Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order by Ray Dalio

Principles by Ray Dalio10 HN recommenders · 2022–2025
232.4M views · explainer · evergreen · Uploaded 2022-03-02

An animated 44-minute summary of Ray Dalio's book Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order. It lays out the Big Cycle of rising and declining nations, covering debt cycles, internal conflict, and shifts in global power over the past 500 years.

HN commenters recommend it as a clear framework for placing the current US and world situation within historical debt and empire cycles.

Watch on YouTube

20 comments from Hacker News

@kstenerud2022 · in “Ask HN: Best country to live in case of food shortages/famine?”

[VIDEO] Unless America can undo its inequality problem within 10 years give or take, it will become financially and politically unstable.

@incomingpain2022 · in “The dispute between radical feminism and transgenderism (2014)”

>I have seen no evidence in support of this. There's plenty of anecdotes of people saying it happened to them, but no evidence of a widespread trend. I hope you are right and I am wrong. >I remember when "gay" was the insult du jour in middle school. Still is. Let's go find a random thread on reddit that has nothing to do with sex or gender. [LINK] And that's reddit... where there are no conservatives left. They've banned all of us. >Now high schools are having walkouts in opposition of homophobic laws [1] School walkouts by children aren't because the students are so well versed and well informed on issues. They were convinced by the teachers to walk out. People who wanted to skip school joins. In terms of this specific one of 'dont say gay' [LINK] Ctrl + F "gay": 0 results. Ctrl + F "homo": 0 results. So frankly the title of 'dont say gay' is propaganda. So what does it say? Classroom instruction by school personnel or third 98 parties on sexual orientation or gender identity may not occur 99 in kindergarten through grade 3 or in a manner that is not age 100 appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards. So it's not that they banned saying gay. They banned talking about sexual orientation with children below grade 3. So 8 years old? Do kids younger than 8 years old need to know about sexual orientation as defined by the government? or should parents be responsible here? I say parents, but this is a key political point. There is n

@OrlandoHakim2022 · in “What is money, anyway?”

I am surprised no one has shared these two important documentary videos on money: Money as Debt: [LINK] Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order by Ray Dalio: [VIDEO]

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@nebula88042022 · in “What does “shitty job” mean in the low-skill, low-pay world?”

They will find a way around those laws. I think the end state of the US was described perfectly in Ray Dalio's "Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order by Ray Dalio" video: Namely, the elite will grab as much capital as they can and when the people finally wrestle back control, all that wealth will fly out of the country as it is collapsing. This is probably how they are operating. [1]: [VIDEO]

@fervor2022 · in “War Without Rules: Inside China’s Playbook for Global Domination”

This video seems appropriate with the article: [VIDEO] A friend recently shared this video “principles for dealing with the changing world order” which stirred up a very solemn feeling in me. It may be the first time as an American that I felt a sense of duty to compete in regard to our international place. I’ve been wondering if any other Americans (and the west in general) wonder what they personally can do. In the video, Ray Dalio suggests saving money (fiscal conservatism?), being nice (political tolerance?), and competing technologically. If only it were that simple.

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@chubot2022 · in “No, America is not collapsing”

I tend to ignore the "endless screeching", and I've long had an optimistic world view somewhat aligned with say Steven Pinker -- we're living through the best times, roughly monotonic progress, with some temporary setbacks. But this recent video by Ray Dalio made me think a lot, and led me to his books: [VIDEO] Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order He did a bunch of quantitative research and came up with a model for the prosperity of countries, and "the world order". In the model, there were 4 world leaders at various points: Dutch, British, Americans, and Chinese. The basic pattern is that they were productive and industrious, gained military power, and grew to hold the world's reserve concurrency. After they hold the world's reserve concurrency, they stop being as productive. The rich parents can bend the rules and corrupt society for their kids. And there is more internal conflict about how to divvy up a fixed or declining pie. There can be more external conflict once rivals see weakness. In Dalio's view, China is obviously on the rise economically, and you also see signs of their increased military power. There is more to it than that -- see the video and books, but that's my short summary. ----- It sounds a little too "clean", but after some reflection, a lot of it is hard to argue with. (I'd definitely be interested in criticisms -- this presentation / framing is pretty new.) This doesn't mean America is "collapsing". But I would now say it's clearly "dec

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@soSadm4n2022 · in “It was a mistake to write off the Russians: Neil MacFarlane takes a long view”

No because the content does not “only get published” when the worst happens. You can find books, popular newspaper articles, etc that predicted the housing crash and some that even predicted the 07-08 timeline. 2022 video about changing world order: [VIDEO] 1997 article about leveraging worker insecurity to keep people in jobs: [LINK] Accurate predictions are all over because human society is intentional, and physical reality has constraints. I predict you will die of dehydration if you stop drinking fluids. Many things are certain despite all the uncertainty we feel.

