Two New Moms Return to Work – One in Seattle, One in Stockholm • Hacker News Board

Re: Two New Moms Return to Work – One in Seattle, One in Stockholm

#71

Post by cbHXBY1D » Mon, Mar 09, 2020, 2:18 AM UTC

_qwfv wrote: post #17

DoreenMichele wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Americans sometimes joke that we live in a third world country. Many people here are dissatisfied with our family and healthcare policies, but no one seems to know how to actually fix it. Obamacare wasn't really a good solution. It was just the most politically viable. So you need more than a good plan for what works better. You also need to somehow get it accepted politically and that ends up being a sticking point.

How to fix it? Get involved with your local DSA chapter. Work on putting socialists on your local ballot and getting initiatives passed locally. Educate your friends and neighbors that 'socialist' policies are much broader than what has been demonized in the US since the red scare. Edit: Also, consider unionizing and bargaining for parental leave, healthcare, living wages, employee board representation, etc.

> Get involved with your local DSA chapter.

I've been in the DSA for years now and would recommend it to anyone who is interested. But just to be clear: most of the organizing does not revolve around electoral politics. There are those like myself who don't want DSA to become "the left wing of the DNC" (RIP Refoundation).

I know HN trends techno-utopian libertarian but I'm sure there's some here who have socialist sympathies.

Re: Two New Moms Return to Work – One in Seattle, One in Stockholm

#72

Post by piva00 » Mon, Mar 09, 2020, 1:03 PM UTC

alltakendamned wrote: post #13

kasperni wrote: post #4

And did you know there are actually more billionaires-per-capita in Sweden than in the USA [1]? Norway as well. So it's actually possible to have both an amazing welfare system and loads of billionaires at the same time. [1] https://www.businessinsider.com/countries-ranked-by-billiona...

Though the background of billionaires tends to be different. Lots of business owner in the US, lots of old money in SE. I'd say there's less opportunities for social mobility in Sweden than in the US, hard to get beyond the "middle class"

I call bullshit on this one. I know and have seen many people become successful in Sweden growing out of lower/middle-class. It's much easier to do it when you have free access to quality education, regardless to your current social standing, where people have safety nets so they are able to take risks instead of having to cling to their job that also provides their health insurance.

The US seems to suffer of some kind of fetishisation of suffering, where you see those heart warming stories that look great on the surface (poor kids getting scholarships because of some sport, single parents making their way out of poverty juggling 2 jobs and getting an education and so on) but that shouldn't ever be a great story for the richest society in history...

Social mobility in the US is a fight against odds, not a possibility, people still have some social mobility DESPITE American society policies, not because of them.

Imagine how many people in the US could be contributing with an idea to a great product/company if they knew they could run out of their savings and still not be homeless, without health insurance and not starving? If the US allowed normal people to take risks when they see opportunities it'd be an even richer society, not even accounting for the overall happinness, lowest levels of stress and all of the ill side-effects of the current state of American society.

Re: Two New Moms Return to Work – One in Seattle, One in Stockholm

#73

Post by cryptica » Mon, Mar 09, 2020, 9:08 PM UTC

polotics wrote: post #66

cryptica wrote: post #41

That's the result of having a country with a smaller population. This gives citizens more even access to quality education and more even access to all kinds of opportunities.

That is super weird logic, very interesting. How do you think can a smaller population change anything?

It's supply and demand. A higher supply of people means that each person has lower value. You get a similar effect if you move to a big city after having lived in a small or medium sized town. People who move to big cities voluntarily turn themselves into commodities; they end up renting tiny apartments which cost a lot and can barely afford to save anything and they can be quickly fired from their jobs due to high competition.

As population size increases, the baseline value of a human being goes down. The baseline value of a human being is the value of the person after the value of their skills and capital have been factored out.