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WeWork Gets a Visit from Financial Reality

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Re: WeWork Gets a Visit from Financial Reality

#371

Post by PhantomGremlin »

pjc50 wrote: post #343
PhantomGremlin wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It remains unlooted so far. On the contrary, public employee unions (including teachers) have done a masterful job of enriching themselves at public expense. E.g. Oregon: Member accounts saw appreciable and consistent growth during this time, but underlying pension assets did not grow to cover the increased benefit guarantee. Career public employees who worked from 1970 to 2000 often were entitled to retirement incom…

I find it hard to describe even 130% of average pay of $90k as "looting", on a website where most software developers wouldn't get out of bed for that kind of money. I also find it very interesting that the 130% number on that wikipedia page comes from the only reference which is a youtube video by one "John Tapogna", who appears to be from a thinktank. A different view: https://www.oregonafscme.org/?zone=/unionactiv…

You can't compare software developer salaries to typical wages in this country. Even software developer salaries are skewed by the Bay Area bubble. In many parts of the country $90K would be a fine salary for a software guy.

Your "different view" is from the public employee union, so of course they will have a different spin. I guess it's all down to what "average" is.

The local newspaper puts it this way:[1]

The average monthly benefit for public employees who retired in 2015 was $2,692, or about $32,300 annually. That includes all retires that year, whether they worked five years or 35. For career employees, with 30 years of service, the average monthly benefit was $3,771, or $45,252 annually.

Not too many private sector people get a pension of $3,771 per month for 30 years of service. But that number includes everyone. I don't see any data just on "education", which is the category that initially started this subtopic.

It's unfair to start pulling in off-the-wall stuff like Intel's "off-shore profits". That's old-school union thought. Thoroughly discredited. I remember very clearly when in NYC the World Journal Tribune[2] newspaper asked the unions for concessions so they could keep operating. To me the money quote was a union guy on TV who resisted this and said: "this is one of the richest firms in the world". There was a 140 day strike. Shortly thereafter the newspaper folded and everyone was out of a job.

[1] https://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2018/04/nation... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Journal_Tribune

Re: WeWork Gets a Visit from Financial Reality

#372

Post by PhantomGremlin »

camgunz wrote: post #334
PhantomGremlin wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It remains unlooted so far. On the contrary, public employee unions (including teachers) have done a masterful job of enriching themselves at public expense. E.g. Oregon: Member accounts saw appreciable and consistent growth during this time, but underlying pension assets did not grow to cover the increased benefit guarantee. Career public employees who worked from 1970 to 2000 often were entitled to retirement incom…

This is facially false. No one eligible for a public sector pension is well off. 130% of nothing is still nothing. Like honestly, think of all the people you know in unions. What are their houses and cars like? Do they live in the rich neighborhoods with the doctors, lawyers, and professional athletes? Do their kids go to expensive private schools? Just outrageously wrong. The issue here is that most (all?) state and…

This is facially false. No one eligible for a public sector pension is well off. 130% of nothing is still nothing.

As I mentioned in a nearby post, the average public sector pension was $3,771 per month for 30 years of service. Maybe to you that's "nothing", but to many people that's a very decent supplement to IRAs, savings, and Social Security.

I can't believe the straw man you're creating. No, the average Joe isn't entitled to live in "rich neighborhoods" alongside "professional athletes". And most "doctors" did 8+ years of additional education and training after college. You resent that they are getting paid for that?

Re: WeWork Gets a Visit from Financial Reality

#373

Post by PhantomGremlin »

strontium_90 wrote: post #333
PhantomGremlin wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It remains unlooted so far. On the contrary, public employee unions (including teachers) have done a masterful job of enriching themselves at public expense. E.g. Oregon: Member accounts saw appreciable and consistent growth during this time, but underlying pension assets did not grow to cover the increased benefit guarantee. Career public employees who worked from 1970 to 2000 often were entitled to retirement incom…

It's not obviously true that high pensions mean unfairly high remuneration. Another hypothesis that fits the facts you've mentioned could be that private sector salaries that could be earned by teachers are higher, and the public sector is competing by offering more attractive pensions for teachers than the private sector does. There's another possible contributing factor: government can offer higher future pensions…

Maybe that's why so many US states have dramatically underfunded pension plans (meaning teachers and other pensioners might not actually get their promised pensions when they retire).

