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Suspicious Discontinuities

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Re: Suspicious Discontinuities

#241

Post by kwhitefoot »

jcranmer wrote: post #207
gwd wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It is an official procedure that in the case of results on the edge, the person marking should mark an ambiguous score in the favour of the student. The funny thing about the "almost there" argument is that what it means is the actual line is more fuzzy, but a bit lower. That is, if the "official" cut-of is 30, and teachers are willing to "find an extra point" for people with scores of 28 and 29 but not 27, then th…

When I was a TA, the rule for homework assignments was that they were due at midnight, with a grace period chosen per-assignment of 1 to 6 hours, undisclosed to students. Alas, I could only choose the grace period on 5 minute increments, so I couldn't pick a time like 3:13. The grace period I set for the hardest homework assignment was 1:05--probably cut off a few people who were hoping to extend a two-week assignmen…

I'm glad my uni didn't have things like homework. Physics at Exeter 74 to 77 had tutorials instead, if you didn't complete the work in time your tutor might grumble but the grumble had no impact because the class of one's degree depended only on the finals and the final year project report/dissertation. Of course not finishing the work quite likely had some impact on your ability to perform in the finals!

Re: Suspicious Discontinuities

#242

Post by DavidVoid »

apta wrote: post #232
streb-lo wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Currently someone who has transitioned is noticeably different than someone who was born that way. I think it's not far-fetched to imagine that in the future there will no longer be any 'uncanny valley' and the stigma will disappear.

It won't happen. A man who pretends to be a woman still carries XY chromosomes. This is a fundamental reality with no way around it.

They don't pretend to be women, transwomen are women (and transmen are men). There's a lot more to people and gender than chromosomes.

And with your line of reasoning can an intersex person (such as someone with XXY chromosomes) never be considered a man nor a woman?

Re: Suspicious Discontinuities

#243

Post by jchrisa »

PaulHoule wrote: post #225
kazagistar wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The leftist solutions are to get rid of of the conditions entirely, and find non-means-tested ways to accomplish goals more universally. The advantage here is significantly reduced administrative costs, freeing up time and energy of those in a tough situation on recovery rather then stress over beurocracy and limitations, and of course, people not viewing the people on the programs as morally deficient. Social securi…

I dunno, wasn't it Milton Friedman who was promoting UBI during the Nixon administration? I've got this funny feeling that Congress likes legalistic solutions to problems because they are mostly lawyers. (All lawyers when it comes to Democrats) The pain of filling out paperwork for means testing seems less painful to them than it does to the general population. The 'swiss cheese' approach to social services is one of…

Maybe you are good at paperwork, but it’s worth remembering that even Google sometimes biffs a domain name renewal. Why put artificial hurdles in front of people who need help?

Re: Suspicious Discontinuities

#244

Post by streb-lo »

apta wrote: post #232
streb-lo wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Currently someone who has transitioned is noticeably different than someone who was born that way. I think it's not far-fetched to imagine that in the future there will no longer be any 'uncanny valley' and the stigma will disappear.

It won't happen. A man who pretends to be a woman still carries XY chromosomes. This is a fundamental reality with no way around it.

A man can't go in space, can't fly, can't trick rocks into thinking, and can't do many things. But we do anways.

Your understanding of reality is flawed. XY chromosomes provide the instructions for the human organism to construct a male body -- they do nothing to prevent the altering of it later on.

Also, is this not 'hacker' news? Chromosomes are just the source code -- eventually we we will hack the souce or the binary all we want.

Re: Suspicious Discontinuities

#245

Post by iainmerrick »

kazagistar wrote: post #215
iainmerrick wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was in the context of a political discussion about what the tax bands should be, not about paying the current taxes in reality. Some people want higher taxes and some want lower; what I’m saying is, 50% stood out as an arbitrary threshold that many people seemed possibly willing to agree on. Some complained that rich people shouldn’t be expected to prop up the rest of society, but conceded that progressive tax b…

Tax rates dont pay for services, they pay for preventing inflation. The government printing money pays for services.

Tax rates dont pay for services

What are you replying to?

Re: Suspicious Discontinuities

#246

Post by BurningFrog »

The Swedish system solves much of this, at a price.

In Sweden, the principle is that everyone pay into the system, and everyone gets benefits from it.

So everyone, rich or poor, gets a $130/month payment per child under 18. There are many other examples.

The price is that while the US has a very progressive tax system, where high income earners pay a lot of tax, while the low & middle pay very little, in Sweden everyone pays a lot of tax. It (kinda) works because everyone also get a lot back from the system.

So Sweden has very high taxes, but most people get similar value back. You can think of it as a forced savings system in some ways.

Re: Suspicious Discontinuities

#247

Post by dangerface »

SilasX wrote: post #82
btilly wrote: post #74

The perverse incentives around these discontinuities is one of the worst misfeatures of programs intended to help people. Here is a real example. My niece wound up with 3 kids, divorced, with inconsistent child support payments. So she went on food stamps. She was looking for a better job. She found one, interviewed, and they wanted to hire her. But the salary that they offered was $0.50/hour too much for her to stay…

Relatedly, I learned about Universal Credit, an attempt by the UK to merge all their social benefits into one coherent system, and it seems like the cliff problem here is worse. From the BBC description: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-41487126 >Under the old system many faced a "cliff edge", where people on a low income would lose a big chunk of their benefits in one go as soon as they started working more than 16 hours…

The universal credits in the uk where setup by a conservative government thats obsessed with austerity.

The intent was to cut the funding to benefits disguised as a new system.

Re: Suspicious Discontinuities

#249

Post by iainmerrick »

thu2111 wrote: post #233
smnrchrds wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I reminds me of that quip that if libraries didn't exist already and did not have a history millennia long, no government would create one today. Instead, they would create a means-tested tax credit for purchasing books.

Intriguing idea :) I'm not sure if you're speaking approving or not (or neither). It seems like a reasonable thing to do though. Amazon is bigger than any library, it avoids the use of physical space in city centres and the need to manage loan systems/handle stolen books. I think the difference between then and now is that IT happened, so it's much easier to do things like calculate complex per-item tax rates than it…

I'm not sure if you're speaking approving or not

It’s “not”

Re: Suspicious Discontinuities

#250

Post by SilasX »

rsync wrote: post #229
SilasX wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My point was that 63% is still very bad, and if it’s supposed to be an improvement, then the existing system is abysmal from an incentive perspective.

"My point was that 63% is still very bad, and if it’s supposed to be an improvement, then the existing system is abysmal from an incentive perspective." This is fascinating . There is an entirely separate debate about tax rates and incentives for high income tax payers wherein it is suggested that marginal income tax rates almost identical to the 63% you are speaking of are fair, equitable, common-sensible and could…

I think 63% marginal tax rates for high earners are stupid too, and their proponents similarly mistaken. So I haven’t changed my opinion based on the context and am not responsible for such advocates.
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