@Litost2022 · in “Only essential services to operate from midnight”

I'm not that familiar with the Fourth Turning and this also originates from the US, but I did find it quite helpful when considering where things are, have been and might be going and how the US is in a cycle along with other nations: [VIDEO] I'd also not heard of Glocalization, but it reminds me of a couple of topics that are covered in Fritjof Capra's Systems View of Life book (also a course), around emergent behaviour in complex systems and how this competes with top down command and control ideas (or in organisations as the formal and informal networks).

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@turns0ut2022 · in “Inflation rose 9.1% in June, even more than expected”

Given the Fed doesn’t even know what’s going on your gut is probably just as good a source: [LINK] There is this from Dalio who suggests money printer go brrr policies sank the Dutch and Brits: [VIDEO] While all the fancy math is great for drawing geometric shapes, human intuition and basic arithmetic run the economy; human intuition for quantity has been evolving for millions of years whereas our fancy languages are only 5,000 years old (so says historians). We annotate our arithmetic operators differently for calculus and the rest of higher level math, but at the end of the day with only 13% of the adult public possessing an “advanced degree” most people make pretty basic arithmetical decisions. Smart people used their education to get ahead but the rest of the world has caught up and caught on as <50% believe in higher powers now; elites are just people, not specials to be kowtowed by. So what’s happened is again elites tried to form concrete agency habits into the masses (like religion did) but the masses agency does not concretely conform to rigid mathematical objects and the elites are now out of touch; either by stubbornness or age, they can’t handle they’re the ones losing ground all this time. So they tinker with official math to keep us in line: [LINK] So in the end economic policy was always politically motivated power consolidation for the elites, and the public, probably thanks to the meta awareness of our communities the internet provides, has caught onto the bi

@f0e4c2f72022 · in “Y Combinator narrows current cohort size by 40%, citing downturn and funding”

Ray Dalio wrote a book theorizing about some of these possibilities. I haven't read it yet but this video summary of it is pretty interesting. [VIDEO]

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@theuri2022 · in “Evolution and Revolution as Organizations Grow (1972)”

Great piece. Most MBAs learn this in b-school. This is wonderfully paired with this video (from Ray Dalio) --> which draws analogs to this process on the macro / country level [VIDEO]

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@scifibestfi2022 · in “Celsius Execs Cashed Out $40M in Crypto Before Halting Withdrawals for Customers”

Fiat works until it doesn't. Whether that's inflation, corrupt government, or the long term debt cycle which we nearing the end of. Ray Dalio has a good video about what that means and how this has played out every time over the past 500 years: [VIDEO]

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@chubot2023 · in “Ask HN: Why Is Everything Declining?”

Assuming you live in the US like I do, definitely watch this video and read Dalio's book (I bought 2 copies) Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order by Ray Dalio (2022) [VIDEO] Basically we're on the downward part of the cycle of wealth. That has NOT happened in our lifetimes, but it's happened many times before to other countries (Netherlands, Britain, China). Some things go in 150 or 250 year cycles and they're hard to see. Basically the idea is that in the long term, countries need to actually produce wealth in accordance to how much money they print. HOWEVER, the problem is that you can actually get away with NOT doing so for 50+ years -- the span of more than one generation. Particularly if you have the reserve currency of the world, as the US currently does. Dalio links a lot of our ills to Nixon's untethering of the dollar in the early 1970's. That reminds me of a good tweet -- What if your entire personality depends on low interest rates ? The idea there is that the habits and culture we've grown up with have been enforced by this distortion of wealth. --- To create wealth as a country, you need education, rule of law, cooperation, trust, etc. There has to be real output, and people have to push in the same direction. But if you can just print money instead of doing the work of those things, then why bother getting educated? Why not just rip people off? Why not rip off the government? They're just printing it anyway. So the social order is hugely affected

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@LoveMortuus2023 · in “Reasons the banking crisis isn’t a repeat of 2008”

If the inflation does reach (although in EU it already is) double digits, could that be a big of a hit to destabilize the US dollar and pave the way to the next global reserve currency? I'm asking because I've had these thoughts on my mind ever since Ray Dalio uploaded his video Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order [0]. [0] (Video length: 43:43) [VIDEO]

@short_throw2023 · in “Uh, guys, we should think about spending more on defense in the US”

If you aren't familiar with Ray Dalio's Principles for a Changing World Order, I can't recommend it enough (both the book and the YouTube video). You'll understand a lot better where the U.S. is in it's history and why so much is the way it is. [VIDEO]

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@rcarr2023 · in “Horrifying numbers of Americans will not make it to old age”

> On the other side of the globe? I guess that wouldn't cross my mind. Everything is interconnected. If your country is the only one on the planet that is doing well, it will not be long until resentments start brewing. If inequality stretches too far, eventually it results in instability. You can see this now with the amount of people immigrating to richer countries, both legally and illegally, and the resulting instability it causes, both in the countries that people immigrate to and those that they have left. Taken to the extreme, it eventually leads to wars between countries over resources. The United States might have the biggest military in the world, but it can't win a war against the rest of the world combined. This is why Joe Biden came out and said that it wasn't the United States economy that worried him, but the economical weakness in the rest of the world. If people think that the United States prints money only to look after the interests of the United States, it will lose its status as the reserve currency of the world. This is already starting to happen, with China making strong inroads in Africa and Latin America with disgruntled countries that have been left behind. If America loses influence in these countries, it's power diminishes and it will only be a matter of time until it is your doctors who are being paid less than convenience store managers in foreign countries. You might not be alive to see it, but your grandchildren might be. It was only 90 years

