I wonder: what odds would people here put on the US becoming a somewhat unsafe place to live even for citizens in the next couple of years due to politics? That is, what combined odds should we put on things like significant erosion of rights and legal protections for outspoken liberal or LGBT people, violent instability escalating to an unprecedented degree, the government launching the kind of war that endangers the homeland, etc.?
My gut says it’s now at least 5%, which seems easily high enough to start putting together an emigration plan. Is that alarmist?
More generally, what would be an appropriate smoke alarm for this sort of thing?
For rights, political power in the US is very federated. Even if many states overtly try to harm you, there will be many states you can run to, and most cities within states will fight against this. Note state-wise weed legalization and sanctuary cities. And the threat of this happening itself discourages such overt acts.
If you’re really concerned, then just move to california! Its much easier than moving abroad.
As for war, the most relevant datapoint is this metaculus question, forecasting a 15% of >10k american deaths before 2030, however it doesn’t seem like anyone’s updated their forecast there since 2023, and some of the comments seem kinda unhinged. It should also be noted that the question counts all deaths, not just civilian deaths, and not just those in the contiguous US. So I think this is actually a very very optimistic number, and implies a lower than 5% chance of such events reaching civilians and the contiguous states.
If you’re really concerned, then just move to california! Its much easier than moving abroad.
I lived in California long enough ago to remember when getting queer-bashed was a reasonable concern for a fair number of people, even in, say, Oakland. It didn’t happen daily, but it happened relatively often. If you were in the “out” LGBT community, I think you probably knew somebody who’d been bashed. Politics influence that kind of thing even if it’s not legal.
… and in the legal arena, there’s a whole lot of pressure building up on that state and local resistance. So far it’s mostly money-based pressure, but within a few years, I could easily see a SCOTUS decision that said a state had to, say, extradite somebody accused of “abetting an abortion” in another state.
War in the continental US? No, I agree that’s unlikely enough not to worry about.
Civil unrest, followed by violent crackdowns on civil unrest, followed by more violent civil unrest, followed by factional riots, on the other hand...
SCOTUS decision that said a state had to, say, extradite somebody accused of “abetting an abortion” in another state.
Look no further than how southern states responded to civil rights rulings, and how they (back when it was still held) they responded to roe v wade. Of course those reactions were much harder than, say, simply neglecting to enforce laws, which it should be noted liberal cities & states have been practicing doing for decades. Of course you say you’re trying to enforce laws, but you just subject all your members to all the requirements of the US bureaucracy and you can easily stop enforce laws while complying with the letter of the law. Indeed, it is complying with the letter of the law which prevents you from enforcing the laws.
… and in the legal arena, there’s a whole lot of pressure building up on that state and local resistance. So far it’s mostly money-based pressure, but within a few years, I could easily see a SCOTUS decision that said a state had to, say, extradite somebody accused of “abetting an abortion” in another state.
What money based pressure are you thinking of? Cities, as far as I know, have and always will be much more liberal than the general populace, and ditto for the states with much of their populace in cities.
The tactic of threatening to discriminate against uncooperative states and localities is getting a lot of play. It’s somewhat limited at the federal level because in theory the state and local policies they demand have to be related to the purpose of the money (and a couple of other conditions I don’t remember). But the present fashion is to push that relation to the absolute breaking point.
What does “unsafe” mean for this prediction/wager? I don’t expect the murder rate to go up very much, nor life expectancy to reverse it’s upward trend. “Erosion of rights” is pretty general and needs more specifics to have any idea what changes are relevant.
I think things will get a little tougher and less pleasant for some minorities, both cultural and skin-color. There will be a return of some amount of discrimination and persecution. Probably not as harsh as it was in the 70s-90s, certainly not as bad as earlier than that, but worse than the last decade. It’ll probably FEEL terrible, because it was on such a good trend recently, and the reversal (temporary and shallow, I hope) will dash hopes of the direction being strictly monotonic.
So, the current death rate for an American in their 30s is about 0.2%. That probably increases another 0.5% or so when you consider black swan events like nuclear war and bioterrorism. Let’s call “unsafe” a ~3x increase in that expected death rate to 2%.
