a monopoly on violence, it is dysfunctional and creates a mountain of unintended consequences and victims.

[JKDS]

Your argument for the sunbelt implies companies seek places with fewer laws. But freedom from laws is not as attractive to businesses as you seem to think. For example, the ability to enforce contracts, patents, and to force other companies to behave morally is huge. The US used to be unique in this aspect, and was a driving factor for companies to actually headquarter in the US.

As far as voters, they have a huge amount of power, and this power is best seen in states like Arizona. Here, voters can literally make legislation and amend the constitution, without any legislative involvement. Further, most laws (with exception, of course) must be submitted to the voters for approval before being adopted. This leads to fast (though sometimes bad) change such as Arizona's english only laws, and anti-gay marriage laws. There are many states where this is the case.

As far as nationally, I wouldnt want fast acting change unless it was absolutely necessary. A government that was constantly changing with the ADHD voters would be catastrophic.

As far as businesses swiftly changing, well, maybe. They might just die though (blockbuster), they might be terrible and still survive (cable companies), they might treat their employees in a way that most people find intolerable, yet still be profitable (walmart). But even considering this, what would fast acting change for security really look like? Pretend you are one of 1000 customers for Security Inc., a fake security company. You are dissatisfied with their service, like you might be dissatisfied with a republican controlled congress. You, individually, have absolutely no power in both cases. Only as a group will this company, or government give a crap, and only if you seriously affect them. Theyre basically doing the same thing.

Take SB1070, a law which, arguably, allows police to racially discriminate. Many voters took offense to this, but many more supported it. It was a divided issue, but there was no reason to change. Enough people liked it, and if it were a product, it would have been profitable. I personally dont like selfie sticks. Theyre retarded. Most people think they are retarded. Yet they are being sold profitably! Even though its a split issue. The company would probably be better served by creating a product with a greater audience, but nothing we can do is gonna stop them from making the selfie stick.

Im on a tangent here, Im not even sure what im talking about atm haha. But I dont think voters have as little voice as you think, and I dont think consumers have as much voice as you think.

[JKDS]

When that law is backed by a monopoly on violence, it is dysfunctional and creates a mountain of unintended consequences and victims.

We need laws though wuf. Even if you want minimal laws, we still need them. For crimes, the bare bones of it is that we need a rule for people to follow where they wont get in trouble. (For a security business, a law/rule where they wont be attacked by a privately owned business army or whatever). To put it another way, there are certain moral rules everyone wants everyone else to abide by. Like not murdering people willy nilly. Whether you call this a law or a rule is semantics.

We then need these laws or 'rules' to be enforced. Else, like jaywalking, no one would care.

You must concede that at least some laws are necessary (particularly many crimes), but then no matter who is charged with enforcing that rule (state, or competing businesses), they will be enforcing a law through violence.

It'd go like this.

Private Officer: You murdered client x.
Murderer: Blow me.
Private Officer: Im arresting you
Murderer: Blow me.
*Private Officer uses force, and a fight breaks out*

I dont see how this differs from government enforcement.

[wufwugy]

Your argument for the sunbelt implies companies seek places with fewer laws. But freedom from laws is not as attractive to businesses as you seem to think. For example, the ability to enforce contracts, patents, and to force other companies to behave morally is huge. The US used to be unique in this aspect, and was a driving factor for companies to actually headquarter in the US.

This is a big deal and is one of the areas where we enter even more theoretical territory. The belief held by anti-statists is that insurance would cover this. Companies would be consumers of arbitrators. I think it would work quite well, and at the very least would be more effective and cheap than the mandated, wasteful arbitration we get from taxes.

As far as voters, they have a huge amount of power, and this power is best seen in states like Arizona. Here, voters can literally make legislation and amend the constitution, without any legislative involvement. Further, most laws (with exception, of course) must be submitted to the voters for approval before being adopted. This leads to fast (though sometimes bad) change such as Arizona's english only laws, and anti-gay marriage laws. There are many states where this is the case.

