BahRamYou
5mo ago
Yeah that is an important caveat. Thanks for catching that. Seems like this guy has very much devoted his life to this strategy. Interesting that the IRS did come after him, but they only took a relatively small amount of money from him, and didn't actually take his passport. Even though he's publicly encouraging tax fraud, so he really seems like the sort of person they'd want to make an example of. He does have some useful tips for legally reducing taxes though.
BahRamYou
5mo ago
I was on that "easy path" for a long time. And it was... fine, just kind of boring and soul-crushing. I feel the need now to experiment and live a little differently. But yes, very risky.
BahRamYou
5mo ago
It is also true that they are disinterested in de minimis settlements from judgment-proof citizens, i.e. they're not coming after you for a $5 error (though they might send a letter about it!).
On the other hand, it is also true that there are things you can do that their computer systems will now notice more or less automatically, which will substantially increase your risk of an audit and/or collection activity. People can, and do, get hit with wage garnishment and even jail time for unpaid accounts.
Yeah... I guess that's what I'm coming around to. I could probably get away with it if it was for a very small amount, but for larger amounts their software will probably catch it and it's not that hard for them to just seize my bank accounts or whatever.
BahRamYou
5mo ago
Indeed. It's pretty shocking to me just how anemic our war production is. And yet... here we are. https://federalnewsnetwork.com/defense-industry/2023/04/unprepared-for-long-war-us-army-under-gun-to-make-more-ammo/ Most of our 155mm artillery shells (the most common size, and probably the most important weapon for Ukraine) are all made from this one plant in Scranton. And the only reason that plant still exists is that it's on the National Historic Registry of Historic Places, so the building can't be knocked down or altered, and the locals wanted to keep it running for its high-paying jobs.
The numbers are pretty shocking.
Already, the U.S. military has given Ukraine more than 1.5 million rounds of 155 mm ammunition, according to Army figures.
But even with higher near-term production rates, the U.S. cannot replenish its stockpile or catch up to the usage pace in Ukraine, where officials estimate that the Ukrainian military is firing 6,000 to 8,000 shells per day. In other words, two days’ worth of shells fired by Ukraine equates to the United States’ monthly pre-war production figure.
Together, the plants are under contract for 24,000 shells per month, with an additional $217 million Army task order to further boost production, although officials won’t say how many more 155 mm shells are sought by the task order.
The Russians are firing 40,000 shells per day, said Ustinova, who serves on Ukraine’s wartime oversight committee.
So Russia really does outproduce the US in artillery. Ukraine is quickly burning through artillery shells faster than the US can produce it. Instead it's buying artillery shells from other countries, mostly former Soviet Bloc countries like Bulgaria that have a lot lying around. https://youtube.com/watch?v=EMEpxX7rS5I
All I can say is... it's a good thing those countries are on our side! Can you imagine if west to fight against all of these countries working together, back during the cold war? We would have been massively outgunned!
BahRamYou
5mo ago
There's a limit on how long Korea can do that though. Yes they have a lot of shells but they also, you know, need them for their national defense. And like Ukraine, while they do have a lot of old shells stockpiled, they don't really have huge production to build new ones.
BahRamYou
5mo ago
Continuing the gymnastics analogy, Aella had recently an interview on trigonometry where she said she vastly prefers escorting and prostitution compared to factory work she used to do when very young, which made her drink too much. Where does the shielding end?
She seems like a very unusual person, and also I don't fully trust her. She seems exaggerate a lot for the sake of building up her rep.
This is something that will obviously vary a lot from person to person. But for what it's worth, I actually sorta got involved in a relationship with a prostitute last year. It didn't last long, but we're still friends, and I got to see how it affected her. Her normal sex drive was completely gone, she was good at faking it but she felt nothing. She was very happy to get away from anything like a "party" and just do normal stuff with me. She's since left that work and seems happier now just doing a low-wage regular job, even though it pays less.
BahRamYou
5mo ago
Or they want something in the middle? They want young people to date, get married, and start a family. They don't want them to have unprotected sex with tons of strangers, or to be isolated at home with no contact. That seems pretty reasonable...
BahRamYou
5mo ago
I think Korea is just a country that naturally takes things to extremes. Like when Buddhism was introduced they got super into Buddhism, and then more recently they took to Christianity hardcore. Online gaming, Go/baduk, and boy/girl pop groups. SK is super capitalist while NK is super communist. And not just big things but silly little fads like eating streams or Taiwanese cakes (the failed business of the family in Parasite) seem to take the whole country by storm one day, then disappear the next. So it makes sense to me that they would also push feminism and MRA to their most toxic extremes.
BahRamYou
5mo ago
Both to some extent, but NK has nukes for deterence and isn't bound by cost disease. They're probably much happier to trade their old shells for hard cash.
BahRamYou
5mo ago
my impression is that it's basically the same as GPT-4 in bing chat. Very impressive as technology, but not all that different from internet searches for most use cases. It can't really generate new knowledge, it just aggregates the most common responses on the net. And of course it has those AI limiters that make it weirdly neutered, like a movie that's been cut down to show on TV.
BahRamYou
5mo ago
well, its not that small. its like 20-40% of all the money you ever earn, which compounds over time.
BahRamYou
5mo ago
The way I understood it, the whole strategy was based around the IRS just being kind of a paper tiger. There were surprisingly few IRS agents, and they are mostly focused on big corporations and extremely wealthy people- it's just not worth their time to go after a regular shmuck who owes less than 100k. EG, Donald Trump seems to have gotten away with a lot of... questionable tax returns over the years, and he's not exactly poor or low-profile.
