261–270 of 1001 posts
One thing I realized over time America is very expensive to live in. Everything is so expensive that only the rich are rich and everyone from middle class and down are on the poor spectrum. It’s done purposefully under the cover of freedom, choice and taxes. It’s impossible to change now at least I am very pessimistic about it. It doesn’t help that the population density is very low and so many of the services just d…
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> living paycheck to paycheck. This phrase is used so often, but I don't know how meaningful it is supposed to be A family might make $300,000 a year and be living "paycheck-to-paycheck" while also maxing out 401k contributions, paying a mortgage on a $2 million home, and paying $80,000 a year in private school tuition. Are we supposed to think that such a family is in worse financial shape than a family making $40,0…
It's somewhat of a mindset question and somewhat of a wealth question. Mr $300k may have zero months in an emergency account, but be stable in his job as a doctor and not worry about finding work - and may actually "feel poor" because he barely has any "fun money" to waste and feels he can't buy coffee in the morning. Mr $40k a year may have 6 months of expenses in the bank, saving half his income to FIRE, and know t…
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That's just objectively untrue. https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/median-in...
I see Norway on that list (no surprise). What is so sad is how much better it could be in the U.S.… but for some odd notion that Billionaires and Corporations are thought to owe so little and the people of this country thought to deserve so little.
I see one real thing here - since 2017, the sense of stability in everyone's lives has been throughly upended - and perhaps, stability really matters for people to the point that rich, but unstable and precarious life feels worse than poorer, but predictable one. Too many things change too fast and no one knows what comes next. A lot of those things were actually positive changes, but people are afraid and bitterly u…
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Happiness = Reality minus Expectation (and sadness is the negative values). For example, if you expected your country to have checks and balances and not empower people who tried to damage the democracy, the reality would sadden you. If you expected to be able to have 2 kids, afford healthcare, not worry about loss of income, live near family in a 2k+ sq ft home, and fly to Disneyworld and Hawaii for vacation, then c…
I wonder how avocados became the poster child for unreasonably expensive food. They're not actually that costly.
The earlier NYT article on the topic was interesting: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/26/opinion/economy-attitudes... It was succinctly put: the top 10% of earners - those making 250k or more - do 50% of the spending. If you're a company with a product or service, are you going to cater to the 90% or the affluent 10%? Clearly the latter - so as a result the bottom 90% of the country just feels like they're "keeping u…
I'd like to see a spending breakdown. I wonder just how much of that 50% of spending is stuff that the bottom 90% would actually be competing for -- eg: an expensive bathroom remodel, a luxury car, etc, vs something basic such as tennis shoes or groceries from the local market.
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"non-scientific worldview" I find this an oft repeated meme. The men to whom we own our scientific understanding were all deeply religious (not just lived in a time when everyone went to church) For example - Darwin had trained to be an Anglican vikar prior to his journey on the Beagle and wrote to his future wife letters full of discussion of divinity. Newton was obviously deeply religious and wrote more about relig…
They were scientific in spite of being religious. Not because of it. > that I don't think are matched by atheism at its best There are plenty of scientists including Feynman and Hawkings. These are unrelated things.
Can you justify that claim?
>> plenty of scientists including Feynman and Hawkings.
Feynman is a good example of that. He was raised in a religious family and went to synagogue every week. His dad challenged him to continuously challenge the orthodox knowledge which I suspect the father himself saw within the talmudic tradition etc.
As feynman rejected Judaism and religion in general he nonetheless hung on and hugely benefited from the approach his religious father instilled on him. Similar to what I said about Einstein above I am not trying to claim feynman for religion but I think he's very far from "today's atheists" if that makes sense. If feynman didn't have his father (for whom religion was integral) I doubt he'd turn out who he was.
>> These are unrelated things
As per above I don't see it that way.
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there's over 20 million millionaires in the USA, that's like, what, 1 in 20?
I would wager a lot of "wealth" is in the value of the homes they live in. That is it is illiquid wealth they cannot use. When you factor in medical debt, their liquid wealth is a lot less rosy.
Housing is actually quite liquid as it is incredibly easy to mortgage. More likely you are overestimating how much housing value is actually there. The majority of American homeowners have already tapped into that liquidity. Owning a house that is worth, say, $1MM on the open market doesn't necessarily mean that your net worth is $1MM.