5 ms·

$10M seems way too much - if it's per year. Call me paranoid, but that kind of money invites the ESG crowd.

by tpmx 3y ago

tomrod 3y ago
ESG crowd? This would fund a team of 10 for four years + operating costs for active development for commodity cloud targets. This isn't a ton of cash.
- quickthrower2 3y ago
  Or 10x that if you get to choose another country :-)
dheera 3y ago
Eh, inflation has happened, and taxes, medical bills, and real estate are insane these days. So much so that you can't live a "normal" life of the standards of 20 years ago with less than $500K+ in salary. (At normal "middle class" modest levels of life hat's $250K after taxes, $200K after medical expenses, $150K after rent, $100K after food, $50K after transportation, $25K after food ...) Sounds outrageous but most people have been brainwashed into thinking living with roommates in a cramped flat full of mildew, giving up all dreams of owning a home, and driving an old, unsafe car is the new norm. Given that, $10M isn't really that much, considering you need to hire software devs to do any of the work they propose, and those software devs are getting $500K+ offers everywhere else.
- abhayhegde 3y ago
  I'm appalled at the perspective of middle class for you. If $500K is barely middle class, how would you classify a grad student? I suppose you were once a grad student too.
  - dheera 3y ago
    I was. But (a) a lot of things are subsidized as a grad student (my dorm room rent was 30% of market price for the area), and (b) savings are nearly zero. It's close to a paycheck-to-paycheck life unless you have some external income (which I did, via Google Ads that I slapped on a 250K MAU/month website of mine). That external income paid for me to eat healthy, buy outdoor exercise equipment, have a couple shoestring budget vacations per year for mental health, etc. I'd consider "being able to save enough to continue a modest quality of life for retirement" a normal feature of what describes middle class life. If you are living paycheck-to-paycheck you'll suffer when you hit old age or have a disabling condition that prevents you from working.
    - abhayhegde 3y ago
      Thanks for a detailed response. I'd definitely like some extra income as a grad student, but I cannot earn outside of the university because of my visa restrictions. For all intents and purposes, you may as well consider me living paycheck-to-paycheck. I wish academia paid better.
- tpmx 3y ago
  This needs to be turned into a tshirt print: You can't live a "normal" life of the standards of 20 years ago with less than $500K+ in salary.
- Aaronstotle 3y ago
  I found it truly incredulous that you are trying to defend the position that $500k a year salary is middle class.
  - dheera 3y ago
    You do realize that's $250K after taxes, here in California? Which is $140K in year 2000 dollars. Houses here cost $1M for a dump, or $2M for something decent. 20-30 years ago, being able to afford a home was a pretty standard thing for anyone in the middle class. A 1-bedroom rental apartment costs $2500/month for something moldy and not wired to modern electrical code, or $3000/month for something clean, safe, and sanitary (you pick). Plus $500 for basic utilities (water+gas+electric+internet+phone). Seems pretty squarely middle class to me.
    - cipheredStones 3y ago
      No, seriously, it's insane that you're trying to defend this claim. Median US household income after taxes in 2022 was $64,240. If you make *quadruple* median household income after taxes, you are not middle class. Median post-tax household income was $34,123 in 2000, so $140k was quadruple that too. Median pre-tax household income in San Francisco is $126k. The standard guideline for an apartment being affordable is "30% of your pre-tax income or less"; a $3k apartment would be affordable by that metric for someone making $120k before taxes. In San Francisco itself, single-family houses do start at around $1M, but it is not remotely true that you need to spend $2M for "something decent" - there are tons for like $1.2M, I'm looking at Zillow right now. You can get a two-bedroom condo in a pretty good neighborhood for like $750k. House price affordability guidelines are "3-5x pre-tax annual income", so even in SF, the paradigmatic housing-crisis city, you could afford a $1.2M house on $250k or a $750k condo on $150k. All of this is just setting aside the question of "if you can just afford to buy a house in one of the most expensive places in the country, does that make you middle class", for which the actual answer is no. But by absolutely no sane metric is $500k/yr "squarely middle class".
      - dheera 3y ago
- hatthew 3y ago
  Not sure I agree that that's middle class levels of expense. If you're living a "normal" life, and for the sake of the example you start with $500k per year, my estimates are $300k after taxes, $290k after medical/insurance, $240k after rent/mortgage, $220k after food, $200k after transportation. IMO $50k for rent/mortgage is the only vaguely plausible number you have.
  - dheera 3y ago
