ping_pong

I went to Hawaii recently. We got first class tickets for around $600. A single test for $150 was required to go to Hawaii, but no test was required after that. And we didn't need to test before returning back to California.

The most expensive part actualy is car rentals. Car rentals in Maui are insanely expensive, if you can even get a rental. One of my friends was quoted $900/day. In other islands like Big Island and Oahu, they are cheaper ($50-80/day) if you can find a deal.

Gas taxes galore

But by that measure, everything is up or down because of the pandemic. A lot of the inflation we are seeing is because of supply chain issues specifically caused by the pandemic. For example, lumber is only because they closed down mills, and chips are short because companies cancelled a ton of orders, etc. I myself went on a trip because plane tickets are so damn cheap right now.

But I do agree that we are in a period of very high inflation.

I find it hard to believe that it costs them $1 million a year in waste costs. The potential to make money and/or tax credits from everything that can be recycled must largely outweigh the residual trash that needs to be dumped. When we threw away a large amount of junk to a junker before moving, I was talking to the worker and they said they not only make money on the junk pickup, but they make money on recycling everything they can from what they pick up, which was over half of the net weight.

If places like Goodwill are having trouble figuring out how to make money off the stuff they can't sell, you should hook up with a junker and split the proceeds as well as save $1M/yr.

By your definition, people are poor because of bad luck. I guess according to you, there's nothing anyone can do except rely on luck. Good luck to you, then!

It's not luck. My parents busted their ass off to get out of the country.

Same as our cleaner. She illegally immigrated into Mexico first, but realized how racist Mexicans were against Central Americans, so she decided to work her way so that she could get into the US. This isn't luck, it's hard work. She didn't accidentally find herself in the US.

This is fairly obvious. Live in a household where education is valued, go to a school with good education, surround yourself with kids who also value education. Of course your likelihood for earning better than average will go up. If you grow up in a household where education is not valued, then you will most likely not be able to succeed as easily. Is this somehow controversial?

My parents grew up poor in a war-torn country. They left the country as soon as they could. However, they concentrated on education, and left on scholarships. My family lived a very middle class life but much better than anything my parents lived in. They had the exact same focus on education for me and my siblings. They sacrificed everything for our education. I went to a public school but I studied harder and worked harder than most of my friends, and I'm now a single-digit millionaire, which isn't very much in Silicon Valley but good enough for me. I'm currently retired at this point while I take care of my kids and my wife works because she wants to. My children will get the same focus on education and hard work, the way I did. My family went from poor to rich in a single generation.

Our cleaner is an illegal immigrant from Central America. Her daughter was born in the US and is going to a very prestigious private high school in the Bay Area and has plans of going to Yale. I know she will do it. They are also going from poor to rich in a single generation.

Generational mobility from poor to rich is easily possible, but you can only do it through hard work and education.

Canada is only 15th because they aren't doing a 2nd dose until 4 months later. So you can't compare Canada to places that are actually scheduling the 2nd shot properly. NO ONE is getting their second shot. That's a complete hack because Pfizer and Moderna both said not to push the 2nd shot past their recommended time period.

If Canada did their 2nd dose in the 3-4 weeks as required by Pfizer and Moderna, their rank would drop precipitously.

Personally I understand what they are doing, they are going breadth first to slow down the spread, but I hate the propaganda that is saying that somehow Canada is doing "great". They aren't. They completely bundled the vaccine.

In Washington DC and Hollywood, I think it's pretty common.

I haven't heard of this at all in Silicon Valley though. In fact interns are pretty well paid, $7500/month at my previous company.

It's pretty bizarre not to offer even a modicum of money, but I can see how the opportunity could be lucrative for an unknown or rising wedding photographer. If you can say you were the wedding photographer for "Love Is Blind" and use that on your web site, it might get you a ton more clients. They should do the right thing and offer the contractor money, but from what I've heard, that's par for the course for Hollywood and movie/tv studios.

This isn't how it works. When customers pull their deposits out of their bank accounts, the bank can't turn that into loans, which is what drives a lot of the income.

If the customers shift that money from the bank account into a trading account in a brokerage, they can't do the same thing with those funds that they do if it were in a savings account.

Stuff like this is so powerful, it really makes me trust Signal. It's the same reason why I use Apple, because they fought the government in court. I'm not sure how much I still trust them, but it's more than I would Google/Android.

> the suggestion that the Fed ignores energy prices / food prices is ridiculous at face value.

Except everywhere it states clearly they exclude it.

If I understand correctly, if you want to get something shipped, you can't pay a fixed price anymore. You have to pay spot, which is exhorbitant. So not only is there a massive delay in getting your goods shipped, there is a massive extra cost.

This sounds pretty interesting.

Is this article suggesting that imports will see lots of inflation because of costs to ship goods to the US? And then a backlog growing in Asia, which will eventually flood the US just in time for the end of the Pandemic?

It sounds like the beginnings of an old-fashion over-inventory-driven recession. But the mechanics these days are different than what we would have seen in the US during the 1980s, since the factories are in Asia. I'm curious what the result of this will be.

