71–80 of 141 posts
Maybe adults should stop telling teenagers that their performance in these things matters that much? Sports / Music are great if you enjoy them, and learning the high school curriculum is important, but outside of the top 1%, there's little reason to compete in these tournaments.
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The reason the system wants you to work hard is because they get a share of your labour for every part you are successful above subsistence. They get this through debt issuance, primarily via land prices. Fiat money costs absolutely zero to produce, they give it out freely and in return you pledge to give part of your labour for 30 years. If land prices were far lower we'd all be working 3 or 4 days a week. Employers…
The land thing is crazy. Buying at the right time means you get paid to live in your house. Then when you sell, they charge you capital gains so you can't buy the same house back with the money you just got. The other thing that's crazy is how ridiculously cheap the same stuff is in countries with lower land prices, like South East Asia. A nice apartment with a pool on the beach is 1/10 the price of San Francisco. Th…
You can't steal from people on the breadline. Once they are above this you can by selling their own futures back to them (and dismantling the future for their kids).
Prices are set by credit. It's the banks.
"hours of nightly homework, daily sports practice and band rehearsal..." Maybe adults should stop telling teenagers that their performance in these things matters that much? Sports / Music are great if you enjoy them, and learning the high school curriculum is important, but outside of the top 1%, there's little reason to compete in these tournaments.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I don't understand how this makes any sense, at all. If the town raises the property taxes on my rental, guess what, the rent is going to go up at least as much as the tax increase. This is only true if the rent is based on the cost of the unit in terms of purchase price and upkeep. That's true in lower cost-of-living areas, but in expensive areas, the rent is high primarily because demand is outstripping supply, n…
This doesn't add up. If rent is so much higher than purchase plus upkeep, people will borrow money and buy, safe in the knowledge that they can just become a landlord and be cash-flow positive at any time. Or investors will simply buy the cheap properties and rent them. The demand for investment properties will drive up the purchase price and parity will be reached. This is why house prices are just as insane in Sili…
Rents do go up when wages go up (SF) and when there is speculation they rise but it's capped by wages.
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Every time this comes up, the answer I see trotted out is that increased land taxes will cause land prices to fall and rents will get cheaper. I don't understand how this makes any sense, at all. If the town raises the property taxes on my rental, guess what, the rent is going to go up at least as much as the tax increase.
If you could just raise your rent tomorrow, why don't you? Will the market bear the new price or won't it? Taxes should have no effect on what renters will bear.
Isn't it amazing, all these capitalist landlords who could be taking a greater cut of their tenant's labour but somehow are not.
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The same reason they ever implement anything: because they are either worried about losing all their power / something even more "abrupt".
In all of history, the elite have never been more secure. They've never had anything close to the level of surveillance and policing as today. The police today are literally thousands of times more effective at their job than the time of the French Revolution. No one with a clue is worried about anything "abrupt". Rebellion is literally impossible.
Did they put guns on Big Dog since 2011? What's changed? Good old UK had to stop the press reporting on it they were so flustered.
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The dominant culture says you are a loser. Paradoxically I'm doing OK by society's standards. By valuing personal space and control over it I decided to get into the property game with my partner earlier in life, enabling us to purchase an inner city property before their prices exploded. Now I'm watching my friends work their arses off to live further away in the 'burbs. Often success comes down to timing...and an a…
>No rent, but you point remains: gotta work to live. The irony is coupled with your statement about buying property. You don't pay rent, we pay you.
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> I don't understand how this makes any sense, at all. If the town raises the property taxes on my rental, guess what, the rent is going to go up at least as much as the tax increase. This is only true if the rent is based on the cost of the unit in terms of purchase price and upkeep. That's true in lower cost-of-living areas, but in expensive areas, the rent is high primarily because demand is outstripping supply, n…
This doesn't add up. If rent is so much higher than purchase plus upkeep, people will borrow money and buy, safe in the knowledge that they can just become a landlord and be cash-flow positive at any time. Or investors will simply buy the cheap properties and rent them. The demand for investment properties will drive up the purchase price and parity will be reached. This is why house prices are just as insane in Sili…
Many of the posts have to do with the expectations of business, society, etc. Maybe we parents have something to do with it too. I should be happy. I'm educated, have interesting and rewarding work to do, have a roof over my head, and get to play music on the side. I've got two great kids, who are both smarter than me. What's wrong with that? Why should I be neurotic about success? Why should push myself and my kids…