🛸 The world in 2040

GM everyone. This is 2036, the newsletter that pays you.

This week, the U.S. Treasury Department published this chart:

This looks a lot like the 'revenue forecast' slide of a start-up pitch...

The Treasury predicts public debt in the US will skyrocket in the coming years.

Now, a quick caveat. At 2036 - we're technological optimists. We believe the world is going to get substantially better over time. In fact, this graph sums it up pretty well how we think about it:

We believe that with time, we might not get flying cars - but we can become a space-faring, multi-planetary species that's conquered life extension.

As our boy Balaji puts it - "If the purpose of technology is to reduce scarcity, then the ultimate purpose of technology is to eliminate mortality."

Just like Gary Vee, we're also "the cup is always full"-kinda people.

On our way to an amazing future, however, we can expect to encounter a few speed bumps. But don't worry - nothing to throw us off course.

One of these is debt.

You can think of the government as a household. Every year it's got to balance its books - make more than it spends. Just like you and I. If not, it needs to borrow.

The problem is that since 1970 the US government has borrowed trillions of $$$ - mostly to finance wars, expand social programs without raising taxes and of course - pay for COVID.

Okay, so what do we do about it?

Realistically, there are 3 things we can do:

1. Default on the debt - which is highly unlikely because US Treasury bills are literally considered "risk-free" assets. This would mean the end of the US economy as we know it.

2. Devalue the currency - which favors debtors and punishes savers. Got $10K in the bank? It's now worth $1K. Got $1M of debt? It's now worth $100K. Throughout history, this is the most common path - by far. It happened in Lebanon yesterday, too.

3. Increase productivity - which drives GDP growth and brings in more money than we spend. This is the ideal scenario and how the US paid for its World War 2 debt. With new technologies, this is also a possible scenario.

Ark Invest predicts global GDP will grow by 8.5% annually until 2040 thanks to technologies like neural networks and open blockchains.

Society in 2040 according to ARK Invest.

So if we know the most likely outcome is a combination of currency devaluation (probably through inflation) and GDP growth - how do we position ourselves?

The answer is crypto.

Ark Invest believes digital wallets and cryptocurrencies are some of the most important catalysts to create super-exponential growth (yes, that's their own word!).

And like we said yesterday, crypto - and particularly bitcoin is - inflation resistant. It's like digital gold.

As it grows in usage, it grows in value. The users own the network. It's like a triple whammy of just good stuff.

The entire ARK Invest report is amazing - it's free, and I highly recommend you check it out if you need a dose of optimism or some more reasons to hold bitcoin. You can find it here.

Today's task will be to gather more of these resources and share them with us.

✅ Task: earn $15 in BTC for an example of technological optimism

Today, we want to hear from you!

Your task today is to reply to this email with your favorite resource, book, article, graph, chart - anything - that makes you optimistic about the world and technology.

It can be about crypto specifically if you want, or about technology in general.

We'll create a central hub for all the best resources out there and share them with you. We'll also publish your name along with the resource you recommend if you wish.

So the only step today is to reply to this email with your favorite resource that makes you optimistic about the world. Make sure to include your BTC wallet so we can pay you.

We'll pick two random submissions and give them $15 in BTC each.

With the goal of spreading a little bit of optimism today, we wish you a fantastic day.

Until tomorrow,

Alex.