Adam Ozimek

Chief economist at @InnovateEconomy. Host of the EconTwitter Water Cooler, live on twitter spaces and downloadable here:

[Adam Ozimek @ModeledBehavior]

What should we do about high skilled immigration and why? This is the topic of my huge new report with @LettieriDC and @cojobrien: Exceptional by Design. Quick thread on why I think you should read this report.

https://t.co/9F0Pi130Z0

[Matthew Yglesias @mattyglesias]

Would be a good topic for a book

[Adam Ozimek @ModeledBehavior]

This is inaccurate and a drastic failure of imagination. It doesn't need to be annual. Only occasional.

[Gabriel Zucman @gabriel_zucman]

The key problem is this:

Why would billionaires permanently leave California in response to a one-time tax owed if they lived there on January 1, 2026?

It would only make sense for them to leave if the tax becomes annual.

But if the tax becomes annual, it would also generate revenue annually — by virtue of, well, being annual.

[Adam Ozimek @ModeledBehavior]

@dredgedskeleton @extramsg Go back to the original video's claims. "His genius I would argue is stock pumping" and he specifically compares Elon to the "very capable executives and engineers" who are running his companies. This is obviously absurd. Don't try to move the goalpost.

[Adam Ozimek @ModeledBehavior]

This is pathetic cope

[The Tennessee Holler @TheTNHoller]

GIBNEY: “Elon Musk’s genius is stock pumping. He’s not a genius inventor. He never invented anything.”

[Jordan McGillis @jordanmcgillis]

The OAI-HF incident, the Iranian critical infrastructure hacks, etc. (combined, of course, with our inherent vulnerability to pathogens and stuff like that) should be enough to widen the aperture of imagination on the very significant downside risks that are approaching.

But this idea @KelseyTuoc has of "a world where humans are without economic value" strikes me as a similar failure of imagination.

Even if a model can do large portions of the types of jobs Kelsey and I have better than we can, I reckon the extraordinary surplus that will correspond with those advances will mean a surge in demand for economic exchanges that only humans can fulfill.

People (myself included) will continue to want human beings to do certain things for them based on the very fact that they're human beings. I could come up with a hundred examples, but here are two that appeal to me personally:

1) Human tutors for my kids.

I don't want to turn my children over to machines, nor do most parents. AI will surely play a big part in developing lessons, but even if rapid technological progress sets in I expect to be very willing to pay a lot of money for a caring human guide. (And when we're surpassed as writers, it'll be people like Kelsey and me that are available to fill these roles.)

2) Live entertainment.

We like watching people do things well, be it on stage or on the field. We will continue doing so even when humanoids can play a concerto really well and shoot three-pointers.

As @ModeledBehavior puts it, don't underestimate the economics of the human touch.

[Adam Ozimek @ModeledBehavior]

@AlanMCole @besttrousers You should all have those alerts setup.

Expensive civic shows how much choice is in consumer hands. The cheaper civic option is there

[Adam Ozimek @ModeledBehavior]

@carney Suddenly, I am an AI doomer

[Nicholas Zukin 🐑🔥🌮 @extramsg]

@ModeledBehavior I wonder if Gibney produced a four hour documentary on Thomas Edison he would conclude that Edison was just a great hype man. Such goofiness.

[Adam Ozimek @ModeledBehavior]

@aaron_renn It seems quite possible that is true. The same critique will apply to Toyota as well then though.

[Adam Ozimek @ModeledBehavior]

There is also quite a motte and bailey when it comes to the outsourcing discussion. Toyota, as he later states, outsources tons of parts as well. It is not about outsourcing, but about relationships with suppliers.

They also did not outsource out of nowhere. The Big 3's failure to be competitive extended to a lot of parts making when those were owned, especially because they would be UAW represented and the pay was way above industry competitive levels. Outsourcing was a needed adjustment at the time.

[Adam Ozimek @ModeledBehavior]

@aaron_renn This series is interesting but I find the idea that the consumer is blameless to be very misleading. "What manufacturers decide to build". There is no consumer here?

[Adam Ozimek @ModeledBehavior]

@Noahpinion I can't tell how much you are joking here. Do you think the internet going down is good? Do you see a harmless way for it to happen? You reference this a lot, have you laid out the longer argument here?

[Adam Ozimek @ModeledBehavior]

@ProfBZZZ The journalistic record is also clear he has taken a close hand in manufacturing processes, buy-make decisions, and often into the weeds on product engineering. It's a huge distinction between how he and Bezos have handled their rocket companies.

[Adam Ozimek @ModeledBehavior]

@souljagoyteller This is so funny to me. It's widely reported that Elon was at times sleeping on the floor fremont factory. I guess this was so he could focus on pumping the stock?

[Adam Ozimek @ModeledBehavior]

They were not content to just make the one time greatest show absolutely terrible. Had to invent a way to sink lower

[Out of Context Simpsons Treehouse of Horror 🎃 @OOCCouchGags]

Eric Lopez is now the new voice of Dr Nick after Treehouse of Horror Presents The Revengening. The final time Hank Azaira performed as Dr Nick was in Season 31's Warrin' Priests Part 2, months before the show recast certain characters of appropriate color/race/gender

[Brian Albrecht @BrianCAlbrecht]

This piece is a good example of what goes wrong when you have some story but not economy theory to map that to the data.

For example, it asks “So how could bird-flu-driven scarcity explain a price increase of 138%?”

The answer is in the article: demand for eggs is inelastic.

[Matthew Yglesias @mattyglesias]

It's I guess not the end of the world, but our comfort with the idea of Hollywood "true stories" that aren't actually true should is kind of troubling and under-discussed.

https://t.co/cB839aOzTi

[Alex Muresianu @ahardtospell]

On that note, I appreciated @ModeledBehavior’s recent piece in @thedispatch:

https://t.co/665uo2dKfi

[Guy Berger @EconBerger]

Some mild cooling in ADP employment growth in the 4 weeks through early October

[Jordan McGillis @jordanmcgillis]

Hi, Ami. Thanks for reading.

Our survey, conducted by @EchelonInsights, reached more than 1,500 workers, among whom more than 600 were 2024 Trump voters.

Of those Trump-voting workers, only 44 percent say that the tariffs have helped the economy. Still, 69 percent of Trump-voting workers support the tariffs.

But while they support the tariffs, it isn't with much intensity:

Just 3 percent select tariffs as their priority. 24 percent of Trump-voting workers choose tariffs as what they'd least like elected officials to prioritize (among 7 options).

That said, 58 percent of Trump-voting workers rated the president's job on trade positively. But at the same time, 59 percent of Trump-voting workers say the tariffs have made their cost of living higher in the past year.

One of the most intricate findings is that among the roughly one-third of all workers who support the tariffs, only one-third say they support them if they raise prices. See slide.

tldr, people are complicated.

Link to full survey results below.

(And I'm glad to be in the USA too. 🇺🇸)