awillen

31 ms·

271.
by awillen 5y ago
I think even if you take a wildly more cynical approach, a substantial amount of welfare is still worthwhile. When people run out of money, society ends up paying for it, whether it's because those people steal and go to prison or end
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by awillen 5y ago
Wow, did not expect those to come in at an 8.8.
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by awillen 5y ago
"There's no way to succeed in such a high pressure environment like those college years with so little space and so little privacy." I lived in Stanford for four of its most overcrowded years... as a junior I lived in an tiny
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by awillen 5y ago
There's so much of this thinking that misses the forest for the trees. When you're running a giant government program, fraud and misuse are to be expected. The question "will there be fraud?" is rarely the right one - ra
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by awillen 5y ago
The theoretical ability to create an infinite tax liability isn't an issue because people just won't do that. Also, you only tax people in this way if they're over a certain level of net worth/income.
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by awillen 5y ago
Yep, and it's perfectly rational for them to look at it that way, unfortunately.
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by awillen 5y ago
Did I call them reluctant do-gooders? I don't see calling them reluctant do-gooders anywhere in my post. I gave unambiguous evidence of China's military escalation in the last couple of years and then used logic to come to a concl
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by awillen 5y ago
In my view the problem for either China or the US using nuclear is still mutually assured destruction - you fire a nuke, and we're going to launch all of ours. If you start using nukes, you better take over the world, because if not, e
279.
by awillen 5y ago
Have you read the news lately? https://www.reuters.com/world/china-surprises-us-with-hypers... https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-58794094 China has becoming increasingly aggressive in both its r
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by awillen 5y ago
I just don't see a way around a future with autonomous killing robots. As China ramps up its military rhetoric and technology spending, it's hard to imagine them drawing a line in the sand against using a technology that could giv
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by awillen 5y ago
Because you don't just automatically win because the patent is expired. You have to hire a lawyer to research the patent and find out it's expired, then, at minimum, your lawyer has to go to court and prove that the patent is expi
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by awillen 5y ago
Except that for what you're describing to exist, other countries would have to acknowledge it and set up diplomatic relations. That's the issue with the power of the existing system of countries - you can go claim to form your own
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by awillen 5y ago
This is one of those nice ideas that only works if you completely ignore reality. "Blockchain enthusiasts are also testing an approach that begs the question: are traditional countries still necessary?" It doesn't matter if t
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by awillen 5y ago
Everybody forgets that this is why Uber did so well in SF. The cabs are complete garbage - they don't come when you call, their credit card machines are always "broken" and the drivers are screaming at people on their cellpho
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by awillen 5y ago
It's normal competitive behavior - you're supposed to try and take market share from your competitors (and prevent them from taking it back from you). What should they say - that they're making sure not to take up too much sp
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by awillen 5y ago
While I don't think this has any wildly profound revelations, I would highly recommend reading it because it contains reasonable advice punctuated by really, really adorable pictures of the author's puppy.
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by awillen 5y ago
No one is making awful $6000 cakes (or at least they're not selling them). You can absolutely tell how good a baker's cake is by how much they charge, assuming they're actually making sales. Someone who is consistently sellin
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by awillen 5y ago
This right here. I own an e-commerce business, and I sell on Amazon, but I do about 10x the revenue on my own site that I do on Amazon. I'm in no way unique in this regard - for all of the talk of how much Amazon dominates e-commerce,
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by awillen 5y ago
As someone whose Southwest flight was cancelled, there's one important thing to consider with Southwest besides risk of cancellation - Southwest does not have reciprocity with other airlines. After my flight was cancelled, I was told t
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by awillen 5y ago
The lack of support for nuclear power is truly astounding, especially as we watch the slow motion car crash of climate change happening around us. It's obviously unsurprising from anti-science Republicans, but the Democratic party as a
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by awillen 5y ago
I'm not sure what the significance of the fact that they would be federal prosecutions is. You say misdemeanors would turn into federal charges, but that's not how it works - they'd still be misdemeanors, just charged by the
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by awillen 5y ago
He doesn't actually understand what he's talking about - he just thinks he can hand-wave away structural problems of the financial system by shaking his fist at companies that he perceives to be the problem because he doesn't
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by awillen 5y ago
Yes, that is the problem, and yes, USPS banking would solve it. I haven't disagreed with either of those things. But here, again, you're talking about the check cashing industry, and to be blunt you have no idea what you're t
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by awillen 5y ago
What is the one industry you're speaking of? Financial services? If so, how can you not include banks, which charge vastly more than the 2-3% that check cashing places do after all their fees are included? Sorry that it's not acce
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by awillen 5y ago
I replied to another comment further down but will say it here again - the stereotype of check cashing as a predatory industry is wrong, and it comes largely from people who have never used a check cashing service and conflate it with payda
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by awillen 5y ago
That's a problem, but it in no way makes them sharks as the post that I was responding to said. There is a structural issue in banking, and they arose to fill a need that results from that structural issue. They do so in a fair and tra
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by awillen 5y ago
But there's potentially an enormous amount of money along the way - first via taking satellites up and contracting with the US to take astronauts, then potentially providing infrastructure for space mining and heavy industry. There&#x2
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by awillen 5y ago
The stereotype of check cashing places as loan-shark-esque is generally wrong - I recommend reading The Unbanking of America by Lisa Servon to get a real understanding of the industry. For a poor person, a check-cashing place is generally t
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by awillen 5y ago
Try framing them as charcuterie boards instead of cutting boards - betcha they get some use that way. I've received a couple of wood cutting boards that I almost never use for cutting, mostly because I prefer to cut on plastic.
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by awillen 5y ago
This seems like it's covered under 3 and 9a. Mr. A has a demand for X and Mr. B has a demand for Y. Wealth can be created by a combination of 3 (making whatever it is they have a demand for) and 9a (creating a marketplace that matches

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