The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
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User ID: 174
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
6hr ago
It's a toy example, obviously. Nevertheless, median wages and median disposable (after tax) personal income have typically grown faster than inflation. Lately they've dropped to about par, but that's because we're in this almost-recession.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
10hr ago
But it's ridiculously impractical and requires continual expensive maintenance by chuds (like Musk)
It's a good thing those cell towers erect themselves!
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
10hr ago
The problem isn't with my logic, it's with your lack of math. If you make $10k per month and have a $3k mortgage, and inflation results in everything going up evenly by 10x, you will be making $100k per month... and still have a $3k mortgage, for a gain of $2700 for other consumption (in old dollars). Inflation straightforwardly helps those with dollar-denominated debt. But that's cash flow, not wealth.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
10hr ago
Larry Fink
I think you mean Steve Schwarzman. Blackstone, not BlackRock (which is no longer a subsidiary).
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
11hr ago
Trailer parks are different because the trailer owner is renting the land (unless there's co-op/condo trailer parks, I haven't really looked into it). Also, they're not cheap and generally available in many places where housing prices are expensive.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
11hr ago
· Edited 10hr ago
That was a terrible video; he starts by talking about the moral superiority of midwesterners. And then he goes to silliness, like suggesting that buying half a tanker truck of gas over 15 years is unreasonable. Honestly, I expected it to be a whole tanker truck, so I guess I wasn't off by that much. But that's wrapped within the sillier thing -- he's banging on about how the fuel can only be used once.... but that's true of any energy. He complains that pointing this out is a "gotcha", but it's just a response to his own "gotcha" about fuel being single use. He's on somewhat more solid ground when instead talking about economics, but then the details matter and he just glosses right over the "what about nighttime" issue. He also then goes and compares the price by the palletload of solar panels to the retail price of gasoline (rather than considering the delivered price of electricity, including batteries -- unless he's ONLY going to use his car at night, so he can charge during the day).
"There's a 27 Megawatt solar farm build in DePue, Illinois. Why is that?" Answer: subsidies, in the form of selling indulgences Renewable Energy Certificates.
And then in the rant section, after he's constructed this whole case that solar either already does or soon will make economic sense, he complains about Republicans taking away subsidies. Bitch, please... do you not believe your own case?
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
12hr ago
Right, but that equity is only useful if you're going to sell it, or you need to borrow money and can afford to make the payments.
It's not very liquid but it is wealth and it is useful. If the 10X increase is straight inflation, you've gained $67,000 in the same currency as you bought the house in.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
12hr ago
That is not how wealth works.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
12hr ago
Doesn't work in the US. I don't know if Trump ever built houses, but if he did I'm sure they would be McMansions, not pods.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
13hr ago
Luckily from my perspective, it seems that space travel hasn't been THAT politicized by the culture war, yet.
You're talking about a mission specifically designed to put a woman on the moon. Although it seems they only have one woman on the 4-person crew, as well as a black man.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
13hr ago
If your home is "worth" 10x your purchase price, you can only use that by selling it or using it as collateral for debt.
Leverage. Suppose you bought your house for $100,000 and still owe $70,000 on your mortgage. If it's still worth $100,000, you have $30,000 in equity. If it's worth $1,000,000 you don't have $300,000 but rather $970,000 in equity. Even if all the other houses have gone up as much, you've won.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
13hr ago
The American Dream is basically 'what if everyone was part of the land-owning class?' and then people are surprised that as a newly endowed member of that class, they are opposed to rentiers and new buyers.
I think you mean "renters". A "rentier" is a landlord, one who lives off income from properties.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
13hr ago
The usual way to solve a problem of "let's make something cheaper while not pissing off existing owners by reducing the value of their product" is market segmentation. Want to make a new $500 phone that doesn't annoy the people who just bought your $1000 flagship? Make sure it's worse in some obvious way. This sort of thing has resulting in lots of amusing things like IBMs computer with the jumper that could be cut to make it faster, but with homes it's pretty easy -- you make new housing that's smaller, of poorer construction, and further away from where people want to be.
Except, well, enter government. Building codes keep you from (legally) making houses of much poorer construction. Occupancy codes keep your houses from being too much smaller. And anti-sprawl rules mean you can't build them much further away.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
13hr ago
A house is not only an investment, houses have cash flows so large it burns the Treasury's butt that they can't tax them. Second largest "tax expenditure" after medical premiums and just before 401Ks is "Exclusion of net imputed rental income". Of course, you might object that these aren't real cash flows (which they aren't, hence "imputed")... but they are spending avoided. They also provide a one-time inflow when sold, of course.
A house becomes less useful with time due to entropy (albeit more slowly than most other physical assets). One would expect the real value of the average house to go down with time.
But in fact houses generally gain real value with time. I expect this to change in 10-15 years, but for now, they gain, not because any intrinsic properties but because of good old supply and demand. Well, that, and the fact that people do tend to fight entropy by doing maintenance and sometimes upgrades, which you need to account for.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
16hr ago
With no apologies to Alanis Morissette, I believe the term is "ironic".
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
16hr ago
In this case we know for a fact the averages are not the same, the debate is over the causes.
By stubbornly insisting the averages are the same and there's just something wrong with measurements which show otherwise, the debate over causes can be avoided. As I said, a defense in depth. It's not happening and if it is it's due to racism and even if it's not, we should take from the able to subsidize the unable.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
17hr ago
Sure. But "Democrats don't like this" is a very different claim than "the optics of this are bad".
The link is "Democrats control the optics".
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
18hr ago
I remember that companies canceling people for the OK sign went on for many months, and the New York Times posted breathless images swearing various figures were making OK signs in public.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
18hr ago
Alice is 5' 2"/157 cm. Bob is 6' 3"/190 cm.
Expecting Bob to get something off a high shelf for Alice does not make Bob Alice's slave.
Sure it does. Bob's got his own things he'd prefer to do. Alice's need is no call on his ability. She can go find a ladder. Or offer Bob something of value.
Rejecting the notion that the more able ought to help the less able is rejecting civilisation itself.
No, it's just rejecting Communism ("From each according to his ability..."). And Margaret Mead, I suppose.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
18hr ago
Could be, but it's false.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
18hr ago
The progressive tech weirdos purged all the other tech weirdos who didn't keep their head down, so the only ones you'll hear from are the progressives.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
18hr ago
Every time someone says "The optics of this are good/bad!", they're manifesting their own claim.
Yes, but the claim is just that "Democrats do/don't like this".
Personally, I think Democrats really need to worry about their optics of "retarded, violent street crazies".
They don't, because control of the media means the normies will see the retarded, violent street crazies as good and normal and the people they are fighting as fascists.
Yes, we have two Hispanic agents who shot a white guy dead, but the narrative that ICE is going around rounding brown people is not hurt in one bit by this.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
1d ago
You can set the threshold for rejecting the null hypothesis at any significance level you want. You have to set it quite high (by social science standards) to not reject it in this case, but if you're starting with the conclusion you want, that's what you do.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
1d ago
You've certainly got your soldiers lined up in an impressive defense in depth. But reality does not care.
If You Have The Means At Hand, You Have The Responsibility To Help.
Rejected. The able are not the proper slaves of the needy.
What you say is correct if
1) There's no mortgage and either
2a) The increase is entirely inflation or
2b) You can only use housing wealth for housing.
Since 2b isn't true, you can make use of wealth from your primary residence. Suppose housing doubled in value compared to general inflation since I bought my house for $400,000. I move from my house to a house costing 3/4 as much (formerly $300,000, now $600,000). The 1/4 I get out is twice that ($200,000 rather than $100,000) if housing remained the same.
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