One of my conspiracy theories is that much of the American economy is fake. Millions employed in entire workfare industries like TSA/DMV/USPS/HR, plunging labor participation rate and sky-high welfare/SSDI/SNAP rate, 20% of GDP in insanely marked up healthcare, asset bubbles in cities driven by NIMBY and FOMO, all this propped up by an overvalued dollar which the government can’t stop printing—conveniently the global reserve currency because our economic rival is a hermetic dictatorship. The only real-ish parts are a small (people-wise) tech sector that launders that bloated paper wealth into a fantastically dynamic entrepreneurial talent sorting machine (with much of the talent having to be imported), and a ruthlessly efficient services industry that keeps cost of living down for the well-off (with much of the labor having to be imported).