They shouldn't pay it anyway. All they have is this guy's word that he won't release any (more) data. Maybe they pay him and he sells the data on to someone else, who then demands their $3m ransom too.
That is why the ransom seekers should be asking for monthly installments. This way both sides have a vested interest in keeping the status quo.
Put all these tradeoffs together, and you get a device that's just barely "good enough" to do any of these things, but really fails at it's once-core function, to "make and receive voice calls".
Fails is a very harsh word. They may be marginally less capable than some old dumb phones, but they certainly don't fail at making and receiving voice calls. I do it all the time.
"Is there a god?" is a yes/no question. A confused atheist's ability to give a rambling non-answer is irrelevant.
If you think there is a god, you're a theist. If you're not sure, you're an agnostic. If you think there's no god, you're an atheist.
You can keep stating your false trilemma all you want, but it doesn't make it correct. There are a wide range of gray areas between the definitions you just gave above, and pigeon holing complex beliefs in this manner is intellectually lazy. You can claim someone is rambling when they are being too precise for your liking, but that form of ad hominem attack is also lazy and unproductive.
There are a wide range of atheists whose beliefs have very little in common. Not recognizing those differences is not better than not recognizing the differences between Catholics and Westboro Baptists.
Atheism is the belief that you don't believe in a god or religion. Taking such a stance using the limited information that we have is just as much a faith based decision as believing in god.
That is a horribly misguided statement. The mere fact there have been thousands of deities in human history, the vast majority of which are no longer worshiped, makes it far more reasonable to at least believe no current religion is correct. And the fact that using deities to explain any natural phenomena never answers anything fully (as in, what created the deities?) is another strong reason why the chance a single religion is correct is far less than the chance their are no gods. Having a lower chance of being true doesn't make something false, but it is incredibly dishonest to claim the odds are not in the atheists' favor.
According to the philosopher William L. Rowe: "In the popular sense of the term, an agnostic is someone who neither believes nor disbelieves in the existence of God, while a theist believes that God exists, an atheist disbelieves in God."
I agree these represent the popular sense of these terms. While these terms are often used this way, when they are they lose almost all ability to actually describe what real people truly believe.
I am not confusing "there is no god" (said an atheist) with "there is no god" (objectively).
You did confuse them when you said (emphasis mine):
Ask these atheists who "lack belief": "Is there a god?" Anything other than "No" makes them an ex-atheist.
When you said the emphasized text, you were claiming any other answer to "is there a god" would automatically make someone not an atheist. My contention is if you asked an atheist who is giving a perfectly accurate response, it would almost never be NO. Saying NO would be a very common but also slightly inaccurate answer. (inaccurate in the sense that it isn't really what most atheists believe)
While it is only a slightly inaccurate answer, that small discrepancy is actually very important when comparing theism to non-theism. One side makes an absolute statement: There is a god. The other does not make an absolute statement, like any answer based on available evidence instead of faith should almost never do. It is one of the big differences between an unsubstantiated belief that anchors a full misguided belief system, and a well educated belief.
That distinction is nonsensical. Agnostic is "I don't know if there's a god", where atheist is "there is no god".
No, atheist is "I don't believe in a god". That is not the same thing as "there is no god".
If I said "I don't believe my wife is at Walmart right now", that is not the same thing as "my wife is not at Walmart". I can have a belief in a statement based on all available knowledge (she should be at work, her car is at a mechanic and I will be picking her up at work, she doesn't even shop at Walmart), but can still be honest that I cannot know for sure.
It is my belief that all non-agnostic atheists are irrational, because it is impossible to know for certain that no gods exist. They do exist, but of the dozens of atheists I know I have never met one.
Your question is not functionally different than mine. "I believe in no deities" == (I believe) "there is no god"
I agree with the equality statement you just made, but that wasn't your original one. My equality statement is:
"Is there a god?" Does Not Equal "Do you believe there is a god?"
An atheist will always answer NO to the latter question, but you asked the former. The former will be different depending on if an atheist is also an agnostic or not. Most atheist are also agnostic, so most atheists who think the question through well enough will answer something like "I'm not 100% sure, but I really doubt it strongly".
then you might, indeed, have a "not collecting stamps" hobby.
