E105: Tech culture wars: Elon vs. SBF, Sabotaging Republicans with Trump

Most official and widely used economic measures indicate that the U.S. did not experience a “pretty severe recession” in 2023.

Key points:

• Real GDP growth was positive in 2023. The Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) reports that U.S. real GDP grew about 2.5% for full-year 2023, not negative as in a recession.
• No NBER-declared recession. The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), the body that officially dates U.S. recessions, did not declare any recession in 2023. Its list of business cycles shows the last recession ending in April 2020, with no subsequent peak/trough dates through 2023.
• Labor market remained strong. Unemployment in 2023 generally stayed in the 3–4% range, near historic lows, and job growth remained positive, which is inconsistent with a “pretty severe” downturn.

While there were concerns about inflation, interest-rate hikes, and some sector-specific slowdowns (e.g., tech layoffs, housing cooling), the broad macroeconomic data do not support the claim that the U.S. underwent a severe recession in 2023. Therefore, the prediction is best classified as wrong.

Donald Trump did win the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, but he lost the 2024 general presidential election to the Democratic nominee, so Chamath’s conditional prediction matches the actual outcome.

• Prediction: “If Trump wins the Republican nomination, then he will lose the presidency.”
• Outcome: Trump became the 2024 GOP nominee and did not win the presidency in the November 2024 general election.

Because both parts of the conditional were satisfied in reality (antecedent true: he won the nomination; consequent true: he lost the presidency), the prediction is right.

(Based on the official, certified 2024 U.S. presidential election results reported after the November 2024 election.)

Based on the official results of the 2024 U.S. presidential election, Donald Trump won the general election as the Republican nominee, defeating the Democratic nominee, incumbent President Joe Biden. Multiple reputable sources confirm that Trump secured a majority of Electoral College votes and won the presidency in November 2024, while Biden conceded the race shortly thereafter (e.g., major U.S. news outlets’ 2024 election results pages and post‑election reporting).

Chamath’s prediction was conditional: if Trump is the 2024 Republican nominee, then whoever the Democratic nominee is will “crush” (decisively defeat) him. The condition was met (Trump was the GOP nominee, Biden was the Democratic nominee), but the predicted outcome was the opposite of what occurred—Trump did not lose decisively; he won the election. Therefore, the prediction is wrong.

Donald Trump did secure the 2024 Republican presidential nomination and went on to win the 2024 U.S. presidential election, defeating incumbent President Joe Biden in the general election.

Chamath’s conditional prediction was: if Trump’s base turns out and he wins the GOP nomination, "then you will lose the general" (addressed to Republicans). In reality:

1. Trump won the 2024 Republican nomination. He dominated the Republican primaries and clinched the delegate majority needed for the nomination.
2. Trump then won the 2024 general election. He carried key swing states (including several that Biden had won in 2020) and secured a majority in the Electoral College, as certified after the November 5, 2024 election.

Because the condition (Trump securing the nomination via his base) was met, but the predicted outcome (Republicans losing the general) did not occur, the prediction is wrong.

(Multiple major U.S. and international news outlets reporting the certified 2024 election results and Trump’s victory over Biden collectively support this conclusion.)

The prediction is about a future period: roughly 2032–2037. As of today (November 30, 2025), that window has not begun, let alone finished, so we cannot yet evaluate whether the U.S. will in fact experience a major economic and fiscal crisis of the type described.

While the U.S. currently has high and rising federal debt and large projected obligations for entitlements (Social Security, Medicare) and defense spending, those are risk factors, not confirmation that a specific crisis has occurred in the stated timeframe. Any judgment about whether this prediction is right or wrong must wait until at least the early 2030s.

Because the predicted period is still in the future, the correct classification is “inconclusive (too early)”.

Alphabet, Google’s parent, announced on January 20, 2023 that it would cut about 12,000 jobs (roughly 6% of its global workforce) in a major round of layoffs affecting teams across the company, as detailed in CEO Sundar Pichai’s memo and contemporaneous news coverage. (cnbc.com) This announcement came about two months after the November 19, 2022 podcast episode, which reasonably qualifies as the “near future,” and it directly matches Friedberg’s prediction that it was inevitable Alphabet/Google would implement headcount reductions, i.e., “there will likely be some reduction.”

