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FTC bans TurboTax from advertising 'free' services, calls deceptive advertising

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Re: FTC bans TurboTax from advertising 'free' services, calls deceptive advertising

#221

Post by andyjohnson0 »

ethbr1 wrote: post #93
wharvle wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anecdotally, it seems like working with fractions is where a lot of people fall off the math-train and never get back on. … yes, that early.

Fractions and negative numbers. And, to be fair, they're the first math concepts that aren't intuitive. Which IMHO leads to some people not studying, then feeling lost, then rationalizing their lack of effort as "I'm bad at math" or "Math is hard."

I'm ok with fractions, but fractional and/or negative exponents always give me problems. I suspect it might be something to do with being taught that "multiplication is repeated addition, exponentiation is repeated multiplication". The model doesn't extend properly.

Re: FTC bans TurboTax from advertising 'free' services, calls deceptive advertising

#222

Post by happymellon »

cityofdelusion wrote: post #54
sharps1 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had to look this up as I didn’t grow up in the States. It was A&W. https://www.snopes.com/news/2022/06/17/third-pound-burger-fr... Crazy.

This story has to be apocryphal, as fractions aren't _that_ rare, especially in the U.S. with its imperial system and third of a cup measurements or quarter inches or half miles and so on.

Or perhaps all those people on here who defend US Standard measurements over metric and quote the fractions they know over decimals as an advantage are a minority?

Perhaps the average Joe would be better off with mm rather than 1/16" increments.

Re: FTC bans TurboTax from advertising 'free' services, calls deceptive advertising

#223

Post by lupusreal »

devindotcom wrote: post #160
fantasyfacts wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

you made an account just to talk shit about the poor?

It isn't "talking shit", what he's saying is broadly true and you're not doing poor people any favors by pretending otherwise.

Re: FTC bans TurboTax from advertising 'free' services, calls deceptive advertising

#224

Post by CogitoCogito »

euroderf wrote: post #214
yurishimo wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But this also depends almost entirely on where you live. €100k in the almost any city in Netherlands, France, or Germany is a great income that can support a family with one earner. $250k might only put you in "solidly" middle class if you have to live in SF or NYC. The difference is that the $250k salaries are 99% of the time only widely available in these extreme HCOL cities. Healthcare for a family of 4 in some pa…

Efficiencies from health care competition are illusory when you properly scope it to include paperwork hassles, time hassles, and pressure on provides to skimp.

There basically is no healthcare competition in the US at all regardless of any qualifiers. You often don’t even know how much a procedure will cost you. That fact alone means there is no price competition. Even if in the past there were hospital competition (assuming you’re in the position where you have the time to shop around), hospitals are merging regionally to take care of that.

The US healthcare system is incredibly expensive and ineffective. Americans often like to come up explanations for this status quo but the fact is the system is trash when compared internationally.

Re: FTC bans TurboTax from advertising 'free' services, calls deceptive advertising

#225

Post by satao »

midasuni wrote: post #180
mfi wrote: post #168

In Sweden, for most citizen the tax authority does the tax declaration for you. If you don't want to do any changes (which most people doesn't have to), you simply write a text to them [1]. [1] https://skatteverket.se/servicelankar/otherlanguages/inengli...

How do private shareholders make a profit and thus increase the gdp from that?

by freeing people from wasting money on rentseekers and letting them spend money on more productive things?

Re: FTC bans TurboTax from advertising 'free' services, calls deceptive advertising

#226

Post by lupusreal »

zo1 wrote: post #184
fantasyfacts wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Some of the "better at planning" poor people have built up crude math to make it all makes sense, but seems overly complicated for someone like me. The one I noticed: "oh, I got $85 for selling that pot I made, I'll use that for the fridge repair." - Which is totally different to "oh I got $85, I'll just put it in the pool of my bank balance because I already budgeted for that fridge repair which costs $60". I tried…

One I've encountered is putting any surplus money into tattoos because they can't be stolen, repossessed or otherwise lost, thus making them a savvy place to put money.

Re: FTC bans TurboTax from advertising 'free' services, calls deceptive advertising

#227

Post by chmod775 »

lupusreal wrote: post #226
zo1 wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some of the "better at planning" poor people have built up crude math to make it all makes sense, but seems overly complicated for someone like me. The one I noticed: "oh, I got $85 for selling that pot I made, I'll use that for the fridge repair." - Which is totally different to "oh I got $85, I'll just put it in the pool of my bank balance because I already budgeted for that fridge repair which costs $60". I tried…

One I've encountered is putting any surplus money into tattoos because they can't be stolen, repossessed or otherwise lost, thus making them a savvy place to put money.

I believe whoever told you that may have been joking[1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joke

Re: FTC bans TurboTax from advertising 'free' services, calls deceptive advertising

#228

Post by chaosmonger7 »

fantasyfacts wrote: post #158
burkaman wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People who live paycheck to paycheck are very good at budgeting because they have to do it to survive, they don't need any more pressure. If anything it's richer people that could use a little prodding, but either way we don't need the government to be withholding extra money from people it thinks might have bad habits. > they get a big paycheck once a year to pay off whatever If you have something big to pay off, yo…

[flagged]

[flagged]

Re: FTC bans TurboTax from advertising 'free' services, calls deceptive advertising

#229

Post by geraldwhen »

yurishimo wrote: post #208
redrove wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you make $250k/yr+ in the US all of those problems melt away due to the availability of disposable income. In the EU you top out at €100-150k. I say this from experience as a European who's lived on both continents.

But this also depends almost entirely on where you live. €100k in the almost any city in Netherlands, France, or Germany is a great income that can support a family with one earner. $250k might only put you in "solidly" middle class if you have to live in SF or NYC. The difference is that the $250k salaries are 99% of the time only widely available in these extreme HCOL cities. Healthcare for a family of 4 in some pa…

This is patently false. 250k+ is readily available in cheaper cities. You just have to work at BigCoSoulStompers.

Re: FTC bans TurboTax from advertising 'free' services, calls deceptive advertising

#230

Post by lupusreal »

chmod775 wrote: post #227
lupusreal wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One I've encountered is putting any surplus money into tattoos because they can't be stolen, repossessed or otherwise lost, thus making them a savvy place to put money.

I believe whoever told you that may have been joking[1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joke

They were completely earnest. The joke followed that they can't take money with them when they die, but they can take tattoos. Pharaohs still have their tattoos, they point out.

There is also a general pattern of spending "extra" money on things like parties, experiences, consumables, etc. Better to spend the money on a pizza party and gocart trip for their kids than to stash it away in a savings account. Better to spend the money on beer for a party than even to hide it under their mattress.

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