This is a very complex topic. I think it's widely agreed that the US Congress can change Social Security benefits at any time. But the pension issue varies in the states. E.g. the Illinois Supreme Court ruled that pensions were sacrosanct:

Justices cited a provision in the Illinois Constitution stating that pension benefits, once granted, “shall not be diminished or impaired.”

https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/politics/ct-met-il...

Re: WeWork Gets a Visit from Financial Reality

#374

Post by hakfoo »

dbt00 wrote: post #277
rconti wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's unquestionable that tech like Uber's can/does allocate cars and rides more efficiently. The taxi model relies on drivers circling looking for a fare and phone dispatch with, at best, a dispatcher seeing GPS cab location on a screen and trying to eyeball-match it to the caller's location. (or, at worst, caller-reported location, and radioing a bunch of cabs asking them "hey, where you at?") At its most ef…

Uber wins through three things. one, the convenience of the app model. two, subsidizing rides to flood the market with drivers. three, offloading risks like employment law and fleet management onto drivers. None of the stuff you said about traffic routing is currently true nor is it likely to be relevant. Taxi and Uber drivers do the same thing -- show up where and when there are predictable flows of people. They do…

1 and 3 are undefensible territory. 2 is selling dollar notes for 90 cents; eventually you're going to have to convert to something more cash-flow positive.

Their only realistic "exit as a world champion" play was to get to self-driving and own a fleet themselves (being able to create economies of scale on vehicle purchase and maintenance that would beat local taxis). That dream ended when they ran over a woman in Tempe.

Their best hope now is to be one of several large commodity players-- modest margins, some limited ability to spread fixed costs like software engineering over large volume.

Re: WeWork Gets a Visit from Financial Reality

#375

Post by joejerryronnie »

ajaxaddicted wrote: post #370
joejerryronnie wrote: post #369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not a moral stand, it is an ideological stand. A moral stand is “We won’t serve meat that is not processed in a humane manner”. We’s stand is the same thing as saying ”Only Christian idolatry may be practiced in our offices”.

"Meat processed in a humane way" - there is no such thing. "Humane meat" is an oxymorone. 1) What is the definition of humane 2) Whatever that definition is, i really doubt it includes killing a sentient being that does not want to die. Also moral stand is - an injustice is happening and you refuse to support it- in this case innocent animals are killed, the environment is trashed for future generations. etc. Ideolog…

Sorry, I simply don’t agree with you. I love a big, juicy steak while at the same time having respect for the animal who provided it. I hope they lived a good life and were humanely slaughtered. I prefer it medium rare.

Re: WeWork Gets a Visit from Financial Reality

#376

Post by yellowbuilding »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #272
barbecue_sauce wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only in the context of being a Britishism that Americans occasionally use.

> Only Nope. Never in my life heard of it being a britishism. Edit: A downvote for proving an absolute statement wrong? "Bloody" is used as a britishism. "Wee" is not, at least in many areas.

When people use it, they probably won’t add “that was a britishism I just used”. You interpret that through... eh, cultural analysis.

Re: WeWork Gets a Visit from Financial Reality

#377

Post by ajaxaddicted »

joejerryronnie wrote: post #375
ajaxaddicted wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Meat processed in a humane way" - there is no such thing. "Humane meat" is an oxymorone. 1) What is the definition of humane 2) Whatever that definition is, i really doubt it includes killing a sentient being that does not want to die. Also moral stand is - an injustice is happening and you refuse to support it- in this case innocent animals are killed, the environment is trashed for future generations. etc. Ideolog…

Sorry, I simply don’t agree with you. I love a big, juicy steak while at the same time having respect for the animal who provided it. I hope they lived a good life and were humanely slaughtered. I prefer it medium rare.

