Comments by "seneca983" (@seneca983) on "Explained with Dom" channel.

  1. "The euro lost a lot of value against the dollar over the past 10 years. This inflates the growth/shrinkage of companies when measuring in usd." I don't buy that argument. In the long term (which a whole decade qualifies as), the movement of the exchange rate should close follow the inflation differential (as per the theory of purchasing power parity). If one country has it's currency devalue over time relative to another currency it should also have a higher inflation rate by similar amount which should add to the nominal growth of its economy. This works exactly in the opposite direction as the effect from the exchange movement so in the long term they should cancel out.
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  2.  @3omab  "the average Estonian has never been so poor in the history of our country" Hyperbole much? I'm fairly sure the average Estonian was much poorer in the early '90s.
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  3. "The EU has 28 member states" It's only 27 now since Brexit.
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  4. I think the "shrinking share of global economy" shouldn't be seen as a big worry. We should expect it to happen unless we expect most of the rest of the world to continue languishing in poverty. The shrinking share is at least part due to various previously poor countries becoming richer and more developed.
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  5. The high inflation is recent. Estonia getting richer is a longer-term trend.
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  6.  @moneymakermike6189  "The countries work as independent markets that share the same currency." This doesn't really mar the argument because inflation rates across the Eurozone are pretty close to each other. "with your logic, countries that do not control the dollar but still use it, such as Ecuador or even Djibouti [...] would encounter equal inflation" Yes, and this is what we actually observe. You can e.g. use the World Bank website to show the inflation rates for the US, Ecuador, and Djibouti after, say, 2004 and they match each other fairly closely. Why 2004? Well, Ecuador dollarized in 2000 so it doesn't make sense to compare earlier years. Also, before dollarization it had a very high rate of inflation and after 2000 it took a couple of years to reach the same level as in the US (so what I argued doesn't hold in the short term but 10 years is long enough) so 2004 seems like the most illustrative starting year for this. "and economic prosperity" No, definitely not. This is a completely different thing.
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  7.  @moneymakermike6189  If you compare the inflation rates between Estonia, France, and Spain in 2011-present (2011 being when Estonia adopted the euro) you can see that they are similar and move similarly. Note that I said what I claim holds in the long term not necessarily in the short term. Inflation rates can differ for e.g. one year or a couple of years but there are limits to how far the price levels can deviate from each other as at some point arbitrage would become possible and force the price levels back closer to each other. (Also, Liechtenstein uses the Swiss franc which is a different currency.)
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  8.  @reiksxd5832  You'd think Estonia can't generate many tourists since it's such a small country, especially compared to Indonesia which is the 4th most populous country in the World.
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  9. "This country is arrogantly bankrupted only another loan from IMF can helps for some time" Estonia has lower public debt than any other EU member.
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  10. But "clog" can also mean "blockage" so a "clog in the machine" could still make sense (though it would be a much more negative implication than "cog in the machine").
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  11. Lithuania doesn't have as many unicorn companies so it's not as striking of an example.
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  12. Well, that's not the only thing that matters. Still, have you taken a look at Cuba recently? At least Bangladesh isn't having blackouts like Cuba (I think).
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  13.  @mardus_ee  I think Serbians are taller.
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  14.  @blackwersus  But I think in the whole of Europe they're not quite the tallest (though they are very close).
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  15.  @Zagriel.  "Estonia will never reach Finland's standards." Don't be so sure. Estonia has been catching up since regaining its independence. In 1992 its real (PPP) GDP per capita was about 1/3 of that of Finland. Today that gap is much narrower. Also, I think during its first stretch of independence, Estonia was richer than Finland.
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  16.  @Zagriel.  That's today. Future might be different. 30 years ago the difference was much larger. I think there's a good chance that after another 30 years there will be no real difference anymore.
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  17. "USSR allowed on purpose us to see Finnish" Isn't it more like that the TV broadcasts from Finland were just close enough to reach Estonia. It's not obvious how the Soviet government could've prevented Estonians from watching Finnish TV barring some kind of drastic measure like sending a jamming signal to drown out the broadcasts.
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  18. Those taxes are still lower than in Finland.
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