    Considering: - health insurance rarely pays for what they do, balance bill you several thousands of dollars every time you have a regular check up for an incurable health issue, and it often requires legal notices and lots of lost work hours on the phone with debt collectors, insurance, hospitals - rent figures don't include my $200 electric bill, $200 water bill, $70 internet bill that comcast decided to charge me $170 last month out of nowhere, $50 trash bill, another $200 in maintainence just to keep the place livable because the landlord won't do it for you - transportation isn't cheap. a rock hit the bottom of my car last month on the highway and it cost $700 to repair. tires wore out and that costs $1000. DMV charge me $600 a year just for the hell of it. insurance costs $200/month. other costs are upwards of $200/month just to use the damn thing. and then there's parking, energy costs, fastrak costs, ...
    - njbooher 3y ago
      Most people don't live in California.
    - BeetleB 3y ago
      > health insurance rarely pays for what they do, balance bill you several thousands of dollars every time you have a regular check up for an incurable health issue, and it often requires legal notices and lots of lost work hours on the phone with debt collectors, insurance, hospitals Despite what the news will tell you, most SW engineers don't deal with this. In over a decade of working, with lots of interactions with the medical system, not one of these has manifested for me nor for my friends. > transportation isn't cheap. a rock hit the bottom of my car last month on the highway and it cost $700 to repair. tires wore out and that costs $1000. DMV charge me $600 a year just for the hell of it. insurance costs $200/month. other costs are upwards of $200/month just to use the damn thing. and then there's parking, energy costs, fastrak costs, ... There's a whole country out there where you don't pay most of these fees. I pay a sixth of what you do to the DMV, and half what you pay for insurance (and I have more than the bare minimum). Repairs? Yeah, sometimes I have to pay a lot. But something on the order of $700 for a single repair is one of those "once every 3-4 years" things for me, for 2 cars.
- jsyang00 3y ago
  Your medical bills probably are really high if you are spending >$5k on food a month...
  - therealrootuser 3y ago
    Most underrated comment.
- BeetleB 3y ago
  > At normal "middle class" modest levels of life hat's $250K after taxes, $200K after medical expenses, $150K after rent, $100K after food, $50K after transportation, $25K after food ...) 99% of the country doesn't pay $50K per year in rent. Nor $50K per year in food. Nor $50K per year in transportation. Nor an additional $25K per year in food.
  - dheera 3y ago
    Most people pay more than they think they pay. For example they think they pay 2K/mo in rent but that easily blows up to 4K after hidden costs that aren't on the sticker price of the lease. Utilities, utilities of others that landlord charges to you because the lease said they could (and so does every other lease in a 100 mile radius), maintainence and safety issues that landlord doesn't cover, moving costs averaged over time, extra months of rent you have to pay because of stupid 12 month lease systems, tax or whatever other stupid fees charged by the rent payment systems, pest control, mold control, cleaning costs, furniture costs, ... only after all that does the place become even livable for a middle class standard. Yeah, if you're okay with some pests and bedbug-ridden furniture you can save $200/month. If you're okay with shitty internet access that you can't even have a quality video call, you can save $50/month. etc. If you breathe mold all day, you can save $50/month. If you move all your stuff with muscles and no moving companies, you can save $200/month. But then you're not having a middle class life.
    - BeetleB 3y ago
      > Most people pay more than they think they pay. Sorry buddy. I track my finances - since 2007. I rarely look at them, but I have all the data for me. And I'm not frugal. Do you have yours? > For example they think they pay 2K/mo in rent but that easily blows up to 4K after hidden costs that aren't on the sticker price of the lease. This may drive you nuts, but in every place I've rented, I've never paid water, trash, sewage or parking. And I did not seek out these places. I know places do charge for these, but they are locale dependent. In a number of apartments I didn't pay for heat either. Moving costs? Only paid them once. Otherwise just moved with friends, or had the company pay. OK, I did have to pay U-Haul. You got me there. No hidden fees. Sorry. As I said, there's a whole country you haven't seen.
- coding123 3y ago
  you did food twice?
nharada 3y ago
> that kind of money invites the ESG crowd what does that mean?
- tpmx 3y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental,_social,_and_corporate_governance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental,_social,_and_cor...
tootien 3y ago
Mozilla ArXiv, anyone?
- quickthrower2 3y ago
  IPFS? Torrents? Maybe an IPFS bridge could be a FTW

$10M seems way too much - if it's per year. Call me paranoid, but that kind of money invites the ESG crowd.

by tpmx 3y ago

$10M seems way too much - if it's per year. Call me paranoid, but that kind of money invites the ESG crowd.