Im on a tangent here, Im not even sure what im talking about atm haha. But I dont think voters have as little voice as you think, and I dont think consumers have as much voice as you think.

I moved part of what you said up here to respond to both at once. "The vote" is what has major power, not voters. Voters are ants. As individuals, when we vote we get virtually nothing of what we want. However, when we buy stuff with money, we get quite a bit of what we want.

In a society larger than the individual, consumption by choice is each person's most powerful weapon. Democratic voting is just paying lip service to the idea of freedom.

It should be noted that what we consider our great freedoms (speech, religion, fair trial, etc) are things we have because the government made it illegal for it to prohibit them. This suggests that it isn't that we have freedoms because the government grants them, but that we have freedoms because the government is restricted. I'd like to take a few more pages out of that book and restrict the government even more. Let's create more freedoms that future generations will consider their unalienable rights by restricting the government more.

As far as nationally, I wouldnt want fast acting change unless it was absolutely necessary. A government that was constantly changing with the ADHD voters would be catastrophic.

I agree. An efficient government is one that efficiently fucks you. Of course, the smaller the scale and the more homogenous the people, the more likely the government won't be fucking you. But most countries don't have that luxury.

Keep in mind that I'm not arguing for efficient government. I'm arguing for an efficient system for positive change. I don't think government is a part of that

As far as businesses swiftly changing, well, maybe. They might just die though (blockbuster), they might be terrible and still survive (cable companies), they might treat their employees in a way that most people find intolerable, yet still be profitable (walmart).

And look at how awesomely they are changing. If it wasn't for this type of change, we'd still be using telegraphs

But even considering this, what would fast acting change for security really look like? Pretend you are one of 1000 customers for Security Inc., a fake security company. You are dissatisfied with their service, like you might be dissatisfied with a republican controlled congress. You, individually, have absolutely no power in both cases. Only as a group will this company, or government give a crap, and only if you seriously affect them. Theyre basically doing the same thing.

I can not pay for their services anymore. But if it's the government, I must pay. Security doesn't have to be fundamentally any different than shopping for food

Take SB1070, a law which, arguably, allows police to racially discriminate. Many voters took offense to this, but many more supported it. It was a divided issue, but there was no reason to change. Enough people liked it, and if it were a product, it would have been profitable. I personally dont like selfie sticks. Theyre retarded. Most people think they are retarded. Yet they are being sold profitably! Even though its a split issue. The company would probably be better served by creating a product with a greater audience, but nothing we can do is gonna stop them from making the selfie stick.

I think these are great examples for why government sucks so much. Government is when laws are made on these things. It's a group (sometimes a majority, but often a minority) forcing everybody else to do certain things.

[wufwugy]

We need laws though wuf. Even if you want minimal laws, we still need them. For crimes, the bare bones of it is that we need a rule for people to follow where they wont get in trouble. (For a security business, a law/rule where they wont be attacked by a privately owned business army or whatever). To put it another way, there are certain moral rules everyone wants everyone else to abide by. Like not murdering people willy nilly. Whether you call this a law or a rule is semantics.

We then need these laws or 'rules' to be enforced. Else, like jaywalking, no one would care.

You must concede that at least some laws are necessary (particularly many crimes), but then no matter who is charged with enforcing that rule (state, or competing businesses), they will be enforcing a law through violence.

It'd go like this.

Private Officer: You murdered client x.
Murderer: Blow me.
Private Officer: Im arresting you
Murderer: Blow me.
*Private Officer uses force, and a fight breaks out*

I dont see how this differs from government enforcement.

The key difference is that if we had choice over our arbitrators of law, justice, and security, they would function much better. They would be cheaper, more effective, more inventive, and would create fewer victims

I don't think a totally private system would be any less "lawful" than we have now. I instead think it would be more accountable to the desires of its customers. Did you watch these three videos when Renton posted them? I think they do a decent job of explaining how a system of arbitration consumption would work

[JKDS]

I dont see how you get from having a choice in arbitrators to having better functioning, cheaper, more effective, or more inventive security.

