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The Gig Economy Celebrates Working To Excess

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Re: The Gig Economy Celebrates Working To Excess

#201

Post by jacquesm »

anamoulous wrote: post #198
jacquesm wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Excellent. Make sure you keep a sharp eye on that and the future developments, this is one of those little things that can really ruin your life. It's bad enough to have a serious health issue, if it gets compounded by a financial crisis then you can go from 'ok' to 'really bad' in a surprisingly short time when there is no safety net.

What gives you the right to be so imperious about this?

I think you are mis-understanding what I wrote. Having seen a couple of lives of states-side friends ruined by what would have been minor (but still serious from a medical perspective) issues in Europe I'm all too aware of the differences in the various health-care solutions.

I've also lived in enough places with various levels of health-care and insurance (and lack of insurance) to see this as a potential problem.

So, instead of reading imperiousness, how about worry?

Re: The Gig Economy Celebrates Working To Excess

#202

Post by ZeroGravitas »

prolly_a_moron wrote: post #185
J-dawg wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to disagree with the parent comment (because overall I prefer the European way) but we do have it worse in some ways. Salaries for professionals are markedly lower, we live in much smaller houses etc. I get the feeling that when you're winning at life in America, you're really winning. But when you're losing you're really losing. In Europe the ups and downs of life are more smoothed out.

> In Europe the ups and downs of life are more smoothed out. When a substantial portion of "success" (especially monetary) can be attributed to luck, isn't this the sort of environment you want?

The philosphical tool called "The Veil of Ignorance" suggests it is:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veil_of_ignorance

Re: The Gig Economy Celebrates Working To Excess

#203

Post by [deleted] »

prolly_a_moron wrote: post #185
J-dawg wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to disagree with the parent comment (because overall I prefer the European way) but we do have it worse in some ways. Salaries for professionals are markedly lower, we live in much smaller houses etc. I get the feeling that when you're winning at life in America, you're really winning. But when you're losing you're really losing. In Europe the ups and downs of life are more smoothed out.

> In Europe the ups and downs of life are more smoothed out. When a substantial portion of "success" (especially monetary) can be attributed to luck, isn't this the sort of environment you want?

[deleted]

Re: The Gig Economy Celebrates Working To Excess

#204

Post by dagw »

jdietrich wrote: post #147
TulliusCicero wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Average home size in the UK is less than half that of the US: http://shrinkthatfootprint.com/how-big-is-a-house US @ 77 sq meters per capita vs UK @ 33 sq meters per capita.

The average new-build British home is 76 square metres; a typical single-wide mobile home ranges from 60 to 93 square metres. We're a crowded island, we have small houses.

We're a crowded island, we have small houses.

The UK has a lower population density the than both Belgium and Holland, both of which have larger average houses than the UK. So there has to be more to it than simply being 'crowded'.

Re: The Gig Economy Celebrates Working To Excess

#205

Post by dukeluke »

ZeroGravitas wrote: post #194
dukeluke wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is overly generalizing a complex issue. In America, we have a two party system that has basically been taken over by lobbying and gerrymandering. Both sides are different socially, but identical fiscally. Propaganda has been spread massively, amplifying everyone's natural us-vs-them mentality. Plus the populist politician on the Democratic side, Bernie Sanders, was suppressed and basically not allowed to be the…

"Both sides are [...] identical fiscally" That's not true, and exactly the kind of misleading statement that leads to people voting against their own interests.

What matters is what the two sides accomplish, not what they say they're going to do. In the US, when the Republicans are in charge, Democrats hem and haw about how they need to do all this stuff differently from the Repubs, but when they're in charge, it doesn't happen. See Obama and friends in '08. Then with the presidential candidate, they chose the one with the $250,000 speaking fees at all the major banks instead of choosing the one who spoke of inequality in the country.

Re: The Gig Economy Celebrates Working To Excess

#206

Post by imgabe »

d--b wrote: post #153

This is a strangely divisive topic in the startup industry. For some reason, there are smart people who think that meritocracy works: work hard and things will be good for you. The problem is that in many cases working hard (as in building up a startup) does indeed give people the opportunity to rise in society. But it is not true in all cases at all. And so the negative statement "if you are struggling you didn't tr…

> First, in capitalism, a work's remuneration is supposed to be related in a way to the perceived utility of that work for society in general.

