Many minimum wage earners are young adults. They aren't heads of households because they can't afford to move out of their parent's on minimum wage. Minimum wage should pay a sufficient amount for an individual to live at an acceptable level given social norms. That isn't the case in most of the world. If the assumption is you can go to the food bank, charities, and multiple jobs greater than what is considered full time minimum wage isn't cutting it.
Why is it even asked any more? You aren't supposed to discriminate based on it in work and other settings. If you wish to pursue a relationship with them it will come up but otherwise why is your gender treated as so important that you have to broadcast it everywhere? I have a dick and my left nut hangs lower than my right one. Now do you feel better or worse about me when it comes to signing up for the soccer team?
No I meant progressive taxation too. I think tiered taxation shouldn't only go in one direction. Basic amount that the poor need to live shouldn't be taxed. A flat tax in the middle and a decreasing tax on the higher end. 15% of 1M a year will still be more than 25% of 500k I don't see why your taxes should scale linearly or greater than linearly. My big 3 bedroom house doesn't use more (or much more) sewage, garbage collection etc of a smaller 3 bedroom house. So why should my taxes be 2X? My six figure salary doesn't mean I get multiples of healthcare, social security etc when I need it so why should I pay multiples of the tax? More than average sure, 2-3X more? No way.
3% wasn't my number was the number from the person I was responding too. I agree it would be much higher. Even 20% over 5 years as I suggested might be too little to cover a fully unsubsidized education. Where I live (Canada) 2/3rds of my education was paid for by the government. Tuition was still ~$5000 or so 10 years ago when I was in school. So roughly $15,000 a year unsubsidized. Probably closer to $25,000 now + living expenses.
Have I tried looking for a job? Yes, about 10 months ago and took the best of several offers. Yes I live in today's world and quite well thank you.
Um, now. Engineering labs, science labs, computer requirements etc are much higher. Professional profs at least at my school got better (though only slightly pay): you have to compensate that MBA instructor for what they otherwise would get on the open market which is a heck of a lot more than an "art appreciation" expert.
What I'm saying is the student shouldn't get to chose what has value (by picking their program of study) but then pass off the cost to someone else (graduates from other programs that are actually employable). This is a good for society. I know a fair number of people that could have gotten into university if they wanted though probably not in in demand fields. They chose to start working at factories instead. Is it better for society to subsidize 4 years of advanced training that apparently no one else (other than the student) is willing to pay for? Things that are fun but don't pay the bills are called hobbies and you should pay for your own entertainment.
I meant it more as an example of a degree that people might pursue for reasons other than employebililty. Broader history you get various levels of teachers + university profs, black history you get university profs (and fewer of them by definition what being a subset of a field). People can make choices based on non-financial incentives they just shouldn't ask for the rest of society to subsidize it for them.
Finance does go silly but I'd say that they work on things that society (or at least a part of society) has decided has value: otherwise they wouldn't get money for what they do. Money goes into hedge funds, CDOs etc because someone thinks they are worth something. Where it goes wrong in my opinion is when people speculate (which is very well likely the majority of the industry): which is essentially buying something not because it has value to you but because you think you can find someone else that it has greater value too. Ie buying Apple stock not because you like the company and want to own a piece of it but because you think you'll find a bigger sucker next month that will pay you more for it. That is a similar situation of separation of those that value and those that pay that having graduates pay for the following generation does if you don't tie it to common interests (ie "trade guilds" of people in the same field paying for the training of apprentices).
But then it is assuming that because you have a higher salary that you are educated. There is a coorelation but it isn't perfect (maybe a 0.7). Ex. bus drivers make more money than I do as a software developer where I live (because of a very strong union). Perhaps they should pay more towards education since they are sucking they 100k salaries off the government teat but it is far from making those who got the education pay for the next generation.
20% of 500k is 100k.3% of 100k is 3k. I get your numbers are arbitrary but the problem with progressive taxation is not just does it make the rich pay more than their fair share (assuming you don't give them corresponding tax loopholes they you need to be rich to make use of): it is that they pay waayy more than their fair share. Can you honestly say that the rich guy got 100k a year worth of value out of is UCLA degree but the other guy that "only" gets 100k a year from his same UCLA degree only gets 3k a year? Some people get lucky. Some don't. Some people have other skills they bring to the table, they might have a basket weaving degree but founded a tech company with skills they learned on their own time, they might have personal connections (or God forbid social skills that get them the personal connections), they might actually give more of a damn about their work and earn their success. Either way progressive taxation doesn't lead to fairness: it punishes the lucky and the skilled/hard workers equally.
