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And that's how solidarity dies. Are we going to start playing the game of "you're not oppressed enough"? Why not start with the $30k a year household: Hot wat

And that's how solidarity dies. Are we going to start playing the game of "you're not oppressed enough"? Why not start with the $30k a year household: Hot water? What a luxury! Half the world can't afford drinking water. Car engine? They can use a bicycle like they do in India. Utility bills? Just bring in some chickens into your home to warm it up. With enough will and prudent planning you can make a dollar a day stretch much further than you could imagine. Just like you are suggesting I spend my life figuring out ways to live better in a system broken by design. In a sane country I wouldn't have to worry about insurance and the people making a tenth less than me wouldn't worry about cars, boilers or bills, because there would be public options for all of those things.

ice109 9y ago
>And that's how solidarity dies. you've gotta be one of the most of out touch people i've ever seen express their out of touch opinions. what shows of solidarity have you made? have you ever even been to the poor part of town? if you live in nyc message me and i'll gladly take you on a tour where you can stand with your brethren. >With enough will and prudent planning you can make a dollar a day stretch much further than you could imagine. go ahead: plan it out for me since my imagination is so poor.
- korrachs 9y ago
  Here we have exhibit A on why the social contract in the US is dead. Instead of using politics to better your physical situation you use it as therapy. I'm not virtuous enough to push for higher taxes and more welfare? By shutting me down you'll have even more poor to celebrate! Isn't virtue signalling great?
  - ice109 9y ago
    how am i virtue signalling on an anonymous forum? who am i signalling to? i don't even have anything identifying me on my profile? and googling this name brings up nothing. so umm maybe i actually mean what i say?
  - dang 9y ago
    Would you please stop arguing like this on HN? It's hard enough for this place to touch on divisive topics without disintegrating. When you post in this nasty, acerbic way, you're weakening the already-fragile bonds that keep HN barely cohesive, and contributing it to it going down in flames. (That's ironic for a post that mentions social contract.) We ban accounts that do this repeatedly, so please make sure not to. A long time ago, pg (who created HN) wrote: A comment in reply to another comment should be written in the spirit of colleagues cooperating in good faith to figure out the truth about something, not politicians trying to ridicule and misrepresent the other side. That's the standard we ask users here to follow, regardless of how wrong or provocative the other comment has been.
    - korrachs 9y ago
      >you've gotta be one of the most of out touch people i've ever seen express their out of touch opinions. Kettle meet pot.
      - dang 9y ago
        I scolded that user as well of course, but you need to follow the rules regardless of who doesn't.
- dang 9y ago
  > you've gotta be one of the most of out touch people i've ever seen Personal attacks like this are a bannable offense on HN. Please never post like this again. Instead, please (re)-read the following and follow them in letter and in spirit from now on: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html That means posting civilly and substantively, or not at all.
John23832 9y ago
I understand your comment and your original post, and while I somewhat agree, I think you're missing the point. You say that the super rich have something most of us don't, stability. I agree with that. The super rich often want the rest of us to lack stability, it's good for employers to have desperate workers. However, at 300k, while you do not have absolute stability like the super rich, you have something that comes very close... the ability to plan ahead. At 300k, you can save, buy top notch insurance and whether the storms that MANY people in the US cannot. Sure, there could be financial blows that are just too large to shrug off... but those blow that you can withstand, and those of a 30k'er, are two different beasts.
- naiveattack 9y ago
  The poor cannot see beyond their own noses. The rich can see the horizon and plan ahead. The super powerful float in space looking down on earth and place things beyond the horizon. Planning is good, but who's game are we playing?
orblivion 9y ago
How rich is "rich" in your mind? At what point can you never be ruined? It's always possible to piss your money away. MC Hammer filed for bankruptcy after being worth 33 million. If you want to slide the scale of "not oppressed" downward, you can just as well slide the scale of "not rich" upward.
AnthonyMouse 9y ago
You want a public option for boiler repairs and parking tickets? That doesn't even make sense, and creates an obvious moral hazard because people have no incentive to make prudent decisions if there are no consequences to imprudent ones. Why do you think healthcare and education are already so expensive and inefficient? The much better solution is to make a universal basic income the sole welfare system. Then let people make their choices.
xaa 9y ago
Where's the evidence that this solidarity ever existed? On the coasts at least, the people in this $300K range may talk a good talk about marginalized groups, etc, but the solidarity clearly ends at their pocketbooks. Wealthier people skew Republican, and that's not just the 1%. OP's example of the school districts is another example. Still another is the fact that, if you look in any city in America, the wealthy (but not 1%er) areas have better roads, better parks, and better everything in terms of public infrastructure. I have a friend who works at the local power company who outright says that whenever there is a storm that takes out power, the wealthy areas come first for repairs, right after hospitals and police stations. Not, you know, the most populated areas or anything. And it gets worse still, when the 20% try to redirect blame at the 1%. Because who are these 20%ers anyway? They're lawyers, managers, mid-level executives, financiers, maybe developers for banks, big ad firms, or VC-owned boondoggles. In short, they are the white-collar "hands" providing the services that allow the 1% to exert the level of control they do over the whole system. To hear the 20% disclaim all responsibility for the state of inequality in the country is very similar to how the head of HR or IT tells you "well, I really can't do anything about anything, it's just Policy, set by our betters". But they are enabling all of it.
- JumpCrisscross 9y ago
  > Wealthier people skew Republican This depends on your state's economy. "In poor states, rich people are much more likely than poor people to vote for the Republican presidential candidate, but in rich states (such as Connecticut), income has a very low correlation with vote preference" [1]. [1] https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1010426 https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1010426
  - xaa 9y ago
    Very interesting paper. Two problems that jumped out at me are: 1) income is not COL-adjusted, and 2) more importantly, there is not a term in the regression for urbanization/population density. It is well-known that urban areas lean Democratic, and richer states are more urban. Thus the phenomenon may be reflecting urbanization rather than state wealth.
- 9y ago
jdietrich 9y ago
We're not playing a game here, we're talking about facts. Whatever structural deficiencies exist in our system, you're not suffering as a result. You don't get to lump yourself in with people who are suffering. You're welcome to express solidarity with us, you're welcome to advocate for us, but you have no right to expect solidarity in return. You're a beneficiary of that broken system, not a victim.

