The trouble is that some people are idiots who refuse to save anything, and so we set up systems like social security and unemployment to save those people from starvation if they lose their jobs, but the existence of those systems encourages everyone else not to save anything (and taxes them by the amount of money they might have saved), so then no one can retire until they're eligible for social security and everyone has incentive to work as many hours as they can until then.
No, the problem is that "some people" don't get paid enough to actually save a meaningful amount, because the people who are their employers are taking all the money for themselves.
This is graphically illustrated by the phenomenally large (and growing) gap in earnings and wealth between the "rich" and "everyone else".
The reason that those jobs are not created is that the value of that labor is lower than its costs, and the reason for that is that the cost of living in this country is too high -- because we ship everything in from the other side of the world.
The cost of living in the USA is the lowest in the Western World. Essentials like cars, petrol, housing and food cost literally1/3 to 1/2 as much in the USA as they do in pretty much every other first-world country.
If you think the cost of living in the USA is - proportionate to living standards - anything greater than "dirt cheap", you need to travel a *lot* more.
It works better than feudalism, which seems to be what progressives want these days [...]
Wait, what ? Feudalism is where the "free marketeers" are trying to take us, with a rapid and growing - particularly in America - concentration of wealth amongst an increasingly smaller group of people. At the current rate it should only be another couple of decades before the middle class has been completely obliterated and the owners of a handful of corporations are ruling over their wage-slaves. They might even be nice enough to do it via the proxy of government to maintain the illusion of democracy.
I'm not quite sure how you conclude the "progressives" want Feudalism. Especially in America, since there's not really any "progressive" politics to speak of in the first place.
If you haven't already, go out and buy the book "Living and Working in Switzerland" and read it thoroughly. It is the single best resource I ever found.
There is an excellent expat forum at www.englishforum.ch. I haven't posted much since we left, but it was extremely helpful while we were there.
You probably won't need a car - public transport is fast, frequent, co-ordinated, comprehensive and (assuming you make good use of it) cheap. There's a system of short-term (by the hour) vehicle rentals called Mobility (www.mobility.ch) that we took advantage of the rare times a car was necessary. They tend to have vehicle depots at bigger train stations. On the upside Switzerland has some of the cheapest petrol in Europe.
You will find nearly everything horrifyingly expensive compared to the US, but particularly food. If you are a heavy red meat eater then you're in trouble. Get used to doing your grocery shopping every day or two on the way home from work, rather than the weekly (-ish) shop you're probably used to here (this also helps remove the need for a car). You will also probably be somewhat limited by the size of your refrigerator, which will probably be 2/3 to 1/2 the size of the one you have now. Most foods have very little, if any, preservatives in them and will not keep as well as you are used to (eg: don't expect a bag of carrots to last more than a few days without starting to go moldy and limp). Large shopping centres/malls are fairly uncommon, but small grocery stores belonging to the two major chains (Coop and Migros) are a dime a dozen (but be aware that they will not always carry the same brands/items, nor will they have similar layouts).
Buy clothes before you leave, especially if you're at all on the larger side of average (I'm assuming you're not having a container full of furniture, etc, shipped over). I'm 6'2 and 250lb+ and ended up having to buy a lot of my clothes when we were visiting friends in England.
Do not tip when you eat out, get a taxi, etc, except maybe to round up to the nearest CHF (or nearest 5 if it's a particularly large bill). Even someone working in McDonalds is making enough to live on (which is why a Big Mac meal will cost you over $10).
You can drink in public and the drinking age for beer is 16 (wine/liquor is 18). Do not be alarmed (/outraged) when you see groups of high school students jumping onto a tram with a six-pack of beer heading for a night out.
Finding somewhere to live will probably be challenging, and the process will be *vastly* simpler if you can get someone in the University's HR department to help you (or, at the very least, a local). Expect to sign a lease for at least 12 months, if not 2-3 years. Be aware when you move out that you will "need" to have the place professionally cleaned - take some solace in the fact the tenants before did as well. You are entitled to one paid day off per year to move house. When you arrive in the country and subsequently move house you need to (de-)register with the local authorities at the Gemeindehaus(es).
