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The NSF Is Being Dismantled — With Broad Implications For The American Economy (www.forbes.com)
submitted 3 weeks ago by yogthos@lemmygrad.ml to c/us_news@lemmygrad.ml
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[-] amemorablename@lemmygrad.ml 16 points 3 weeks ago

I keep thinking about the job "market" as a whole with stuff like this. Like they're just deleting jobs that would not be easy to replace in quantity alone (setting aside the complexities of the fields and specializations involved). Some people will probably leave the country to look for better prospects if they're specialized enough. But some are just gonna end up added to the list of unemployed in a country that already doesn't have enough jobs to go around, much less reasonable wages for them. STEM was perceived as one of the most reliable for job prospects. In the US, not sure that's going to last, with what they're doing. The reason I focus on this is not cause STEM worker job security is all-important, but because jobs in general are tied up in survival and if people can't get them on a broader scale, they're going to get desperate.

I would like to think local socialists would have a response in this declining empire, but it seems more likely that we see a civil war between Christo-Fascists and Constitutional Loyalists.

[-] freagle@lemmygrad.ml 12 points 2 weeks ago

And there are even more knock-on effects! Dismantling the NSF while simultaneously defunding universities and other grants while simultaneously making student loans more toxic means that a lot of research will be grinding to a halt in the US. That puts the US in further behind China than it already is, and potentially will slide it so far it falls below India or maybe even Russia. Without that research edge, there's no high tech manufacturing coming to the US. There's no next gen chips, there's no new energy tech, there's no quantum, AI will lose ground, and many other tech trees will all be non-viable for investment in the US.

And since property is so over valued, cost of living is so high that low tech manufacturing won't be viable either because the required wage level is just too high. So there's really nowhere for the labor pool to go because there's no incentive for investment.

At this point, it's almost as if the US isn't creating a reserve army of labor but an actual literal military army of desperate people that can be focused into a meat grinder for a world war. With no prospects at any level, people will be forced to consider violence and the jingoism, racism, and orientalism will continue to ramp up until people can only understand their suffering as a result of what those foreigners did to us and sign up to go get killed in a war.

[-] amemorablename@lemmygrad.ml 6 points 2 weeks ago

At this point, it’s almost as if the US isn’t creating a reserve army of labor but an actual literal military army of desperate people that can be focused into a meat grinder for a world war. With no prospects at any level, people will be forced to consider violence and the jingoism, racism, and orientalism will continue to ramp up until people can only understand their suffering as a result of what those foreigners did to us and sign up to go get killed in a war.

Wouldn't be surprised if they want that to happen. Although I'm doubtful it would work very well. There's just so much individualism in the US, not enough agreed upon sense of "patriotism" for people to rally around, and among those who are not versed in socialism/communism, quite a lot of blaming republicans or blaming democrats, depending on which "side" a person lands more on. So even among those who don't have a socialist view or an anti-imperialist view, they may still have a "this party sucks" view and not want to go along with a war for that reason. As it is, I don't know how long this Trump stuff can go on, even in the short-term, without something sparking. Through the mixture of dumping on the federal gov and fucking around with global trade like it's a game of Monopoly where he does a table flip, his admin has gotta be creating a lot of local enemies and not just in the typical USian way of "exploited minority group."

[-] freagle@lemmygrad.ml 5 points 2 weeks ago

I dunno. I think the Rs and Ds, both leadership and voters, have strong anti-China alignment and war against China will have desperate unemployed people happy to enlist to "fight for freedom and liberty". Plenty of Ds that I know say shit like "if we're not careful we'll all be speaking Chinese soon". I think anti-China sentiment and patriotism is strong enough to unify a desperate US population.

I think it's a huge risk because such desperation could easily precipitate internal conflict before external conflict kicks off. I think it's a huge risk because external conflict may never happen if military analysts realize they can never win.

[-] amemorablename@lemmygrad.ml 4 points 2 weeks ago

Well manufactured consent for it and will to enlist in that fight aren't necessarily the same. Having some anti-China fears/thoughts won't necessarily translate into personal risk, in other words. That's where I think the individualism is sorta a double-edged sword aspect of capitalism and its imperialist wars; on the one hand, it makes it harder for people to organize against the system and on the other hand, it means people don't want to make personal sacrifices for the system. Like the manufacturing stuff and that poll about how many people who were in favor of local manufacturing vs. actually want to do that kind of job. I could easily see legislators rallying around a war, but the actual masses is hard for me to believe.

[-] freagle@lemmygrad.ml 3 points 2 weeks ago

I think we're at the point where we have to say: we'll see

[-] Commiejones@lemmygrad.ml 5 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

It's not even "individualism" as it is basic materialism. American wars have not benefited the working class materialy since ww2. When they invaded Iraq "for oil" it didn't even slow consumer prices for gasoline. Even the slowest people can see it which is how trump got elected in the first place.

Destroying the entire economic social contract of the labor aristocracy is pretty much the surest way to bring about class consciousness in america. While the fascists are doing a bit of the classic blame throwing I don't think they are doing it well enough to galvanize a sufficiently large part of the population to make it a viable movement.

I don't believe in JDPON don as much as penis fingers don (everything he touches gets fucked) but I can understand why people would think this constant stream of fuckups could be intentional.

I feel like donald and friends read a few AI summaries of books on "how to turn a country into a fascist dictatorship" and are following the general outline. They think the process is like making a soup where they can eyeball measurements and if they don't have one ingredient they can ignore or substitute it. In reality the process is more like doing chemistry where using the wrong thing will destroy what they are making and maybe take them with it.

this post was submitted on 11 May 2025
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