6 ms·

And they vote. Go figure. Maybe schools should teach literacy skills and other useful subjects. Just a thought.

tamaharbor 5y ago
- encryptluks2 5y ago
  - Arnt 5y ago
    Citation needed.
    - weatherlight 5y ago
      https://citationsneeded.medium.com https://citationsneeded.medium.com You're welcome.
  - csdvrx 5y ago
    Leaving asides the offense/racist grandparent comments, the worship of money is what has made America prosperous, and what still allows us to get the best and the brightest. Ask "them enlightened" Europeans (or Australians or...) how much they make, and rejoice we get to live a prosperous life here in America! And no, before someone says "but what about universal healthcare?", health insurance doesn't count, because if you work at a normal job, you get that, and if you don't, the ER never refuses anyone thanks to our legal system which you also disparage.
    - yardie 5y ago
      The European countries who never fulfill their annual US visa allotments; to the chagrin of Chinese and Indian visa seekers who are facing almost a decade long wait. The disparities in salaries are pretty much isolated to tech. Most other occupations are pretty much similar all things considered.
      - 908B64B197 5y ago
        > to the chagrin of Chinese and Indian visa seekers who are facing almost a decade long wait. A lot of that is self-imposed; fraudulent H1B applications (it's for specialty occupations, some low level QA position does not qualify) from shady bodyshops are backloging the system. Thankfully, the previous administration started issuing more RFEs and we might see the backlog getting better.
    - vmception 5y ago
      Rich Europeans are also illiquid, first born manchilds that inherited a finance role at the family office and have no idea what to do. I find it really interesting how the US optimized specifically for liquidity. Like, foreigners came to the US to use it for that and eventually won. Crazy to think how much is illiquid around the world, and how much more can become liquid.
      - bigfudge 5y ago
        This comment is both patronising, rude and incorrect at the same time. Social mobility is broadly the same in the US and Europe. What is different is that people in the US overestimate their social mobility: https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2018/02/14/americans-overestimate-social-mobility-in-their-country https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2018/02/14/american...
        vmception 5y ago
        I’m talking about the generational 1% not broad population movements into something moderately stable, best not to conflate those two
    - dragonwriter 5y ago
      > health insurance doesn’t count, because if you work at a normal job, you get tha Plenty of normal jobs without health insurance. Only 71% of private industry employees have health care benefits available. [0] [0] https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/ebs2.pdf https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/ebs2.pdf > the ER never refuses anyone The ER is only required to screen for and, if found, stabilize emergency medical conditions. For many health conditions, by the time something is an emergency, its too late to do much. This mandate is important, but it doesn’t substitute for having insurance for proper medical care.
    - ClumsyPilot 5y ago
      "worship of money is what has made America prosperous" Ah, so it's a religion and prayer works? It's got nothing to do with US being the only industrial power that wasn't obliterated in WW2 and had debt that took untill 2006 to pay off, like UK did? Or with US being center of global finance, having global reserve currency, etc? Okay lets take your argument at face value - what's the money for, to lead a better life, right? Look at life expectancy, crime rates, 'satisfaction', is US leading the world? Could it be that a succesfull society needs something in addition to a 'money religion'?
      - encryptluks2 5y ago
        I'm not advocating for a money religion, what I'm saying is that people do terrible things for money and your point only elaborates on this.
  - mrep 5y ago
    I mean, I'm not jeff bezos rich but I am in the 0.1% of income for my age group according to [0] and I don't want that. Why would I want that? Even for the uber rich I feel like they wouldn't want that. Smarter population keeps us competitive which is good for the stock market which is where the uber rich have their money and it's not like smarter population = more cap gains tax from what can tell [1]. [0]: https://www.financialsamurai.com/the-top-1-percent-and-top-0-point-1-percent-income-levels-by-age-group/#:~:text=Ages%2027%20%E2%80%93%2031%3A%20You%20are,if%20you%20make%20roughly%20%24210%2C000 https://www.financialsamurai.com/the-top-1-percent-and-top-0.... [11]: https://taxfoundation.org/us-taxpayers-face-6th-highest-top-marginal-capital-gains-tax-rate-oecd/ https://taxfoundation.org/us-taxpayers-face-6th-highest-top-...
    - encryptluks2 5y ago
      Do you think smart people are going to work for tips because their employers don't pay enough while their employers complain about them going on unemployment while taking huge payouts from pandemic relief and having millions forgiven while everyone else loses their assistance? Or smart people will work for ISPs and large corporations that have turned employment into a one-sided legal agreement that many people feel like they have no other choice to sign, all the while dealing with a company that doesn't even care about it's customers? Do you think media and people in power really want people to have the capacity to think logically about issues instead of just accept whatever narrative they are pushing? Rich people want to get richer and need stupid people to do the low wage jobs and to fight amongst themselves. That's the way it has been for ages.
