Live data from Hacker News

The U.S. Can No Longer Hide from Its Deep Poverty Problem

nytimes.com

221–230 of 238 posts

Re: The U.S. Can No Longer Hide from Its Deep Poverty Problem

#221
post #19

So what do Switzerland, Germany and Iceland better than the rest of the developed nations?

I would provide you an answer in public, but the authoritarian censor goons are out in full force today. But I'm guessing information is being withheld from you for your own protection, of course. Right? Don't want to harm your mind with wrong-think, do we now.

That brings up another interesting topic though, the psychological tendency for people to defer to authoritarians, a kind of legitimacy or validity from authority (almost as if they were named for it), which leads people to make the mistake to assume that, for example, "if this user was censored (if you ever even find out about it since most of the time you aren't even allowed to know the censorship is happening at all) then those in control must have just cause as implied by the authority they have". It's quite a concerning negative feedback loop.

Re: The U.S. Can No Longer Hide from Its Deep Poverty Problem

#222
post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Couldn't you give him an address by allowing him to register at yours to obtain the ID?

Turns out, I did some research and found he could use the local Post Office as his mailing address for the ID. He went into the PO and the people there didn't want to deal with him. The basically threw him out (this PO has a guard, which is a little odd to me). I offered to go with him to the PO and sort it out, but he was unwilling, even after I made the offer multiple times. But, the good news is that he ended up w…

Cool, thank you for looking out for others.

Re: The U.S. Can No Longer Hide from Its Deep Poverty Problem

#223
post #19

So what do Switzerland, Germany and Iceland better than the rest of the developed nations?

Cultural homogeneity and qualities of values. People will not like hearing it until the day that someone has to say "I told you so" once it is way too late, but here it is:

You will be able to trace the decline in Germany in particular as a kind of longitudinal study of what has long and thoroughly been established by science as the inherent conflict that comes from "diversity". You will be able to clearly track over time as the German culture and characteristics that made it "better than the rest of developed nations" decline as it is corrupted by values that aren't just individually of objectively less advantageous quality, but the pollution aspect itself compounds those effects.

Essentially all research into the matter of human social conflict clearly shows that increased "diversity", combination of components of various incompatible and contradictory characteristics, means a fracturing and decline of social cohesion and focusing of interests in terms of human relations. It will be no exception with Germany as it has crossed the Rubicon, just the same way that you can trace how Poland and other eastern European countries that have not committed to cultural self-genocide and diversification self-harm will not develop all the very problems that are already emerging in Germany and western Europe in general and will only increase going forward.

This is not even really just a European matter, it's a universal reality of human nature. When you combine things against their nature or will, especially certain ones that trigger reactions of varying violent degrees, you will get those very predictable reactions just like any chemist will tell you. That violent reaction will be triggered when volatile substances are forced to combine, regardless of whether the motivation is "diversification" or not. Violating people's dignity, rights, and presumed democratic self-determination will result in violent reaction, regardless of any other desired outcomes. Throw potassium in water and no matter how hard you hope and dream, the reaction will be predictably violent and forceful. Democracy is under threat, ironically from people who think they are doing good by violating people's rights and deconstructing democracy in the most fundamental manner. Just like if I force you to take in and support the livelihood of a drug addict, you would have a violent reaction, so inevitably will the current violations of human dignity cause a violent reaction. It's not really rocket science, yet for some reason the idiom, can't see the forest for all the trees, aptly and thoroughly applies.

Just like oil and water in and of themselves have certain desirable characteristics and are useful in and of themselves for different purposes, when you combine them you don't just pollute the water with oil and therefore make it useless, most, if not all people totally miss that in such a case you have thereby also polluted the oil with water and have made both substances unusable for their respective purposes. Additionally, the pollution aspect as also thereby accrued massive costs ... through a simple act of foolishness ... of separating and making the substances again valuable and of desirable and advantageous quality again that can be used for any number of relevant applications.

Re: The U.S. Can No Longer Hide from Its Deep Poverty Problem

#224

This is the other side of globalization. Globalization is super nice when you're secure in your job, "hey everything is getting cheaper!" but when your job is the one in the crosshairs what you're feeling is a pressure that is pushing the living standard of the third world and yours together. That's why I find it so annoying that this board is usually against abundant H1B's but for factory outsourcing. It's completel…

The problem is that every country can curtail trade. The world is far more interlocked now and any country trying to extract itself from that reality will undoubtedly go into an economic recession.

Re: The U.S. Can No Longer Hide from Its Deep Poverty Problem

#225
post #19

So what do Switzerland, Germany and Iceland better than the rest of the developed nations?