At best it is better than having a fixed dollar amount tax that causes the poor not to be able to live. It is first aid for the other side of a bad situation not the ideal we should strive for.
In other news rain showers are expected in April. The south can be idiots when it comes to dealing with snow. Sure you don't get it often but if you don't have salt trucks, plows, snow tires, still insist on driving like the roads are clear than you get what you deserve. I interviewed for a job in Forth Worth a while back and they said if it snows don't come to work its not worth your life. Meanwhile where I'm from we get 30cm snow falls a few times a winter and typically 5cm a few times a week... and people drive reasonably, leave for work 30 min earlier in the winter etc.
A more key part of the problem IMO is the "progressive" statement. Progressive = "we the government know how to spend your money better than you do"
Engineers paying for the next generation of engineers is one thing, engineers paying for 3 basket weaving degrees is something else entirely. If they tie the payers to the degrees that the current students are pursuing it is likely okay. But if they tax all and then decide afterwards which programs get the money collected based on political pressure we'll end up with a bunch of "coal science" programs and black history graduates. Society can use some of both of course but separating market supply from market demand (by pushing the cost of inputs to everyone rather than the person making the choice to enter that field) isn't good. Nor would it be good for the relative costs of programs. A literature degree might end up costing the same as an engineering degree even though one has a large unmet demand and the other does not, one requires much more expensive teaching resources than the other etc.
A better solution along these lines though hard to enforce people actually trying hard to get good paying jobs early on: a fixed percentage for a fixed number of years after graduating. Given that people are getting out of school right around when they start having families and have the lowest earnings (and higher unemployment) I'd say some delay. Say from year 5 to year 10 after graduating you pay 20% of your salary. People are less likely to take a couple years "to see the world" when they are 30 with kids or just have bills than right after graduating so that would help mitigate the risk of people just saying "screw it now is a good time to be a missionary for no pay". Tying it to graduate pay would also allow the market to naturally choose how much money goes into each program based on its value to society.
I really like technical challenges. But I also like to help others and do bigger picture strategy. As you start mentoring more and more people you end up with a choice at somepoint because both demand a lot of time: put helping the rest of the team with architectural and training type tasks (and using connections across departments to pull in resources you need) or being that guy who codes for 10hr stints of genius coding without washroom breaks. Both are interesting to me but I think at sometime I'll for the most part hang up my compiler and do more management type stuff because I actually enjoy helping people or even bouncing ideas off them and have them come back with a better idea. You can only be the go to guy for so many parts of a project before you spend all your time doing design and code reviews anyways, it becomes next to impossible to make forward progress on your own tasks with interruptions every 10min. Might as well make the interruptions the job.
Which could lead to interesting cat and mouse between transit authorities and ridership if you aren't supposed to do that sort of thing. Random people meeting up and trading tickets would be harder to stop I think than noticing that the tall guy and the short girl always meet each other at 8:15. But things are crowded enough I suppose a lot of things get missed anyways.
The transit near my house has kind of an arbitrary point where you have to pay an extra $1 to go further south (or north if coming from south). It must suck for people that live a couple stops two far on the wrong side. You can travel on the bus on either side for an hour but travel 5 mins but cross that border line and presto you pay a higher rate. I solution (though maybe doesn't work for all cultures) I noticed in Japan you pay when you get off and they bill you based on how far you've traveled. You take a ticket when you get on and when you get off they tell you 235 yen or whatever. Of course now with card readers it would be much easier to implement graduated billing.
Still there would likely be a line. Standing in line to save $1 when it likely will just result in higher property taxes and cause you to pay for it twice doesn't make a lot of sense to me. Generally speaking arbitrage situations exist for a reason: the cost of buying and selling the good + getting it between the markets costs more than it is worth. Hubs are the obvious potential exception but for very low margin items you'd need crazy volume. Particularly good for expensive/highly taxed items (cigarettes, booze, etc) where one country/state has different prices than the one right across the border.
For a low margin item crazy volume means long lines or lots of staff which you can't afford because you are low margin. Both the buyer and the seller would want a cut of the savings, then you as the third party are trying to get a piece of it... not likely to work. Easier to have a craigslist listing and let people self organize into groups going the opposite way that agree to meet at specific times.
Same thing with bus passes some of them don't have photo id so if you can find someone that travels when you don't need it you can share one pass between the two of you.