> Core PCE includes food (split between line 9 and line 19), and fuel (line 11).

Wrong.

"The "core" PCE price index is defined as personal consumption expenditures (PCE) prices excluding food and energy prices."

https://www.bea.gov/help/faq/518

> Both CPI and PCE are both up slightly in the past year. Both are measures of inflation and clearly indicate slightly higher prices.

Sure, if you consider 1.5% PCE and indication of inflation. By your definition, 0.1% PCE would indicate inflation. But in reality, the target PCE is 2.0%. The numbers that the Fed are using to dictate policy indicate that inflation is not high enough, and yet the evidence of asset inflation is irrefutable.

https://www.bea.gov/data/personal-consumption-expenditures-p...

Why are you trying to spread misinformation? What's in it for you?

What I meant is that Fed Policy is dictated by Core PCE, so they don't look at that when setting rates. So it doesn't matter if fuel prices skyrocket or drop, it's not anything that gets the headlines. The only thing you hear about is Core PCE or Core CPI. If no policy is enacted by regular CPI, then who cares. The Fed only sees no inflation regardless of the inflation we see all around us.

Designer bags have gotten extremely expensive. I'm talking about the $8000-10000 bags. The thing to do is to buy an expensive bag, use it for a few years, and then sell it for a profit, so basically people are now looking at is as an investment.

Housing prices are high because the stock market is high and interest rates are rock bottom. The higher the stock market goes and the lower interest rates go, the more house prices are juiced. Anyone without exposure to the stock market will never be able to afford a house, ever. That's where the income inequality is really stark.

Some comments below keep saying that CPI measures things like food and energy prices.

What we really mean is that Fed policy is dictated by the Core PCE rate, which specifically excludes food and energy prices. So sure, the PCE and CPI measures energy and food prices and other volatiles prices, but *FED POLICY is dictated by the CORE rates*, which specifically exclude those volatile components.

So de facto, no one (ie. the Fed) doesn't care about energy or food price inflation.

Some comments below keep saying that CPI measures things like food and energy prices.

What we really mean is that Fed policy is dictated by the Core PCE rate, which specifically excludes food and energy prices. So sure, the CPI measures energy and food prices and other volatiles prices, but *FED POLICY is dictated by the CORE rates*, which specifically exclude those volatile components.

So de facto, no one (ie. the Fed) doesn't care about energy or food price inflation.

No one keeps track of inflation for anything other than consumer goods. Inflation is floating around 1-2% according to the Fed. They conveniently don't track things like fuel prices or food because they are too "volatile". And things like asset inflation simply isn't considered in the equation. But the reality is that upper income people have 401ks with stocks in them and lower income people live paycheck to paycheck. Since 2008 when the Fed start QE, the stock market has gone through the room, including companies like FANG.

If you're not exposed to the stock market or housing market, then you're fucked.

The price of ALL assets have skyrocketed this year, including collectibles like this. I collect comics and the prices in 2021 have gone bananas. I can't afford to collect anymore.

Blame the Fed for creating asset price inflation including stocks, housing, collectibles, etc. This is why income inequality has exploded, because everyone with assets like stocks have seen a huge increase in their wealth, and people without any assets which are the lower income people get left behind.

What are you saying?

How can Tesla be a significant player in car sales globally, when as a percentage of EV car sales, they are decreasing?

Think about it for a second and it will come to you. As more cars turn EV, unless Tesla maintains their marketshare, they will become less and less significant. They've lost marketshare in the first year that the major car companies have introduced reasonable EVs. Their 2nd derivative is negative.

Tesla is valued at 3X Toyota with having a fraction of the sales. What happens when the EV market becomes fully realized, but Tesla isn't the market leader but a small player. Do they still deserve to be 3X Toyota's market cap?

Tesla has already lost marketshare in almost every market so they won't be bigger than Ford in 2 years. They will likely lose their regulatory credits some time this year because VW, Audi, Porsche and Ford have strong offerings.

This is an incredibly great idea.

It sounds like you've been through some childhood trauma that you haven't gotten over. If possible, I would consider seeking therapy to try to get yourself past this anger and trauma. I think your life could be much happier if you let go of this anger. Not looking at people with such suspicion will ease your life a lot.

I've found the most fascinating people are those that I share absolutely nothing in common with. I learn a lot about their lives and their views, and it's often fascinating. I met one person who is a fanatic Republican, something that I don't share, and she believes in a wide range of conspiracies. I've met people on the left that also have the same level of conspiracies coming from the other direction. Talking with people who are just like me is often boring and I find I learn a lot less that way.

My current TV turns on when I turn on the Apple TV. It's probably an option for the HDMI plug, when it senses power to turn on the TV itself.

If you have an iphone. But outside the US, Android is far more popular.

But this also begs the question, if I steal something with an AirTag on it, my iPhone would tell me that the item has an AirTag on it.

As a current AppleTV 4K owner, I have no idea how any of this is different from the previous version. I don't any any discernible difference. I already have HDR, Dolby Atmos, etc.

What I really want is the ability to make my remote control beep so I can find it. That's literally the only feature that I want at this point.