That is an oxymoron. You can not have respect for the animal and fully support killing it and all this without a hint of remorse or empathy. I can not comprehend how that would work.

For the sake of argument lets imagine there is such thing as "humanely" slaughtered cow. For example this one here, enjoying the sun: https://i.redd.it/9v0shahwsh921.jpg

First of all, cows live around 20-25 years and are slaughtered between 18 months and 3-4 years when it comes to dairy cows (which live a live full of misery and are disposed of, once they stopped producing enough milk to be economically viable). Best case scenario, you steak was a child/teenager in cow years.

Second, even the the most "humanely" slaughtered cow has to bleed to death for you steak - we don't want our precious meat to be soaking in blood don't we.

Third, your steak almost certainly didn't have a good live. If you want to see what humanity looks like at its worst, look no further then any industry involving humans and animals that can be economically exploited. Dairy, meat, eggs, fur, wool - it is all horrors beyond your wildest dreams.

Forth, last time I checked - if you eat a lot of meat, cholesterol still blocks your arteries. Heme iron still causes a lot of oxidative stress, aka you age faster. And animals are filled to the brim with antibiotics and hormones and all that good stuff accumulates in the meat, so you get a good juicy concentrated dose.

Fifth, that steak also hurts humans. Nobody in their right mind wants to work in a slaughterhouse, only the most desperate an financially vulnerable choose this field of work and are scared for life afterwords.

All this misery for 15 minute of sensory pleasure. In a time where we have the impossible burger, beyond meat and a plethora of other options, if we want meat without all the suffering and misery.

Re: WeWork Gets a Visit from Financial Reality

#378

Post by areyousure »

camgunz wrote: post #334
PhantomGremlin wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It remains unlooted so far. On the contrary, public employee unions (including teachers) have done a masterful job of enriching themselves at public expense. E.g. Oregon: Member accounts saw appreciable and consistent growth during this time, but underlying pension assets did not grow to cover the increased benefit guarantee. Career public employees who worked from 1970 to 2000 often were entitled to retirement incom…

This is facially false. No one eligible for a public sector pension is well off. 130% of nothing is still nothing. Like honestly, think of all the people you know in unions. What are their houses and cars like? Do they live in the rich neighborhoods with the doctors, lawyers, and professional athletes? Do their kids go to expensive private schools? Just outrageously wrong. The issue here is that most (all?) state and…

> No one eligible for a public sector pension is well off.

https://www.mcall.com/news/nationworld/pennsylvania/mc-nws-p... states that "Rodney Erickson is netting $477,590 a year -- from a state pension". I believe that is "well off".

Re: WeWork Gets a Visit from Financial Reality

#379

Post by camgunz »

areyousure wrote: post #378
camgunz wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is facially false. No one eligible for a public sector pension is well off. 130% of nothing is still nothing. Like honestly, think of all the people you know in unions. What are their houses and cars like? Do they live in the rich neighborhoods with the doctors, lawyers, and professional athletes? Do their kids go to expensive private schools? Just outrageously wrong. The issue here is that most (all?) state and…

> No one eligible for a public sector pension is well off. https://www.mcall.com/news/nationworld/pennsylvania/mc-nws-p... states that "Rodney Erickson is netting $477,590 a year -- from a state pension". I believe that is "well off".

OK I was dabbling in ghoulish overkill. But if you read that article, it contains this:

"More than 127,000 former Pennsylvania state employees or their beneficiaries collect public pension checks each month, and most are comparatively paltry. The average paid out last year was $27,722."

I'm a little tired of people using rare abuses to justify shutting down programs that people depend on. "ODB got food stamps", "this Penn State president makes $500k a year from his pension". The programs are still worth it, and even that level of abuse is beneath the cost of what it would take to combat it. It's also important to note that this guy is an example of "privileged white guy bilking the public sector", as we remember that the vast majority of fraud in social safety net programs is actually by providers of services (medical, food, etc.), not receivers. Guess which demographic most of those are?