Police agencies already operate on a very tight budget. That alone incentivizes them to act efficiently and effectively. They prioritize certain crimes, and have an elaborate system of where cop cars are at any given time to increase police response time. As far as inventive, that doesnt change with your new system. We already have companies inventing new weapons for law enforcement (TAZER, for instance), and psychologists/theorists working out the best ways to enforce laws. That is in addition to any R&D the states do or the government does on its own. So im not sure anything here really changes.

The videos dont do anything for me. They make a ton of assumptions that I cant agree with, and when those assumptions are gone their argument isnt believable.

[JKDS]

I moved part of what you said up here to respond to both at once. "The vote" is what has major power, not voters. Voters are ants. As individuals, when we vote we get virtually nothing of what we want. However, when we buy stuff with money, we get quite a bit of what we want.

When you vote, you get the law you wanted or didnt want. That matters, and it matters to quite a bit of people.

In a society larger than the individual, consumption by choice is each person's most powerful weapon. Democratic voting is just paying lip service to the idea of freedom.

I could say the same thing about buying power. Right now, everyone could collectively decide "you know what, repubicanism is retarded" and vote democrat or libertarian or whatever. After doing this only a few times, the republican party would be dead. This is what you're getting at with consumer buying power. If a company is bad enough, everyone would leave it and go somewhere else. But this is extreme; it assumes that entire group is unified on the issue, but law enforcement is clearly a heavily divided and long debated topic.

It should be noted that what we consider our great freedoms (speech, religion, fair trial, etc) are things we have because the government made it illegal for it to prohibit them. This suggests that it isn't that we have freedoms because the government grants them, but that we have freedoms because the government is restricted. I'd like to take a few more pages out of that book and restrict the government even more. Let's create more freedoms that future generations will consider their unalienable rights by restricting the government more.

Well, yes. But thats what government does, it makes laws prohibiting conduct that society wants prohibited. What rights are being infringed that require protection though?

And look at how awesomely they are changing. If it wasn't for this type of change, we'd still be using telegraphs

You cant deny that government is responsible for a large amount of technological development and funding.

I can not pay for their services anymore. But if it's the government, I must pay. Security doesn't have to be fundamentally any different than shopping for food

Well, government or not, you'd still have to pay somebody. You'd be a fool to not have 'murder insurance' or whatever. And since you must have it in order to enforce crimes made against you, companies would essentially just be printing money.

[wufwugy]

I dont see how you get from having a choice in arbitrators to having better functioning, cheaper, more effective, or more inventive security.

It's for the same reasons that all other companies work better when their customers purchase their products by choice. Imagine how awful Google would be if it was by law the only search engine and its revenues came through mandatory taxation.

Police agencies already operate on a very tight budget. That alone incentivizes them to act efficiently and effectively. They prioritize certain crimes, and have an elaborate system of where cop cars are at any given time to increase police response time. As far as inventive, that doesnt change with your new system. We already have companies inventing new weapons for law enforcement (TAZER, for instance), and psychologists/theorists working out the best ways to enforce laws. That is in addition to any R&D the states do or the government does on its own. So im not sure anything here really changes.

I like where you're going with this because I think it's the start of showing that police is dysfunctional. In isolation, their budgets are tight, but that's because they're allocated, not earned. The way they garner allocations is fundamentally different than how companies "earn" purchases. You're right that they prioritize certain crimes, but that prioritization is all but a total disaster. I have never had an interaction with a cop where he was doing anything other than harassing me even though I did nothing wrong. And I'm suburban WASP. I can't imagine how bad it is for the millions of people who are less fortunate by birth or status. Hell, even the ardent supporters of the police usually have a majority of bad experiences with them. I found it funny (more like sad) when on Rogan's podcast Ana Kasparian told a story of getting pretty hugely harassed by a cop, yet everyday she gets on camera and talks about how we need more cops who have more power so they can tell more people what to do.

The Wire has it right. The incentives for law enforcement are dogshit. Most of the system is focused on drug enforcement, which is a great evil of our society. Most of the rest are focused on dishing out senseless traffic violations for revenue. A small number of them are involved in actual good things: investigating violent crime, and on the rarest of occasions, stopping it in action. Even though most cops are probably good people trying to do the right thing, the system is fucked and doesn't allow the right thing to be done.

