What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922) • Hacker News Board

Re: What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)

#491

Post by mardifoufs » Thu, Jan 06, 2022, 8:55 PM UTC

deanCommie wrote: post #440

mardifoufs wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those rankings have absolutely 0 values. We are currently under our 2nd curfew in less than a year, I can't go outside after 10pm under the threat of a 2000$ fine (which the police is very heavily enforcing) and yet we are way up there in the list you linked. Complete joke

Well, when we're in the middle of a Global Pandemic, with the 5th-highest death toll in human history [0], a couple things have to change temporarily, don't you think? Also, this is a Quebec-only curfew. Take it up with your provincial government. If separated as a country, perhaps Quebec wouldn't make the list. Quebec has plenty of other counter-freedom policies including your government-endorsed islamophobia. [0] h…

You are contradicting yourself. It's a global pandemic yet only quebec is going for these absolutely ridiculous measures. Hence why it's ludicrous for canada to be higher than the US. And it's been 2 years, it's not exactly temporary, especially since there's literally no scientific backing for a curfew in a pandemic and our government is not even pretending that there is any. At a certain point the "it's a global pandemic" excuse just does not work and you get well into the threshold of a non free society and I think we are well past that in quebec.

Also, quebec is still part of canada. So again, your point is just strange. You are just deflecting very weakly what I said.

Re: What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)

#492

Post by slg » Thu, Jan 06, 2022, 8:56 PM UTC

nightski wrote: post #486

slg wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The Federal Reserve is private" is a meme at this point that is largely divorced from our usual meaning of public/private. Calling the Federal Reserve Board "private citizens" is like calling the Supreme Court Justices "private citizens". They are both officials appointed by the president, who must be confirmed by the Senate, and who collect a public salary. Any profits from the Federal Reserve go right back into th…

While all supreme court justices are appointed, from my understanding only the chairman is appointed correct? Everyone that works for the fed is not necessarily appointed? Maybe we say it is private but the government serves as the board :) Seeing the tension over the years the Chairman, the President, and Congress implies to me that the government does not have absolute authority over the Fed.

All the board members are appointed. From their website:[1]

>The Board of Governors--located in Washington, D.C.--is the governing body of the Federal Reserve System. It is run by seven members, or "governors," who are nominated by the President of the United States and confirmed in their positions by the U.S. Senate.

Not everyone who works for the Fed is appointed, but that is also true of the Supreme Court, Congress, the FBI, or any other part of the government. The leaders are political appointees and they oversee a bureaucratic system that includes many workers who are ostensibly apolitical.

>Seeing the tension over the years the Chairman, the President, and Congress implies to me that the government does not have absolute authority over the Fed.

Once again, just like the Supreme court. Both of these entities are designed to be more independent of the day-to-day political squabbles of the president and Congress.

[1] - https://www.federalreserve.gov/aboutthefed/structure-federal...

Re: What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)

#493

Post by zionic » Thu, Jan 06, 2022, 9:03 PM UTC

long_time_gone wrote: post #312

iso1631 wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Inflation is a flat tax of a few percentage points Flat tax on cash holdings, which poor people don't have. It's a negative tax on debt, which poor people tend to hold. It doesn't apply to assets. Now if wages don't keep track with inflation, that's not a tax, it's an employer reducing wages.

>It's a negative tax on debt, which poor people tend to hold. It doesn't apply to assets. Thank you!! This is the first time I've heard someone acknowledge this since the "inflation crisis" started. Inflation is good for student debt holders.

Their student debt might go down but so does their chance of ever owning a home.

They hoodwinked an entire generation of children into going six-figures in debt, made the high school diploma worthless etc.

Before: -HS degree -no debt -immediately start a factory job that makes enough for an average home, 2 cars, and a spouse that doesn’t work

Now: -4 year degree, delaying income in prime years -graduate with a small house-worth of debt, with no house -your new job’s earnings in real terms is barely enough to rent -your spouse has to work too -have to make one car work

The American people have been robbed of their prosperity and sold a bucket of lies.

Re: What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)

#494

Post by zionic » Thu, Jan 06, 2022, 9:04 PM UTC

iso1631 wrote: post #392

slg wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure the distinction you are making here. A flat tax is called that because it is flat in percentage not in nominal value. Yes, debtors will benefit more than creditors, but that doesn't mean it isn't a flat tax. Also it doesn't just impact cash which should be obvious from the last sentence. If inflation decreases the real amount owed by debtors, it also decreases the real amount that is owed to creditors, a…

> If inflation decreases the real amount owed by debtors, it also decreases the real amount that is owed to creditors, and therefore decreases the value of their investments. I'm sure that's upsetting for wealthy people with investments For the mom working 3 jobs at Macdonalds, as long as Macdonalds continues to pay an inflation linked salary, her debts being whittled away, that's great news. Now if Macdonalds can cu…

> For the mom working 3 jobs at Macdonalds, as long as Macdonalds continues to pay an inflation linked salary

Huge assumption. Wages have not kept up with inflation since the 1970’s. Know what has? Asset prices. Guess who owns stocks/gold/real estate?