      - mrep 5y ago
        > Do you think smart people are going to work for tips because their employers don't pay enough I'm not a waiter and hate tipping but don't most waiters like tips because they earn more with them. It looks like the US has the highest paid waiters in the world being 25% more than malta and 50% higher than the UK which are the second and third highest paying countries for waiters [0]. > Or smart people will work for ISPs and large corporations that have turned employment into a one-sided legal agreement that many people feel like they have no other choice to sign, all the while dealing with a company that doesn't even care about it's customers? What do you mean? What is legally allowed to be contracted is dictated by laws, not the populaces education. > Rich people want to get richer and need stupid people to do the low wage jobs and to fight amongst themselves. That's the way it has been for ages. That is a great way to destroy your economies stock market and your wealth by turning your country from a high income economy into a middle income one [1]. [0]: https://knowyourworth.site/job-titles/waiter https://knowyourworth.site/job-titles/waiter [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_income_trap https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_income_trap
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- slater 5y ago
  Untied, ey? ;) I'd say it's a lack of funding for general education, and the decades-long prevalence of "lol nerds suck" attitudes to those who even THINK of getting said education.
  - DavidPiper 5y ago
    > and the decades-long prevalence of "lol nerds suck" attitudes to those who even THINK of getting said education. There was a HN post semi-recently comparing American mathematics textbooks to soviet mathematics textbooks. Basically the Russian school textbook was/is equivalent to the American university textbook. There were other comments in the thread about education quality, school systems, etc, but the novel takeaway for me was that there are some countries where anti-intellectual stigma doesn't exist at all. It was quite a moment to realise that a lot of your experiences growing up and going through the education system (as one kind of said nerd) are the result of a mass-cultural and quasi-political _choice_ of attitudes that aren't actually universal.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- ClumsyPilot 5y ago
  I mean, millons of people die unneccesarily, its the problem of the entire species.
- anonuser123456 5y ago
  ~50% of people are dumber than average. That's just how averages work.
  - Skunkleton 5y ago
    Dumber than average shouldn't mean illiterate.
encryptluks2 5y ago
You act like people that struggle with reading aren't capable of making a decision between usually only two candidates. Seriously, a 6th grade has enough brain capacity to vote in American politics. Also, schools do teach literacy but a lot of funding gets sent to private schools and suburbs while large inner city schools get underfunded. There are also racial issues, where people of other races have continued to be impacted economically from past issues with race and so they end up being sent to schools in low-income areas where literacy rates are worse. I don't think the issue is soley on teachers, but I can tell you firsthand that many teachers just stopped trying with COVID-19 and didn't follow up to ensure kids were progressing.
- ClumsyPilot 5y ago
  >"capable of making a decision between usually only two candidates" This short sighted attitude is the peoblem. Do you know your representative? Have you ever spoken to them? How do the two presidential candidates come about? Have you ever been in a political party? There is a lot more to democracy than choosing a front clown
  - encryptluks2 5y ago
    Yes I've called my Representatives I get someone answering the phone that says they'll take my concern or suggestion and that is the end. If you want to have a meeting with them then you have to pay for it and you usually need to draft the changes to the bills in advance if you want them introduced which takes entire teams to do, but even individuals can see where things are clearly wrong. The only special people in politics are the ones who pay and have money. Everyone else is just hoping they'll get a share of the pie in the end.
    - ClumsyPilot 5y ago
      "Yes I've called my Representatives I get someone answering the phone that says they'll take my concern or suggestion and that is the end. If you want to have a meeting with them then you have to pay for it" I am sorry to hear that, a few of my friends met their MP's and discussed their concerns, for however little that counts. This was in UK.
kerneloftruth 5y ago
They should; instead though, schools are disposing of standards because they're now unpopular (i.e. called 'racist') https://www.cnn.com/2021/05/15/us/university-of-california-sat-act-scores-admission/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2021/05/15/us/university-of-california-s... https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/16/us/harvard-admissions-act-sat.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/16/us/harvard-admissions-act... https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/move-end-standardized-testing-high-schools-draws-both-praise-concern-n1282657 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/move-end-standardized-t...
redis_mlc 5y ago
ransom1538 5y ago
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
dang 5y ago
Please don't post unsubstantive flamebait to Hacker News. It leads to dumbed-down, boring, inflammatory subthreads and we're trying for something different here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

