Except for birth cert, passport, and ss card - totally paperless. Scan everything instantly. Maybe a little fanatical but it really keeps my head clear.
2,217 karma · joined January 18, 2013
But I wonder of the future of mass corporate home buying, which I would assume Airbnb would do like Amazon, create a huge platform and then enter that market to compete with your customers.
I understand not everyone has an easy time with it. But today, 70% of Americans can file for free. Some version of optional auto-filing I have no problem with.
As far as a private company trying to protect it's revenue, there are far more egregious examples of that, out there right now.
The thing to understand about filing is that (particularly for W2 wage earners) you're not telling the Government how much you made and how much you owe. They know that already.
If you make a mistake in your filing, good or bad, they will send you a friendly letter correcting your mistake. The filing is just acknowledging the debt to them.
Well, we’re all dependent on the Internet which can be shut down at any time by any government, and normally almost completely dependent on FAANG companies.
I applaud the freedom activist spirit but the only exciting technologies in this regard must be P2P and not Internet carried.
The US needing to debate the ethics of AI however is exactly the kind of value difference w China that illustrates the West's adversarial stance towards them.
China is and will be a real challenge because ultimately you can't beat them by selling out your principles and becoming like them.
In the film, an artist forges works of art by famous artists and fraudulently sells them to museums. It's implied that the museums don't know they are forgeries or don't care. So why is a Picasso more valuable than a perfect reproduction of it?
I think the point is, it's all just perception, and greed.
Cryptography is a highly significant technology, but cryptocurrency and now NFT too often just smacks of a money making scheme, promoted by self-serving people who happen to own a lot of it.
We’re not served well by the constant prideful “we’re the greatest country in the world”. There are some wonderful things to be proud of.
However, the fact is, we’re a rather violent society. We’re a society that loves alcohol. We’re a very insecure people. We don’t get to the root of the problems. They are in the psyche.
Actually the 60k guy was the most talented on my 15 person team. The reason is simply when the 60k guy came on they asked him how much do you need, and he said 60k. He never asked for a raise, but they actually bumped him up anyway cause they thought he may be a flight risk if he ever checked out the marketplace.
I also found, people are much more likely to underestimate themselves than overestimate.
Only 10% of employees would consistently ask for more money every year. Everyone else almost never asked for a raise.
Now its not solely just negotiation cause if they were a star they probably got it. If they sucked it just made management like them less. When management doesn't like you, and comes time someone needs to be cut. That's who gets cut.
"Certifications" doesn't get there - too easy to just game a multiple choice test. I would like to see a formal education + testing requirement (ala Doctors, just not 10 years!) Essentially, a barrier of entry for serious programmers. That would ultimately come with a high minimum salary without having to get hired at faang.
College accreditation doesn't cut it either. I work w programmers with an MS in CS. Programmers are kinda impressed. Managers could care less.
The insanely high demand for labor and (always present) priority to reduce labor costs however encourages the entry of boot-camp you're hired on the low end of experience/competence.
You cannot infuse trillions of extra dollars into the economy without inflation. There's no magic pill - there must be consequences.
So the $29 kettle is $21. I've never bought a "used" item from Amazon that was unsatisfactory cause it was "used".
"Law enforcement" is always used as a reason to invade privacy. Searching smartphones wasn't envisioned by the founding fathers but is exactly what they were talking about when it was written into the constitution.
In fact I'd probably be skeptical of a tech person who greatly emphasizes the challenge of the tech effort over the challenges of the sales effort.
If Social Security cannot pay it’s obligations to recipients, it is funded by the general treasury. The treasury doesn’t have the funds either, so is funded by treasuries.
The told me I can gladly travel 30 min back to the store and wait in line for a refund. No thanks.
That money that would have gone towards your equity, is being spent in interest. This is why people making 60k/yr. buy $65,000 trucks. Interest rates drop and they only look at the monthly payment amount.
You don’t always get the full tax deduction on a first home either. In high tax states the 10k deduction limit kicks in when your paying high state taxes + mortgage interest.
I'm a happy user of Microsoft/Google/Apple but there needs to be some alternatives.
The public can be manipulated into absolutely anything. I wouldn’t mind if “Never Forget” were replaced with “let’s keep our heads here”.
This issue was then weaponized for political purposes, and people got militant about it.
But governments have consistently lied/been wrong about this virus, so there is no trust either in their messaging about this crisis.
We should have had a full-court press in all areas to fight this virus. Not just a $100 billion for big pharma for a vaccine that always works, except when it doesn't. It's no wonder 25% of the US have adopted the idiotic position that they wont accept a mask or vaccine. People are so done with the 'new normal' for this week that just needs to be accepted.
It’s too bad bc financial incentives like a carbon tax would almost certainly work. But needs better PR. For instance, a tax credit for electric cars can also be considered a tax on combustion engines, but it’s not presented that way.