@rcarr2023 · in “U.S. national debt hits $33T for the first time”

I said this on another thread a few weeks ago but a lot of US citizens should be concerned about this. Debt levels adjusted for inflation put the US in a similar position as the UK when it was still the biggest economy just before WW2. If a war kicks off on the opposite side of the Pacific and it gets involved (even indirectly like it is currently in Ukraine) then, even if they end up on the winning side, the US may find itself effectively bankrupt by the end of it just like the UK did at the end of WW2. Ray Dalio has a video that projects something like this happening: [VIDEO]

@HenryBemis2024 · in “'Iranian cyber army' blamed as Wikipedia deletes atrocities”

(recklessly simplified ramblings of an semi-old man below) Remembering the "21 lessons for the 21st century" and how Harari described the arm-wrestling between the various ideologies/worlds, I see the the world is split in 3 (3.5) pieces. 1) The West (US-EU-satellites - writing first coz I'm in it) 2) The anti-west: Russia and satellites, Iran, NK, etc.)(they broke SO MANY EGGS but still - no omelette - well apart from the very few who rule via death) 3) The indifferent giants (they are planning their own world domination - soon)(see [VIDEO] is next, then perhaps India(?)) 0.5) The remaining 0.5 (e.g. some African countries that will just follow whoever gives them goodies/is the next global overlord). In IT I use the phrase: the more you do, the more you need to do. I.e. you have 10 systems, you need to do 100 things (backups, encryption, training, etc.). When you go to 20 systems and 5 are talking to each other you also need job schedulers, and you add in the connected dots and complexity (thus more assets produce more effort) You got a wikipedia? There is a new attack/manipulation opportunity (available to all the players). The more you got, the more you need to do. Now, why I care.. (this is not about politics/religion) I got some stocks and mutual funds. If the "West" is going "down", I want to make sure that my/the next generations will not receive a bunch of SP500 that is worth $0, so do I start NOW to buy "China", "India"? Also, should we be telling our kids to start l

@hayst4ck2024 · in “U.S. Strikes Iran-Backed Groups in Syria and Iraq”

Ray Dalio has weighed on exactly your question. This is a 45 minute video that directly answers exactly your question, that is very much worth a watch: [VIDEO] The extremely quick version is that wars happen when am empire is in decline, not when they have collapsed, so we are still salvageable, but only if we get a handle on income inequality. He would say that Pax Americana has not collapsed yet, but that it is definitely in the process of collapsing. He asserts that the main identifier of empire decline is income inequality which is fueled heavily by inflation which was enabled by the abandoning of the gold standard (Have you seen that WTF happened in 1971 meme? Abandoning the gold standard is what happened. [LINK] ). When the rich get richer because they are the main winners of inflation, they start gutting institutions that can threaten their entrenched power (such as infrastructure, R&D, and most importantly education -- "we don't want people who can critically think, we want people who know how to perform a task" -- there's a move from liberal to technical education) which results in less innovation and therefore waning military strength and adaptability. As a militaries strength falters, the use of the American petrodollar for trade becomes less appealing, which would ultimately stop you from living beyond your means by powering yourself with debt/inflation. As soon as quality of life drops, civil war/revolution/civil unrest becomes much more likely, leading to inabil

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@muzani2025 · in “Ask HN: Could tariffs be used as a reverse pump and dump?”

I always recommend Ray Dalio's video on how economics: [VIDEO] The tariffs and heck, electing a man like Trump, is a response to the existing situation. 1. Debt is very high and increasing at an unsustainable rate. Rather than default on debts, empires always print more money. 2. Competitiveness has gone down. In times of comfort, work ethic goes down too and a culture emerges where the working class is looked down on. 3. Economic disparity results in political polarity between the left and the right. This leads to revolutions. American revolutions tend to be fairly peaceful, but many are violent. 4. Technological advances allows for a shift in the order. New contenders have the conditions to make good use of them, which allows them to outpace the global leader. 5. Wars increase in a desperate move to hold on to power without having an economic lead. This leads to overextension and further collapse. The tariffs are primarily a response to debt and competitiveness. Trump's election and everyone's distrust for him stems from political polarity. Many of his recent surprising actions are in preparation for a war. The tariffs are an attempted cure to an existing problem. But like many cures, it buys time until the inevitable happens. It's not making the US more competitive. It might not cure the economic disparity. So what you see is three things coming together: 1) admission that the US debt may not be manageable, 2) worrying long term outlook, 3) Trump's lack of diplomacy making

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