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Come here and work on hard problems – except the ones on our doorstep

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Re: Come here and work on hard problems – except the ones on our doorstep

#281

Post by nawitus »

tokenadult wrote: post #181
tobinfricke wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having moved from the U.S. to northern Germany, I have to say: the difference is shocking. Here, mentally unstable homeless people are not a daily sight on the city streets. In fact, I have seen only one San Francisco-style lunatic: and he was, indeed, raving in English. Saying that "United States social policy is [not] a model for anywhere" must be an understatement. I would ask: what social policy? Any aid from the…

Having moved from the U.S. to northern Germany I'd really love to learn about what is actually done in Europe. Where is a "mentally unstable" person to be found in Germany? If a "San Francisco-style lunatic" (like the one you saw in public in Germany) is encountered out in public in Germany, where is he put? P.S. I have adequate reading knowledge of German to be able to read German-language links about what is done f…

>I'd really love to learn about what is actually done in Europe. Where is a "mentally unstable" person to be found in Germany? If a "San Francisco-style lunatic" (like the one you saw in public in Germany) is encountered out in public in Germany, where is he put?

Some notes about the Finnish system:

There are plenty of psychiatric hospitals where most mentally ill people are (those who are not cared by their parents or relatives). There are some alcoholics/"crazy people" on the streets, but most of them have housing that they pay for themselves (through social security) or they live in special apartments for homeless people.

The whole country has about 1000 homeless people (for 5 million citizens). They could pay for their rent since they're entitled to "toimeentulotuki", a sum of about 700-1000 euros per month, but they probably spend it on alcohol or are unable to fill in the papers correctly (not an expert on homeless people here).

There's no official minimum wage, but "general employement contracts" make the minimum wage about 7-10€ depending on the job. There's some regulation on rents too.

Re: Come here and work on hard problems – except the ones on our doorstep

#282

Post by arethuza »

LekkoscPiwa wrote: post #268
pyoung wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The lack of universal health care probably exacerbates the homelessness situation in the U.S. With that said, what you see in San Francisco is largely a product of the combination of homeless friendly policies and tolerable weather. Many of the 'homeless' you see during the day don't actually sleep on the street (although a decent number do) and actually reside in SRO's, subsidized housing, and shelters (One complain…

European nations would not be able to afford universal healthcare and all the welfare if they had to pay for their security. US bases in Europe are great financial aid. I never hear discussions about Iran or Russia being a possible threat in Europe. I do in the US. Which is funny because it really is much bigger problem for Europeans to have guys like Putin and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at their door steps. Never happens.…

EU countries spend roughly half the amount on defence that the US does. Given that the US spends an insane amount on its military that seems plenty enough to me.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_of_the_European_Union

Possibly also worth mentioning the tens of billions of dollars (and many hundreds of lives) that countries like the UK have spent in fighting mainly US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Re: Come here and work on hard problems – except the ones on our doorstep

#283

Post by LekkoscPiwa »

just_hobbyst wrote: post #272
LekkoscPiwa wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

European nations would not be able to afford universal healthcare and all the welfare if they had to pay for their security. US bases in Europe are great financial aid. I never hear discussions about Iran or Russia being a possible threat in Europe. I do in the US. Which is funny because it really is much bigger problem for Europeans to have guys like Putin and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at their door steps. Never happens.…

Bullshit. Finland doesn't have US bases on it's territory and all it's security is paid by the country itself. Plus, it always is under direct threat from Russia. Despite of that (or maybe because of that?) it does have a decent universal healthcare system. Besides, having US base on your territory is not a guaranty of security - South Vietnam had a lot of them and it didn't help them.

Yeah, that's why socialism is exported by Russia. You see: normally people would vote for security/military spending and not social care. But that's exactly what Russians, i.e. KGB do. They export socialism to the elites of countries they want to weaken.

If you study Russian expansionism since its inception hundreds of years ago, their strategy has always been the same. Russia strategy for centuries has been always the same: start weakening countries you want to invade decades before military action by the means of exporting intellectual fashions that will destroy country's defense system. They use spies and agents heavily for that. Polish kings used to be Russian agents way before Russia invaded Poland. Isn't that genius? Sponsor some crazy parties that want to cut military spending or some other that will introduce social chaos and not talk about real issues (i.e. "rights" of different groups of people, introduce heavy political correctness to avoid important topics), all the stuff to rotten country from inside first. In XX/XXI century this means helping create in targeted country via KGB socialistic elites, socialistic media, education creating weak confused people. So they will never vote for parties advocating strong military and patriotism.

So, this much better for Russia, this much worse for Finland. First thing KGB does is to make sure you (as a country) loose your common sense. Military spending when neighboring Russia? What for, right? No, we'll spend it all on help for the poor. Well, what I can say: Good Luck!

BTW: http://www.therightsphere.com/2013/04/putins-russia-to-make-...

Re: Come here and work on hard problems – except the ones on our doorstep

#284

Post by just_hobbyst »

thatswrong0 wrote: post #222
misc_closet wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When the poor have no money they can't pay entrepreneurs. When the super-rich have all the money, the super-rich drive up the cost of living. The middle class then must directly serve the interests of the rich in order to get enough profit to afford the higher cost of living. It quickly becomes uneconomical to sell anything to poor people. It's a poverty spiral. Uneducated families just get more uneducated without st…

> When the super-rich have all the money, the super-rich drive up the cost of living. For the sake of argument, let's assume that the super-rich spend the same or a similar proportion of their income on necessities as everyone else (meaning that they buy more food, more clothing, more housing, etc.). What does this do? It increases the demand for food, clothing, housing , etc. in the area. This is _not_ a bad thing.…

> let's assume that the super-rich spend the same or a similar proportion of their income on necessities as everyone else (meaning that they buy more food, more clothing, more housing, etc.).