ice109 9y ago

>And that's how solidarity dies. you've gotta be one of the most of out touch people i've ever seen express their out of touch opinions. what shows of solidarity have you made? have you ever even been to the poor part of town? if you live in nyc message me and i'll gladly take you on a tour where you can stand with your brethren. >With enough will and prudent planning you can make a dollar a day stretch much further than you could imagine. go ahead: plan it out for me since my imagination is so poor.

korrachs 9y ago
Here we have exhibit A on why the social contract in the US is dead. Instead of using politics to better your physical situation you use it as therapy. I'm not virtuous enough to push for higher taxes and more welfare? By shutting me down you'll have even more poor to celebrate! Isn't virtue signalling great?
- ice109 9y ago
  how am i virtue signalling on an anonymous forum? who am i signalling to? i don't even have anything identifying me on my profile? and googling this name brings up nothing. so umm maybe i actually mean what i say?
- dang 9y ago
  Would you please stop arguing like this on HN? It's hard enough for this place to touch on divisive topics without disintegrating. When you post in this nasty, acerbic way, you're weakening the already-fragile bonds that keep HN barely cohesive, and contributing it to it going down in flames. (That's ironic for a post that mentions social contract.) We ban accounts that do this repeatedly, so please make sure not to. A long time ago, pg (who created HN) wrote: A comment in reply to another comment should be written in the spirit of colleagues cooperating in good faith to figure out the truth about something, not politicians trying to ridicule and misrepresent the other side. That's the standard we ask users here to follow, regardless of how wrong or provocative the other comment has been.
  - korrachs 9y ago
    >you've gotta be one of the most of out touch people i've ever seen express their out of touch opinions. Kettle meet pot.
    - dang 9y ago
      I scolded that user as well of course, but you need to follow the rules regardless of who doesn't.
dang 9y ago
> you've gotta be one of the most of out touch people i've ever seen Personal attacks like this are a bannable offense on HN. Please never post like this again. Instead, please (re)-read the following and follow them in letter and in spirit from now on: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html That means posting civilly and substantively, or not at all.