ESG crowd? This would fund a team of 10 for four years + operating costs for active development for commodity cloud targets. This isn't a ton of cash.

quickthrower2 3y ago
Or 10x that if you get to choose another country :-)

dheera 3y ago

Eh, inflation has happened, and taxes, medical bills, and real estate are insane these days. So much so that you can't live a "normal" life of the standards of 20 years ago with less than $500K+ in salary. (At normal "middle class" modest levels of life hat's $250K after taxes, $200K after medical expenses, $150K after rent, $100K after food, $50K after transportation, $25K after food ...) Sounds outrageous but most people have been brainwashed into thinking living with roommates in a cramped flat full of mildew, giving up all dreams of owning a home, and driving an old, unsafe car is the new norm. Given that, $10M isn't really that much, considering you need to hire software devs to do any of the work they propose, and those software devs are getting $500K+ offers everywhere else.

abhayhegde 3y ago
I'm appalled at the perspective of middle class for you. If $500K is barely middle class, how would you classify a grad student? I suppose you were once a grad student too.
- dheera 3y ago
  I was. But (a) a lot of things are subsidized as a grad student (my dorm room rent was 30% of market price for the area), and (b) savings are nearly zero. It's close to a paycheck-to-paycheck life unless you have some external income (which I did, via Google Ads that I slapped on a 250K MAU/month website of mine). That external income paid for me to eat healthy, buy outdoor exercise equipment, have a couple shoestring budget vacations per year for mental health, etc. I'd consider "being able to save enough to continue a modest quality of life for retirement" a normal feature of what describes middle class life. If you are living paycheck-to-paycheck you'll suffer when you hit old age or have a disabling condition that prevents you from working.
  - abhayhegde 3y ago
    Thanks for a detailed response. I'd definitely like some extra income as a grad student, but I cannot earn outside of the university because of my visa restrictions. For all intents and purposes, you may as well consider me living paycheck-to-paycheck. I wish academia paid better.
tpmx 3y ago
This needs to be turned into a tshirt print: You can't live a "normal" life of the standards of 20 years ago with less than $500K+ in salary.
Aaronstotle 3y ago
I found it truly incredulous that you are trying to defend the position that $500k a year salary is middle class.
- dheera 3y ago
  You do realize that's $250K after taxes, here in California? Which is $140K in year 2000 dollars. Houses here cost $1M for a dump, or $2M for something decent. 20-30 years ago, being able to afford a home was a pretty standard thing for anyone in the middle class. A 1-bedroom rental apartment costs $2500/month for something moldy and not wired to modern electrical code, or $3000/month for something clean, safe, and sanitary (you pick). Plus $500 for basic utilities (water+gas+electric+internet+phone). Seems pretty squarely middle class to me.
  - cipheredStones 3y ago
    No, seriously, it's insane that you're trying to defend this claim. Median US household income after taxes in 2022 was $64,240. If you make *quadruple* median household income after taxes, you are not middle class. Median post-tax household income was $34,123 in 2000, so $140k was quadruple that too. Median pre-tax household income in San Francisco is $126k. The standard guideline for an apartment being affordable is "30% of your pre-tax income or less"; a $3k apartment would be affordable by that metric for someone making $120k before taxes. In San Francisco itself, single-family houses do start at around $1M, but it is not remotely true that you need to spend $2M for "something decent" - there are tons for like $1.2M, I'm looking at Zillow right now. You can get a two-bedroom condo in a pretty good neighborhood for like $750k. House price affordability guidelines are "3-5x pre-tax annual income", so even in SF, the paradigmatic housing-crisis city, you could afford a $1.2M house on $250k or a $750k condo on $150k. All of this is just setting aside the question of "if you can just afford to buy a house in one of the most expensive places in the country, does that make you middle class", for which the actual answer is no. But by absolutely no sane metric is $500k/yr "squarely middle class".
    - dheera 3y ago
hatthew 3y ago
Not sure I agree that that's middle class levels of expense. If you're living a "normal" life, and for the sake of the example you start with $500k per year, my estimates are $300k after taxes, $290k after medical/insurance, $240k after rent/mortgage, $220k after food, $200k after transportation. IMO $50k for rent/mortgage is the only vaguely plausible number you have.
- dheera 3y ago
