Click to enlarge.
As seen in the following chart, the exponential growth rates are themselves growing exponentially. In fact, it's nearly a perfect fit.
Click to enlarge.
If exponential trends are guaranteed to fail at some point (they are), then what does that say about exponentially increasing exponential growth rates?
The failure could be spectacular someday.
This would come as yet another major blow to the true believers of the Chinese economic miracle story. Note that the China Shanghai Composite Index is currently down 66% from the peak set in 2007. With miracles like that, who needs enemies?
November 8, 2012
Foxconn 'considers plan to open factories in US'
In Foxconn's huge assembly halls in China, iPhones and iPads are largely put together by human hands, with very little automation. In the US, sources say Foxconn will specialise in flatscreen TV sets, which are easier to assemble with the help of robots.
See Also:
Definition of Laspeyres Index
Source Data:
St. Louis Fed: Custom Chart
Put another way...
ReplyDeleteI generally see an exponential growth chart that has a fixed rate of growth. It will ALWAYS end with a failure of the exponential growth model. It is a mathematical certainty. The only real question is in the timing.
In this post, we're seeing an exponential growth chart with an exponentially increasing rate of growth.
It's like an exponential trend within an exponential trend. That's pretty frickin' amazing. I therefore believe that WHEN it eventually fails it may fail quite spectacularly. Once again, the only real question is in the timing.
I think it says something rotten about Apple that their manufacturing engineering is predicated on vast amounts of relatively cheap labor. Their products could have been designed to be manufactured by robots, but they chose not to do so.
ReplyDeleteGreat analysis with the PPP trend. This metric will run into a great brick wall by 2020 at the latest.
ReplyDeleteScott,
ReplyDeleteTo infinity, and back again!
Or not. ;)