Exactly. Most people that gripe about MS look at the retail price. Virtually no one pays retail for windows they get it from the OEM or as volume licenses for ~20-30 a year. I think it is just the trend of tech: 200 years ago you knew how to build a barn and a farmhouse. Now we have specialists. A few years ago everyone built their own 3D printers now more people find it interesting and (perhaps because) you can buy working systems. Computers were the same way: first we needed them for census and war, then scientists (who to be honest are already one step removed from "productive" society) who needed lots of things calculated made use of them. Then banking, etc. Eventually the number of users/uses of a technology expands past the point where the average person has sufficient skill/interest to learn how to do it themselves.
Even if you didn't unless things always exactly lined up you'd end up waiting for the next train. I'm sorry even 5 min of my time is worth more than $1 to me.
Exactly. Especially with China: they want to make yours and theirs too. Ie make it hard for foreign companies to sell there without a local partner but they are of course okay selling their crap to you.
In China they can treat people like virtual slaves but in Indonesia they can get actual slaves (people who bought a job from a dealer and came over from say Thailand only to have their passports taken by their new bosses and all their salary taken as interest on the loan, cost of rent for their on factory dormatory etc). I think we should seriously consider whether outsourcing is worth it. Companies make small concessions to "cultural differences" in labor practices in overseas markets. Those companies make "small consessions" when they outsource to regional players, etc. Eventually you have children working in illegal mines at gun point in a forest somewhere. I really don't the latest iCrap that bad.
Not to mention that the people that tend to be very analytical an precise don't always match up with people that are visually skilled. Text and symbols is more the domain of engineers and mathies which are the breeding ground of programmers.
These are enterprise customers meaning it isn't just a virus you are putting on a random home computer. This would be unpatched or potentially pirated versions with exploits added being not/put on servers. Bad idea. Things that don't cost a lot (like hosting a patch website) should be free because if it isn't stories will abound of cheap companies cutting back on support contracts and then the horrible quality of HP servers vs paying the $0.01 a year it costs you for them to download the patches and have them not be able to complain about the problems you fixed in a timely manner.
If hardware breaks or software versions need updating then they should be encouraged to pay ad hoc or get a service agreement. Bug fixes that just require a download and an install: free. They are the cost of not getting it right the first time.
Good point most I find are pretty thin though (there might be a heavier one but I haven't found it). Average temp in my part of the world from Dec-April is ~-10C with frequent dips below -20C. Thin gloves might be fine for a cool November day but other than that... useless.
Good points. I also find that eReaders fail via that Made In California crowd. I find my Kindle doesn't work -5C which pretty much is Dec-March where I live. So you can read anywhere as long as it isn't while waiting for a bus/train etc. The no touch with gloves bit is annoying too when you want to pause a video, change a setting etc and you have to chose between staying entertained or keeping your fingers.
One day battery life: I have a dumb phone and it usually lasts 3 days or so without a charge. But occasionally (likely if I'm just at the edge of connection and so the antenna keeps powering up to the high state to see if it is getting anything) it will fail by the end of the day. So... I've gotten into the habit of putting it on the charger every night whether or not the battery is low. Anyways a smart watch is more for the similar market as a smartphone: people that don't care if it lasts more than one day because they'll be playing with it all day and the battery will be dead by 8pm regardless. You're right Apple almost certainly will not have a replaceable battery in the thing should it ever come out.
I'm probably not the target market but with a 1X1" display say the only "app" I'd really want on it besides the clock would be for it to sync with my calendar and notify me of meetings so if I'm away from my desk I still get my notifications. Anything more interactive I don't even think phones are good for (hence my dumb phone and the very not dumb desktop computer:)).
Essentially you zap with low power to see where you are aiming, then high power to vibrate/boil the tissue you wish to destroy. The beauty of it is compared to most radiotherapy (proton might be better but is relatively rare and expensive) the distribution of normal to target dose is much better.
That is a pretty reasonable fraction of the power needed to talk say ~25% well (most people) aren't talking 25% of the day (well I guess 12.5% of the day since you don't have daylight charging at night:)). Presumably you can take it off and charge it overnight too so the solar just needs to stretch it out the a ~18hr battery life and you are golden. This is actually what I would prefer: a smart watch/phone. No bluetooth/iPhone in the pocket. An iPhone nano. Basic functionality (say weather, clock and calendar app) + phone for half the price of a full sized iPhone.
