Now when I look at putting up shelving, fixing drywall or whatever, I think, "Okay, is this going to be more difficult than the cabinet I built from scratch, using unfamiliar power tools, when I was 13? No? Then I can do this."

Kids should be using table saws. Kids should be getting experience in machine shops.

Easily 75% of my competence and comfort at basic homeownership tasks comes from the fact that I built a small cabinet for my parents in wood shop in middle school.

I don't even agree with the analogy! I think more kids should be using table saws. Schools have done an entire generation a *huge* disservice by getting rid of wood shop and industrial technology classes.

The early experiments in prediction markets succeeded because they limited participation drastically and engaged in severe gatekeeping.

You're not going to get meme stock dynamics when all your participants are CIA analysts.

But open that market up to the general public...

Bed Bath and Beyond had tremendous volume too, in the days before it sank. Did that mean its stock was priced correctly?

One thing that Robin Hanson et. al. underestimated is how much prediction markets for contracts that will resolve a long time from now are just venues for people to indicate support for their partisan cause and/or just meme around.

The sad thing is that the concept is good. It's new guided missile cruiser type to replace the Ticonderoga class, which are old and obsolete.

It's yet another example of the Trump administration taking basically a good idea and trashing it via poor execution.

You mean Sarcophaguys?