Re: What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)

#495

Post by __MatrixMan__ » Thu, Jan 06, 2022, 9:05 PM UTC

jollybean wrote: post #146

__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be nice if the cost of rungs in the social later (housing, education, etc) wasn't so high that only certain kinds of people could achieve them. Many of the "your not allowed to do that"s of the past are still in place for entire neighborhoods, only the words changed.

In 1922 only 5% of people went to University - now 50% go on to post secondary which is largely due to cost and opportunity. Only about 50% finished HS - now it's 95%. Doctors were not very affordable by anyone - now it's >90%. Most people didn't have running water and electricity yet now it's almost 100%. The only thing that's not as nice as 'real estate' - housing was cheap, but the houses were crap, and often you…

All of these improvements, numerically speaking, and yet my wife regularly has classes of 40 where none of the students have parents that went to college, a quarter of them need glasses that they can't afford, and an eighth is homeless.

The size of the group that benefits from modernization is indeed growing, as your numbers point out, but if you're not in that group you're just as stuck as you've ever been.

Re: What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)

#496

Post by neycoda » Thu, Jan 06, 2022, 9:08 PM UTC

They didn't predict that I wouldn't be able read their article on my phone.

Re: What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)

#497

Post by beeboop » Thu, Jan 06, 2022, 9:14 PM UTC

Ancapistani wrote: post #476

beeboop wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He definitely missed the mark about alimony or men not bearing the majority of child support

I don't think he did. Alimony and child support do apply to women as well as men in the US, though it's obviously not equally distributed today. Even if we assume that's not because of a flawed system, I can think of several reasons it might be the case. For example, any or all of the following could cause that in a fair system: * wage earners are still disproportionately men * women tend to be much more likely to re…

Men pay ~95% of the dollars given/taken for child support in this country. It applies to women but only in a very very marginal way. Men going from >99% to 95% of child support costs isn't really a noteworthy change and doesn't align with a prediction that it would be meaningfully different.

Re: What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)

#498

Post by VirusNewbie » Thu, Jan 06, 2022, 9:16 PM UTC

Manuel_D wrote: post #396

VirusNewbie wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Inflationary monetary policy is wealth transfer into the upper class without most people realizing it. Wealth, be it institutions or individuals, will always push for central banking as it entrenches their power.

Is this really the case? Inflation favors debtors over creditors, the upper class tends to be the latter not the former. While it is the case that the value of savings goes down, the lower class are much less likely to save.

Yes, the majority of US equities is held by the upper class and corporate debt dwarfs consumer debt (including mortgages).

Re: What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)

#499

Post by beeboop » Thu, Jan 06, 2022, 9:17 PM UTC

yurishimo wrote: post #472

beeboop wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He definitely missed the mark about alimony or men not bearing the majority of child support

I don't think he did. My mother paid child support to my father after the divorce. I think in most instances, it's simply more convenient for the mother to take the children in a divorce, or the kids are too young to choose, so it ends that way by default. There is no rule for it though.

The default way still being women that get the children doesn't really change that the dynamic that gender versus child support is not meaningfully any different than the 1920s. Women's share of child support has gone from, I assume, ~0% in 1922 (I didn't look it up but I imagine it was less than 1%) to around 5% in 2022 in terms of dollars paid. Men going from 99% to 95% of child support costs isn't really a noteworthy change and doesn't align with a prediction that it would be meaningfully different.

Re: What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)

#500

Post by bilbo0s » Thu, Jan 06, 2022, 9:20 PM UTC

verisimi wrote: post #361

bilbo0s wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not that I disagree with the underlying ideas, but I'd argue we're not slaves. I'll concede that in practice we can definitely be thought something more akin to peasants, but what we live in today is not slavery. Now, is being a peasant, with all the concomitant limitations on one's livelihood any better than being a slave to the mental health of the bright and ambitious? Perhaps not, but it would be significantly mo…

If I am forced to give any percentage of my income to a government I do not want, I think that is slavery. You wouldn't think it ok if an individual forced you, or the mafia. The government is just big mafia. But that is not really the nub of it. Slavery is really a mental state - having been through the system we have been propagandised that the government is a good thing, it's the right way to manage ourselves - an…

If I am forced to give any percentage of my income to a government I do not want, I think that is slavery

This is a good example of what I'm talking about.

Maybe you think of it as slavery, but in reality, it's the very definition of peasantry.

Slavery is you get no money. And by the way, if you disagree with it, the power holder beats the tar out of you. Or maybe s/he just kills you and gets another slave. Whatever's most convenient at the time/place.

Other than money, there are also a host of other differences between how we live and slavery. Including the fact that slaves don't choose their masters. There is no right to leave. Less than expected productivity results in severe beatings. And on and on and on.

Again, peasantry is its own special form of perdition. No need to exaggerate to get that point across. I was only saying that it's clearly not slavery.