This is equivalent to saying "let's assume 2+2=5, so you see that 0=1". You need to revise basic economics.

Re: Come here and work on hard problems – except the ones on our doorstep

#285

Post by TheBoff »

LekkoscPiwa wrote: post #268
pyoung wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The lack of universal health care probably exacerbates the homelessness situation in the U.S. With that said, what you see in San Francisco is largely a product of the combination of homeless friendly policies and tolerable weather. Many of the 'homeless' you see during the day don't actually sleep on the street (although a decent number do) and actually reside in SRO's, subsidized housing, and shelters (One complain…

European nations would not be able to afford universal healthcare and all the welfare if they had to pay for their security. US bases in Europe are great financial aid. I never hear discussions about Iran or Russia being a possible threat in Europe. I do in the US. Which is funny because it really is much bigger problem for Europeans to have guys like Putin and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at their door steps. Never happens.…

You really the NHS costs less per-capita in tax than US healthcare?

Re: Come here and work on hard problems – except the ones on our doorstep

#286

Post by shpiel »

dominostars wrote: post #230

San Francisco homelessness is not a question about rich vs. poor. It's a question about what to do with people who are mentally handicapped and/or drug abusers. This is partially a money problem, but it's largely a social problem. A lot of other countries deal with this better because they have stronger family support structures. Programming can help, but this isn't a programming problem. And there's no money in it,…

I work in the Downtown Crossing section of Boston, which has the one of the highest visible homeless populations in the Boston area. I was also consistently troubled by the number of homeless people I encountered to and from work.

It really helped to volunteer at a nearby homeless shelter (Pine Street Inn). I was comforted to see some of worst cases (including people I encountered daily) have access to meals, a clinic, a shelter, and treated with courtesy.

I was also struck by how many people seemed normal - not someone who was mentally ill or spent time on the street.

In general America fulfills a lot of need with private charity - which can occasionally be really impressive. When I worked at a large financial institution there were lots of opportunities for matched giving and volunteering opportunities. I wish tech companies would do this more.

Re: Come here and work on hard problems – except the ones on our doorstep

#287

Post by bicknergseng »

dominostars wrote: post #230

San Francisco homelessness is not a question about rich vs. poor. It's a question about what to do with people who are mentally handicapped and/or drug abusers. This is partially a money problem, but it's largely a social problem. A lot of other countries deal with this better because they have stronger family support structures. Programming can help, but this isn't a programming problem. And there's no money in it,…

I had no idea "quire" was another way of saying "choir," with the exception that "quire" may also refer to a measure of paper. Interesting.

Re: Come here and work on hard problems – except the ones on our doorstep

#288

Post by shpiel »

tobinfricke wrote: post #242
jarrett wrote: post #179

This article leaves out an important point: Most, if not all, programmers I know do care about these issues, but we can't solve them. We would if we could, but it's not what our profession is good at. The title of the article, "come here and work on hard problems – except the ones on our doorstep," speaks to this. We programmers have the tools to solve many interesting and important problems, but certainly not all. D…

I think being a programmer does help the situation in one respect: by having a large salary, you also pay commensurately more in taxes, which could be used to pay for social services. One reason the quality of life is so high in Germany is that it is, as far as I can tell, a nation of engineers. With an economy based on high value products for export, Germany can afford one of the shortest work-weeks in the world and…

If more programmers did volunteer (or their employers encouraged volunteering), even for a little bit, by being exposed to the problem and having an opportunity to interact with the homeless, some new solutions might arise.

Re: Come here and work on hard problems – except the ones on our doorstep

#289

Post by pacaro »

shpiel wrote: post #286
dominostars wrote: post #230

San Francisco homelessness is not a question about rich vs. poor. It's a question about what to do with people who are mentally handicapped and/or drug abusers. This is partially a money problem, but it's largely a social problem. A lot of other countries deal with this better because they have stronger family support structures. Programming can help, but this isn't a programming problem. And there's no money in it,…

I work in the Downtown Crossing section of Boston, which has the one of the highest visible homeless populations in the Boston area. I was also consistently troubled by the number of homeless people I encountered to and from work. It really helped to volunteer at a nearby homeless shelter (Pine Street Inn). I was comforted to see some of worst cases (including people I encountered daily) have access to meals, a clini…

Matched giving seems to be one of those benefits that is more common at the larger employers (e.g. Microsoft employees broke the 1 billion dollar mark last year) and doesn't appear on the smaller tech companies benefits sheets

Re: Come here and work on hard problems – except the ones on our doorstep

#290

Post by just_hobbyst »

LekkoscPiwa wrote: post #283
just_hobbyst wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bullshit. Finland doesn't have US bases on it's territory and all it's security is paid by the country itself. Plus, it always is under direct threat from Russia. Despite of that (or maybe because of that?) it does have a decent universal healthcare system. Besides, having US base on your territory is not a guaranty of security - South Vietnam had a lot of them and it didn't help them.

Yeah, that's why socialism is exported by Russia. You see: normally people would vote for security/military spending and not social care. But that's exactly what Russians, i.e. KGB do. They export socialism to the elites of countries they want to weaken. If you study Russian expansionism since its inception hundreds of years ago, their strategy has always been the same. Russia strategy for centuries has been always t…

Man, you really are confused! If a country is serious about national defence then it really needs universal health care, because it needs lots of healthy soldiers. Soviet Russia did a lot to make sure there was at least basic medical care available to everyone for exactly this reason - they needed millions of soldiers! Finland is doing the right thing when it takes care for it's citizens.

Also, news flash for you: socialism in Russia ended some 20 years ago. Now they have a pretty ruthless form of capitalism in there.

When I read what you have to say about Poland I start to think you are from some kind of alternative universe. It's just bizarre.

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