Re: WeWork Gets a Visit from Financial Reality

#380

Post by camgunz »

PhantomGremlin wrote: post #372
camgunz wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is facially false. No one eligible for a public sector pension is well off. 130% of nothing is still nothing. Like honestly, think of all the people you know in unions. What are their houses and cars like? Do they live in the rich neighborhoods with the doctors, lawyers, and professional athletes? Do their kids go to expensive private schools? Just outrageously wrong. The issue here is that most (all?) state and…

This is facially false. No one eligible for a public sector pension is well off. 130% of nothing is still nothing. As I mentioned in a nearby post, the average public sector pension was $3,771 per month for 30 years of service. Maybe to you that's "nothing", but to many people that's a very decent supplement to IRAs, savings, and Social Security. I can't believe the straw man you're creating. No, the average Joe isn'…

> the average public sector pension was $3,771 per month for 30 years of service.

It would be better to quote the rest of the context [1]:

    As organized labor groups were quick to point out on
    social media this weekend, normal benefits are much
    lower. Out of some 136,000 retirees receiving PERS
    benefits, only 2,000 or so collect more than
    $100,000 a year.

    The average monthly benefit for public employees who
    retired in 2015 was $2,692, or about $32,300 annually.
    That includes all retires that year, whether they
    worked five years or 35. For career employees, with
    30 years of service, the average monthly benefit was
    $3,771, or $45,252 annually. The Oregonian/OregonLive
    maintains an online database of public employee
    pensions.
In fairness, OP does have a point here, so I apologize:

    Along with the guaranteed rate of return for older
    members' pension accounts, and the decision by a
    PERS Board packed with public employees to credit
    most of the system's bull-market earnings to
    employee accounts for two decades ending in 1999,
    the money match formula inflated pensions for a
    large cohort of public employees.
You could also take a look at the reason for some of PERS' issues, and you'd discover that it's the "money match" formula [2], which wasn't always beneficial for pensioners. You'd also discover that the pension was set up in the 40s, and has since undergone a lot of changes to accommodate different market conditions (as recently as 2003), and it's likely that it will continue to.

But I wouldn't say that Oregon teachers are "enriching" themselves. We're talking about pensions that ended up paying 100% of salary. That's not bananas; most advice is save for 75% taking inflation into account. But I also think pensions are weirdly complicated for probably political reasons. It seems to me a benefits cap at 50% makes complete sense (considering Social Security and other retirement income vehicles)?

(OP quotes 130%, and the source is a YouTube video via Wikipedia posted by the president of ECONorthwest. The video is clear and feels unbiased--in fact ECONorthwest is an economics consulting firm so it's in their interest to be analytical--but the 130% number is assuming Social Security accounts for 30% of salary [5]).

I'm not at all saying everyone's entitled to be rich. OP made the claim Oregon teachers enriched themselves via public sector pensions, and as I interpret the word "enrich" to mean "become rich", I presumed their argument was Oregon teachers can live like rich people on public sector pensions. This is, as we've both pointed out, not true, even though it seems there have been some shenanigans in how the pension is managed.

There are a lot of "social safety net" politics swirling around pension policy debates, and I guess my points are generally:

- A lot of public sector employees don't even get pensions

- Average pension payments are low

- There are sometimes outrageous abuses

- There should probably be a cap on benefits

- Beneficiaries shouldn't be allowed to manage the fund

- Pensions in general are a good idea

- But it would be better if we just expanded Social Security and removed the taxable earnings cap

[1]: https://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2018/04/nation...

[2]: https://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2012/11/oregon...

[3]: https://www.heritage.org/social-security/report/the-real-cos...

[4]: https://www.brookings.edu/blog/brown-center-chalkboard/2016/...

[5]: https://youtu.be/8viDMetIUHA?t=153

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