Balaji Srinivasan

That might be an obvious point, but it's a non-obvious point as well.

Should I elaborate on that for a second?

Okay.

All right.

So...

Basically, in the 20th century, the Industrial Revolution led to the rise of, you know, capitalism as we, you know, the industrial variety of capitalism and the captains of industry and whatnot.

And this did result in enormous improvements in standard of living.

You had, you know, modern homes and you had running water and all this kind of stuff.

But it also resulted in, obviously, huge wars and also a disruption of traditional means of government.

All got disrupted.

And as a consequence, I mean, America was actually a society that was relatively young and supple.

Technological disruption and roll with it, right?

But the older governments of Europe were totally disrupted by it.

And actually, you know, that also led to the Industrial Revolution, which was in its own way a new government that in a sense was adapted to the age, albeit in a malign adaptation.

But the thing is that

You know, did you know Russia's stock market by some reports did better than America's stock market in the 1800s?

No.

I believe it.

Yeah.

They were not barbarians, right?