You may have a hobby, but not a "not collecting stamps" hobby. Your hobby might be reading about the psychology of people with rare hobbies. You may focus on a particular hobby (stamp collecting), which would be likely if the vast majority of people in your community have that hobby. If a large number of people in your community thought only stamp collectors could be moral people, or lived in a country where only stamp collectors have a chance of being elected to the highest positions of political power, then it would make a lot of sense to research the topic.
I would venture to guess if less than 10% of Americans believed in a god, there would almost no public displays of atheism. It would be as common as public displays of the irrationality of being a schizophrenic is now.
Not knowing, not having a position, and not caring would be agnosticism.
Almost all atheists are also agnostics. They are not mutually exclusive terms. One term describes how many deities you worship, and the other gauges your confidence in those beliefs.
Saying atheism is a belief system is no less ridiculous than saying not collecting stamps is your favorite hobby.
atheism
1. the doctrine or belief that there is no God.
So says dictionary.com.
Not sure if you meant that to refute my statement, but it doesn't. Having a belief is not the same as having a belief system. Atheists do believe that there is no god, although rarely with 100% conviction (more likely only 99.999999999%). But they almost always fall short of building a belief system around this belief.
It is also likely that most if not all non-stamp collectors have the belief that the hobby is not worth their time to pursue. But this belief does not build a belief system. They may even go as far as to research why stamp collectors pick such a horrible hobby. That researcher, and others who read their research, may start to form a belief system around why people become stamp collectors. But that still doesn't elevate their belief that stamp collecting is not worth their time into a belief system. That would require them to build a set of doctrines they feel they must follow because of their distaste of stamp collecting.
Most atheists could be lumped into a belief system of rationalism, or something similar. It is this belief system that most likely made them atheist in the first place. Militant atheists like Richard Dawkins have a belief system that I think could be called being a rationalist that plays a large part in their life and sometimes even careers. There mere fact they choose attacking theism as a significant way of expressing their rationalism still does not elevate being an atheist to a belief system.
Ask these atheists who "lack belief": "Is there a god?"
Anything other than "No" makes them an ex-atheist.
Saying "I doubt it" does not make someone an ex-atheist. You can be agnostic and atheist at the same time; they are not mutually exclusive. In fact it is exceedingly rare to find an atheist that is not also agnostic. Your question is not good enough to determine whether someone is an atheist, only whether they are Gnostic or Agnostic about the existence of god(s).
A better question to determine if they are an atheist would be: "Which deities do you believe in?"
If they answer anything but "None" then they are an ex-atheist.
It is not a lack of belief. It is a belief that there is no god. It's as much a dogma as those who do believe in a god. It is certainly a belief system.
Incorrect. It is the lack of belief. Saying atheism is a belief system is no less ridiculous than saying not collecting stamps is your favorite hobby.
Atheists certainly do hold belief systems. Some believe religion is harmful. Some believe killing animals is wrong. Some believe bacon is the best food ever. But being atheist is not a belief system by any sensible definition of the term.
Different regimes make it harder/easier to compel strangers to help you — and Socialist regimes, being the least free, are exceptionally "good" at it, leading to the oft-repeated perception you just cited. But it is hardly a good thing...
The bottom lines (conclusions) are: it is better to be rich than poor. It is better to live in a wealthy nation, than in a poor one. Incidentally, Socialism quickly ruins one's chances of both.
Such a horrible outlook on life. There really isn't any point in arguing when our opinions on the type of society we would like to live in vary so much. I can only hope your viewpoints change over time, although I guess you think the same of me.
or you could remit that money to the government instead which is governed by the people.
Or he could realize he has already amassed enough money to do meaningful change, unlike the rest of society that needs to pool their money into the government to amass wealth of a similar scale. Now that he has this wealth, I feel there are two "best" options based on where his motivations lie:
1) He doesn't care about helping people: Start a charity to funnel money into and avoid as much taxes as possible. 2) He does care about helping people: Start a charity to do enact meaningful change in a much more efficient manner than giving it to the government.
In both scenarios, giving his money to a charity that he and/or people he trusts have control over is the best play.
Socialist nations are doing much better in results per cost when it comes to health care
People with money rarely care about the results per cost when it comes to staying alive. They care about the progress that allowed an innovative solution to be created 20 years earlier than it would have been if there were no market forces. They are okay with it being 10x as expensive because of those same market forces, because the new medicine is keeping them alive.