This is a misconception, I think. A work's remuneration is related to the utility perceived by the person providing the remuneration. Society in general doesn't pay people. Specific people pay other people. Find something enough people want and give it to them. It's not any more complicated than that.

Re: The Gig Economy Celebrates Working To Excess

#207

Post by conanbatt »

iicc wrote: post #193
alkonaut wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Salaries for professionals are markedly lower, we live in much smaller houses etc. This is an age old debate, and it's very hard to compare one vast continent to another. Regional differences between US cities and European cities are at least as large or larger than the difference between the avereages of US and European salaries/living standards etc. The difference between central manhattan and rural Apalachia is…

>...doctors who can basically make a killing in the US but not in Europe. Arguably that's due to constrained Supply - http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2013/03/the_high_price.h...

This is related to one of the least favoured policy changes Milton Friedman wanted to make: remove medical licenses.

There are plenty of tasks doctors are commanded with that do not require mastery level of expertise, and that enormously raises the cost of medicine. You dont need to study 10 years to read an EKG, someone could learn all the EKG patterns in a much shorter time.

A funny story about this in argentina: anesthesiologists earn more money than surgeons. Surgeons are not unionized, but anesthesiologists are.

Re: The Gig Economy Celebrates Working To Excess

#208

Post by vidarh »

kamaal wrote: post #179
pyrale wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Inequality is the result of reaping the rewards of your own work: someone is more effective, so they earn more. Why is it bad? How can any market economy even function without it? Let us make an experiment and drop Paul Graham in a rainforest to see how much value he manages to extract. Then, once he has starved to death or died from some random infection, let's think again what makes IT jobs more valuable than gar…

We can't have a debate from the position of exceptions. The point he and Mr Graham are trying to make is simple. People are not same, and by that definition are not equal. The fact is that this inequality manifests itself in far more different ways before it appears as income/wealth inequality. Far before some one is rich and poor, they are good and bad at playing the piano, writing a book, programming or anything fo…

> Far before some one is rich and poor, they are good and bad at playing the piano, writing a book, programming or anything for that matter. Wealth inequality comes far later.

If you are poor enough, chances are fairly good you will never get to touch a piano to even find out if you can be good or bad at it.

So no, it does not come far before someone is rich and poor. If you are poor, a whole lot of avenues close off to you early regardless of skill, and the odds of you remaining poor is overwhelmingly higher than that you will be able to overcome it, irrespective of how hard you work or how smart you are.

Re: The Gig Economy Celebrates Working To Excess

#209

Post by ZeroGravitas »

dukeluke wrote: post #205
ZeroGravitas wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Both sides are [...] identical fiscally" That's not true, and exactly the kind of misleading statement that leads to people voting against their own interests.

What matters is what the two sides accomplish, not what they say they're going to do. In the US, when the Republicans are in charge, Democrats hem and haw about how they need to do all this stuff differently from the Repubs, but when they're in charge, it doesn't happen. See Obama and friends in '08. Then with the presidential candidate, they chose the one with the $250,000 speaking fees at all the major banks instea…

It doesn't sound like even you believe they are both the same, certainly you've provided no evidence that is the case in your response.

You'd just prefer if the Democrats were even more towards your preference on fiscal matters. I can agree with that, whether it would fly with the American voters sufficiently to overcome the rural/republican tilt is another matter entirely.

Re: The Gig Economy Celebrates Working To Excess

#210

Post by CM30 »

ZeroGravitas wrote: post #150
wiz21c wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you describe about really winning/loosing is inequality. I generally think that inequality is bad for populations (you may disagree, but usually, those in favor of inequality are those on the right side of it)

Though weirdly in modern American politics, there's some degree of inversion there, with the "coastal liberal elites" voting for "socialist" healthcare and the unemployed coal miner with black lung disease voting against it.

I suspect the two party system is responsible there. Lots of political viewpoints are all lumbered into one party, meaning that people with fiscally liberal/conservative preferences are lumped in with those with socially liberal/conservative preferences even if they're not the same crowd.

People aren't voting 'against their own interests' in the sense that they're stupid. They're voting for their own interests in a party which also has interests they're against because it's the only practical option. For example, someone who wanted less immigration and pro globalism rules (aka US protectionism) but then also thought things like equal rights for trans people and gay marriage and allowing abortion were the right would be up a creek without a paddle. Either option (with a decent chance of getting elected) is against their interests in some way.

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