encryptluks2 5y ago
- Arnt 5y ago
  Citation needed.
  - weatherlight 5y ago
    https://citationsneeded.medium.com https://citationsneeded.medium.com You're welcome.
- csdvrx 5y ago
  Leaving asides the offense/racist grandparent comments, the worship of money is what has made America prosperous, and what still allows us to get the best and the brightest. Ask "them enlightened" Europeans (or Australians or...) how much they make, and rejoice we get to live a prosperous life here in America! And no, before someone says "but what about universal healthcare?", health insurance doesn't count, because if you work at a normal job, you get that, and if you don't, the ER never refuses anyone thanks to our legal system which you also disparage.
  - yardie 5y ago
    The European countries who never fulfill their annual US visa allotments; to the chagrin of Chinese and Indian visa seekers who are facing almost a decade long wait. The disparities in salaries are pretty much isolated to tech. Most other occupations are pretty much similar all things considered.
    - 908B64B197 5y ago
      > to the chagrin of Chinese and Indian visa seekers who are facing almost a decade long wait. A lot of that is self-imposed; fraudulent H1B applications (it's for specialty occupations, some low level QA position does not qualify) from shady bodyshops are backloging the system. Thankfully, the previous administration started issuing more RFEs and we might see the backlog getting better.
  - vmception 5y ago
    Rich Europeans are also illiquid, first born manchilds that inherited a finance role at the family office and have no idea what to do. I find it really interesting how the US optimized specifically for liquidity. Like, foreigners came to the US to use it for that and eventually won. Crazy to think how much is illiquid around the world, and how much more can become liquid.
    - bigfudge 5y ago
      This comment is both patronising, rude and incorrect at the same time. Social mobility is broadly the same in the US and Europe. What is different is that people in the US overestimate their social mobility: https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2018/02/14/americans-overestimate-social-mobility-in-their-country https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2018/02/14/american...
      - vmception 5y ago
        I’m talking about the generational 1% not broad population movements into something moderately stable, best not to conflate those two
  - dragonwriter 5y ago
    > health insurance doesn’t count, because if you work at a normal job, you get tha Plenty of normal jobs without health insurance. Only 71% of private industry employees have health care benefits available. [0] [0] https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/ebs2.pdf https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/ebs2.pdf > the ER never refuses anyone The ER is only required to screen for and, if found, stabilize emergency medical conditions. For many health conditions, by the time something is an emergency, its too late to do much. This mandate is important, but it doesn’t substitute for having insurance for proper medical care.
  - ClumsyPilot 5y ago
    "worship of money is what has made America prosperous" Ah, so it's a religion and prayer works? It's got nothing to do with US being the only industrial power that wasn't obliterated in WW2 and had debt that took untill 2006 to pay off, like UK did? Or with US being center of global finance, having global reserve currency, etc? Okay lets take your argument at face value - what's the money for, to lead a better life, right? Look at life expectancy, crime rates, 'satisfaction', is US leading the world? Could it be that a succesfull society needs something in addition to a 'money religion'?
    - encryptluks2 5y ago
      I'm not advocating for a money religion, what I'm saying is that people do terrible things for money and your point only elaborates on this.
- mrep 5y ago
  I mean, I'm not jeff bezos rich but I am in the 0.1% of income for my age group according to [0] and I don't want that. Why would I want that? Even for the uber rich I feel like they wouldn't want that. Smarter population keeps us competitive which is good for the stock market which is where the uber rich have their money and it's not like smarter population = more cap gains tax from what can tell [1]. [0]: https://www.financialsamurai.com/the-top-1-percent-and-top-0-point-1-percent-income-levels-by-age-group/#:~:text=Ages%2027%20%E2%80%93%2031%3A%20You%20are,if%20you%20make%20roughly%20%24210%2C000 https://www.financialsamurai.com/the-top-1-percent-and-top-0.... [11]: https://taxfoundation.org/us-taxpayers-face-6th-highest-top-marginal-capital-gains-tax-rate-oecd/ https://taxfoundation.org/us-taxpayers-face-6th-highest-top-...
  - encryptluks2 5y ago
    Do you think smart people are going to work for tips because their employers don't pay enough while their employers complain about them going on unemployment while taking huge payouts from pandemic relief and having millions forgiven while everyone else loses their assistance? Or smart people will work for ISPs and large corporations that have turned employment into a one-sided legal agreement that many people feel like they have no other choice to sign, all the while dealing with a company that doesn't even care about it's customers? Do you think media and people in power really want people to have the capacity to think logically about issues instead of just accept whatever narrative they are pushing? Rich people want to get richer and need stupid people to do the low wage jobs and to fight amongst themselves. That's the way it has been for ages.
    - mrep 5y ago
      > Do you think smart people are going to work for tips because their employers don't pay enough I'm not a waiter and hate tipping but don't most waiters like tips because they earn more with them. It looks like the US has the highest paid waiters in the world being 25% more than malta and 50% higher than the UK which are the second and third highest paying countries for waiters [0]. > Or smart people will work for ISPs and large corporations that have turned employment into a one-sided legal agreement that many people feel like they have no other choice to sign, all the while dealing with a company that doesn't even care about it's customers? What do you mean? What is legally allowed to be contracted is dictated by laws, not the populaces education. > Rich people want to get richer and need stupid people to do the low wage jobs and to fight amongst themselves. That's the way it has been for ages. That is a great way to destroy your economies stock market and your wealth by turning your country from a high income economy into a middle income one [1]. [0]: https://knowyourworth.site/job-titles/waiter https://knowyourworth.site/job-titles/waiter [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_income_trap https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_income_trap
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
slater 5y ago
Untied, ey? ;) I'd say it's a lack of funding for general education, and the decades-long prevalence of "lol nerds suck" attitudes to those who even THINK of getting said education.
- DavidPiper 5y ago
  > and the decades-long prevalence of "lol nerds suck" attitudes to those who even THINK of getting said education. There was a HN post semi-recently comparing American mathematics textbooks to soviet mathematics textbooks. Basically the Russian school textbook was/is equivalent to the American university textbook. There were other comments in the thread about education quality, school systems, etc, but the novel takeaway for me was that there are some countries where anti-intellectual stigma doesn't exist at all. It was quite a moment to realise that a lot of your experiences growing up and going through the education system (as one kind of said nerd) are the result of a mass-cultural and quasi-political _choice_ of attitudes that aren't actually universal.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
ClumsyPilot 5y ago
I mean, millons of people die unneccesarily, its the problem of the entire species.
anonuser123456 5y ago
~50% of people are dumber than average. That's just how averages work.
- Skunkleton 5y ago
  Dumber than average shouldn't mean illiterate.