Private health insurance is mandatory, but you have full choice of provider and they *must* accept you for basic cover. Your employer will probably have a "recommended" provider for expats. There is a website at www.comparis.ch that can help you compare providers. While you are in Switzerland you will need to pay into the unemployment insurance fund and compulsory retirement fund (similar to a 401k). If you are planning to stay a while (many years), investigate the "second pillar" and "third pillar" aspects of retirement funding, as they can be very tax advantageous (though taxes are relatively low). You can get some of this money refunded when you (permanently) leave the country.
That's all I can think of off the top of my head. Good luck !
People aren't machines, and expecting us to operate heavy machinery with 100% accuracy all the time is not realistic. There has to be a 'close enough' to make it even remotely fair.
There is. It's the light changing to amber.
If aren't picking a stop/go point for the light changing to amber as you approach any intersection where that is a possibility, You're Doing It Wrong. There is damn near *no* excuse for running a red light, ever. The light going amber means "slow down and stop", not "floor it and try to get through".
(In case it's not obvious, you should be erring on the side of stopping. Especially true in the US where lengths of amber lights are highly variable and there's no delay between lights in one direction doing red and in the other direction going green.)
I have a lot of sympathy with arguments against speed cameras. I have nearly zero with arguments against red light cameras (the exception being due to the habit US authorities have of shortening amber durations when they install red light cameras).
Red light cameras are often set up to catch anyone who is even in the intersection as the light turns red, [...]
I find it hard to believe this is legal.
As is par for the course, a huge number of people who would not have caused an accident and likely missed the light by a few fractions of a second (because, well, they're human) are fined because just ticketing those who are most likely to cause accidents is not the goal.
Yeah, but how many of them could write a patch to fix some low level vulnerability in WinXP without the source code?
What scenario are you envisaging where Microsoft goes out of business but some other company doesn't buy up the source code to continue selling and supporting ?
Heck, what scenario are you envisaging where Microsoft goes out of business at all ?
Why would you go back to "permanent"? Less money, more hours, less flexibility...? I worked permanent at one IT job once, and I couldn't understand why other people did it. I worked as a contractor for the rest of my IT career.
Some people prefer stability and job security which - outside of the USA - a permanent position offers much more of.
It's a lot easier to live with a predictable and constant income stream than one that comes in fits and starts - especially when you have more responsibilities than just yourself.
Movies aren't like oxygen. If people don't pay to watch them the businesses that make movies will do something else instead.
But people *do* pay to watch them.
The problem is that the MPAA, et al, don't think they pay _enough_.
When a handful of individuals involved in the production of a movie aren't being paid millions - if not tens of millions - of dollars each, the argument that people aren't prepared to pay to see movies might barely start to carry some weight.
BSD is free and unencumbered, and it has its place.
GPL is free almost in the sense that the software itself is "liberated" and has its own rights, intended to ensure that the software remains equally free for anybody who might ever want it, and that you can't take away the rights of the software to remain free -- I like to think of the GPL'd software as almost emancipated and with a stake in things.
The key difference is that the BSDL affects code you write, and the GPL affects code other people write.
If you want your code to remain "free", then use the BDSL.
If you want other people's code to become "free", then use the GPL.
The LGPL is the fairest balance, IMHO. It's a shame it sees relatively little support, but that's usually what happens to compromises.
No. An EULA takes away rights on something you bought, the GPL gives you rights on something you've copied for free (or bought for money, but GPL gives you the right to copy it for free after that).
An EULA defines the terms under which the copyright holder allows you to use their work, for which you may or may not have paid money for.
They've long had the potential to make an OS competent enough to far surpass their commercial offerings thus far. The bugaboo holding them back has always been backward compatibility.
Really ? What do they need to change ? What changes are prevented by maintaining legacy support ?
Why is "we will refuse to import these products at any price because it is a Faustian bargain and our souls are not for sale" not a perfectly valid and moral answer?
Because if the average US citizen had to deal with a similar cost of living to the rest of the world, he might realise how badly he's been getting screwed for the last thirty-odd years.
Sure there are and always have been but punishing the "Rich" will just result in lowering the amount of "value" in the world. Less "value" means a lower standard of living for all.
As usual, reality disagrees with right-wing rhetoric.
I'd really, really pay a reasonable extra fee for a more comfortable trip, but all that I see on flights is economy and first class (apparently, business class has vanished from european long-distance flights, or am I just flying the wrong airlines?).
You must be. All the airlines I've flown to Europe offer a three-class service, and many offer a four-class.
