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LA wildfires force thousands to evacuate, NASA JPL closed

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Re: LA wildfires force thousands to evacuate, NASA JPL closed

#341

Post by mullingitover »

nradov wrote: post #332
mullingitover wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

California voters had a question before them in this election of whether or not to ban the practice of slavery, and they voted to keep practicing slavery.

It's not slavery. The inmate firefighters are paid below minimum wage but it's completely voluntary. They can quit any time and go sit in state prison if they prefer. We can argue about whether they should be paid more , but let's not trivialize real slavery by misusing the term.

In general when you're a "prisoner with a job," that's slavery, even if there's some pittance of a wage involved. They're paid $10 a day, let's not pretend this is a fair wage for a fair day's work. This is a form of economic warfare against the working class, who shouldn't have to compete against prison labor.

Re: LA wildfires force thousands to evacuate, NASA JPL closed

#342

Post by martinpw »

sbohacek wrote: post #163

The relative humidity is 0.33 [1]. The previous lowest recorded relative humidity was 0.36 in Needles CA and Iran [2] [1] https://www.weather.gov/wrh/timeseries?site=KSMO [2] https://www.wunderground.com/cat6/world-record-low-humidity-...

I wonder if there is a problem with the data collection at that time? From your link, it looks like to drop much lower than 0.33, lowest value on that chart is 0.11, which is massively lower than any previous worldwide value, before jumping up to ~10.

Re: LA wildfires force thousands to evacuate, NASA JPL closed

#343

Post by jandrewrogers »

geysersam wrote: post #318
culi wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry for your loss. Are you lucky enough to be in a place where insurers in California are still operating? Hopefully you can at least get financial situation taken off your mind

Are there areas of California where insurers are not operating anymore because of wildfires? That's crazy

Yes, there are parts of California that are uninsurable against wildfires. Technically they could be insurable but State regulators will not allow insurance companies to raise premiums sufficient to cover the actuarial risk. The necessary premiums are prohibitively expensive for homeowners, but anything less risks bankrupting the insurance companies and increases their reinsurance costs which also must be passed on to homeowners.

This is mostly on the California government, since the high insurance premiums are a side effect of disastrous wildfire mitigation policy in California. More proactive and competent wildfire mitigation would reduce the risk and therefore make insurance premiums more reasonable.

Re: LA wildfires force thousands to evacuate, NASA JPL closed

#344

Post by rayiner »

azemetre wrote: post #324
rayiner wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recommend to everyone to get out of cities and counties that have large pension liabilities. You will be less safe, your kids will be educated more poorly, and your quality of public services will be whittled away because the money is going to retirees and debt. E.g. Retirement benefits and debt service took up 43% of Chicago’s budget in 2022: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/30/opinion/chicago-illinois-... . A deca…

And go where exactly? To towns that don't even have the tax base to support themselves and lack jobs? It's not like suburbs aren't sitting on financial bombs either.

https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/fiscal-stab...

I moved to unincorporated exurban Maryland. The state government is a mess, but it’s mostly preoccupied dealing with Baltimore. Our county is great. Good schools with modest per student spending, the friendliest police I’ve ever interacted with. Even our county landfill is one of the cleanest and most orderly facilities I’ve ever seen. Nicer than most of New York City for sure.

Re: LA wildfires force thousands to evacuate, NASA JPL closed

#345

Post by Mistletoe »

saagarjha wrote: post #311
Mistletoe wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>very little that can be done in these situations I don't agree with that. People can choose to not live there. There is an entire country to live in and we keep crowding in what seem to the worst places to live and then act surprised when it goes badly. Climate change is going to make some places uninhabitable, that's why we tried to prevent it, but no one cares.

Where should they live? People living in the Midwest being hit by freezing winters get told to move to warmer weather…then Georgia gets hit by hurricanes. Move to California to avoid those and your house burns down. It turns out that climate change affects weather everywhere.

The Midwest is paradise compared to crowding into a desert with no water and winds that whip flames into something like a blast furnace.

https://gisgeography.com/us-precipitation-map/

https://projects.propublica.org/climate-migration/

Re: LA wildfires force thousands to evacuate, NASA JPL closed

#346

Post by colechristensen »

azemetre wrote: post #324
rayiner wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recommend to everyone to get out of cities and counties that have large pension liabilities. You will be less safe, your kids will be educated more poorly, and your quality of public services will be whittled away because the money is going to retirees and debt. E.g. Retirement benefits and debt service took up 43% of Chicago’s budget in 2022: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/30/opinion/chicago-illinois-... . A deca…

And go where exactly? To towns that don't even have the tax base to support themselves and lack jobs? It's not like suburbs aren't sitting on financial bombs either.

Not every city is drowning in those kinds of liabilities.

Re: LA wildfires force thousands to evacuate, NASA JPL closed

#347

Post by perihelions »

consumer451 wrote: post #150

NASA's FIRMS site shows the scale of both fires. They are huge given their proximity to the city. https://firms.modaps.eosdis.nasa.gov/map/#d:24hrs;@-118.57,3...

Note that some of the small flagged regions are spurious triggers on industrial waste heat (oil refineries, power plants, and something else). There aren't as many fires as that map naively would suggest.

Re: LA wildfires force thousands to evacuate, NASA JPL closed

#348

Post by mulmen »

nradov wrote: post #332
mullingitover wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

California voters had a question before them in this election of whether or not to ban the practice of slavery, and they voted to keep practicing slavery.

It's not slavery. The inmate firefighters are paid below minimum wage but it's completely voluntary. They can quit any time and go sit in state prison if they prefer. We can argue about whether they should be paid more , but let's not trivialize real slavery by misusing the term.

It's very literally slavery. You don't have to deny it because the practice is legal in the United States. As you say, they can do this work or they can sit in state prison. I don't have to squint to see how that's a threat. These prisoners didn't volunteer to be in prison. If you gave them the choice of fighting fires or going free I doubt many would pick the $10.00 a day firefighting gig.

Re: LA wildfires force thousands to evacuate, NASA JPL closed

#349

Post by bwock »

anon291 wrote: post #290
mulmen wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm still uneasy about it. They're in a vulnerable position and the alternative is unpleasant because of the same people offering the "opportunity". The pay is only legal because they're prisoners. If it was a fair wage I'd be more comfortable although still uneasy.

They're being provided with a full life while the rest of us pay for it. If, at market rate, their earnings make up for the expense the state pays for them, I'd be willing to let them earn it, but I doubt any are earning that much.

Yeah, but the amendment was to get rid of slavery. And it failed.

Re: LA wildfires force thousands to evacuate, NASA JPL closed

#350

Post by 8note »

rayiner wrote: post #273
darth_avocado wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with that though is that the overall budget includes big ticket items like pensions and overtime. And cuts often directly are from live services. So even though it’s 2% of the overall budget, the cut could still be significant to the availability of firefighters and crucial things like response times.

I recommend to everyone to get out of cities and counties that have large pension liabilities. You will be less safe, your kids will be educated more poorly, and your quality of public services will be whittled away because the money is going to retirees and debt. E.g. Retirement benefits and debt service took up 43% of Chicago’s budget in 2022: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/30/opinion/chicago-illinois-... . A deca…

i dont think i want to live in a place that will abandon me when im old. doesnt seem ideal
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