Brandon DonnellyCanada must become a global superpower
The silver lining to the US starting a trade war with Canada and regularly threatening annexation is that it has forced this country out of complacency. Indeed, I'm hard pressed to remember a time, at least in my lifetime, when patriotism and nationalism has united so much of Canada. According to a recent survey by Angus Reid, the percentage of Canadians expressing a "deep emotional attachment" to the country jumped from 49% in December 2024 to 59% in February 2025. And as further evidence of...
Brandon DonnellyThe bank robbery capital of the world
Between 1985 and 1995, Los Angeles' retail bank branches were robbed some 17,106 times. In 1992, which was the the city's worst year for robberies, the number was 2,641. This roughly translated into about one bank robbery every 45 minutes of each banking day. All of this, according to this CrimeReads piece by Peter Houlahan, gave Los Angeles the dubious title of "The Bank Robbery Capital of the World" during this time period. So what caused this? Well according to Peter it was facil...
Brandon DonnellyThe story behind those pixelated video game mosaics in Paris
If you've ever been to Paris, you've probably noticed the small pixelated art pieces that are scattered all around the city on buildings and various other hard surfaces. Or maybe you haven't seen or noticed them in Paris, but you've seen similarly pixelated mosaics in one of the other 79 cities around the world where they can be found. Or maybe you have no idea what I'm talking about right now. Huh? Here's an example from Bolivia (click here if you can't see...
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Brandon DonnellyCanada must become a global superpower
The silver lining to the US starting a trade war with Canada and regularly threatening annexation is that it has forced this country out of complacency. Indeed, I'm hard pressed to remember a time, at least in my lifetime, when patriotism and nationalism has united so much of Canada. According to a recent survey by Angus Reid, the percentage of Canadians expressing a "deep emotional attachment" to the country jumped from 49% in December 2024 to 59% in February 2025. And as further evidence of...
Brandon DonnellyThe bank robbery capital of the world
Between 1985 and 1995, Los Angeles' retail bank branches were robbed some 17,106 times. In 1992, which was the the city's worst year for robberies, the number was 2,641. This roughly translated into about one bank robbery every 45 minutes of each banking day. All of this, according to this CrimeReads piece by Peter Houlahan, gave Los Angeles the dubious title of "The Bank Robbery Capital of the World" during this time period. So what caused this? Well according to Peter it was facil...
Brandon DonnellyThe story behind those pixelated video game mosaics in Paris
If you've ever been to Paris, you've probably noticed the small pixelated art pieces that are scattered all around the city on buildings and various other hard surfaces. Or maybe you haven't seen or noticed them in Paris, but you've seen similarly pixelated mosaics in one of the other 79 cities around the world where they can be found. Or maybe you have no idea what I'm talking about right now. Huh? Here's an example from Bolivia (click here if you can't see...
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Brandon DonnellyHousing doom loop
Support Brandon Donnelly
Brandon DonnellyHousing doom loop
Share Dialog
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https://open.spotify.com/episode/2uRUg7HPsK8oeLdnhPNCdg?si=b4ab87565f874547
This discussion between Patrick O'Shaughnessy and Marc Andreessen is a great follow-up to my recent post about the productization of housing. Broadly speaking it's about tech, software eating everything, and the future of the world. But if you skip to around the 15 minute mark, Marc talks about the growing divide in our economy between sectors that are changing rapidly and sectors that are changing slowly.
Examples of the former include things like computers, media, retail, cars, and a lot of the other stuff that we regular consume. Examples of the latter include things like healthcare, education, and housing (you know, the pillars of the American Dream).
The noteworthy problem with this divide is that the fast changing sectors are producing things that have been getting more affordable over time. The specific example that he gives is televisions. Think about how much more TV you can get today compared to when they were first introduced.
In contrast to this, things in the slow changing sectors keep getting more expensive. The same university education is exponentially more expensive today than it was a few decades ago, even though it's far more important for people to have an education than to own TVs.
A similar thing can be said about housing. How much has really changed in terms of the way we build new homes?
One of the common threads across these slow change sectors, Marc argues, is strong government intervention. We restrict supply such that we can't meet demand. We then respond to higher prices by trying to subsidize demand, but this only drives prices up even further. Because, at the end of the day, we haven't addressed the underlying issue.
The result is a doom loop.
If you can't see the embedded podcast above, click here.
https://open.spotify.com/episode/2uRUg7HPsK8oeLdnhPNCdg?si=b4ab87565f874547
This discussion between Patrick O'Shaughnessy and Marc Andreessen is a great follow-up to my recent post about the productization of housing. Broadly speaking it's about tech, software eating everything, and the future of the world. But if you skip to around the 15 minute mark, Marc talks about the growing divide in our economy between sectors that are changing rapidly and sectors that are changing slowly.
Examples of the former include things like computers, media, retail, cars, and a lot of the other stuff that we regular consume. Examples of the latter include things like healthcare, education, and housing (you know, the pillars of the American Dream).
The noteworthy problem with this divide is that the fast changing sectors are producing things that have been getting more affordable over time. The specific example that he gives is televisions. Think about how much more TV you can get today compared to when they were first introduced.
In contrast to this, things in the slow changing sectors keep getting more expensive. The same university education is exponentially more expensive today than it was a few decades ago, even though it's far more important for people to have an education than to own TVs.
A similar thing can be said about housing. How much has really changed in terms of the way we build new homes?
One of the common threads across these slow change sectors, Marc argues, is strong government intervention. We restrict supply such that we can't meet demand. We then respond to higher prices by trying to subsidize demand, but this only drives prices up even further. Because, at the end of the day, we haven't addressed the underlying issue.
The result is a doom loop.
If you can't see the embedded podcast above, click here.
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