An increase that large would take something a lot more dramatic than the kind of politics we’re used to in the US, but while political changes that dramatic are rare historically, I think we’re at a moment where the risk is elevated enough that we ought to think about the odds.
I might, for example, give odds for a collapse of democracy in the US over the next couple of years at ~2-5%- if the US were to elect 20 presidents similar to the current one over a century, I’d expect better than even odds of one of them making themselves into a Putinesque dictator. A collapse like that would substantially increase the risk of war, I’d argue, including raising a real possibility of nuclear civil war. That might increase the expected death rate for young and middle-aged adults in that scenario by a point or two on its own. It might also introduce a small risk of extremely large atrocities against minorities or political opponents, which could increase the expected death rate by a few tenths of a percent.
There’s also a small risk of economic collapse. Something like a political takeover of the Fed combined with expensive, poorly considered populist policies might trigger hyperinflation of the dollar. When that sort of thing happens overseas, you’ll often see reduced health outcomes and breakdown in civil order increasing the death rate by up to a percent- and, of course, it would introduce new tail risks, increasing the expected death rate further.
I should note that I don’t think the odds of any of this are high enough to worry about my safety now- but needing to emigrate is much more likely outcome than actually being threatened, and that’s a headache I am mildly worried about.
Honestly, my odds of this have been swinging anywhere from 2% to 15% recently. Note that this would be the odds of our democratic institutions deteriorating enough that fleeing the country would seem like the only reasonable option- p(fascism) more in the sense of a government that most future historians would assign that or a similar label to, rather than just a disturbingly cruel and authoritarian administration still held somewhat in check by democracy.
I think that what you describe as being 2 to 15 percent probable sounds more extreme than what the original post described as being 5 percent probable. You can have “significant erosion” of some groups’ rights without leaving the country being the only reasonable option, especially if you’re not in those groups. It depends on what you’re trying to achieve by leaving, I guess.
Although if I were a trans person in the US right now, especially on medication, I’d be making, if not necessarily immediately executing, some detailed escape plans that could be executed on short notice.
I wonder: what odds would people here put on the US becoming a somewhat unsafe place to live even for citizens in the next couple of years due to politics? That is, what combined odds should we put on things like significant erosion of rights and legal protections for outspoken liberal or LGBT people, violent instability escalating to an unprecedented degree, the government launching the kind of war that endangers the homeland, etc.?
My gut says it’s now at least 5%, which seems easily high enough to start putting together an emigration plan. Is that alarmist?
More generally, what would be an appropriate smoke alarm for this sort of thing?
For rights, political power in the US is very federated. Even if many states overtly try to harm you, there will be many states you can run to, and most cities within states will fight against this. Note state-wise weed legalization and sanctuary cities. And the threat of this happening itself discourages such overt acts.
If you’re really concerned, then just move to california! Its much easier than moving abroad.
As for war, the most relevant datapoint is this metaculus question, forecasting a 15% of >10k american deaths before 2030, however it doesn’t seem like anyone’s updated their forecast there since 2023, and some of the comments seem kinda unhinged. It should also be noted that the question counts all deaths, not just civilian deaths, and not just those in the contiguous US. So I think this is actually a very very optimistic number, and implies a lower than 5% chance of such events reaching civilians and the contiguous states.
I lived in California long enough ago to remember when getting queer-bashed was a reasonable concern for a fair number of people, even in, say, Oakland. It didn’t happen daily, but it happened relatively often. If you were in the “out” LGBT community, I think you probably knew somebody who’d been bashed. Politics influence that kind of thing even if it’s not legal.
… and in the legal arena, there’s a whole lot of pressure building up on that state and local resistance. So far it’s mostly money-based pressure, but within a few years, I could easily see a SCOTUS decision that said a state had to, say, extradite somebody accused of “abetting an abortion” in another state.
War in the continental US? No, I agree that’s unlikely enough not to worry about.
Civil unrest, followed by violent crackdowns on civil unrest, followed by more violent civil unrest, followed by factional riots, on the other hand...