You act like people that struggle with reading aren't capable of making a decision between usually only two candidates. Seriously, a 6th grade has enough brain capacity to vote in American politics. Also, schools do teach literacy but a lot of funding gets sent to private schools and suburbs while large inner city schools get underfunded. There are also racial issues, where people of other races have continued to be impacted economically from past issues with race and so they end up being sent to schools in low-income areas where literacy rates are worse. I don't think the issue is soley on teachers, but I can tell you firsthand that many teachers just stopped trying with COVID-19 and didn't follow up to ensure kids were progressing.

ClumsyPilot 5y ago
>"capable of making a decision between usually only two candidates" This short sighted attitude is the peoblem. Do you know your representative? Have you ever spoken to them? How do the two presidential candidates come about? Have you ever been in a political party? There is a lot more to democracy than choosing a front clown
- encryptluks2 5y ago
  Yes I've called my Representatives I get someone answering the phone that says they'll take my concern or suggestion and that is the end. If you want to have a meeting with them then you have to pay for it and you usually need to draft the changes to the bills in advance if you want them introduced which takes entire teams to do, but even individuals can see where things are clearly wrong. The only special people in politics are the ones who pay and have money. Everyone else is just hoping they'll get a share of the pie in the end.
  - ClumsyPilot 5y ago
    "Yes I've called my Representatives I get someone answering the phone that says they'll take my concern or suggestion and that is the end. If you want to have a meeting with them then you have to pay for it" I am sorry to hear that, a few of my friends met their MP's and discussed their concerns, for however little that counts. This was in UK.

kerneloftruth 5y ago

They should; instead though, schools are disposing of standards because they're now unpopular (i.e. called 'racist') https://www.cnn.com/2021/05/15/us/university-of-california-sat-act-scores-admission/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2021/05/15/us/university-of-california-s... https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/16/us/harvard-admissions-act-sat.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/16/us/harvard-admissions-act... https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/move-end-standardized-testing-high-schools-draws-both-praise-concern-n1282657 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/move-end-standardized-t...

redis_mlc 5y ago

ransom1538 5y ago

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

dang 5y ago

Please don't post unsubstantive flamebait to Hacker News. It leads to dumbed-down, boring, inflammatory subthreads and we're trying for something different here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html