171–180 of 213 posts
> Mr. Russell and his wife were active church members, Mr. Orr said, “so he doesn’t really fit the bill of someone who would steal an airplane.” Can we please stop insinuating that people who attend church are perfect and incapable of doing wrong and, by omission, insinuating that those of us who do not are evil? Edit: If the downvoters would like to explain how I’m wrong, that would be lovely.
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The medallion system reminds me of feudalism. It blows my mind that taxi drivers would defend this system and not flee to Uber/Lyft/etc.
> It blows my mind that taxi drivers would defend this system and not flee to Uber/Lyft/etc. For those who defend the system, often enough the medallions are their life saving / insurance when they get old, and almost always financed by loans. The medallions going worthless at the same time invalidates their retirement plans and STILL leaves them on the hook for the loan.
Would it not be just that, if we're going to rewrite the economic rules in some areas, we give partial compensation towards those we just screwed over?
Presumably we're changing the rules because of progress (e.g. Uber and Lyft showing on-demand rideshare has a market), which is good for everyone.
But say the human lifespan is 85 years +/-. 25 years for education to post-secondary graduation (e.g. bachelor's degree in US). Probably another 2-5 years of accumulating working capital for your venture.
So there's a set number of "shots" a person gets in their life.
In this instance, what's wrong with saying "We're doing away with the medallion system. Existing medallions will be repurchased by the government at a price proportional to ownership time. Funding will be accomplished by a tax on rideshare companies, that decreases yearly, and ends 5 years from now"?
Otherwise, I see the following sequence of events: (1) people get screwed by technological upheaval -> (2) people become resentful against technological progress -> (3) people vote in politicians / laws that retard technological progress, to the detriment of all
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I'm not an MBA, but I think it's way too early to attribute motivation to this incident.
Reading the dialog I think it's fair to say that both a) the man was not quite well, and b) the only motivation he actually DID suggest was the stress of low wage. So there's that.
Literally anyone can snap. The only deterrent is precrime.
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> It blows my mind that taxi drivers would defend this system and not flee to Uber/Lyft/etc. For those who defend the system, often enough the medallions are their life saving / insurance when they get old, and almost always financed by loans. The medallions going worthless at the same time invalidates their retirement plans and STILL leaves them on the hook for the loan.
This is something that's made me think a lot about the health care debate. Would it not be just that, if we're going to rewrite the economic rules in some areas, we give partial compensation towards those we just screwed over? Presumably we're changing the rules because of progress (e.g. Uber and Lyft showing on-demand rideshare has a market), which is good for everyone. But say the human lifespan is 85 years +/-. 25…
Why not also subsidize traders who lose on a stock?
If you want a society where people can't lose then you also get a society where no one wins.
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Had the guy been a terrorist, he could have flown that plane into Seattle or into SeatTac airport itself. They wouldn't get here in time because they were flying in from Portland. We all got lucky this time.
F-15 max speed is 1646mph (around 0.45 mi/s). From take off in Portland to arriving at SeaTac would be less than 5 minutes at top speed. I assume it takes longer than that to get pilots in planes and takeoff. Seattle also has JBLM (joint base Lewis/McChord, army and air Force), along with Bremerton naval base. I'm guessing they picked pdx because of pilot availability, travel time is near nothing compared to getting…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is something that's made me think a lot about the health care debate. Would it not be just that, if we're going to rewrite the economic rules in some areas, we give partial compensation towards those we just screwed over? Presumably we're changing the rules because of progress (e.g. Uber and Lyft showing on-demand rideshare has a market), which is good for everyone. But say the human lifespan is 85 years +/-. 25…
No no no. People who overpaid for medallions gambled and lost. It is not my problem to subsidize. Why not also subsidize traders who lose on a stock? If you want a society where people can't lose then you also get a society where no one wins.
It seems to me to be a continuation of the pattern of labor 'Going Postal' in the labor hostile environment that has emerged since Reagan. This should be a wake-up call to everyone in the country. We can't survive without being able to trust and respect each other as human beings. Part of that is recognizing that even the most humble occupations deserve a fair wage and chance at advancement in life. If we can't respe…
Guy is depressed and crashes plane and you’re connecting to labor relations? That’s a stretch!
The fact is our society has a tendency to be unable to have meaningful discourse until someone provides framework for it. Just as the issue of Slavery back in the 1800's was fraught with the same types of rebellious antics and slaveowner hysterics, we're seeing the same patterns reserve at a time where inequality in the country has begun to reach a new perceived maxima.
You're also seeing the same sort of outpouring of sympathy that many workplace shooters saw after they snapped, even from some people they shot.
I'm not bringing the topic up lightly. I DON'T make a habit of bringing up the obvious or trying to find a way to turn things political. I've seen slices of life recently from the 1%, to teachers, to call center workers, to someone working the floor at a Tractor Supply, to an AM in a grocery store, to farmers, to the retired elderly for who the system worked.
Every last one realizes that something is going amiss right now after a bit of time spent talking. Every last one feels helpless to change anything about it. In this type of environment it is frequently the mentally ill who are best able to perceive the flaws inherent in the System, and the most likely to ACT because of them.
The 'crazies' in short, aren't the problem. The fact we as a society have normalized something so 'off' that even the 'crazies' are starting to get pushed over the edge by it is what we should be paying attention to.
As I said, I was quite confident my post would prove controversial, but I felt it needed to be said, as it has been left unsaid for too long.
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I've always wondered about the true value of "for show" security measures. Requiring millions of passengers to spend 5 minutes more going through security to undergo procedures that wouldn't stop a determined terrorist definitely seems like a huge waste. However, if the government didn't do "something", it's pretty likely that trust in the US air transportation system would shrink. Wouldn't crush it, but maybe 3 of 1…
The opposite effect happens as well: https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2013/09/excess_automo... > The inconvenience of extra passenger screening and added costs at airports after 9/11 cause many short-haul passengers to drive to their destination instead, and, since airline travel is far safer than car travel, this has led to an increase of 500 U.S. traffic fatalities per year. Using DHS-mandated value of statis…
The average lifespan is 79. 700M passengers * 1hr / 79yrs --> every year, over 1000 babies are killed by the TSA.