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This is a teenager

pudding.cool

611–620 of 868 posts

Re: This is a teenager

#611
post #423

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't seem unlikely to me at all. Lots of people are smart or successful despite coming from a broken home. Weird example but Eminem was extremely poor growing up.

You're misinterpreting. When sorted by annual income, the top 5 incomes all have the same value: 380,288. This points to something weird going on in the data, unless all of those specific participants happen to work the same job at the same company. Even then, years of experience and salary increases would likely differ.

Oh this is a fascinating coincidence- 380,288 just so happens to be the income reported by Vice President Harris and her husband on their 2021 federal tax return.

https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/2022-0...

Re: This is a teenager

#612
post #516

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is, likely intentionally, understated. I cannot speak for the author, but the gist I got is that our society thrusts wholly unprepared people into adulthood and we could get a lot of improvements from just making it harder for people to fail at adulting. IYKYK and if you don’t you will get fucked - repeatedly. Basic life skills are not taught so it’s up to the individual if their family fails. Importantly,…

> navigating health insurance, paying taxes, budgeting, managing credit, home maintenance, vehicle care The self-perpetuating lie in American life is that all of these get solved by . Silicon Valley has only made it worse because these solutions are just monkey-patching poor "source code". Why learn how to balance a checkbook when Chase online can do it for you? Our parents' generation had it different. They had fewe…

Society is consciously created by the active participants in that system. Government fails to hold them accountable for directly creating unwanted outcomes. Task companies with robust interoperability and let’s see how that goes.

Re: This is a teenager

#613

I was Alex (my name is not Alex). Graduated high school in 97, but with a 2.1 GPA (yeah, pretty bad). Went to community college while working part time, living in a 'separated' household (mom/dad did the splits), supported both my parents both emotionally and financially (as much as I could) through their transition and new living arrangements. We were all immigrants, and still learning the ropes in this wonderful co…

I agree. I find it hilarious when Americans complain about America. Most have no clue how good they have it.

I'd bet that most do, but also know that America could be better and want it to be better. No one has to be ignorant about what is good in order to see what needs improving.

Re: This is a teenager

#614

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rather than looking at USA as Scandinavian county, imagine living in some of the counties in the global south. The competition for good jobs is so intense that you’ll work 10 hours a day, 6 days a week. You won’t miss work if you’re sick or have a family event because then somebody else gets your job. Culturally second chances don’t exist, and you’re the only chance your children have to get through school (because y…

There are no doubt way worse places than the US. I was under the impressions that Americans work hard too. For example, if I'm not mistaking there's no mandated minimum number of vacation days, so you might get only 11 compared to 20 in most European countries. > Heaven forbid you get sick. The medical act is (very) good in the US, but is it affordable? > The children have to compete in complicated exams to even have…

> The medical act is (very) good in the US, but is it affordable?

The answer is....it depends.

If youre at poverty levels you would qualify for federal-level Medicaid insurance. learning about these benefits takes some digging. Some states(often democrat) provide their omedical benefit coverage for people who are at or below poverty line(which is itself a locale-specific metric).

If youre upper-middle-class or work for the government, you have good medical insurance through your employer or by paying $$$$$ out of pocket.

Anything between these two -- youre probably underserved in terms of medical coverage and you probably only see the inside of hospitals via emergency rooms.

Re: This is a teenager

#615
post #516

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> navigating health insurance, paying taxes, budgeting, managing credit, home maintenance, vehicle care The self-perpetuating lie in American life is that all of these get solved by . Silicon Valley has only made it worse because these solutions are just monkey-patching poor "source code". Why learn how to balance a checkbook when Chase online can do it for you? Our parents' generation had it different. They had fewe…

I learned out to fill out a basic Form 1040 tax return in middle school (late 1970s). Banking now is WAY easier. Balancing a checkbook? All your transactions and your balance are available 24/7 on your phone. Your paycheck appears in your bank account automatically. You used to have to get a paper check at work and then take it to the bank (open 9-5, maybe a little later on Fridays, and 9-12 or maybe 2pm on Saturday)…

You focus on banking, I’m talking about budgets. Do you track every cent in and out and have a quarterly updated forecast of your financial position a decade out? How close are you to that? If your answer doesn’t include a spreadsheet of some sort you’re not budgeting but taking a shortcut on faith your intuitions are correct.

Did you get taught how credit applications work, how banks determine credit worthiness, how to depreciate an asset, how to calculate lifetime cost of a vehicle, how to draft a bill of materials for a project? All things everyone should be able to do. It’s the lack of these skills and the cost of living crisis that creates ripe markets of ignorant people to exploit for profit through their financial mistakes.

Your school offers home ec? Mine dropped it forever ago. Only the trade school kids learned anything more hands on AP chem.

Cars are more reliable sure, but less maintainable in a home garage. I didn’t bring them up because the best argument I have for cars is repealing cafe and taxing cars annually with a multiplier for wheelbase squared x miles.