Most of the invention isn't just about new technologies, but new policies. Markets are incredible at shifting policies swiftly, effectively, and for all sorts of different reasons. The government can't stop putting people in prison for pot for decades. Nobody even wants people to go to prison for pot. Nobody would buy that. Yet millions were/are in there. It's all because of the fundamentally different form of revenue streams. Governments are not accountable the way markets are. The police can fuck up and keep all the same revenue. If McDonald's fucks up it either changes or goes bankrupt

There will always be a handful of ways that the government doesn't fuck up. Like fire departments. But that's a rarity, and I don't think it's an example that can fit in many other places

[wufwugy]

When you vote, you get the law you wanted or didnt want. That matters, and it matters to quite a bit of people.

When we as individuals vote for representatives, we get an extremely dilute representation. When we as individuals vote in initiatives, about half the time we don't get what we voted for.

When we pay for things from companies competing for our business, we mostly get what we want. The difference between the two appears to me to be light years apart

I could say the same thing about buying power. Right now, everyone could collectively decide "you know what, repubicanism is retarded" and vote democrat or libertarian or whatever. After doing this only a few times, the republican party would be dead. This is what you're getting at with consumer buying power. If a company is bad enough, everyone would leave it and go somewhere else. But this is extreme; it assumes that entire group is unified on the issue, but law enforcement is clearly a heavily divided and long debated topic.

The difference is one of scale. We vote once every two years. On each ballot we vote on maybe 1-10 items. The amount of influence these votes have is miniscule in comparison to the juggernaut that is daily economic choice. The argument you made is at direct contrast to the argument you previously made about how government is indeed slow

Well, yes. But thats what government does, it makes laws prohibiting conduct that society wants prohibited. What rights are being infringed that require protection though?

I don't think I understand the last sentence. As for the first two, yeah, when enacting laws, societies, either by majority or minority, prohibit conduct on stuff. They push a whole bunch of people under the rug. I should not be forced into a conduct regime that I don't want to be a part of, exactly like I'm not forced to be a part of a gaming company, a religion, a restaurant, or a sport that I do not want to. When the society is structured by this sort of choice, change comes when merited.

You cant deny that government is responsible for a large amount of technological development and funding.

Eh I think it's actually pretty small. A fact is that what government spends on R&D is what would have otherwise been used in the private economy in the first place. The vast majority of investment is private, and it is distributed more effectively. For every time it can be said that government did something good in R&D, we could point to many more instances of private investment doing the same and more. Gabe Newell, Shane Smith, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs: all investors who have done what the government can't. Furthermore, if the government invests in things the private market otherwise wouldn't, it necessarily means the costs are too high since the private market would invest if they weren't.

Well, government or not, you'd still have to pay somebody. You'd be a fool to not have 'murder insurance' or whatever. And since you must have it in order to enforce crimes made against you, companies would essentially just be printing money.

If this was true, it would be true for food. We all need it just the same, yet for some reason it's ultra cheap, abundant, and delicious. That's the power of the price system.

[JKDS]

Food and security are similar in that they would both be required, but theyre incredibly different types of goods. Ones a product that gets mass produced, the other is labor that is limited to the skill/number of individuals. Further, farming is subsidized heavily by the government, in exchange for keeping costs down.

A better example would be insurance companies pre-obama care. They operate like security insurance discussed in the video, but were completely shit. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...ore-obamacare/

The problem there was the absurd price for decent care for millions of americans. But you're talking private security insurance. You're talking the only protection available for someone if they get robbed, assaulted, raped, etc. How much would you pay for that? The companies would have to cover injuries, theyd cover the huge cost of crime scene investigation, the cost of paying the individuals to investigate, to give reports, to testify, to pay for vehicles, to pay for equipment, etc. We havent even gotten to labor costs, or how valuable a trained individual in this field would be, or what we should pay them to potentially get shot when confronting a criminal. An arbitrator currently isnt exactly cheap either, but perhaps thats obvious given the skill/know how needed in negotiation and dispute resolution.

