161–170 of 322 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Having two or three jobs is not really conductive to free time.
In the US per official data ~5% have more than one job (and that includes lawyers doing consultancy for example) https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12026620
Not convinced, plenty of countries (e.g. UK) don’t have such stringent don’t have strict zoning laws and also don’t have $4 food
Basic pre-packaged sandwiches can be had for under $2.
For about $4.75 you can get a sandwich, pastry, and a latte from just about any of the chain corner shops (Tesco Express etc)
It's not gourmet, but it's a solid affordable option that millions of people eat every day. There's no real equivalent of this in the US sadly.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Protests come when people are pushed into a corner with little other choice. Participation is more prevalent when people have free time in their lives. Our economics has systematically squeezed free time out in favor of more work to most of our workforce, and particularly hard for young people. One reason so many local city policies favor the old, is that they're retired and have the time to participate
I don't think economics have squeezed out free time -- phones squeeze out all our free time.
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The ones who will “always be there” can get their papers for permanent residence done and vote. If they don’t want to (or can’t since they don’t have the legal grounds to even stay there for longer), then they shouldn’t have a say on decisions that can permanently change things about the place.
There will always be the population of people who will be in short term housing or similar situations, but due to their circumstances the individual people will come and go. 5 years from now the makeup of the itinerant population may be almost entirely different, but the people in that population are in the same circumstances, especially if they don't have any political representation. Who is going to speak for the p…
I’m also not expecting to fly to country X, book an airbnb for 6 months or get a summer job, and then just somehow be entitled to vote there.
I serve as a planning commissioner for my city, and my city just recently tried to overhaul our zoning code to allow for more affordability and better economic outcomes for our citizens and future as a city. Here is what I have learned: In the US, few people participate or care about local laws, zoning, and elections, or even understand why participation may be important. In a citizen ballot to determine if we should…
As much as I'd love to have something like Matsuya in the US, it's just not practical here. I'm surprised it hasn't been talked about yet, but zoning is also a major factor in the spiraling of housing costs.
No one sells $4 lunch bowls in the US because no one wants to work for minimum wage for 12 hours a day. The article makes it seem like a great idea, but people in Japan who run these stores work like dogs and live in poverty for their whole lives.
Does the US really lack cheap easily exploitable labor? What about Uber taxi drivers?
Ok… if this is the case, then why are food trucks charging $18 for a burger and fries now? It isn’t all zoning laws.
from the article: > But the restaurant industry fights to limit food trucks. On average, food trucks must handle 45 separate regulatory procedures and spend $28,276 on associated fees. Lets napkin-math this. If we assume a food truck has margins at the upper end of the fast-casual industry of 9%, then each $18 burger-and-fries nets 1.62 in profit. $28,276 / 1.62 = 17,454 burgers-and-fries. If you were open every day…
This looks crazy because it is incorrect. In your premise, that 9% profit margin includes the regulatory costs for a brick and mortar restaurant already. The only way your logic works out is if truck regulations are on average $30k more expensive than a regular building, which they almost certainly are not.
You can’t even begin to do the calculation without knowing the breakdown underlying the profit margin you cite.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The ones who will “always be there” can get their papers for permanent residence done and vote. If they don’t want to (or can’t since they don’t have the legal grounds to even stay there for longer), then they shouldn’t have a say on decisions that can permanently change things about the place.
That is only possible with stable and legal housing. Not everyone is privileged to be in that situation, especially not with the housing market in many countries. With your thinking you are creating a class of subhumans where you enjoy the benefits of their labour but you are not allowing them to vote. Like African Americans in the US not that long ago.
Black Americans are not nomads. We're forced out by them.
Not convinced, plenty of countries (e.g. UK) don’t have such stringent don’t have strict zoning laws and also don’t have $4 food
>don’t have such stringent don’t have strict zoning laws I thought the planning process in UK is even more perilous because of the lack of zoning laws? Everything is up to council review, which basically means vibes based instead of something that's codified.
It's totally normal to have shops, restaurants and houses in the same area, and often on the same street.
Yes, a bowl at chipotle in the US might be 2x the price (more, probably) of a Japanese bowl, but it matters if I am getting 2x the calories also.
And there are foods in the US that are technically as cost effective, although maybe not as nutritious, like pizza which they mention, that can be around $1-$3 per slice. (Not my first choice for a lunch, but I could pickup a large 3 topping dominos pizza for $10 and make 3-4 lunches out of it, for example)