John23832 9y ago

I understand your comment and your original post, and while I somewhat agree, I think you're missing the point. You say that the super rich have something most of us don't, stability. I agree with that. The super rich often want the rest of us to lack stability, it's good for employers to have desperate workers. However, at 300k, while you do not have absolute stability like the super rich, you have something that comes very close... the ability to plan ahead. At 300k, you can save, buy top notch insurance and whether the storms that MANY people in the US cannot. Sure, there could be financial blows that are just too large to shrug off... but those blow that you can withstand, and those of a 30k'er, are two different beasts.

naiveattack 9y ago
The poor cannot see beyond their own noses. The rich can see the horizon and plan ahead. The super powerful float in space looking down on earth and place things beyond the horizon. Planning is good, but who's game are we playing?

orblivion 9y ago

How rich is "rich" in your mind? At what point can you never be ruined? It's always possible to piss your money away. MC Hammer filed for bankruptcy after being worth 33 million. If you want to slide the scale of "not oppressed" downward, you can just as well slide the scale of "not rich" upward.

AnthonyMouse 9y ago

You want a public option for boiler repairs and parking tickets? That doesn't even make sense, and creates an obvious moral hazard because people have no incentive to make prudent decisions if there are no consequences to imprudent ones. Why do you think healthcare and education are already so expensive and inefficient? The much better solution is to make a universal basic income the sole welfare system. Then let people make their choices.

xaa 9y ago

Where's the evidence that this solidarity ever existed? On the coasts at least, the people in this $300K range may talk a good talk about marginalized groups, etc, but the solidarity clearly ends at their pocketbooks. Wealthier people skew Republican, and that's not just the 1%. OP's example of the school districts is another example. Still another is the fact that, if you look in any city in America, the wealthy (but not 1%er) areas have better roads, better parks, and better everything in terms of public infrastructure. I have a friend who works at the local power company who outright says that whenever there is a storm that takes out power, the wealthy areas come first for repairs, right after hospitals and police stations. Not, you know, the most populated areas or anything. And it gets worse still, when the 20% try to redirect blame at the 1%. Because who are these 20%ers anyway? They're lawyers, managers, mid-level executives, financiers, maybe developers for banks, big ad firms, or VC-owned boondoggles. In short, they are the white-collar "hands" providing the services that allow the 1% to exert the level of control they do over the whole system. To hear the 20% disclaim all responsibility for the state of inequality in the country is very similar to how the head of HR or IT tells you "well, I really can't do anything about anything, it's just Policy, set by our betters". But they are enabling all of it.

JumpCrisscross 9y ago
> Wealthier people skew Republican This depends on your state's economy. "In poor states, rich people are much more likely than poor people to vote for the Republican presidential candidate, but in rich states (such as Connecticut), income has a very low correlation with vote preference" [1]. [1] https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1010426 https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1010426
- xaa 9y ago
  Very interesting paper. Two problems that jumped out at me are: 1) income is not COL-adjusted, and 2) more importantly, there is not a term in the regression for urbanization/population density. It is well-known that urban areas lean Democratic, and richer states are more urban. Thus the phenomenon may be reflecting urbanization rather than state wealth.
9y ago

jdietrich 9y ago

We're not playing a game here, we're talking about facts. Whatever structural deficiencies exist in our system, you're not suffering as a result. You don't get to lump yourself in with people who are suffering. You're welcome to express solidarity with us, you're welcome to advocate for us, but you have no right to expect solidarity in return. You're a beneficiary of that broken system, not a victim.