Top all-time · #818
Yanis Varoufakis
Personal blog · yanisvaroufakis.eueconomicspoliticsphilosophy
Yanis Varoufakis's personal blog at yanisvaroufakis.eu covers economics, politics and philosophy. Since 2012, 80 different Hacker News readers have linked it 100 times, most often “Bitcoin and the dangerous fantasy of ‘apolitical’ money”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-10-09, and you can follow it by feed.
Rarely recommended · 2 of 40 sampled comments recommend it?
Why HN links it
HN readers link Varoufakis's blog for his economics writing on Europe, the euro crisis, Bitcoin, and tech platforms, with his Valve and Greek finance minister background also cited.
- Recommended for · 2 comments
- One commenter calls his economics blog a great read for anyone following the tech/Valve angle; another calls him their favourite economist and praises his insig
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 40 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
THOUGHTS FOR THE POST-2008 WORLD
Most-linked posts?
- Bitcoin and the dangerous fantasy of ‘apolitical’ money5 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2013-04-22
- Bitcoin and the dangerous fantasy of ‘apolitical’ money (2013)3 people · 7 mentions · first linked 2017-09-12
- /2025/02/21/donald-trumps-economic-masterplan-unherd/3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2025-03-05
- The new Greek finance minister continues to blog3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2015-01-27
- /2014/01/30/war-spikes-in-the-eve-online-universe-a-political-economists-account/3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2023-08-16
- Bitcoin: A flawed currency with a useful application for the Eurozone (2014)3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2014-02-15
- Confessions of an Erratic Marxist (2013)3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2013-12-10
- Behind Germany’s refusal to grant Greece debt relief2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2015-07-11
- Minister No More2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2015-07-06
- Crypto, the Left and Technofeudalism2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2022-04-23
What Hacker News says?
His recent stuff is pretty relevant to tech. Eg https://www.yanisvaroufakis.eu/category/books/technofeudalis...
Comment linking /category/books/technofeudalism-what-killed-capitalism/
on “Steam Machine”Submitted Crypto, the Left and Technofeudalism as a story · 181 points
HN discussionIgnoring all the slop out there, we are seeing AI being sent to reverse engineer, accelerate projects, etc. According to Greek economist and former finance minister Yanis Varoufakis, an open source AI strategy is one way a capitalist economy can avoid the rent trap (platforms being created, monopolizing resources, and extracting ever higher rents from everyone else). https://www.yanisvaroufakis.eu/2026/08/31/ai-is-r…
Comment linking /2026/08/31/ai-is-reviving-chinese-marxist-economics-project-syndicate/
on “DeepInfer: High-performance inference framework for DeepSeek models”Submitted Minister No More as a story · 148 points
HN discussionI have attended one lecture-seminar-debate for economists. He was a spokesman and his ideas can be summarized in 2010 here [1]. His work regarding european crisis [2] [1]: http://yanisvaroufakis.eu/2010/12/17/the-modest-proposal-in-... [2]: http://yanisvaroufakis.eu/euro-crisis/
Comment linking /euro-crisis/
on “It all began with a strange email”Submitted Greece’s Proposals to End the Crisis as a story · 127 points
HN discussionComplete tangent, but I noticed that on Yanis Varoufakis' blog, the current entry is his interview with Max Keiser. http://yanisvaroufakis.eu/2012/06/15/ponzi-austerity-intervi... What's the connection? Max Keiser sounds exactly like the defective turrets from Portal 2 . Coincidence?!
Comment linking /2012/06/15/ponzi-austerity-interviewed-on-the-keiser-report/
on “It all began with a strange email”Submitted Bitcoin: A flawed currency with a useful application for the Eurozone (2014) as a story · 115 points
HN discussionI find Yanis Varoufakis' account of the history leading up to the collapse of Bretton Woods very telling: As the combined costs of the Vietnam War and the Great Society began to mount, the government was forced to generate mountains of US government debt. By the end of the 1960s, many governments began to worry that their own position, which was interlocked with the dollar in the context of the Bretton Woods system,…
Comment linking /2011/02/10/surplus-recycling-currency-unions-and-the-birth-of-the-global-minotaur/
on “WTF Happened in 1971? (2019)”Submitted Behind Germany’s refusal to grant Greece debt relief as a story · 47 points
HN discussion> I prefer my economic takes from economists, or people who actually study these things. I think the ideas are interesting and worthy of discussion. If you want an actual credentialed economist talking about similar issues — here’s one: https://www.yanisvaroufakis.eu/2025/02/21/donald-trumps-econ... But you need to recognise that there is an “orthodoxy” and challenges to that. You aren’t going to hear the questionin…
Comment linking /2025/02/21/donald-trumps-economic-masterplan-unherd/
on “The Demoralization is just Beginning”Submitted Why Bitcoin is not a socialist’s ally as a story · 38 points
HN discussionThis[1] is an insightful article from an economist who has experienced the real world economics from very close quarters. I don't have any opinion about Bitcoin one way or another, though through these fascinating arguments I gain new insight about the money and its relationship with geopolitics, human civilisation and other aspects. [1] https://www.yanisvaroufakis.eu/2013/04/22/bitcoin-and-the-da...
