Noah Smith

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Has anyone written a good blog post about "SF growth girls"? Who the fuck ARE these people?? 1 Sept
Specifically: 1. 1991-2000: the peak of human civilization 2. 2001-2013: lots of disasters but very cool culture + early internet 3. 2021-2026: idiotic politic… 1 Sept
Ranking of decades I can remember: 1. 90s 2. 00s 3. 20s (so far) 4. 10s 1 Sept
Rarely do I disagree with Kevin, but his chart here cuts off three years ago. @joseazar has found that the college wage premium has fallen steeply in just the… 1 Sept
This is kind of cool. 1 Sept
The two best bars I've found for food in San Francisco (Jabroni and Stoa) are right across the street from each other. That's kind of incredible. 1 Sept
"Not productive" 1 Sept
These people think of the world as a perpetual war-of-extermination between racial groups. If you let yourself think like this -- if you let yourself listen to… 1 Sept
I'm definitely enjoying the 2020s more than the 2010s. The 2010s were ASS. I felt like the Borg was trying to assimilate me every day. The 2000s, however, were… 1 Sept
Thoughts on leftist antisemitism: 1 Sept
I understand that some people dislike living around people from other cultures. And that's not wrong or evil. But I think most Americans just don't really mind… 1 Sept
Acemoglu wrote a pure theory paper (no data) claiming that as the capital stock increases, countries become more repressive. Even a quick glance at the histori… 1 Sept
This is such an epic bet. 1 Sept
China actually started moving away from coal. Amazing. 1 Sept
The Electric Revolution will transform the world in ways we've only just begun to appreciate. 1 Sept
America is missing out on the Electric Revolution. The rest of the world is racing to take advantage of newer, better energy technologies, while America is stu… 1 Sept
The upside of the Hugging Face attack is that it shows why AI won't take all our jobs anytime soon! Anything both agentic and intelligent enough to actually re… 1 Sept
Roundup #87: Technology BAD!! 1 Sept
In defense of Asian American art 30 Aug
China leapfrogged the West on cars by treating internal combustion as obsolete and mastering the technology that replaces it. 29 Aug
Japan's loss of innovation is mostly a finance story: companies can no longer get the cheap plentiful bank loans they had in the 70s and 80s. 29 Aug
Here’s how we’re all going to die 28 Aug
AI-designed superviruses outweigh every other risk in the world right now. 28 Aug
The death of Market Street 26 Aug
What if our biggest problems aren’t economic? 24 Aug
Are we watching the U.S. go bankrupt? 22 Aug
Economists should be worried about birth rates 19 Aug
Where to eat in San Francisco 18 Aug
The end of an era for China's economy 16 Aug
Roundup #86: Unintended consequences 12 Aug
The poverty of anti-tech thought 11 Aug
Banning data centers would blow up the U.S. economy 8 Aug
Are the Democrats going to save us this time? 6 Aug
The end of the age of heroes 4 Aug
Slopulism is taking over America 2 Aug
Why did South Korean stocks just crash? 30 Jul
Roundup #85: Most policy is also industrial policy 28 Jul
What will more intelligence actually do for us? 26 Jul
The "private equity is buying up all the houses" argument is both wrong and an excuse for deferring zoning reform. 13 Aug 2025
Housing affordability is almost the direct inverse of how many new homes are built, so the answer is to build more houses. 25 Mar 2024
Stocks sustained by persistent online attention can stay overpriced for long periods, so overvaluation alone does not imply a near-term correction. 25 Jul 2022
Cash welfare benefits contributed at least somewhat to the inflation of 2021-2022. 25 Jul 2022