A whole lot of our life in a first-world society really just relies on cultural norms and the honor system. Like, if everyone decides to just start littering all over the place, the cops aren't going to stop that.
But it's been pointed out to me that the author of that strategy was kind of a hippy who avoids regular income, and also that the IRS has hired more agents lately and stepped up its game in automation. So it's possible that it worked for him in the past, but not for us going forward.
BahRamYou
5mo ago
I'm thinking the IRS probably operates more like a business than most parts of the Federal Government. For any possible enforcement action, they're going to be looking at how much money they put into it versus how much they'd recover, and they'll stick with the things that bring in the most money for the least effort.
I'm sure that's their plan. But I've never gotten the sense that they're even that competant. Partly because the Republicans have shrunk the IRS for political reasons, they're just not even active enough to spend 10 minutes writing a letter to your bank.
BahRamYou
5mo ago
Only up to 10 years, according to the guy who wrote the post. And it's a wash if you have to pay back taxes with penalties, since you also get the time value of the money.
If I someday become a billionaire, then I'll be happy to pay back my middle-class taxes from 10 years ago.
Have you ever personally gotten a tax lien, or known someone that did?
All good points. But the earlier decades had their charms too (at least for me, as a white American male).
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The 40s allowed every healthy young person to sign up and be "a hero" in the greatest war the world has ever known, which for Americans mostly meant hanging around in England or the South Pacific islands, dating the local women. Then you have lifelong bragging rights as "the greatest generation."
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The 50s: ridiculously strong economy. Just walk into your local factory, shake the boss's hand, and you've got a job that lets you buy a house and support a family. "Support a family" meant being head of the household, where the wife is fully devoted to taking care of you and the kids. Or go into the cities, rent an apartment ridiculously cheaply, and live as a beatnik, making a name for yourself in all the new forms of music. Or tour the world, which was all destroyed from WW2, so your American middle-class salary made you relatively rich. Buy yourself a new car every year, because each new model year is better than the one before and you can afford it. Or become a professor, since all the universities were hiring like mad.
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The 60s: Much the same, but with better music and movies. You can also move out to California and be hippy, living in a commune for practically nothing or going surfing all day. If you were organized enough to buy a house there back then, it's probably worth millions now. Or get a regular office job, wear a suit and tie, have a secretary, and be on the golf course by 4 every day. Enjoy listening to the local news tell of amazing technological progress like "man lands on the moon" while your wife cooks you dinner and your 4 children play outside. Or if you're more adventurous, go to Vietnam, experience what it's like to kill a man, then go work off the stress by banging a dozen hookers (no worries about condoms or aids).
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The 70s: Even better music and movies. Any guy with a guitar can instantly become a "rock star," possibly getting rich, but at least having a good time playing local shows. Or hang out in disco clubs, dancing with the beautiful women who flocked there. Take one of them with you to the drive-in theater, in the back of your massive Cadillac. Complain about the middle east and gas prices, but ultimately it's not your problem. Cities, beaches, and international travel are still very affordable. Host a party and impress everyone with your stereo, record collection, and maybe some blow.
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The 80s: Get into finance and live like a king with some basic math. Or computer programming, or hardware electronics. Hang out at the local arcade, impressing people with your mad pac-man skills, or at home on the NES. Wear a crazy colored jacket. Watch "Cocktail" and then start a cocktail bar. Enjoy the feeling of your country's supreme military dominance and victory in the cold war. Watch all the classic sci-fi movies on first release, then over and over, and talk about them with your local crew. Rock out to the coolest hard rock shows of all time. Travel to Japan and see it at the height of its bubble, but while also being an exotic foreigner.
I think what all of these decades have in common was we were rich enough to have materialistic comforts and freedom, but still doing thingt in the real world instead of being all addicted to our screens. That, and relative status is also important for human happiness. I also like the aesthetics of pre-1940s architecture, clothes, and music, but there's probably too much poverty back then for me to enjoy.
BahRamYou
5mo ago
I would definitely not want to have lived in India in the past! At least, not as a regular person. Being a rich person might have been sweet, though.
BahRamYou
5mo ago
To be fair I was cherry-picking some of the better lives. You could definitely screw up your life in the past by, say, working at a factory that closed down, or on a farm that was no longer profitable, or getting addicted to drugs that you didn't understand the dangers of.
BahRamYou
5mo ago
Do you have any personal experience with this? Because what you say directly contradicts the post I linked and what I've heard about the IRS in general.
BahRamYou
5mo ago
Cool, that's the kind of experience I was looking for. That does make them sound a lot more competant than I expected.
BahRamYou
5mo ago
Eggs in particular are kind of weird. Depending on your perspective, they can be either a fancy food (nice eggs benedict at a fancy brunch restaurant) or a cheap food (substituting eggs in place of beef, which has also gone up in price a lot). Then there's like two dozen varities at any supermarket, for cage free, organic, etc, which frankly leave me baffled which one I should choose. There isn't any one "price of eggs."
BahRamYou
5mo ago
I feel like Twitch has a good sweet spot. The PG13 camgirls grab your attention, but they're not the same as actual porn. There's a million other sites where you can watch porn, but not so many where you can develop a parasocial relationship with a hot chick. And I also think that, for a parasocial relationship, it works better if your fake girlfriend is hot but not too slutty- most people don't want their girlfriend being an actual slut.
Was kinda hoping for more engagement on this... should I have posted this in one of the megathreads?
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