Business costs 2-3x as much as economy, minimum. Premium economy is usually around 1.5-2x as much (and worth it, IMHO, but I simply don't fit in most economy seats).
The Concorde was not uncomfortable at all. It was first class and you only had to spend a few hours in that nice leather seat to get to Europe.
Note that the Concorde's "First Class" wasn't as good as even a US carrier's "Business Class" these days.
The quality of air travel for the people at the front of the plane has increased dramatically over the last few decades, while the room in economy has gotten smaller and smaller.
Business class, which is almost as comfortable but typically doesn't have the fully horizontal sleeping position, can be as little as £200 more than economy for a transatlantic flight.
That would be an exceptionally good deal and fairly unusual situation. It's certainly not something you would *expect* to find as a regular occurrence.
Business tickets are typically 2-3x as much as economy tickets. First class is usually another 2x again on top of that. Even for relatively short international flights like across the Atlantic, the difference is generally a *lot* more than 200 quid.
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No, the problem is that "some people" don't get paid enough to actually save a meaningful amount, because the people who are their employers are taking all the money for themselves.
This is graphically illustrated by the phenomenally large (and growing) gap in earnings and wealth between the "rich" and "everyone else".
The cost of living in the USA is the lowest in the Western World. Essentials like cars, petrol, housing and food cost literally 1/3 to 1/2 as much in the USA as they do in pretty much every other first-world country.
If you think the cost of living in the USA is - proportionate to living standards - anything greater than "dirt cheap", you need to travel a *lot* more.
Wait, what ? Feudalism is where the "free marketeers" are trying to take us, with a rapid and growing - particularly in America - concentration of wealth amongst an increasingly smaller group of people. At the current rate it should only be another couple of decades before the middle class has been completely obliterated and the owners of a handful of corporations are ruling over their wage-slaves. They might even be nice enough to do it via the proxy of government to maintain the illusion of democracy.
I'm not quite sure how you conclude the "progressives" want Feudalism. Especially in America, since there's not really any "progressive" politics to speak of in the first place.
Note that should you travel outside of the USA, microwaves in hotel rooms are relatively uncommon.
If you haven't already, go out and buy the book "Living and Working in Switzerland" and read it thoroughly. It is the single best resource I ever found.
There is an excellent expat forum at www.englishforum.ch. I haven't posted much since we left, but it was extremely helpful while we were there.
You probably won't need a car - public transport is fast, frequent, co-ordinated, comprehensive and (assuming you make good use of it) cheap. There's a system of short-term (by the hour) vehicle rentals called Mobility (www.mobility.ch) that we took advantage of the rare times a car was necessary. They tend to have vehicle depots at bigger train stations. On the upside Switzerland has some of the cheapest petrol in Europe.
You will find nearly everything horrifyingly expensive compared to the US, but particularly food. If you are a heavy red meat eater then you're in trouble. Get used to doing your grocery shopping every day or two on the way home from work, rather than the weekly (-ish) shop you're probably used to here (this also helps remove the need for a car). You will also probably be somewhat limited by the size of your refrigerator, which will probably be 2/3 to 1/2 the size of the one you have now. Most foods have very little, if any, preservatives in them and will not keep as well as you are used to (eg: don't expect a bag of carrots to last more than a few days without starting to go moldy and limp). Large shopping centres/malls are fairly uncommon, but small grocery stores belonging to the two major chains (Coop and Migros) are a dime a dozen (but be aware that they will not always carry the same brands/items, nor will they have similar layouts).
Buy clothes before you leave, especially if you're at all on the larger side of average (I'm assuming you're not having a container full of furniture, etc, shipped over). I'm 6'2 and 250lb+ and ended up having to buy a lot of my clothes when we were visiting friends in England.
Do not tip when you eat out, get a taxi, etc, except maybe to round up to the nearest CHF (or nearest 5 if it's a particularly large bill). Even someone working in McDonalds is making enough to live on (which is why a Big Mac meal will cost you over $10).
You can drink in public and the drinking age for beer is 16 (wine/liquor is 18). Do not be alarmed (/outraged) when you see groups of high school students jumping onto a tram with a six-pack of beer heading for a night out.