The assumption is that private companies would be cheaper and more efficient, but this still seems like quite a stretch to me.

[wufwugy]

Food and security are similar in that they would both be required, but theyre incredibly different types of goods. Ones a product that gets mass produced, the other is labor that is limited to the skill/number of individuals.

Farming is just as much a labor and dependent upon skill of the laborers as security.

Further, farming is subsidized heavily by the government, in exchange for keeping costs down.

The subsidization is small and specific. It isn't good policy, but it plays no part in why food is abundant, cheap, and delicious.

A better example would be insurance companies pre-obama care. They operate like security insurance discussed in the video, but were completely shit. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...ore-obamacare/

They didn't operate like anything discussed in the video. Pre-obamacare insurance companies were heavily regulated, with all sorts of subsidies and price controls.

The problem there was the absurd price for decent care for millions of americans. But you're talking private security insurance. You're talking the only protection available for someone if they get robbed, assaulted, raped, etc. How much would you pay for that? The companies would have to cover injuries, theyd cover the huge cost of crime scene investigation, the cost of paying the individuals to investigate, to give reports, to testify, to pay for vehicles, to pay for equipment, etc. We havent even gotten to labor costs, or how valuable a trained individual in this field would be, or what we should pay them to potentially get shot when confronting a criminal. An arbitrator currently isnt exactly cheap either, but perhaps thats obvious given the skill/know how needed in negotiation and dispute resolution.

These things are all costs regardless of whether or not its paid for by taxes or purchases by choice. Obamacare didn't do anything to stymie cost growth, and the absurd cost for healthcare before it (and now) is due to the absurd regulations. If you would like to discuss this to greater detail, we can.

The assumption is that private companies would be cheaper and more efficient, but this still seems like quite a stretch to me.

This is one of the most believed things in economics. Free markets always create cheaper products and services than centrally controlled ones. This isn't ideology. The data backs it up 100%. Hell, as far as I know it's in economic theory too.

If you would like to discuss why free markets do so, we can

Check out the Milton Friedman videos I've posted.

[jackvance]

Oh it's definitely for oil. But oil != petrodollar

Are you sure about that? In my current residence the UAE, the dollar is locked to the dirham. And you know why of course, oil. The US has gone to war over countries (iraq) wanting to trade oil in anything other than dollars. The dollar being the backup currency of the world and the trading currency for oil is a fact. What evidence do you have to dispute the petrodollar?

[wufwugy]

Are you sure about that? In my current residence the UAE, the dollar is locked to the dirham. And you know why of course, oil. The US has gone to war over countries (iraq) wanting to trade oil in anything other than dollars. The dollar being the backup currency of the world and the trading currency for oil is a fact. What evidence do you have to dispute the petrodollar?

IIRC the claim in the video is different than this. The claim is that without the petrodollar, the US economy suffers immensely. That isn't true.

The most I've seen from serious economists is that the US gets some marginal benefit from the peg. I suspect that the State Department and Pentagon care the most about it for geopolitical reasons. It is probably more important for maintaining regional hegemony and subverting any escalations by other powers (Russia, mostly). Without the peg, the US economy would be just fine (like how so many other non-pegged countries are fine), but the issues would be more about global security and hegemony

[Renton]

Seems like a lot of the petrodollar theory is falsely attributing tinfoil theories to basic economic realities. The value of everything in the economy is closely tied to the amount of embodied energy that went into creating it. So we shouldn't be surprised when changes in the extraction costs of basic resources cascade down to changes in the prices of things and in the value of currency. Petrodollar just makes this effect official, if anything.

[jackvance]

IIRC the claim in the video is different than this. The claim is that without the petrodollar, the US economy suffers immensely. That isn't true.