Re: This is a teenager

#616

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are no doubt way worse places than the US. I was under the impressions that Americans work hard too. For example, if I'm not mistaking there's no mandated minimum number of vacation days, so you might get only 11 compared to 20 in most European countries. > Heaven forbid you get sick. The medical act is (very) good in the US, but is it affordable? > The children have to compete in complicated exams to even have…

> The medical act is (very) good in the US, but is it affordable? The answer is....it depends. If youre at poverty levels you would qualify for federal-level Medicaid insurance. learning about these benefits takes some digging. Some states(often democrat) provide their omedical benefit coverage for people who are at or below poverty line(which is itself a locale-specific metric). If youre upper-middle-class or work f…

This also describes the situation in some countries of the "global south". Not sure why the original commenter thought the US was so different.

Re: This is a teenager

#617

I was Alex (my name is not Alex). Graduated high school in 97, but with a 2.1 GPA (yeah, pretty bad). Went to community college while working part time, living in a 'separated' household (mom/dad did the splits), supported both my parents both emotionally and financially (as much as I could) through their transition and new living arrangements. We were all immigrants, and still learning the ropes in this wonderful co…

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_position

Re: This is a teenager

#618

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is, likely intentionally, understated. I cannot speak for the author, but the gist I got is that our society thrusts wholly unprepared people into adulthood and we could get a lot of improvements from just making it harder for people to fail at adulting. IYKYK and if you don’t you will get fucked - repeatedly. Basic life skills are not taught so it’s up to the individual if their family fails. Importantly,…

If you say the problem is social class and poverty, and not having available role models to show how adult life actually works, you’ll get flamed and trolled. If you say the problem is racial issues, you’ll get upvotes. I’ll just sit here and await my downvotes now

> Please don't comment about the voting on comments. It never does any good, and it makes boring reading.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: This is a teenager

#619

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is old news. Basically children in bad situations need just one reliable person who believes in them in their lives. What it does is making them realize that it’s not them who are doing something wrong but that their surroundings are flawed. The problem begins when children start to believe everything is their own fault.

> The problem begins when children start to believe everything is their own fault. My experience is it's the opposite and you need to overcome learned helplessness and understand that you can change your life. Are there any good studies that could tell us which of us is correct?

Learned helplessness can also afflict adults, especially those who are not accustomed to dealing with computers. I get that quite a bit, and it's not just older people. Young people who have only used tablets, phones, and Chromebooks also are affected. YMMV

Re: This is a teenager

#620

I was Alex (my name is not Alex). Graduated high school in 97, but with a 2.1 GPA (yeah, pretty bad). Went to community college while working part time, living in a 'separated' household (mom/dad did the splits), supported both my parents both emotionally and financially (as much as I could) through their transition and new living arrangements. We were all immigrants, and still learning the ropes in this wonderful co…

Your story rubs me the wrong way. For one, you say you had to financially support your parents, but then insinuate that people highlighted in the article should bootstrap themselves up since America is such a great place. Also being an immigrant doesn't make it 'high risk.' In many areas, belonging to an immigrant community might actually confer an advantage. The point of the article is to think about how adverse chi…

Not implying anything regarding OPs comment other than perspectives is greatly influenced by where you come from.

From: https://collabfund.com/blog/immutable-truths-and-arguing-foo...

> This is so foreign to the world I know. But so is my world to them. I think they’re wrong, but they’d say the same to me. I’m sure I’m right; so are they. Often the reason debates arise is that you double down on your view after learning that opposing views exist.

> Here’s another.

> Former New York Times columnist David Pogue once did a story about harsh working conditions at Foxconn tech assembly factories in China. A reader sent him a response:

>> My aunt worked several years in what Americans call “sweat shops.” It was hard work. Long hours, “small” wage, “poor” working conditions. Do you know what my aunt did before she worked in one of these factories? She was a prostitute.

>> Circumstances of birth are unfortunately random, and she was born in a very rural region. Most jobs were agricultural and family owned, and most of the jobs were held by men. Women and young girls, because of lack of educational and economic opportunities, had to find other “employment.”

>> The idea of working in a “sweat shop” compared to that old lifestyle is an improvement, in my opinion. I know that my aunt would rather be “exploited” by an evil capitalist boss for a couple of dollars than have her body be exploited by several men for pennies.

>> That is why I am upset by many Americans’ thinking. We do not have the same opportunities as the West. Our governmental infrastructure is different. The country is different.

>> Yes, factory is hard labor. Could it be better? Yes, but only when you compare such to American jobs.

>> If Americans truly care about Asian welfare, they would know that shutting down “sweat shops” would force many of us to return to rural regions and return to truly despicable “jobs.” And I fear that forcing factories to pay higher wages would mean they hire FEWER workers, not more.

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