If you have money, the US is arguably the best health care system in the world. Cancer survival rates among those with good health care are by far the best in the world. We also have one of the worst health systems in the developed world if you don't have money though. I'm not sure if there is a way to have the best of both worlds.
So just to be equivalent you would have to make around $80 an hour.
His statement was he could make 3x his current hourly rate as a freelancer, or $150 per hour (assuming he makes $50 per hour salaried). If this is the case, he could work 5 months out of the year and match his old salary. 7 months could be spent learning new frameworks or whatever else he wants. It gives plenty of buffer to be out of work and still pay the bills, along with keeping his skills up to date.
With a suit and tie, I was better dressed than the hiring manager and CEO.
For the vast majority of job interviews, you will be much better dressed than the person interviewing you. For them it is just another day at the office. I have never been interviewed by someone in a suit, but I have never went to an interview without one. Unless you are very confident their culture would look down on a suit, its much safer to wear one. Your appearance is a very visual indicator of how much you respect the person interviewing you, and how much you respect yourself.
I didn't get the job because the CEO said he couldn't afford me even though the job was at a fixed rate.
This most likely had nothing to do with the suit. And if it did, this is the exception not the norm. No different than an anecdotal story of someone whose life was saved by not wearing a seat belt.
What counts most in business is connections. Freelancers by definition don't have connections. When work dries up, no one has has their back.
While freelancing has its downsides, this is absolutely not one of them. Almost no one has better connections than a good freelancer / consultant. It can be hard to build a good network when you stick with a single company for years. When you are constantly meeting new people at new consulting gigs, you will build a network very quickly. And these are people with the power to make buying decisions, or else they couldn't hire you as a freelancer. So your connections on average will be with much more influential people than most full time employees.
My references from businesses I worked as a FTE are mostly other senior level developers and some mid-level managers. My references from my time as a consultant are directors and senior VP's at multinational corporations, and owners of small to medium sized businesses. Guess which ones I hand out to prospective employers? I don't even plan on using them as references anymore, because last time I did 2 out of 3 of my references called me upset that I didn't ask them for a full time position first. I'll just ask my network for an opportunity next time.
the freelance rates I charge are over 3 times my day job's hourly rate
So much of what you wrote does not mesh with your statement above. Lets say you make $100k per year, so your hourly rate is roughly $50 per hour. That puts the freelance rate at $150 per hour. Lets add in a great family insurance plan that would cost you $15k per year, the employer's portion of your taxes at $8000 per year, and an extra $2000 per year in hardware purchases since you can't use the company laptop anymore. Add in another $5k for good measure, and you would need $130k to make the same as your last job. That is 22 weeks of work, or roughly 5 months.
I can't afford to not know how much I'm going to be making month to month because the work has dried up for a couple of months
Yes you can. You can go 7 months with no work as long as you work the other 5. A couple months out of work is nothing at the rates you feel you could make freelancing. Its still may not be as certain as a full time job at an established company, but making it sound like a couple months "on the beach" would be dangerous financially is dishonest. Being out of work for 6 months or more is the real danger.
I need that steady paycheck so I can budget how much we can spend on necessities, how much we can spend on niceties, and how much we can save.
If you need a steady paycheck for those things then you are by definition not budgeting. That's not meant to be an insult; almost no one budgets their money. But if you actually budget your money you could go all year with a single paycheck and not be any different than someone with 26 paychecks.
I don't think anyone is saying they have figured out the perfect way to evaluate teachers
No, we do. You just said it in your last post. You said teachers believe we have perfect metrics for other professions. ALL other professions.
What's good for the goose is good for the gander. If there are teachers who believe other professions have perfect metrics, then there must be people from other professions who think we have or can have perfect metrics for teachers.
I said nothing of the sort. I sarcastically said they must believe that or else their argument is incredibly dishonest. I don't actually think they believe this; I think their argument is incredibly dishonest.
It is no different than saying "if you believe that then you must believe pigs fly." You don't actually think they believe pigs fly, you are making a comment about how ridiculous their other belief is.
Every other industry has limits on the raw materials they accept. Teachers are basically craftsman who don't get to pick their raw materials.
Even if I agreed with your premise (and I don't), you may be correct that someone decides what raw materials to accept but it is rarely the craftsmen. It is more likely their boss's boss's boss who found he could save two dollars per cabinet by buying lower grade wood. The craftsmen is still expected to do his job though, and have his ability be evaluated when it is time for a raise.