Look no further than how southern states responded to civil rights rulings, and how they (back when it was still held) they responded to roe v wade. Of course those reactions were much harder than, say, simply neglecting to enforce laws, which it should be noted liberal cities & states have been practicing doing for decades. Of course you say you’re trying to enforce laws, but you just subject all your members to all the requirements of the US bureaucracy and you can easily stop enforce laws while complying with the letter of the law. Indeed, it is complying with the letter of the law which prevents you from enforcing the laws.
What money based pressure are you thinking of? Cities, as far as I know, have and always will be much more liberal than the general populace, and ditto for the states with much of their populace in cities.
This sort of tactic. This isn’t necessarily the best example, just the literal top hit on a Google search.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/pam-bondi-ban-sanctuary-cities-funding-b2693020.html
The tactic of threatening to discriminate against uncooperative states and localities is getting a lot of play. It’s somewhat limited at the federal level because in theory the state and local policies they demand have to be related to the purpose of the money (and a couple of other conditions I don’t remember). But the present fashion is to push that relation to the absolute breaking point.
What does “unsafe” mean for this prediction/wager? I don’t expect the murder rate to go up very much, nor life expectancy to reverse it’s upward trend. “Erosion of rights” is pretty general and needs more specifics to have any idea what changes are relevant.
I think things will get a little tougher and less pleasant for some minorities, both cultural and skin-color. There will be a return of some amount of discrimination and persecution. Probably not as harsh as it was in the 70s-90s, certainly not as bad as earlier than that, but worse than the last decade. It’ll probably FEEL terrible, because it was on such a good trend recently, and the reversal (temporary and shallow, I hope) will dash hopes of the direction being strictly monotonic.
So, the current death rate for an American in their 30s is about 0.2%. That probably increases another 0.5% or so when you consider black swan events like nuclear war and bioterrorism. Let’s call “unsafe” a ~3x increase in that expected death rate to 2%.
An increase that large would take something a lot more dramatic than the kind of politics we’re used to in the US, but while political changes that dramatic are rare historically, I think we’re at a moment where the risk is elevated enough that we ought to think about the odds.
I might, for example, give odds for a collapse of democracy in the US over the next couple of years at ~2-5%- if the US were to elect 20 presidents similar to the current one over a century, I’d expect better than even odds of one of them making themselves into a Putinesque dictator. A collapse like that would substantially increase the risk of war, I’d argue, including raising a real possibility of nuclear civil war. That might increase the expected death rate for young and middle-aged adults in that scenario by a point or two on its own. It might also introduce a small risk of extremely large atrocities against minorities or political opponents, which could increase the expected death rate by a few tenths of a percent.
There’s also a small risk of economic collapse. Something like a political takeover of the Fed combined with expensive, poorly considered populist policies might trigger hyperinflation of the dollar. When that sort of thing happens overseas, you’ll often see reduced health outcomes and breakdown in civil order increasing the death rate by up to a percent- and, of course, it would introduce new tail risks, increasing the expected death rate further.
I should note that I don’t think the odds of any of this are high enough to worry about my safety now- but needing to emigrate is much more likely outcome than actually being threatened, and that’s a headache I am mildly worried about.
That’s a crazy low probability.
You’re already beyond the “smoke alarm” stage and into the “worrying whether the fire extinguisher will work” stage.
Honestly, my odds of this have been swinging anywhere from 2% to 15% recently. Note that this would be the odds of our democratic institutions deteriorating enough that fleeing the country would seem like the only reasonable option- p(fascism) more in the sense of a government that most future historians would assign that or a similar label to, rather than just a disturbingly cruel and authoritarian administration still held somewhat in check by democracy.
I think that what you describe as being 2 to 15 percent probable sounds more extreme than what the original post described as being 5 percent probable. You can have “significant erosion” of some groups’ rights without leaving the country being the only reasonable option, especially if you’re not in those groups. It depends on what you’re trying to achieve by leaving, I guess.
Although if I were a trans person in the US right now, especially on medication, I’d be making, if not necessarily immediately executing, some detailed escape plans that could be executed on short notice.
If this risk is in the ballpark of a 5% chance in the next couple of years, then it seems to me entirely dominated by AI doom.