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Many minimum wage earners are young adults. They aren't heads of households because they can't afford to move out of their parent's on minimum wage. Minimum wage should pay a sufficient amount for an individual to live at an acceptable level given social norms. That isn't the case in most of the world. If the assumption is you can go to the food bank, charities, and multiple jobs greater than what is considered full time minimum wage isn't cutting it.
Why is it even asked any more? You aren't supposed to discriminate based on it in work and other settings. If you wish to pursue a relationship with them it will come up but otherwise why is your gender treated as so important that you have to broadcast it everywhere? I have a dick and my left nut hangs lower than my right one. Now do you feel better or worse about me when it comes to signing up for the soccer team?
Dibs on the woman's figure skating long program.
The same people that think a handful of races provide a significant statistical sample to be able to blame poor performance on the suit I'd imagine.
No I meant progressive taxation too. I think tiered taxation shouldn't only go in one direction. Basic amount that the poor need to live shouldn't be taxed. A flat tax in the middle and a decreasing tax on the higher end. 15% of 1M a year will still be more than 25% of 500k I don't see why your taxes should scale linearly or greater than linearly. My big 3 bedroom house doesn't use more (or much more) sewage, garbage collection etc of a smaller 3 bedroom house. So why should my taxes be 2X? My six figure salary doesn't mean I get multiples of healthcare, social security etc when I need it so why should I pay multiples of the tax? More than average sure, 2-3X more? No way.
3% wasn't my number was the number from the person I was responding too. I agree it would be much higher. Even 20% over 5 years as I suggested might be too little to cover a fully unsubsidized education. Where I live (Canada) 2/3rds of my education was paid for by the government. Tuition was still ~$5000 or so 10 years ago when I was in school. So roughly $15,000 a year unsubsidized. Probably closer to $25,000 now + living expenses.
Have I tried looking for a job? Yes, about 10 months ago and took the best of several offers. Yes I live in today's world and quite well thank you.
Um, now. Engineering labs, science labs, computer requirements etc are much higher. Professional profs at least at my school got better (though only slightly pay): you have to compensate that MBA instructor for what they otherwise would get on the open market which is a heck of a lot more than an "art appreciation" expert.
What I'm saying is the student shouldn't get to chose what has value (by picking their program of study) but then pass off the cost to someone else (graduates from other programs that are actually employable). This is a good for society. I know a fair number of people that could have gotten into university if they wanted though probably not in in demand fields. They chose to start working at factories instead. Is it better for society to subsidize 4 years of advanced training that apparently no one else (other than the student) is willing to pay for? Things that are fun but don't pay the bills are called hobbies and you should pay for your own entertainment.
I meant it more as an example of a degree that people might pursue for reasons other than employebililty. Broader history you get various levels of teachers + university profs, black history you get university profs (and fewer of them by definition what being a subset of a field). People can make choices based on non-financial incentives they just shouldn't ask for the rest of society to subsidize it for them.
Finance does go silly but I'd say that they work on things that society (or at least a part of society) has decided has value: otherwise they wouldn't get money for what they do. Money goes into hedge funds, CDOs etc because someone thinks they are worth something. Where it goes wrong in my opinion is when people speculate (which is very well likely the majority of the industry): which is essentially buying something not because it has value to you but because you think you can find someone else that it has greater value too. Ie buying Apple stock not because you like the company and want to own a piece of it but because you think you'll find a bigger sucker next month that will pay you more for it. That is a similar situation of separation of those that value and those that pay that having graduates pay for the following generation does if you don't tie it to common interests (ie "trade guilds" of people in the same field paying for the training of apprentices).
But then it is assuming that because you have a higher salary that you are educated. There is a coorelation but it isn't perfect (maybe a 0.7). Ex. bus drivers make more money than I do as a software developer where I live (because of a very strong union). Perhaps they should pay more towards education since they are sucking they 100k salaries off the government teat but it is far from making those who got the education pay for the next generation.
20% of 500k is 100k.3% of 100k is 3k. I get your numbers are arbitrary but the problem with progressive taxation is not just does it make the rich pay more than their fair share (assuming you don't give them corresponding tax loopholes they you need to be rich to make use of): it is that they pay waayy more than their fair share. Can you honestly say that the rich guy got 100k a year worth of value out of is UCLA degree but the other guy that "only" gets 100k a year from his same UCLA degree only gets 3k a year? Some people get lucky. Some don't. Some people have other skills they bring to the table, they might have a basket weaving degree but founded a tech company with skills they learned on their own time, they might have personal connections (or God forbid social skills that get them the personal connections), they might actually give more of a damn about their work and earn their success. Either way progressive taxation doesn't lead to fairness: it punishes the lucky and the skilled/hard workers equally.
