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Scheduling Technology Leaves Low-Income Parents With Hours of Chaos

nytimes.com

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Re: Scheduling Technology Leaves Low-Income Parents With Hours of Chaos

#131

Post by dragonwriter »

zo1 wrote: post #130
angersock wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Consult your history--even in the event where going there was a choice, there are many, many ways to rig the game so that it becomes economically infeasible to leave again. You also assume that people have free choice; when you're near flat broke, it's easy to miss your other options.

I see, so you're going to argue against historical company towns instead of my as-yet-undetermined suggestion. Do you honestly think a civilized country or informed internet would allow a company town to exist if it behaved like the historical company towns? They'd be up in arms as soon as they found out. Though, to be fair. We have "company towns" right now in Dubai and those oil-rich middle-east cities. Guess who's…

> Do you honestly think a civilized country or informed internet would allow a company town to exist if it behaved like the historical company towns?

If you want to propose something that is distinct from the historical phenomenon labelled "company towns", I suggest you use a different name (though your description seems to fit exactly into the historical mold, so I'm not going to be convinced that there is a meaningful difference unless you have a concrete explanation as to how your model would avoid recurrence of those problems once the laws put in place that would prevent anything on that model in most US jurisdictions that were motivated by the experience of company towns, such as state and federal laws imposing minimum wages and requiring that such be paid in cash or equivalents, were repealed to allow your new-model company towns.)

> Do you honestly think a civilized country or informed internet would allow a company town to exist if it behaved like the historical company towns?

Well, no, absent compelling arguments otherwise, I'm rather convinced that a country that allowed "company towns" as you have described them, given the historical experience that demonstrates the problems with that model, would, in that respect at least, be, ipso facto, uncivilized.

Re: Scheduling Technology Leaves Low-Income Parents With Hours of Chaos

#132

Post by _delirium »

Kenji wrote: post #57
_delirium wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The whole thing is completely self-inflicted. No, it's inflicted by a broken society. In a working society, at least a working first-world society, everyone has at least a basic standard of living. This allows both a flexible economic system (entrepreneurship, job-changing, etc.) and family life to coexist: your company going bankrupt does not mean your kid can't attend school or eat. The American solution seems to…

"No, it's inflicted by a broken society." No, it's not. The broken society didn't make the woman pregnant and give birth. Also, 'broken' sounds really melodramatic. "In a working society, at least a working first-world society, everyone has at least a basic standard of living." Is having and maintaining a Ferrari a basic standard of living? No? Well, that's how expensive kids are, no, they're even more expensive. Tha…

Unlike having a nation full of Ferraris, having a nation where at least a replacement-rate of kids are born is necessary to keep it from aging and eventually dying out. Human reproduction is not a random consumer product, but an integral part of the continuation of human societies. Therefore, society puts in place a social system to ensure that kids can be raised, educated, etc., but does not put in place a system to ensure widespread Ferrari ownership.

Re: Scheduling Technology Leaves Low-Income Parents With Hours of Chaos

#133

Post by crpatino »

ars wrote: post #121
crpatino wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An example from late 19th century Mexico: Tiendas de Raya. The drill worked like this. You live in a poverty riden rural area, and an "enganchador" (lit. hooker, but its kind or a recruiter) comes town and offers you a job elsewhere. You sign up and leave with this guy. Upon arrival, you learn that you have to pay for the recruiter fee, which is always more than whatever money managed you brought with you for the tri…

I think his proposal for a company town is that all that stuff is free. Daycare, longings, travel, food, medical care, all free (or more accurately included in your paycheck). The only things that cost are luxuries. Seems to me that would solve the problem you outline.

It sound pretty Utopian to me. The problem with giving full control of the means needed for your own existence to some external entity (even a "Benevolent Tyrant"), is that when that entity begins making unreasonable demands you will be compelled to say "yes" under duress.

Re: Scheduling Technology Leaves Low-Income Parents With Hours of Chaos

#134

Post by ende »

dragonwriter wrote: post #129
ars wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think his proposal for a company town is that all that stuff is free. Daycare, longings, travel, food, medical care, all free (or more accurately included in your paycheck). The only things that cost are luxuries. Seems to me that would solve the problem you outline.

> Daycare, longings, travel, food, medical care, all free (or more accurately included in your paycheck). Or, more accurately still, the amount of those things that the company decides that you should get without paying extra replaces the bulk of your paycheck. Anything more you want you have to buy with the pittance that remains (or on credit), from suppliers you have access to given the travel, communications, etc.…

If you illegalize debtors prison (which it now is), one can just walk off and go elsewhere.

Re: Scheduling Technology Leaves Low-Income Parents With Hours of Chaos

#135

Post by aianus »

ars wrote: post #122
aianus wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For what it's worth I wouldn't have a kid without $1 million in liquid assets set aside for him. It seems evil to me to have a kid without enough money to feel confident he'll never have to work for money. But then most people think I'm nuts.

By the time you have $1 million you will be too old to have a kid (especially if female). People really need to start getting married earlier. If you marry in your early twenties having a child at that time is not a problem, even if you don't have tons of savings yet. And aside from the biology of having a child late, simply raising a child is much harder when you are older (late thirties), because your energy level…

I'm pretty sure men can have children into their 70s. And with $1 million I don't have to raise the kid by myself like normal people. I can use nannies and boarding schools.

