经济生活及其他

有些行当，例如“经济学家”、“妓女”和“咨询师”，即使再进一步详细分类也提供不了更多信息了。

数学家从问题出发得出解决方案，咨询师从“解决方案”出发创造问题。

他们所谓的“风险”，我称之为机遇；他们所谓的“低风险”机遇，我称之为愚人的问题。

组织就像是在咖啡因刺激下倒着跑步的傻瓜，你只会听说其中极少数碰巧到达终点。

要判断一个人是否极度愚蠢（或者极度聪明），就看经济和政治新闻对他来说是否有意义。

左派认为市场是愚蠢的，所以模型应该是聪明的；右派认为模型是愚蠢的，所以市场应该是聪明的。双方都从来没有意识到，市场和模型都是极度愚蠢的。

经济学就像是一颗死亡的恒星，尽管看上去好像仍然在发光，但你知道它已经死了。

愚人认为你可以用金钱治疗贪婪，用毒品治疗毒瘾，用专家治疗专家问题，用银行家治疗银行业，用经济学家治疗经济学，用欠债治疗债务危机。

如果一家企业老总公开宣布“没什么需要担心的”，那你可以肯定他有很多需要担心的。

股市概论：参与者平静地排队等待着遭受宰割，还以为自己是排队参加百老汇的表演。

政府救市和抽烟的主要区别在于，在某些罕见情况下，“这是我抽的最后一根烟”这句话有可能是真的。

让我们脆弱的是，组织机构不可能拥有跟个人同样的美德（荣誉，诚实，勇敢，忠诚，坚韧）。

最糟糕的损害是能力足够的人试图做好事而造成的，最棒的改进是能力不足的人不想做好事而造成的。

银行和黑手党的区别如下：银行更擅长跟法律法规打交道，但是黑手党能理解公众意见。

“骗来几个亿比骗来几百万容易多了。”[1]

在莫斯科的会场上，我眼看着经济学家埃德蒙·菲尔普斯因为写的东西没有人看，提出的理论没有人应用，发表的演讲没有人听得懂，而获得了“诺贝尔奖”。

在非线性领域，“科学估计”的失败之一在于，期望值的平均值跟平均值的期望值并不一样。[2]

记者跟格言家的思路正好相反：我提出“你需要技能才能赢得宝马车，需要技能和魔鬼般的运气才能变成沃伦·巴菲特”。记者们对此的总结是，“塔勒布认为巴菲特不具有任何技能”。

好奇的人喜欢科学，敏感而有天赋的人喜欢艺术，实干的人喜欢商业，剩下的人只好当经济学家了。

上市公司像人体细胞一样，最终会衰亡，因为债务和潜在风险而自己毁灭。救市行为让这一过程增添了历史效应。

在穷国，官员们可以收下明摆着的贿赂；在华盛顿，他们会接受复杂的、隐含的、不说出口的暗示，让他们替大企业工作。

命运最残酷的时候，银行家也会陷入穷困之中。

我们应该让学生重新计算学分，方法是把财务和经济学方面的得分算成负数。

机构问题会导致隐含风险的增加，让所有公司的脆弱程度最大化。

在政治里，我们要么选择酷爱战争和民族国家的大企业代表，要么选择盲目的、在认识论上骄横无知的大雇主服务者，但我们至少还有得选择。

[1]这是某些人对麦道夫欺诈案的看法。

[2] 不要因为一条河“平均”只有一米深就试图趟过去。这一规律又叫做詹森不等式。

ECONOMIC LIFE AND OTHER VERY VULGAR SUBJECTS

There are designations, like "economist", "prostitute", or "consultant" for which additional characterization doesn't add information.

A mathematician starts with a problem and creates a solution; a consultant starts by offering a "solution" and creates a problem.

What they call "risk" I call opportunity; but what they call "low risk" opportunity I call sucker problem.

Organizations are like caffeinated dupes unknowingly jogging backward; you only hear of the few who reach their destination.

The best test of whether someone is extremely stupid (or extremely wise) is whether financial and political news make sense to him.

The left holds that because markets are stupid models should be smart; the right believes that because models are stupid markets should be smart. Alas, it never hit both sides that both markets and models are very stupid.

Economics is like a dead star that still seems to produce light; but you know it is dead.

Suckers think that you cure greed with money, addiction with substances, expert problems with experts, banking with bankers, economics with economists, and debt crises with debt spending.

You can be certain that the head of a corporation has a lot to worry about when he announces publicly that "there is nothing to worry about".

The stock market, in brief: participants are calmly waiting in line to be slaughtered while thinking it is for a Broadway show.

The main difference between government bailouts and smoking is that in some rare cases the statement "this is my last cigarette" holds true.

What makes us fragile is that institutions cannot have the same virtues (honor, truthfulness, courage, loyalty, tenacity) as individuals.

The worst damage has been caused by competent people trying to do good; the best improvements have been brought by incompetent ones not trying to do good.

The difference between banks and the Mafia: banks have better legal-regulatory expertise, but the Mafia understands public opinion.

"It is much easier to scam people for billions than for just millions".

At a panel in Moscow, I watched the economist Edmund Phelps, who got the "Nobel" for writings no one reads, theories no one uses, and lectures no one understands.

One of the failures of "scientific approximation" in the nonlinear domain comes from the inconvenient fact that the average of expectations is different from the expectation of averages.

Journalists as reverse aphorists: my statement "You need skills to get a BMW, skills plus luck to become a Warren Buffett" was summarized as "Taleb says Buffett has no skills".

The curious mind embraces science; the gifted and sensitive, the arts; the practical, business; the leftover becomes an economist.

Public companies, like human cells, are programmed for apoptosis, suicide through debt and hidden risks. Bailouts invest the process with a historical dimension.

In poor countries, officials receive explicit bribes; in D.C. they get the sophisticated implicit, unspoken promise to work for large corporations.

Fate is at its cruelest when a banker ends up in poverty.

We should make students recompute their GPAs by counting their grades in finance and economics backward.

The agency problem drives every company, thanks to the buildup of hidden risks, to maximal fragility.

In politics we face the choice between warmongering, nation-stateloving, big-business agents on one hand; and risk-blind, top-down, epistemic arrogant big servants of large employers on the other. But we have a choice.