10 rules: If I ruled the world.
Apr 8th 2009NiaLLLarkinUncategorized
The 10 principles are stolen directly from Nassim Nicholas Taleb article in Today’s FT.
Taleb, a veteran trader and dinstinguished professor. And views economies as complex adaptive systems. So it’ll come as no surprise that I’m a fan. He has also published two very famous books in The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable and “Fooled by Randomness: The Hidden Role of Chance in Life and in the Markets”
The original article is here. Its already very short and sweet. I highly recommend it. If you haven’t clicked through yet. Here’s an even shorter version.
1. What is fragile should break early while it is still small . Nothing should ever become too big to fail.
2. No socialisation of losses and privatisation of gains. Whatever may need to be bailed out should be nationalised; whatever does not need a bail-out should be free, small and risk-bearing.
3. People who were driving a school bus blindfolded (and crashed it) should never be given a new bus. It is irresponsible and foolish to put our trust in the ability of such experts to get us out of this mess. Instead, find the smart people whose hands are clean.
4. Do not let someone making an “incentive” bonus manage a nuclear plant - or your financial risks . No incentives without disincentives: capitalism is about rewards and punishments, not just rewards.
5. Counter-balance complexity with simplicity. Complexity from globalisation…needs to be countered by simplicity in financial products.
6. Do not give children sticks of dynamite, even if they come with a warning. Complex derivatives need to be banned because nobody understands them and few are rational enough to know it.
7. Only Ponzi schemes should depend on confidence. Governments should never need to “restore confidence”. Governments cannot stop the rumours.
8. Do not give an addict more drugs if he has withdrawal pains. Using leverage to cure the problems of too much leverage is not homeopathy, it is denial. We need rehab.
9. Citizens should not depend on financial assets or fallible “expert” advice for their retirement. Citizens should experience anxiety about their own businesses (which they control), not their investments (which they do not control).
10. Make an omelette with the broken eggs. This crisis cannot be fixed with makeshift repairs.
[Apply these principles and] we will see an economic life closer to our biological environment: smaller companies, richer ecology, no leverage. A world in which entrepreneurs, not bankers, take the risks and companies are born and die every day without making the news.
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