I don't think anyone is saying they have figured out the perfect way to evaluate teachers. It will always be difficult. But it is difficult for almost every profession, but we still do it anyway since it is still better than treating everyone as if they are equally capable.
Umm what kinda daycare do you use? I would think the amount of school children whose parents work during school hours and now need daycare because the kids are out of school would trump the few dozen (if that) teachers who now can care for their kids instead of using a daycare. Also since most teachers are under paid they need to work other jobs in the summer.
To be more specific they only reduce the number of part time workers / floaters. The school aged children are in a different center, so for all I know these part time workers are just shifted to a different location. I also go to a very expensive day care center in an affluent area, and being a teacher is among the few predominantly female professions with a high enough salary to justify daycare instead of just being a stay at home parent. This may be why it seems about 1 in 5 kids are out of daycare during the summer.
Even then you have to ask yourself if it makes more sense to hire managers where the jobs are... in India or China.
I doubt you have ever managed a team of workers across multiple continents.
I have been the lead developer on a couple of these, and I assure it makes more sense to hire managers where the users are, where the decision makers are, and where the jobs are. It also makes the most sense to have skilled staff members in all three locations. In both cases where I have worked with teams on multiple continents, the decision makers where in the US. This meant the most skilled workers were in the US. As long as the C-level executives and very top VP's are in the US, most of the top staff members will be in the US.
This is the main reason I am a strong proponent on programs like the H1B (even if management of it is a shit storm). Keeping a large pool of skilled workings in the US is what keeps the CEO's here. If other countries started having a better pool of tech talent, foreign companies will start to take over companies based in the US. Then your doom and gloom prophecies will start to become a reality. The longer we can take advantage of the brain drain of the rest of the world the better we will be. We may lose our preeminence regardless of our best efforts (simple population size works against us), but the longer we can hold on the better.
Slashdot Mirror
The problem with paying blackmail is that it doesn't ever stop.
That is where negotiations come in. Agree to pay in installments so both sides have a reason to keep up the status quo.
They shouldn't pay it anyway. All they have is this guy's word that he won't release any (more) data. Maybe they pay him and he sells the data on to someone else, who then demands their $3m ransom too.
That is why the ransom seekers should be asking for monthly installments. This way both sides have a vested interest in keeping the status quo.
Except that the rich would find a way around it, legally or otherwise.
Identity farms would do a booming business.
Good for them. I certainly would never want the fear of a few people gaming the system to stop everyone else enjoying their lives far more.
Put all these tradeoffs together, and you get a device that's just barely "good enough" to do any of these things, but really fails at it's once-core function, to "make and receive voice calls".
Fails is a very harsh word. They may be marginally less capable than some old dumb phones, but they certainly don't fail at making and receiving voice calls. I do it all the time.
"Is there a god?" is a yes/no question. A confused atheist's ability to give a rambling non-answer is irrelevant.
If you think there is a god, you're a theist. If you're not sure, you're an agnostic. If you think there's no god, you're an atheist.
You can keep stating your false trilemma all you want, but it doesn't make it correct. There are a wide range of gray areas between the definitions you just gave above, and pigeon holing complex beliefs in this manner is intellectually lazy. You can claim someone is rambling when they are being too precise for your liking, but that form of ad hominem attack is also lazy and unproductive.
There are a wide range of atheists whose beliefs have very little in common. Not recognizing those differences is not better than not recognizing the differences between Catholics and Westboro Baptists.
Atheism is the belief that you don't believe in a god or religion. Taking such a stance using the limited information that we have is just as much a faith based decision as believing in god.
That is a horribly misguided statement. The mere fact there have been thousands of deities in human history, the vast majority of which are no longer worshiped, makes it far more reasonable to at least believe no current religion is correct. And the fact that using deities to explain any natural phenomena never answers anything fully (as in, what created the deities?) is another strong reason why the chance a single religion is correct is far less than the chance their are no gods. Having a lower chance of being true doesn't make something false, but it is incredibly dishonest to claim the odds are not in the atheists' favor.
According to the philosopher William L. Rowe: "In the popular sense of the term, an agnostic is someone who neither believes nor disbelieves in the existence of God, while a theist believes that God exists, an atheist disbelieves in God."
I agree these represent the popular sense of these terms. While these terms are often used this way, when they are they lose almost all ability to actually describe what real people truly believe.