Finding somewhere to live will probably be challenging, and the process will be *vastly* simpler if you can get someone in the University's HR department to help you (or, at the very least, a local). Expect to sign a lease for at least 12 months, if not 2-3 years. Be aware when you move out that you will "need" to have the place professionally cleaned - take some solace in the fact the tenants before did as well. You are entitled to one paid day off per year to move house. When you arrive in the country and subsequently move house you need to (de-)register with the local authorities at the Gemeindehaus(es).
Private health insurance is mandatory, but you have full choice of provider and they *must* accept you for basic cover. Your employer will probably have a "recommended" provider for expats. There is a website at www.comparis.ch that can help you compare providers. While you are in Switzerland you will need to pay into the unemployment insurance fund and compulsory retirement fund (similar to a 401k). If you are planning to stay a while (many years), investigate the "second pillar" and "third pillar" aspects of retirement funding, as they can be very tax advantageous (though taxes are relatively low). You can get some of this money refunded when you (permanently) leave the country.
That's all I can think of off the top of my head. Good luck !
I hope you're ready for a serious culture shock ! Having lived in both, Switzerland is a very, very different place to America.
All the problems you describe seem equally apparent with open source code.
There is. It's the light changing to amber.
If aren't picking a stop/go point for the light changing to amber as you approach any intersection where that is a possibility, You're Doing It Wrong. There is damn near *no* excuse for running a red light, ever. The light going amber means "slow down and stop", not "floor it and try to get through".
(In case it's not obvious, you should be erring on the side of stopping. Especially true in the US where lengths of amber lights are highly variable and there's no delay between lights in one direction doing red and in the other direction going green.)
I have a lot of sympathy with arguments against speed cameras. I have nearly zero with arguments against red light cameras (the exception being due to the habit US authorities have of shortening amber durations when they install red light cameras).
I find it hard to believe this is legal.
If it was that close, they should have stopped.
What scenario are you envisaging where Microsoft goes out of business but some other company doesn't buy up the source code to continue selling and supporting ?
Heck, what scenario are you envisaging where Microsoft goes out of business at all ?
School won't help them. Basic math is no longer taught.
Some people prefer stability and job security which - outside of the USA - a permanent position offers much more of.
It's a lot easier to live with a predictable and constant income stream than one that comes in fits and starts - especially when you have more responsibilities than just yourself.
But people *do* pay to watch them.
The problem is that the MPAA, et al, don't think they pay _enough_.
When a handful of individuals involved in the production of a movie aren't being paid millions - if not tens of millions - of dollars each, the argument that people aren't prepared to pay to see movies might barely start to carry some weight.
The key difference is that the BSDL affects code you write, and the GPL affects code other people write.
If you want your code to remain "free", then use the BDSL.
If you want other people's code to become "free", then use the GPL.
The LGPL is the fairest balance, IMHO. It's a shame it sees relatively little support, but that's usually what happens to compromises.
An EULA defines the terms under which the copyright holder allows you to use their work, for which you may or may not have paid money for.
Just like the GPL.
Great. How about the *offense* spending ? The last time the American Military acted defensively was in the 1940s.
In America, however, you don't get anywhere near as much civilisation as you do in most other civilised countries.
The ~$1000 minimum buy-in point for a Mac probably plays a non-trivial part as well.
Really ? What do they need to change ? What changes are prevented by maintaining legacy support ?
Heck, I can't think of an airline that *doesn't* run at least a Business+Economy service from the USA to Europe.
Because if the average US citizen had to deal with a similar cost of living to the rest of the world, he might realise how badly he's been getting screwed for the last thirty-odd years.
As usual, reality disagrees with right-wing rhetoric.
You must be. All the airlines I've flown to Europe offer a three-class service, and many offer a four-class.
Business costs 2-3x as much as economy, minimum. Premium economy is usually around 1.5-2x as much (and worth it, IMHO, but I simply don't fit in most economy seats).
Note that the Concorde's "First Class" wasn't as good as even a US carrier's "Business Class" these days.
The quality of air travel for the people at the front of the plane has increased dramatically over the last few decades, while the room in economy has gotten smaller and smaller.
Kind of like society in general, really...
That would be an exceptionally good deal and fairly unusual situation. It's certainly not something you would *expect* to find as a regular occurrence.
Business tickets are typically 2-3x as much as economy tickets. First class is usually another 2x again on top of that. Even for relatively short international flights like across the Atlantic, the difference is generally a *lot* more than 200 quid.