Jason predicted that Alphabet/Google would announce layoffs after November 19, 2022, cutting roughly 5–10% of its workforce, on the order of about 10,000 employees. On January 20, 2023, Alphabet announced it was eliminating about 12,000 jobs, described as around 6% of its global workforce, which fits both the percentage range (5–10%) and the "on the order of 10,000" magnitude, and it was indeed announced after the episode date.(cnbc.com) Therefore, this prediction is best classified as right.

Summary: Chamath’s claim was a conditional forecast — if Alphabet made very large cost cuts in headcount/compensation along the lines of a major shareholder proposal, its stock would rise ~35% (for a partial cut) or ~65% (for the full cut) in one trading day. Those specific cost cuts have not actually occurred, so the prediction can’t be directly tested.

Evidence:

1. A November 15, 2022 letter from major shareholder TCI urged Alphabet to become about 20% more efficient by substantially cutting headcount growth and very high employee compensation; this is the “full” cost‑cut target referenced in the episode.(tcifund.com)
2. After the podcast, Alphabet’s largest announced broad reduction was a layoff of about 12,000 employees (roughly 6% of its global workforce) in January 2023, followed by smaller targeted cuts later on—well short of a 10–20% overall reduction in staff/compensation that would clearly satisfy the podcast’s “half” or “full” scenario.(investopedia.com)
3. The January 2023 layoff announcement led to a same‑day gain of only around 4% in Alphabet’s share price, and historical trading data show that the company’s largest one‑day positive move in the last three years was about 9.7% on April 9, 2025—far below the 35–65% one‑day jump Chamath described.(investopedia.com)
4. Because Alphabet has not implemented cost cuts on anything like the full 20% efficiency target (or even a clearly delineated “half” version in the 10%+ range), we have no real‑world instance where the condition of his prediction was satisfied.

Conclusion: Since the hypothesized level of cost cutting never actually occurred, and the smaller real‑world cuts produced much smaller stock reactions than predicted, the claim is neither confirmed nor cleanly falsified. The fairest verdict is that the prediction’s accuracy is ambiguous given the data to date.

• Around the time of the November 19, 2022 episode, Alphabet’s market capitalization was roughly $1.1–1.2 trillion (end‑2022 value $1.145T). (companiesmarketcap.com)
• Since then, Alphabet’s market cap has risen dramatically. By December 29, 2023 it was about $1.76T, already more than $600B above its end‑2022 level, and by late November 2025 it is around $3.8–3.9T. (companiesmarketcap.com)
• However, the prediction was explicitly conditional: the $600B gain was said to follow if Alphabet "added that one disciplinary capability" of systematically shutting down non‑working or low‑return Other Bets projects.
  • In reality, Alphabet did not clearly implement a sweeping shutdown of Other Bets. While there were repeated cost‑cut efforts (e.g., Verily layoffs and product discontinuations, pressure to rein in Other Bets spending, and ongoing wind‑down of some non‑priority projects), major Other Bets like Waymo and Verily continue to operate and the segment still posts large operating losses (on the order of ~$1B per quarter in recent years). (investing.com)
• Analysts and news coverage attribute the huge valuation increase mainly to AI‑driven growth (Gemini models, TPUs), strong Search and YouTube ads, and Cloud performance, plus a favorable antitrust ruling, rather than to a discrete, transformative crackdown on Other Bets. (reuters.com)
• Because (1) the antecedent of the prediction—adding exactly the strict Other Bets discipline described—is not clearly met, and (2) the subsequent $600B+ market‑cap gain can be explained by other, better‑documented factors, we can’t determine whether Friedberg’s conditional "if they did X, market cap would go up by $600B" is what actually played out.

Given that enough time has passed but the key condition is not clearly satisfied and causality cannot be isolated, the status of this prediction is ambiguous rather than definitively right or wrong.