The average rent, per person, in NYC is $2k-$4k. I do not believe most people have the money to support migrants, and neither are most people planning their finances with that expectation that a larger portion of their income is going to migrants.
Remember even $120k is around $84k take home. Minus rent ($24k low end apartment rent), you are left with $40k (after 401k and healthcare). Adding migrant costs, what is the point of living in NYC at that point...
I haven't done any research on pi-hole (I use firewalla) but is a raspberry Pi even powerful enough to support a small home network?
What kind of CPU/RAM usage for a your unit normally have?
How does piracy help creators?
I'd say a pretty safe definition of engineering is applied physics. No, most software engineers are just programmers, particularly ones working in web framework or apps. Software engineers that apply software to manipulate/interact with physical phenomenon, those people are engineers: such as control loop engineers/roboticists, embedded swe, flight instrument/telemetry engineer. I'm not trying to gatekeep the word, but too many people think that they are engineers because what they are doing is hard. Statistics is hard, Chemistry is hard but see a fine distinction between economist, quantitative trader and data scientist or chemist, pharmacist and chemical engineer. Software is hard, but it's eeriely the only profession where everyone is so hung up on being called an engineer.
I am not saying people don't deserve a living wage. Raising the minimum wage helps solve short term problems, but from what I see, doesn't help fix the high cost of living. The cost of living needs to be lowered somehow, and I was curious what people thought on this. I don't think the money to subsidize the workers are going to come from the CEOs salaries...
This part I haven't figured out. Seems chicken and egg to me. If we keep raising wages to match inflation, the costs of good measured to match inflation will also go up and we end up with higher inflation right?
The current way we determine those things are clickthroughs for marketing copy, ratings or repeat clients for landscapers and gutter cleaners. I've definitely hired someone before and said, damn they did a good job, I'd have paid more for that.
I'd disagree profit is excess. At most companies, if a product or job is profitable, the extra money is used for R&D, taking risk on new things and giving bonuses to people who really stood out. Profit is required for products in services so then you can reinvest and provide more value to users.
I think that capitalism generally does create the best product. In the US we are leaders in technology, research, aerospace and infrastructure. I'm not saying we are #1 in everything, but the process does work and time and time again companies and countries use products developed from the US.
The most talented people in their fields come here because they have the ability to earn money for their talents. While it's not a perfect meritocracy, generally the best in their field stand out.
Regarding healthcare, railroads or other private services. The best thing is that they are private, and if something comes to disrupt the status quo you are free to take your dollars elsewhere. Same thing with lemmy; while I'd argue reddit (at the moment) has a lot more engaging and varied content because of it's user base, I chose to stick with lemmy because I like it's value propositions.
Privatisation isn't terrible, look at what SpaceX has done, completely turned the space industry sideways. For healthcare you have new companies like Oscar, which have given people immediate access to telemedicine. In Japan, the Japan Railways (JR) is a massive private railway organization that provides bullet trains and local trains across the country: it can be done.
Very good points. I hadn't thought of the downfall of delivery to be an option, but I can understand that. The inflation stuff is a little over my head but if we constantly target higher inflation, what is the end game? We can't raise all salaries realistically and have a loaf of bread cost $20 in the end. Is the future meant to have less humans?
Yes @missveeronica, love peace, love discussion! I am curious what other alternatives we have or what people can think of. It's obviously a very tough problem since the US government can't seem to (agree to) fix it. Things that pop in my mind:
I understand this is a basic overstatement, but in general, people work so that they can afford a house. I think housing prices have gone bonkers in recent years, partially due to foreign investors and the flipping houses/Airbnb craze. One thing that pops into my mind is to impose a flip tax, where unless the owner personally lives in a house for 4-5 years, they pay a large tax when selling the home. This of course applies to corporations as well but with the added spice of larger tax if the inventory was empty the entire time. If we can make housing affordable again, I think the need for higher salaries is less of an issue.
Revamp the food stamp system and make it universal to everyone. This ties into universal basic income, but I think if everyone was part of a food stamp program, it would make it less stigmatized and there would be a wider offering of choices available. This could be very cool.
Aside from the usual tax billionaires/term limits/socialize healthcare ideas, it seems that we have an issue where things can get out of hand from people who are greedy. I don't know how to solve this problem, but I feel like if there was some website that showed what companies are owned by who, we could vote with our dollars and level the playing field. I hate that I found out after years the gym I belong to is owned by some nutjob and I've been patronizing him. If there was some visibility into where my money was going, it might educate people where their money is going.
I agree. I'm having a hard time understanding how raising the salary of delivery workers to what an entry level doctor, engineers or lawyer is going to solve the problem. There are two things that might happen, either all the other salaries in the world will then also increase (and thus services too), keeping the wealth disparity the same, or, since these delivery companies already operate on such thin margins (GrubHub net profit for past years have been negative $millions), they are going to pass the cost to the consumer. It creates an interesting problem where then it's too expensive to get delivery so you don't order food, which means less delivery jobs are needed so people are laid off, preventing people from making money. Also, from what I've seen, most of the workers seems to be immigrants. While I'm not saying we take advantage of immigrants, but these low barrier to entry jobs have always been helpful for those who have complicated statuses.
I'm not bashing any delivery worker (I used to work at a wings shop in my youth), but the amount of interaction you spend with a delivery worker is usually minimal. It doesn't require any formal training and neither being a bad one is going to affect whether you are in the mood for Thai food.
I don't think it's the wrong question. Profits exists in every society and many countries are capitalist or have their own flavor of capitalism. If the idea is to create a system where those who excel are rewarded, then profits need and should exist. In a capitalist economy, this drives better products, better services, etc. Additionally, the opposite of profit (loss), serves as a great metric to determine whether something is worth doing. If the customer wants a pure gold toilet, but only has $50 to spend, your going to offer them spray paint instead of the real thing.
There are some bad apples that abuse profits, and disproportionately hoard all the value, but I'm looking to discuss my original question.
I'm saying what is the point for the average New Yorker. The migrants are putting a strain on people who live in NYC legally, imagine out of the blue you are losing a huge portion of your paycheck in an already expensive city. Waves of migrants showing up in a city is unfair to the people.