Comment linking /2013/04/22/bitcoin-and-the-dangerous-fantasy-of-apolitical-money/
on “Bitcoin Is Time”Submitted Bitcoin and the dangerous fantasy of ‘apolitical’ money (2013) as a story · 27 points
HN discussion"Perfectly functioning and always has been"? That is beyond delusion. The EU is co-ruled by an opaque system of non elected bodies, under the table deals, and backroom diplomacy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_deficit_in_the_Euro... https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/mar/09/brexit... https://www.economist.com/special-report/2017/03/23/how-to-a... https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1007/S1…
Comment linking /books/adults-in-the-room/
on “Article 13 is almost finished and will change the internet as we know it”Submitted The Eurozone’s grappling with crisis, class war and the North-South divide as a story · 17 points
HN discussion> Also, what exact lack of understanding in terms of "structure" of the current system did you find appalling in those blockchain hackers? Can you be more specific? - How currencies are created by a population or state? - How currencies are adopted/enforced to/by a population or state? - What is the role of a central bank in a modern economy? - How if the "Chair of the FED" appointed? - What is the inflation rate? -…
Comment linking /2015/08/17/greeces-third-mou-memorandum-of-understading-annotated-by-yanis-varoufakis/
on “We Tracked Down a Fake-News Creator in the Suburbs”Submitted Schäuble’s plan for Europe as a story · 16 points
HN discussionTo a large degree, they aren't accepting it. This is why around 2014 treasury holdings by rest of world stopped growing on net. Many governments/central banks are trying to exit the $ and UST's and are buying gold instead of treasuries. Ultimately, the US has quite a large amount of liabilities, and entitlement spending on retiring boomers coming due in the next few years. Currently, at the peak of the economic cycl…
Comment linking /2011/02/10/surplus-recycling-currency-unions-and-the-birth-of-the-global-minotaur/
on “NY Fed rescues overnight lending market with $53B”Submitted Bitcoin and the dangerous fantasy of ‘apolitical’ money as a story · 6 points
HN discussionGreat article. Anyone who has worked for a large, established corporation knows from personal experience that internally they are a lot like the Soviet Union, with a hierarchical structure of bureaucrats and their apparatchiks making decisions for everyone at the company. Despite having grown to around 400 employees, Valve is evidently not like that. The author, Yanis Varoufakis, makes a compelling case that future…
Comment linking /
on “Why Valve? Or, what do we need corporations for..”Submitted Bernie Sanders’ backers aren’t voting for socialism as a story · 4 points
HN discussion2013: http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB100014240527023045495045793203... 2014: http://www.wsj.com/articles/greece-misses-target-on-budget-s... 2013 caveat: http://yanisvaroufakis.eu/2014/04/24/greek-statistics-are-ba...
Comment linking /2014/04/24/greek-statistics-are-back-primary-deficit-presented-as-surplus-with-eurostats-seal-of-approval/
on “Greeks Reject Bailout Terms”Submitted Economic Organization of a Prisoner of War Camp (1945) [pdf] as a story · 3 points
HN discussionWell that is the problem: There is no good way for people to organise effectively on an European level, or at least it is much harder. By comparison is very easy for a determined few to organise at this level, which is why you have tons and tons of lobbyists in Brussels. You can partially observe this when "Wutbürger" protest against local changes like building a new railway station (months of protest, sitins, gener…
Comment linking /2017/03/14/19258/
on “UK triggers the official Brexit process in a letter to EU”Submitted Technofeudalism – a video essay/transcript summarizing the book (2024) as a story · 3 points
HN discussionI'm surprised by the amount of comments denying even the sense of such critique as DHH presented in the article. The problem comes from a very narrow understanding of how 'capitalism/free market economy/society' should work. In the original theoretical framework that laid the ground for the modern economical system, David Hume (and Adam Smith) talked about 'spontaneous order' that comprised multiple social signals,…
Comment linking /2013/02/25/on-spontaneous-order-valve-the-future-of-corporations-hume-smith-marx-and-hayek-a-one-hour-chat-with-russ-roberts-on-econtalk/
on “Microsoft reboots war on sleep”Submitted Bitcoin and the dangerous fantasy of ‘apolitical’ money as a story · 3 points
HN discussionWow! I certainly wasn't expecting that. Mr. Varoufakis has been my favorite economist for many years now, and I think he has brilliant insights as to reasons for the Eurocrisis. Whether he can translate his genius into government policy is another matter, but I wish him the best luck. I've heard him tell the story about how he became Valve's economist. Mr. Varoufakis is a regular guest on the popular left-wing podca…
Comment linking /2014/11/24/taking-stock-of-the-euro-crisis-interviewed-by-doug-henwood-for-behind-the-news/
on “Valve Economist Yanis Varoufakis Appointed Finance Minister of Greece”Submitted Bitcoin and the dangerous fantasy of ‘apolitical’ money (2013) as a story · 3 points
HN discussion
