291–300 of 368 posts
Would it be similar to say "factories worsen inequality by mostly helping high-income earners" (consider England during the Industrial Revolution)? New technology increases our productivity.
It seems from the comments that a lot of the readers here equate "let's look at socioeconomic inequality" with "let's make sure everyone has the same socioeconomic outcome by bringing down the people who earn more." This is... a leap not found in this article. The idea is to make sure that we realize the knock-on effects of changes in the workforce / society and take measures to make sure people who have the ability…
> Giving people computers Better is simply giving people money which they can use for their highest priorities, which may not be computers. > Access to broadband Competitive internet is available in larger metropolitan areas. If there's a mandate for some or all companies to provide access in rural areas, that must be subsidized by increased prices in metropolitan areas. This was accepted in the US for the bulk of th…
Competitive internet in the US is almost an oxymoron. I have two choices here, and they magically always set the same price, which is no cheaper now than ten years ago. I can walk to a cocktail, a pour-over coffee, boutiques, and my choice of macaron or Parisian-style croissant, but I cannot get cheap and high-bandwidth internet.
Subsidizing relocation is not the best alternative. Farming regions already suffer from a shortage of labor. It would be far better for one of a family to be able to get a good tech job while another in the family farms than the current state of affairs, where I know a farmer who actually commutes by his private plane to his second job as a college instructor. Farming is important, because food is important. No other service is expensive there, unless you want a Brazilian keratin treatment or something. Relocating the last of America's farmers is not a great answer.
Last, I will get my teeth looked at as soon as it's possible, whether I'm WFH or not. You only get one set of adult teeth.
The most interesting part (to me) is not touched on in the article - if expensive jobs can be done remotely from Gary, Indiana, they're not going to go to Gary natives who are currently underemployed, but to the same small crowd of well-off people who are just going to move to Gary, driving prices there up. I think this is the inequality that is interesting and matters.
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> "Pilots cannot pilot from home" ... Google 'drones' Most of pilot training consists of dealing with emergencies. Pilots tend to be highly motivated to be safe because they hit the ground first. There's a saying among pilots that saving themselves saves the passengers. I wouldn't get on an airplane with a remote pilot. BTW, in WW2, bringing the chief of maintenance along for the check ride after an overhaul ensured…
Would you buy a package shipped on a plane with a remote pilot? Not all flights carry passengers
One thing that I find curious about the initial chart of data from Canadian workers (percent who worked some hours at home by income group) is that while the trend is clearly more hours worked at home with more income, I'm not so sure that's an unambiguously good thing. "Are you able to work an entire day of your 40-hour workweek from home?" is a very different question from "Are you able to work your 45th through 60…
> Sometimes, I think it would be refreshing to do something like airline pilot where I'd probably enjoy the job overall but that it was pretty clear there's no expectation that I'd fly an airliner in my non-work time. Yeah, I've only had jobs that can be done anywhere, which is both good and bad. It gives me flexibility but also expectations. Sometimes I envy my dentist friends. They make great money, but when they l…
In reference to some kind of changing circumstance that was going to compel their rank and file to spend more time doing some work-related task, the labor rep said, "They're entitled to their time" with a kind of finality I envy.
Absolutely no wiggle room around the question of, "should they be paid for every minute they spend on the clock for someone else's business." The ubiquity of salaried work really gets me sometimes.
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That sounds like yet another wealth transfer from metro areas to rural areas. I understand that the US government is structured that way, by the creation of the Senate, but as a city-dweller, I'm not a fan. I'd rather pay for people to move, perhaps subsidizing housing where other services have competition and jobs are plentiful.
> wealth transfer from metro areas to rural areas I live in the Rust Belt, and when I visited San Francisco, it was like visiting a different planet. I find it hard to believe that wealth transfer from metro to rural is larger than wealth transfer in the opposite direction. Why does $HOT_TECHBRO_STARTUP invariably choose to locate its offices in the ultra-tight real estate and labor markets of SF, NYC or Austin when…
Check the data. It's readily available from various government agencies. As you say, companies invariably locate in cities.
What facts from your experience formed your belief?
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That sounds like yet another wealth transfer from metro areas to rural areas. I understand that the US government is structured that way, by the creation of the Senate, but as a city-dweller, I'm not a fan. I'd rather pay for people to move, perhaps subsidizing housing where other services have competition and jobs are plentiful.
> wealth transfer from metro areas to rural areas I live in the Rust Belt, and when I visited San Francisco, it was like visiting a different planet. I find it hard to believe that wealth transfer from metro to rural is larger than wealth transfer in the opposite direction. Why does $HOT_TECHBRO_STARTUP invariably choose to locate its offices in the ultra-tight real estate and labor markets of SF, NYC or Austin when…
Why do you find this hard to believe? I'm curious to learn what wealth transfer from rural to urban metros you're considering, since I'm not aware of many (any?). Rural communities have struggled and are increasingly subsidized by metro areas in the US:
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/six-charts-illustrate-di...
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> Giving people computers Better is simply giving people money which they can use for their highest priorities, which may not be computers. > Access to broadband Competitive internet is available in larger metropolitan areas. If there's a mandate for some or all companies to provide access in rural areas, that must be subsidized by increased prices in metropolitan areas. This was accepted in the US for the bulk of th…
Employers should provide computers to employees who are WFH. It's the cost of doing business. Schools need to provide students with computers or computer access, as well; the coronavirus has certainly thrown a wrench into traditional distribution methods. Competitive internet in the US is almost an oxymoron. I have two choices here, and they magically always set the same price, which is no cheaper now than ten years…
As for your teeth, I suggest an early morning appointment. Aerosolized virus can live in the air for quite some time, which is what you get when you use a high speed drill in someone's mouth. It's unclear what viral load you'd get from being the next patient in the chair, but I wouldn't want to be the guinea pig.
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> Imagine if a single mother working for $20k a year at an office could do that work from home? Imagine if we applied this same kind of get-it-done thinking to wondering why there were so many women raising children on their own without support from the child's father?
But then we'd have to have a lot of politically and religiously uncomfortable conversations about contraception, birth control, and other forms of family planning. Not to mention sexual education.
This is one big reason marriage rates are lower among poorer Americans. It's not bad that a guy wants a good job before he gets married -- it's bad that he's never gonna get one and his kid is going fatherless while he pursues that pipe dream.
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I really can't understand this mindset, it views the system that we have as fundamentally meritocratic and that only hard work matters. This is demonstrably false with a cursory review of how our (the US) education system, economy, and geographic distributions reward and punish people.
This idea is false. Intra-generational mobility in the US is quite strong. Half of people in the 1% are not in the 1% a decade later. About 50% of people move up 1 quintile from their starting quintile of income. I don’t have stats on how this compares to EU or other countries, but this shows a majority American people can move between income quantiles in their lifetime. [1] https://www.stlouisfed.org/publications/in…
Tier 1 top-talent engineers are just worth multiples more than lower talent people and deserve to reap from their hard work and expertise. It's unfair to me and other FAANGs to say we don't deserve our lifestyle and are silver spoon.