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Post by colechristensen » Tue, Jun 30, 2015, 6:33 AM UTC

saryant wrote: post #150

colechristensen wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People are also missing the basic fact: with inflation and interest rates on par and both so low ... government bonds aren't profit centers. They store value and gain just enough interest to beat inflation. It's about your savings not evaporating over the years more than big greedy profits. If you look at the interest payments for the US debt over the last 25 years ... despite the recent debt bubble... the actual int…

I absolutely agree. I was mostly replying to the uninformed belief that the benefits of investment accrue only to the "rich" (a loaded term I'm loathe to use).

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Jun 30, 2015, 11:28 AM UTC

gress wrote: post #141

umeshunni wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Global inequality has been sharply dropping over the past few decades as hundreds of millions of people in India and China have been lifted out of poverty. Amusing that you think inequality has been rising.

It has been rising in the U.S. and Europe. I imagine you're pretending you didn't know that, but it's not clear why.

Post by wslack » Tue, Jun 30, 2015, 1:45 PM UTC

acdha wrote: post #110

steven777400 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interestingly, they say 18F jobs are capped at four years. I wonder if this is a harbinger of change overall in government employment from being "lifers" to a more mobile workforce where people perform "civil service" at all levels as a more temporary thing (like elected positions are intended to be). On the other hand, it also strikes me a possible way to select for younger (less encumbered/tied down) applicants wit…

I think it's simply a sign of how difficult it is to hire permanent staff which are seen as long-term commitments in a way that NTE (Not-To-Exceed) staff are not. My impression from the outside is that people are working on a more permanent system to keep people around indefinitely without losing a way to jettison the retire-in-place types and are working to get something in place by the time it starts to matter. I d…

Post by dragonwriter » Tue, Jun 30, 2015, 2:05 PM UTC

gress wrote: post #142

dragonwriter wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or one might mean that it has redistributed the other way, while other factors in society were redistributing from the poor to the rich, and that the net imbalance would be far worse without the mitigating effect of the internet. Your presentation presumes that the internet is the only redistributive factor that existed in the time under consideration.

True, but pointing out multiple interpretations adds nothing unless you can tell us about the other factors. What are they?

Post by jchrisa » Tue, Jun 30, 2015, 5:46 PM UTC

simoncion wrote: post #102

jchrisa wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been working on p2p sync since 2008 or so. Now we have a real deployed base. I feel lucky because I chose the tech for it's political possibilities. This keeps me on track on the days when it'd be hard to focus otherwise.

What's the p2p sync software that you've been working on for the past seven years? (This is a part/spare-time project, yes?)