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Alaska’s Engineering Colleges Prepare to Slash Programs, Lay Off Faculty

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Re: Alaska’s Engineering Colleges Prepare to Slash Programs, Lay Off Faculty

#71

Post by cybersnowflake »

Jtsummers wrote: post #21
hpoe wrote: post #17

On the flip side if they just continue to run at a deficit for extended periods then they have to cut even more as they will no longer be able to fund what they have. I get that this isn't an ideal situation but it seems like so often whenever anyone wants to cut anything its the end of the world. I mean what would you cut in order to reduce the deficit? Welfare services? Health services? Emergency services? It may n…

They need to raise taxes. Alaska has been riding the oil money for a long time, but that's being reduced every year. Since they didn't invest it wisely, they have nothing to fall back on. The only way to reduce the deficit is a combination of eliminating government services and raising taxes.

There are several reasons why alaska wants badly to maintain low taxes and it's not entirely because the leaders are all fiscally conservative ideologues.

Re: Alaska’s Engineering Colleges Prepare to Slash Programs, Lay Off Faculty

#72

Post by wolco »

hpoe wrote: post #17

On the flip side if they just continue to run at a deficit for extended periods then they have to cut even more as they will no longer be able to fund what they have. I get that this isn't an ideal situation but it seems like so often whenever anyone wants to cut anything its the end of the world. I mean what would you cut in order to reduce the deficit? Welfare services? Health services? Emergency services? It may n…

"I mean what would you cut in order to reduce the deficit? Welfare services? Health services? Emergency services?"

Why would those be untouchable"

Re: Alaska’s Engineering Colleges Prepare to Slash Programs, Lay Off Faculty

#73

Post by dang »

dv_dt wrote: post #2

We are entering a new dark ages ruled by the priests of austerity, unable to value anything but short-term money.

Maybe so, but please don't post unsubstantive comments here.

Lack of new information plus grandiose ideological rhetoric guarantees a generic, predictable discussion.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Alaska’s Engineering Colleges Prepare to Slash Programs, Lay Off Faculty

#74

Post by darkpuma »

sweetcherrypie wrote: post #64
darkpuma wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have systems that give equal weight to a vote made by somebody with 5 years left on the planet and somebody with 50 years left. That's a huge incentive divide and it favors short term thinking. In many ways it's unfair and sub-optimal, but I don't foresee it changing.

Indeed, a teenager should have triple the voting power of a 40 year old

Perhaps, perhaps not. But I see little reason that somebody over 70 at the oldest should be allowed to vote at all (let alone do something even more serious like hold public office!)

If you and your friends were trying to decide what to do next weekend, would you give a vote to the friend who was going to be out of town that weekend? People should not have a say in matters they won't be around for. I'm not allowed to vote in Canada, nor should I be, because I don't live there. Similarly if I am near death, I should not be allowed to cast a vote on matters pertaining to the future because I won't be there.

Re: Alaska’s Engineering Colleges Prepare to Slash Programs, Lay Off Faculty

#75

Post by tastyfreeze »

rovolo wrote: post #60
tastyfreeze wrote: post #40

The Alaska budget cuts are not only to the University. Deep cuts across the board with services Governor Dunleavy feels are unnecessary taking the biggest hit (public health, university, public ferry transportation). However, according to Alaska's constitution the government must come up with a balanced budget. They have failed to do so since revenue shortfalls began. The previous governor used a stopgap measure of u…

I think that you're underselling the size of the PFD relative to the state budget when you say "akin to digging through [the] couch cushions for change". Here's a comparison of the numbers: // (expected - actual) * valid applicants // ($2,300 - $1,100) * 666,047 PFD withheld 2017: $ 687M Total state revenue 2017: $1,018M Also, these statements are in conflict: > the PFD that isn't constitutionally protected > pay res…

The phrase was meant to illustrate that the fund isn't for the legislators to spend regardless of its size. It is the people's money. The whole thing looks like the Grasshopper and the Ant. The ant(people) established investments to benefit themselves and their descendants. The grasshopper(legislators) spent damn near every penny of oil revenue. Now the grasshopper has stolen part of the ant's cache and is begging for more.

You also cut my quote in a bad spot. There are two parts of how Alaska residents get a check. There is an investment account that by constitution gets 25% of oil revenue to invest. Part of investment gains are rolled back in to the investment account. The other portion are put in the earnings fund that checks are paid from. The earnings fund is not constitutionally protected.

