On HN it has been fascinating to watch the rise of "line go up" financial vehicles. It seems that the appetite for such things as NFTs, shitcoins, meme stocks, etc is nearly insatiable.
This article nails down some things about this phenomenon - at least concretely identifying the demographics - but it doesn't really give any satisfying answers or propose any solutions.
We've made it so easy for people with addictive personalities to click "gamble" that it's unsurprising to see it on the rise. With stuff like crypto we've normalized - even glamorized - the behaviors. Gambling is "useless" in an economic sense - it doesn't create any real value, it only provides "entertainment."
The problem is that not every gambler is going to be entertained, especially if they light a bunch of money on fire and suffer real negative economic consequences. It seems like we should be doing something to mitigate this...
This article nails down some things about this phenomenon - at least concretely identifying the demographics - but it doesn't really give any satisfying answers or propose any solutions.
We've made it so easy for people with addictive personalities to click "gamble" that it's unsurprising to see it on the rise. With stuff like crypto we've normalized - even glamorized - the behaviors. Gambling is "useless" in an economic sense - it doesn't create any real value, it only provides "entertainment."
The problem is that not every gambler is going to be entertained, especially if they light a bunch of money on fire and suffer real negative economic consequences. It seems like we should be doing something to mitigate this...