The most I've seen from serious economists is that the US gets some marginal benefit from the peg. I suspect that the State Department and Pentagon care the most about it for geopolitical reasons. It is probably more important for maintaining regional hegemony and subverting any escalations by other powers (Russia, mostly). Without the peg, the US economy would be just fine (like how so many other non-pegged countries are fine), but the issues would be more about global security and hegemony

I agree with this, my only criticism would be that youre probably down-playing the importance a bit. I mean, would they go to war over this stuff if it didnt matter much? What this probably causes is that the US can print a lot more money than it otherwise could.

Also I have to add, the world would probably be worse off if the US wasnt doing this, in terms of progress at least, but this is up for debate of course.

[wufwugy]

I agree with this, my only criticism would be that youre probably down-playing the importance a bit. I mean, would they go to war over this stuff if it didnt matter much? What this probably causes is that the US can print a lot more money than it otherwise could.

Well, I definitely think they're going to war over oil, but I don't think it helps the Fed print dollars. Of all the reading from monetary policy experts I've done, I've never seen it framed like this. I'm pretty sure that the petrodollar is basically inconsequential to monetary policy, but that's not to be confused with real oil shocks. Commodity supply shocks affect monetary policy a ton, or at least are supposed to. Central banks have final say, so if they don't respond to shocks, then we see the kind of thing that happened in 2008 (or more like the exact thing).

Two things:

(1) If the Fed was printing too much money, it would show up in inflation and other measures. It doesn't therefore the Fed isn't.

(2) The massive "printing" (QE) is a byproduct of an unsound monetary regime as well as bounce back from the hole created by abysmal monetary policy in 2008. Several countries (Australia and Israel, to name two) have defacto monetary regimes that are much looser than the Fed, yet the amount of stimulus they produce is far less. This apparent contradiction is because macroeconomics is often counter-intuitive. An NGDP level-targeting monetary regime will produce 2% inflation with less stimulus than a non-targeting regime with more stimulus.

I'm not sure if you read Zerocred, but Tyler Durden has never said a correct thing about money in his life. If you're interested in monetary policy, there are several bloggers with PhDs and teaching creds specific to monetary policy. Scott Sumner is probably the best place to start. Just keep in mind that his specialization in economics is money. Marcus Nunes is a great source if you like short posts with graphs. Lars Christensen is good too

[jackvance]

Yeah but look at it like this. Lets say Putin pulls off a diplomatic miracle and the rubble becomes the new currency in which the world starts trading oil. A lot of the surplus dollars in the world start flowing back to the US because thats the only place theyre useful anymore. Thats through both currency exchange and spending. This would crash the dollar.

Norway has about $850 billion dollars of oil money stocked away, theyre keeping this in various offshore banks in different currencies because introducing into their own country would devalue their currency too much. I use this example to show the principle. Regardless of fed money printing, this fact alone shows some of the power of the petrodollar no?

[wufwugy]

Yeah but look at it like this. Lets say Putin pulls off a diplomatic miracle and the rubble becomes the new currency in which the world starts trading oil. A lot of the surplus dollars in the world start flowing back to the US because thats the only place theyre useful anymore. Thats through both currency exchange and spending. This would crash the dollar.

Norway has about $850 billion dollars of oil money stocked away, theyre keeping this in various offshore banks in different currencies because introducing into their own country would devalue their currency too much. I use this example to show the principle. Regardless of fed money printing, this fact alone shows some of the power of the petrodollar no?

Inflating the dollar isn't a problem though. It's a problem if the inflation comes from real shocks or too tight of monetary policy. A strong dollar means import industries look better. A weak dollar means export ones do. "Strength" of a currency is the wrong thing to look at. If it was the right thing to look at, we would be saying things like how terrible the Chinese economy is because the USD is so much stronger than the renminbi.

I suspect the economics and finance professions used the words "strong" and "weak" to signify something industry specific, but then journalists and the public took them as colloquial terms. Like how "theory" in science means something different than "theory" in conversation.

I see the media talk about exchange rates a lot as if they're determinative of certain outcomes, but I don't recall ever seeing economists do so. Scott Sumner has a famous phrase (within his sphere, I guess): "never reason from a price change". I still don't quite understand what that means, but I suspect it would be his first response to reasoning from exchange ratios.