My parents already gave a standard middle-class upbringing. If I can't do better by my children, what's the point?

Re: Scheduling Technology Leaves Low-Income Parents With Hours of Chaos

#136

Post by ars »

aianus wrote: post #135
ars wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By the time you have $1 million you will be too old to have a kid (especially if female). People really need to start getting married earlier. If you marry in your early twenties having a child at that time is not a problem, even if you don't have tons of savings yet. And aside from the biology of having a child late, simply raising a child is much harder when you are older (late thirties), because your energy level…

I'm pretty sure men can have children into their 70s. And with $1 million I don't have to raise the kid by myself like normal people. I can use nannies and boarding schools. My parents already gave a standard middle-class upbringing. If I can't do better by my children, what's the point?

> I'm pretty sure men can have children into their 70s.

Sometimes, but sperm quality declines, leading to more birth defects and it takes longer to succeed. And a 70 year old is simply not a suitable father.

I assume you were planning a may/cecember marriage? Which is pretty cruel to the wife, and to the kids who will loose their father MUCH too early.

Kids need their father very much in their 30's. If you are waiting long enough that you are dead, or even just declined you are not doing well by them.

> I don't have to raise the kid by myself like normal people. I can use nannies and boarding schools.

You don't even have kids and already you hate them?

> My parents already gave a standard middle-class upbringing. If I can't do better by my children, what's the point?

OK, now you REALLY make no sense. A sentence before you want to give them a horrible childhood (using nannies too much leads to attachment issues, and various disorders).

And now you want to do better?

I have a feeling you have no idea whatsoever about what children actually need out of childhood. It's not money. It's love, attention, and approval. Having lots of money is detrimental to all of them.

And your standard is ridiculous anyway - if every generation refused to have kids until they could do it "better" no one at all would have kids.

Re: Scheduling Technology Leaves Low-Income Parents With Hours of Chaos

#137

Post by ars »

aianus wrote: post #87
kasey_junk wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without trying to poke holes in your economic assumptions (which I think I could), giving your kid 15K a year seems a lot less valuable than teaching them self reliance, logical reasoning, frugality, a love of education/learning, work ethic, etc. You can do all of those things without being a rich parent, and there is at least anecdotal evidence that a trust fund impairs someones ability to learn these things. The id…

Well they didn't choose to be born so leaving them with the option of killing themselves or spending most of their lives doing things they don't enjoy just to stay alive seems cruel to me. I would hope I could teach them all of those things you outlined and have them be happy and productive on their own terms, not some other rich guy's.

> or spending most of their lives doing things they don't enjoy just to stay alive seems cruel to me.

I assume you mean poverty? The parent having money is associated with kids having less money later in life, but it's not the cause of it.

If you want them to do things they enjoy give them skills and confidence. If you give them money instead you do them harm.

> I would hope I could teach them all of those things you outlined and have them be happy and productive on their own terms, not some other rich guy's.

You can't. It's a reality of humanity that giving people things too easily leads to misery. People need to WORK for their success if they are to be happy.

I'm very tempted to advise you not to have kids because of your weird views, but I won't, because I suspect you are actually just testing out your views to see what other people think of them. If you are willing to learn from the replies you got then you'll do fine.

Re: Scheduling Technology Leaves Low-Income Parents With Hours of Chaos

#138

Post by [deleted] »

aianus wrote: post #135
ars wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By the time you have $1 million you will be too old to have a kid (especially if female). People really need to start getting married earlier. If you marry in your early twenties having a child at that time is not a problem, even if you don't have tons of savings yet. And aside from the biology of having a child late, simply raising a child is much harder when you are older (late thirties), because your energy level…

I'm pretty sure men can have children into their 70s. And with $1 million I don't have to raise the kid by myself like normal people. I can use nannies and boarding schools. My parents already gave a standard middle-class upbringing. If I can't do better by my children, what's the point?

[deleted]

Re: Scheduling Technology Leaves Low-Income Parents With Hours of Chaos

#139

Post by _delirium »

ars wrote: post #137
aianus wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well they didn't choose to be born so leaving them with the option of killing themselves or spending most of their lives doing things they don't enjoy just to stay alive seems cruel to me. I would hope I could teach them all of those things you outlined and have them be happy and productive on their own terms, not some other rich guy's.

> or spending most of their lives doing things they don't enjoy just to stay alive seems cruel to me. I assume you mean poverty? The parent having money is associated with kids having less money later in life, but it's not the cause of it. If you want them to do things they enjoy give them skills and confidence. If you give them money instead you do them harm. > I would hope I could teach them all of those things you…

> People need to WORK for their success if they are to be happy.

I would guess this is not true on average. If anything, I would guess the opposite: the Waltons, Kochs, Kennedys, etc., who inherited their money and are able to do whatever kind of bullshit they want with it, are happier.

Re: Scheduling Technology Leaves Low-Income Parents With Hours of Chaos

#140

Post by streptomycin »

TheCoelacanth wrote: post #120
streptomycin wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you expect endless increases in population to affect the climate?

That's irrelevant, because developed countries (i.e. the countries that are in the position to have a social safety net) almost universally have shrinking populations, not growing ones.

It's not irrelevant. More people (especially more people in developed countries) = more CO2. You can't spin that away. Even if the US population goes from 300M to 200M, that would produce more CO2 than going from 300M to 100M.
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