Correction, the amount of a check is in statue not constitution. The fund itself is in constitution.

[PFD Statutes] https://pfd.alaska.gov/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=KRSQ6VCpO_Q...

Re: Alaska’s Engineering Colleges Prepare to Slash Programs, Lay Off Faculty

#77

Post by stefco_ »

darkpuma wrote: post #74
sweetcherrypie wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, a teenager should have triple the voting power of a 40 year old

Perhaps, perhaps not. But I see little reason that somebody over 70 at the oldest should be allowed to vote at all (let alone do something even more serious like hold public office!) If you and your friends were trying to decide what to do next weekend, would you give a vote to the friend who was going to be out of town that weekend? People should not have a say in matters they won't be around for. I'm not allowed to…

That's a fair point, but you can also flip it the other way: someone with 5 years left on Earth might be much more interested in improving things for future generations. Thinking about how your impact will live on after your death is an enduring human strategy for dealing with the terror of impending nonexistence. Another way to flip it: someone who's 40 has plenty of time left to live hedonistically without having to face really long-term consequences of their actions.

It's also worth noting that short-vs-long-term planning is just a paradigm for thinking about your politics; in practice, absolutely horrible things can arise from both strategies. Long-term thinking can manifest as clinging to tradition (since you now feel ownership over future generations and want to impose your own world-views on them). It can manifest as early optimization. Both of these things can be good (maintaining culinary/aesthetic culture, infrastructure investment) or bad (maintaining brutal and oppressive traditions, prematurely and hence inefficiently optimizing things at tremendous economic/social cost).

I'm not saying the status quo is anywhere near optimal. I think it's a very interesting (read: hard) and probably culturally-dependent question of what age groups are able to minimize the societal happiness cost function (and of what that cost function even is). It's incredibly difficult to say anything generally meaningful about how you might do this well. The one-person-one-vote system is at least a simple solution that seems acceptable to most, which is an important feature (not that each person's vote counts the same in practice in USA, but that's a whole other problem).

Re: Alaska’s Engineering Colleges Prepare to Slash Programs, Lay Off Faculty

#78

Post by AnimalMuppet »

darkpuma wrote: post #74
sweetcherrypie wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, a teenager should have triple the voting power of a 40 year old

Perhaps, perhaps not. But I see little reason that somebody over 70 at the oldest should be allowed to vote at all (let alone do something even more serious like hold public office!) If you and your friends were trying to decide what to do next weekend, would you give a vote to the friend who was going to be out of town that weekend? People should not have a say in matters they won't be around for. I'm not allowed to…

Somebody over 70 has seen some things in their life. For a concrete example: There are people alive who experienced the Great Depression. Should none of them be allowed to vote? Is that really a good idea? Should people who lived through World War II not be allowed to vote?

Or would it be better to have some of those people, as voters, to be able to say "wait a minute" to some stuff that sounds good to people who haven't been through similar things?

Re: Alaska’s Engineering Colleges Prepare to Slash Programs, Lay Off Faculty

#79

Post by selimthegrim »

narrator wrote: post #46
anticensor wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Replace censored by WTC 7 and World Trade center respectively.

I did the [censored] thing so as not to trigger cognitive dissonance in the mainstream narrative true believers.

I'm sure Popular Mechanics was hijacked by the deep state too.

Re: Alaska’s Engineering Colleges Prepare to Slash Programs, Lay Off Faculty

#80

Post by narrator »

selimthegrim wrote: post #79
narrator wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did the [censored] thing so as not to trigger cognitive dissonance in the mainstream narrative true believers.

I'm sure Popular Mechanics was hijacked by the deep state too.

Fun with argdown:

(1) Only an idiot would read magazines that publish incorrect analysis.

(2) I am not an idiot

----

(3) I do not read magazines that publish incorrect analysis.

(4) I read popular mechanics

----

(5) popular mechanics does not publish incorrect analysis.

That's what I'm talking about with regards to my original comment about triggering cognitive dissonance. By saying the mainstream narrative is wrong it's activating that syllogism in their mind and they feel personally attacked because if premise (5) is false then premise (2) may also be false.

BTW, cognitive dissonance is a well know psychological phenomenon that is totally normal and observed widely throughout the population in many different studies.

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