The idea behind wisdom of the crowd is that the people who don’t know the answer cancel each other out. It’s the reason why the audience joker on who wants to be a millionaire is so powerful.

Users don’t cost much to keep around, especially if they don’t post. The data needed for the account would be authentication data, and post data, the second of which doesn’t apply to users who don’t post, and the first one being negligible compared to the amount of space available on a common hard drive. So, why not just give them a chance?

Even more obvious in the book, where its mentioned that even the commander can’t afford to eat meat whenever he wants.

The joke is twofold:

1. Some people, mostly authoritarian communists, claim that the ‘tankie’ is being used to describe anybody too far left.
2. Democrats are by now very right on immigration.

Plus the only places that are left to build giant factories are distant from population centers.

You’re forgetting about eminent domain. Clearly, giant factory on American soil is a public good, even if it’s privately owned. Hence, the government will seize the homes and give the land to the corp. The prices of the houses will fall first, because who wants to buy a house that’s going to get bulldozed, reducing the compensation the government has to pay to the homeowners, potentially causing them to be upside down on their mortgages. This will leave them with nothing, or potentially even debt, when their homes get sized.