  Considering: - health insurance rarely pays for what they do, balance bill you several thousands of dollars every time you have a regular check up for an incurable health issue, and it often requires legal notices and lots of lost work hours on the phone with debt collectors, insurance, hospitals - rent figures don't include my $200 electric bill, $200 water bill, $70 internet bill that comcast decided to charge me $170 last month out of nowhere, $50 trash bill, another $200 in maintainence just to keep the place livable because the landlord won't do it for you - transportation isn't cheap. a rock hit the bottom of my car last month on the highway and it cost $700 to repair. tires wore out and that costs $1000. DMV charge me $600 a year just for the hell of it. insurance costs $200/month. other costs are upwards of $200/month just to use the damn thing. and then there's parking, energy costs, fastrak costs, ...
  - njbooher 3y ago
    Most people don't live in California.
  - BeetleB 3y ago
    > health insurance rarely pays for what they do, balance bill you several thousands of dollars every time you have a regular check up for an incurable health issue, and it often requires legal notices and lots of lost work hours on the phone with debt collectors, insurance, hospitals Despite what the news will tell you, most SW engineers don't deal with this. In over a decade of working, with lots of interactions with the medical system, not one of these has manifested for me nor for my friends. > transportation isn't cheap. a rock hit the bottom of my car last month on the highway and it cost $700 to repair. tires wore out and that costs $1000. DMV charge me $600 a year just for the hell of it. insurance costs $200/month. other costs are upwards of $200/month just to use the damn thing. and then there's parking, energy costs, fastrak costs, ... There's a whole country out there where you don't pay most of these fees. I pay a sixth of what you do to the DMV, and half what you pay for insurance (and I have more than the bare minimum). Repairs? Yeah, sometimes I have to pay a lot. But something on the order of $700 for a single repair is one of those "once every 3-4 years" things for me, for 2 cars.
jsyang00 3y ago
Your medical bills probably are really high if you are spending >$5k on food a month...
- therealrootuser 3y ago
  Most underrated comment.
BeetleB 3y ago
> At normal "middle class" modest levels of life hat's $250K after taxes, $200K after medical expenses, $150K after rent, $100K after food, $50K after transportation, $25K after food ...) 99% of the country doesn't pay $50K per year in rent. Nor $50K per year in food. Nor $50K per year in transportation. Nor an additional $25K per year in food.
- dheera 3y ago
  Most people pay more than they think they pay. For example they think they pay 2K/mo in rent but that easily blows up to 4K after hidden costs that aren't on the sticker price of the lease. Utilities, utilities of others that landlord charges to you because the lease said they could (and so does every other lease in a 100 mile radius), maintainence and safety issues that landlord doesn't cover, moving costs averaged over time, extra months of rent you have to pay because of stupid 12 month lease systems, tax or whatever other stupid fees charged by the rent payment systems, pest control, mold control, cleaning costs, furniture costs, ... only after all that does the place become even livable for a middle class standard. Yeah, if you're okay with some pests and bedbug-ridden furniture you can save $200/month. If you're okay with shitty internet access that you can't even have a quality video call, you can save $50/month. etc. If you breathe mold all day, you can save $50/month. If you move all your stuff with muscles and no moving companies, you can save $200/month. But then you're not having a middle class life.
  - BeetleB 3y ago
    > Most people pay more than they think they pay. Sorry buddy. I track my finances - since 2007. I rarely look at them, but I have all the data for me. And I'm not frugal. Do you have yours? > For example they think they pay 2K/mo in rent but that easily blows up to 4K after hidden costs that aren't on the sticker price of the lease. This may drive you nuts, but in every place I've rented, I've never paid water, trash, sewage or parking. And I did not seek out these places. I know places do charge for these, but they are locale dependent. In a number of apartments I didn't pay for heat either. Moving costs? Only paid them once. Otherwise just moved with friends, or had the company pay. OK, I did have to pay U-Haul. You got me there. No hidden fees. Sorry. As I said, there's a whole country you haven't seen.
coding123 3y ago
you did food twice?

nharada 3y ago

> that kind of money invites the ESG crowd what does that mean?

tpmx 3y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental,_social,_and_corporate_governance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental,_social,_and_cor...

tootien 3y ago

Mozilla ArXiv, anyone?

quickthrower2 3y ago
IPFS? Torrents? Maybe an IPFS bridge could be a FTW