At best it is better than having a fixed dollar amount tax that causes the poor not to be able to live. It is first aid for the other side of a bad situation not the ideal we should strive for.
In other news rain showers are expected in April. The south can be idiots when it comes to dealing with snow. Sure you don't get it often but if you don't have salt trucks, plows, snow tires, still insist on driving like the roads are clear than you get what you deserve. I interviewed for a job in Forth Worth a while back and they said if it snows don't come to work its not worth your life. Meanwhile where I'm from we get 30cm snow falls a few times a winter and typically 5cm a few times a week ... and people drive reasonably, leave for work 30 min earlier in the winter etc.
A more key part of the problem IMO is the "progressive" statement. Progressive = "we the government know how to spend your money better than you do"
Engineers paying for the next generation of engineers is one thing, engineers paying for 3 basket weaving degrees is something else entirely. If they tie the payers to the degrees that the current students are pursuing it is likely okay. But if they tax all and then decide afterwards which programs get the money collected based on political pressure we'll end up with a bunch of "coal science" programs and black history graduates. Society can use some of both of course but separating market supply from market demand (by pushing the cost of inputs to everyone rather than the person making the choice to enter that field) isn't good. Nor would it be good for the relative costs of programs. A literature degree might end up costing the same as an engineering degree even though one has a large unmet demand and the other does not, one requires much more expensive teaching resources than the other etc.
A better solution along these lines though hard to enforce people actually trying hard to get good paying jobs early on: a fixed percentage for a fixed number of years after graduating. Given that people are getting out of school right around when they start having families and have the lowest earnings (and higher unemployment) I'd say some delay. Say from year 5 to year 10 after graduating you pay 20% of your salary. People are less likely to take a couple years "to see the world" when they are 30 with kids or just have bills than right after graduating so that would help mitigate the risk of people just saying "screw it now is a good time to be a missionary for no pay". Tying it to graduate pay would also allow the market to naturally choose how much money goes into each program based on its value to society.
I really like technical challenges. But I also like to help others and do bigger picture strategy. As you start mentoring more and more people you end up with a choice at somepoint because both demand a lot of time: put helping the rest of the team with architectural and training type tasks (and using connections across departments to pull in resources you need) or being that guy who codes for 10hr stints of genius coding without washroom breaks. Both are interesting to me but I think at sometime I'll for the most part hang up my compiler and do more management type stuff because I actually enjoy helping people or even bouncing ideas off them and have them come back with a better idea. You can only be the go to guy for so many parts of a project before you spend all your time doing design and code reviews anyways, it becomes next to impossible to make forward progress on your own tasks with interruptions every 10min. Might as well make the interruptions the job.
Which could lead to interesting cat and mouse between transit authorities and ridership if you aren't supposed to do that sort of thing. Random people meeting up and trading tickets would be harder to stop I think than noticing that the tall guy and the short girl always meet each other at 8:15. But things are crowded enough I suppose a lot of things get missed anyways.
The transit near my house has kind of an arbitrary point where you have to pay an extra $1 to go further south (or north if coming from south). It must suck for people that live a couple stops two far on the wrong side. You can travel on the bus on either side for an hour but travel 5 mins but cross that border line and presto you pay a higher rate. I solution (though maybe doesn't work for all cultures) I noticed in Japan you pay when you get off and they bill you based on how far you've traveled. You take a ticket when you get on and when you get off they tell you 235 yen or whatever. Of course now with card readers it would be much easier to implement graduated billing.
Still there would likely be a line. Standing in line to save $1 when it likely will just result in higher property taxes and cause you to pay for it twice doesn't make a lot of sense to me. Generally speaking arbitrage situations exist for a reason: the cost of buying and selling the good + getting it between the markets costs more than it is worth. Hubs are the obvious potential exception but for very low margin items you'd need crazy volume. Particularly good for expensive/highly taxed items (cigarettes, booze, etc) where one country/state has different prices than the one right across the border.
For a low margin item crazy volume means long lines or lots of staff which you can't afford because you are low margin. Both the buyer and the seller would want a cut of the savings, then you as the third party are trying to get a piece of it ... not likely to work. Easier to have a craigslist listing and let people self organize into groups going the opposite way that agree to meet at specific times.
Same thing with bus passes some of them don't have photo id so if you can find someone that travels when you don't need it you can share one pass between the two of you.
