Last winter my gas heater was out of commission for about a month. I plugged in 3 oil filled electric radiant heaters. I had guests at the time so I kept the temperature up higher than usual in areas of the house which I normally keep cooler. It all worked out great.
The next power bill showed that most of my power usage was "lighting." Uh huh.
"Consume" labor hours? What does that even mean? Those laborers get paid, and then they spend the money they get. That money is circulating through the economy.
> "Consume" labor hours? What does that even mean? Those laborers get paid, and then they spend the money they get. That money is circulating through the economy.
Money isn't stuff. Yes, those craftsmen get paid, but when one of them has something he needs done, some service provided, or some physical resource, he ends up paying more for the labor, because he is competing in the same labor market as everyone else.
Don't you think spending the working time of 4 million labor hours a year, building megayachts, is perhaps not the most productive/ROI generating activity for society at large? You could for example, with ~4 million skilled labor hours a year, build a lot of housing. You could build factories that provide for the needs the people. Hell, you could just give people time-off to, y'know, live and enjoy life (and perhaps, uh, have _children_, which the current system seems to be very efficient at disincentivizing).
> he ends up paying more for the labor, because he is competing in the same labor market as everyone else
You'll have to explain that more. Ship builders aren't competing with plumbers.
>Don't you think spending the working time of 4 million labor hours a year, building megayachts, is perhaps not the most productive/ROI generating activity for society at large
Well, that's a drop in the bucket. But you could apply this reasoning to any form of luxury goods. Where do you draw the line? Nice clothes? Fancy watches? Sports cars? Five-star restaurants? Are any of these "the most productive/ROI generating activity for society at large?" Who decides what goods and services are worthy?
> and perhaps, uh, have _children_
You think people are having fewer children because luxury yachts are being built?
> You'll have to explain that more. Ship builders aren't competing with plumbers.
Sure, on any given year. But the current economic organization of society wasn't born yesterday. On a longer timescale? Absolutely are.
> Well, that's a drop in the bucket. But you could apply this reasoning to any form of luxury goods.
Yes.
> Where do you draw the line? Nice clothes? Fancy watches? Sports cars? Five-star restaurants? Are any of these "the most productive/ROI generating activity for society at large?" Who decides what goods and services are worthy?
The neat thing about market economies is that you don't actually have to draw a line anywhere. You can just reduce income & wealth inequality via taxes and markets will sort it out. If you had taxed capital gains such that Bezos would have had to liquidate 10x - 100x in Amazon stock to buy his yacht, he likely would have settled for a smaller, but still perfectly acceptable yacht, and so on down the wealth ladder.
> You think people are having fewer children because luxury yachts are being built?
Yes I think income/wealth inequality + the amount of labor hours demanded from people to just stay in place is why people are having fewer children.
"In 2021 he was found to have libelled a 15-year-old refugee at a school in Huddersfield and was ordered to pay £100,000 plus legal costs. After breaching an injunction about repeating the libel, Robinson was sentenced to 18 months in prison for contempt of court in October 2024"
Also:
"Robinson's criminal record includes convictions for violence, financial, and immigration frauds, cocaine possession with intent to supply, and public order offences.[135][136][137] He had previously served at least three separate custodial sentences: in 2005 for assault, in 2012 for using false travel documents and in 2014 for mortgage fraud."
No. Prison for contempt of court. He lost a civil case related to the libel and was ordered to pay the victim and not repeat the libel (by showing his film). He decided to show his film at a rally, and the court deemed this contempt and sentenced him to prison.
However you frame it, that’s not “prison for libel”. That’s prison for contempt of court. He was ordered not to do a thing. He decided to do the thing. So the court sent him to prison.
Yet, many even here on HN will if not outright defend this, then let it slide, because there is one overarching goal which must not be compromised at any cost: to own the libs.
Given that despite open knowledge nothing was done for >50 years about climate change, there's plenty of blame to go around. Hell, I like to compare the feedback vs the forcing and the feedback has been going down since 2018. Imho that can only mean the tipping point is very close.
Becoming a doctor, lawyer, scientist, or engineer is a personal choice, and a personal investment. You don’t get to socialize the costs and privatize the gains for your personal benefit in the name of “society”. If you need to take out a loan, borrow against your future, not everyone else’s. You’ll be making more money later so it’s not like you can’t afford it anyways.
However you can't protect yourself against all kind of things happening, like pandemic affecting your ability to work.
In cases of emergencies government can and often does intervene (see housing crisis, airlines during covid etc). Why wouldn't government offset something like this in case of student loans during emergencies?
In the end this was a statue (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Higher_Education_Relief_Opport...) Biden was using for loan forgiveness. According to current Supreme Court (at least when Trump is a president) court shouldn't be deciding (in a lot of cases) over executive when its assessment of a situation is correct. However the court did it with Biden.
You're framing it like it's black and white and it's obvious loan forgiveness is wrong/illegal. Nah, it's not obvious, we did have an emergency and it might have needed exceptional solutions to it (in this case with student loans).
> In cases of emergencies government can and often does intervene (see housing crisis, airlines during covid etc). Why wouldn't government offset something like this in case of student loans during emergencies?
Because it is unconstitutional, and because it is unlawful. It is during times of emergencies that individual liberties are under the greatest threat and so it is during those times they need the strongest protections.
I find it funny you cite the housing crisis and covid as paragons because the government intervention to each of those were horrible and people in general would be much better off in the long run if the government never intervened. Maybe you don't like the idea that the government can be a threat, but I assure you that governments can and do go rogue. Never forget that the constitution was written as a document to put limits on the government. There is an important reason for framing it exactly like that. It puts into focus the very real dangers of having a centralized power encroaching in on every aspect of your life. With every piece it seizes, it also seizes a piece of your individual autonomy.