Germany and Switzerland do also have homeless people. Normalized to the population they're fewer though (about 39'000/80mio population for Germany compared to 550'000/300mio in the US, or 335'000/80mio for germany if you count people who are wohnungslos [=homeless, but sometimes can sleep on a friends couch, a trailer or something])

Additionally low-skill people are hurting here as well and the government makes the issue worse by allowing mass immigration of low skill labor: in 2017 alone 88'000 immigrants from EU-17 countries (a record low figure) arrived, 80% of them are low skill workers. There are many more frontier commuters. Switzerland has 8mio inhabitants out of which 25% are immigrants that have not yet been naturalized. So yeah, for low skill citizens the real wages have not kept up with cost of living (obviously rent prices go up with mass immigration since government doesn't make it easy to build upwards or outwards) and in quite a few places taxes had to be increased to pay welfare for jobless migrants which has lead to quite a bit of discontent among low skill citizens. Saddest thing about this whole thing is probably the mainstream left-wing reaction to the whole issue: they want to increase or keep the current levels of low-skill immigration and at the same time tell low-skill citizens that they're voting against their own interests by voting for a right-wing anti-low-skill immigration party.

Sources: Been to Germany many times and live in Switzerland. I see them at least 5 days a week. 39k figure http://www.zeit.de/gesellschaft/zeitgeschehen/2015-10/deutsc... 335k figure http://www.deutschlandfunk.de/sozialstatistik-immer-mehr-obd... 550k figure https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/feb/16/homeless-cou... 88k figure https://www.sem.admin.ch/dam/data/sem/publiservice/statistik... 80% are low skill figure https://www.nzz.ch/schweiz/studie-zum-arbeitsmarkt-vier-von-...

Re: The U.S. Can No Longer Hide from Its Deep Poverty Problem

#226
post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A significant difference is, that American police are arresting Americans. They are likely armed, while in other countries that may not be the case.

They are not likely armed. Fewer than half of all households have even a single gun. Most of those aren't households where the gun owners carry in public: they're the kind of household where the "responsible gun owner" leaves his kit where the two year old can get it and accidentally shoot his 6 month old sister to death.

> They are not likely armed.

But definitely way, way more likely than in any other civilized country in the world, and that's the problem.

Re: The U.S. Can No Longer Hide from Its Deep Poverty Problem

#227
post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well Bubba has no more right to a good life than Liu Chu but if you live next door to Bubba and 7000 miles from Liu Chu I think you have a higher duty to him than her. Second, you could consider that Bubba has the ability to vote in US elections and Liu Chu doesn't. Making Liu Chu better off is a nice moral deed, making Bubba better off is not just a nice moral deed but also a political obligation.

Bubba can vote, so he's able to represent his own interests. Liu Chu has no voice in the system. It seems to me that if I have any obligation it would be to advocate for those that cannot advocate for themselves first.

The Chinese will take care of Liu Chu, with nary a concern for Bubba.

Re: The U.S. Can No Longer Hide from Its Deep Poverty Problem

#228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could we not exaggerate? It doesn't help the discussion. plus all the violence committed by Nazis (e.g. the Heather Heyer murder and the other actions counted as right-wing domestic terrorism) "all of the violence", you listed one death. One death is a tragedy, but it's not a massively systematic problem unless we act like it is and turn it into one. You also act like there isn't such a thing as left-wing domestic te…

Considering the U.S. government was just shutdown over a purge of immigrants I'm not sure what more proof you need.

That being anti-illegal immigration is being a nazi? That's evidence of exaggerated rhetoric, which distorts the discussion.

Re: The U.S. Can No Longer Hide from Its Deep Poverty Problem

#229
post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This raises an interesting question: Do US democrats think inter-state immigration is bad? For example some liberal friends when talking about immigration last year kept posting that poem on the statue of liberty: > "Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free", etc. The Republican controlled cities are giving huddled masses to the people who accept that immigration logic.

> Do US democrats think inter-state immigration is bad? Not at all. The US has a big problem with homelessness, and for a long time we've been sticking our head in the sand. Cities like SF have been trying to do something about it for a while, but I don't believe any city can solve the problem. This issue is greater than one city or one state. It's a national problem that requires national solutions.

Agreed. It's made worse by the fact that homeless people are often transient. When a city does a good job of providing services to homeless people, homeless people travel there. Rinse, repeat until the services are overwhelmed, and everyone goes back to "why are we failing to deal with our homelessness problem?"

It worked for SLC because SLC is isolated and expensive to travel to. In the tightly packed, interconnected megalopolises of the Bay Area, LA, and the Northeast, good luck getting anything to work long-term at just the municipal level.

Re: The U.S. Can No Longer Hide from Its Deep Poverty Problem

#230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Considering the U.S. government was just shutdown over a purge of immigrants I'm not sure what more proof you need.

That being anti-illegal immigration is being a nazi? That's evidence of exaggerated rhetoric, which distorts the discussion.

> That's evidence of exaggerated rhetoric, which distorts the discussion.

Simply apply this old quote whenever you hear an "alt-righter", a "white nationalist" or a "teabagger" talking, and replace "duck" with "nazi": "When I see a bird that walks like a duck and swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, I call that bird a duck."

It's not exaggerated rhetoric when you call out that the core ideals of these groups equate those of Nazism (or fascism, but the distinction is really nitpicking). It's simply new words for old hate. These groups and their friends and supporters are as dangerous as Hitler was before rising to power!

Post reply on HN