Exactly. Most people that gripe about MS look at the retail price. Virtually no one pays retail for windows they get it from the OEM or as volume licenses for ~20-30 a year. I think it is just the trend of tech: 200 years ago you knew how to build a barn and a farmhouse. Now we have specialists. A few years ago everyone built their own 3D printers now more people find it interesting and (perhaps because) you can buy working systems. Computers were the same way: first we needed them for census and war, then scientists (who to be honest are already one step removed from "productive" society) who needed lots of things calculated made use of them. Then banking, etc. Eventually the number of users/uses of a technology expands past the point where the average person has sufficient skill/interest to learn how to do it themselves.
Even if you didn't unless things always exactly lined up you'd end up waiting for the next train. I'm sorry even 5 min of my time is worth more than $1 to me.
Exactly. Especially with China: they want to make yours and theirs too. Ie make it hard for foreign companies to sell there without a local partner but they are of course okay selling their crap to you.
In China they can treat people like virtual slaves but in Indonesia they can get actual slaves (people who bought a job from a dealer and came over from say Thailand only to have their passports taken by their new bosses and all their salary taken as interest on the loan, cost of rent for their on factory dormatory etc). I think we should seriously consider whether outsourcing is worth it. Companies make small concessions to "cultural differences" in labor practices in overseas markets. Those companies make "small consessions" when they outsource to regional players, etc. Eventually you have children working in illegal mines at gun point in a forest somewhere. I really don't the latest iCrap that bad.
Not to mention that the people that tend to be very analytical an precise don't always match up with people that are visually skilled. Text and symbols is more the domain of engineers and mathies which are the breeding ground of programmers.
These are enterprise customers meaning it isn't just a virus you are putting on a random home computer. This would be unpatched or potentially pirated versions with exploits added being not/put on servers. Bad idea. Things that don't cost a lot (like hosting a patch website) should be free because if it isn't stories will abound of cheap companies cutting back on support contracts and then the horrible quality of HP servers vs paying the $0.01 a year it costs you for them to download the patches and have them not be able to complain about the problems you fixed in a timely manner.
If hardware breaks or software versions need updating then they should be encouraged to pay ad hoc or get a service agreement. Bug fixes that just require a download and an install: free. They are the cost of not getting it right the first time.
Good point most I find are pretty thin though (there might be a heavier one but I haven't found it). Average temp in my part of the world from Dec-April is ~-10C with frequent dips below -20C. Thin gloves might be fine for a cool November day but other than that ... useless.
Good points. I also find that eReaders fail via that Made In California crowd. I find my Kindle doesn't work -5C which pretty much is Dec-March where I live. So you can read anywhere as long as it isn't while waiting for a bus/train etc. The no touch with gloves bit is annoying too when you want to pause a video, change a setting etc and you have to chose between staying entertained or keeping your fingers.
One day battery life: I have a dumb phone and it usually lasts 3 days or so without a charge. But occasionally (likely if I'm just at the edge of connection and so the antenna keeps powering up to the high state to see if it is getting anything) it will fail by the end of the day. So ... I've gotten into the habit of putting it on the charger every night whether or not the battery is low. Anyways a smart watch is more for the similar market as a smartphone: people that don't care if it lasts more than one day because they'll be playing with it all day and the battery will be dead by 8pm regardless. You're right Apple almost certainly will not have a replaceable battery in the thing should it ever come out.
I'm probably not the target market but with a 1X1" display say the only "app" I'd really want on it besides the clock would be for it to sync with my calendar and notify me of meetings so if I'm away from my desk I still get my notifications. Anything more interactive I don't even think phones are good for (hence my dumb phone and the very not dumb desktop computer :)).
ultra sound ablative surgery: ex. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pu... .
Essentially you zap with low power to see where you are aiming, then high power to vibrate/boil the tissue you wish to destroy. The beauty of it is compared to most radiotherapy (proton might be better but is relatively rare and expensive) the distribution of normal to target dose is much better.
That is a pretty reasonable fraction of the power needed to talk say ~25% well (most people) aren't talking 25% of the day (well I guess 12.5% of the day since you don't have daylight charging at night :)). Presumably you can take it off and charge it overnight too so the solar just needs to stretch it out the a ~18hr battery life and you are golden. This is actually what I would prefer: a smart watch/phone. No bluetooth/iPhone in the pocket. An iPhone nano. Basic functionality (say weather, clock and calendar app) + phone for half the price of a full sized iPhone.
I'm not sure which team the free market fairy plays for.