I am not confusing "there is no god" (said an atheist) with "there is no god" (objectively).
You did confuse them when you said (emphasis mine):
Ask these atheists who "lack belief": "Is there a god?"
Anything other than "No" makes them an ex-atheist.
When you said the emphasized text, you were claiming any other answer to "is there a god" would automatically make someone not an atheist. My contention is if you asked an atheist who is giving a perfectly accurate response, it would almost never be NO. Saying NO would be a very common but also slightly inaccurate answer. (inaccurate in the sense that it isn't really what most atheists believe)
While it is only a slightly inaccurate answer, that small discrepancy is actually very important when comparing theism to non-theism. One side makes an absolute statement: There is a god. The other does not make an absolute statement, like any answer based on available evidence instead of faith should almost never do. It is one of the big differences between an unsubstantiated belief that anchors a full misguided belief system, and a well educated belief.
That distinction is nonsensical. Agnostic is "I don't know if there's a god", where atheist is "there is no god".
No, atheist is "I don't believe in a god". That is not the same thing as "there is no god".
If I said "I don't believe my wife is at Walmart right now", that is not the same thing as "my wife is not at Walmart". I can have a belief in a statement based on all available knowledge (she should be at work, her car is at a mechanic and I will be picking her up at work, she doesn't even shop at Walmart), but can still be honest that I cannot know for sure.
It is my belief that all non-agnostic atheists are irrational, because it is impossible to know for certain that no gods exist. They do exist, but of the dozens of atheists I know I have never met one.
Your question is not functionally different than mine. "I believe in no deities" == (I believe) "there is no god"
I agree with the equality statement you just made, but that wasn't your original one. My equality statement is:
"Is there a god?" Does Not Equal "Do you believe there is a god?"
An atheist will always answer NO to the latter question, but you asked the former. The former will be different depending on if an atheist is also an agnostic or not. Most atheist are also agnostic, so most atheists who think the question through well enough will answer something like "I'm not 100% sure, but I really doubt it strongly".
then you might, indeed, have a "not collecting stamps" hobby .
You may have a hobby, but not a "not collecting stamps" hobby. Your hobby might be reading about the psychology of people with rare hobbies. You may focus on a particular hobby (stamp collecting), which would be likely if the vast majority of people in your community have that hobby. If a large number of people in your community thought only stamp collectors could be moral people, or lived in a country where only stamp collectors have a chance of being elected to the highest positions of political power, then it would make a lot of sense to research the topic.
I would venture to guess if less than 10% of Americans believed in a god, there would almost no public displays of atheism. It would be as common as public displays of the irrationality of being a schizophrenic is now.
Not knowing, not having a position, and not caring would be agnosticism.
Almost all atheists are also agnostics. They are not mutually exclusive terms. One term describes how many deities you worship, and the other gauges your confidence in those beliefs.
Saying atheism is a belief system is no less ridiculous than saying not collecting stamps is your favorite hobby.
atheism
1. the doctrine or belief that there is no God.
So says dictionary.com.
Not sure if you meant that to refute my statement, but it doesn't. Having a belief is not the same as having a belief system. Atheists do believe that there is no god, although rarely with 100% conviction (more likely only 99.999999999%). But they almost always fall short of building a belief system around this belief.
It is also likely that most if not all non-stamp collectors have the belief that the hobby is not worth their time to pursue. But this belief does not build a belief system. They may even go as far as to research why stamp collectors pick such a horrible hobby. That researcher, and others who read their research, may start to form a belief system around why people become stamp collectors. But that still doesn't elevate their belief that stamp collecting is not worth their time into a belief system. That would require them to build a set of doctrines they feel they must follow because of their distaste of stamp collecting.
Most atheists could be lumped into a belief system of rationalism, or something similar. It is this belief system that most likely made them atheist in the first place. Militant atheists like Richard Dawkins have a belief system that I think could be called being a rationalist that plays a large part in their life and sometimes even careers. There mere fact they choose attacking theism as a significant way of expressing their rationalism still does not elevate being an atheist to a belief system.
Hobbies are optional. Belief systems are not.
Ask these atheists who "lack belief": "Is there a god?"
Anything other than "No" makes them an ex-atheist.
Saying "I doubt it" does not make someone an ex-atheist. You can be agnostic and atheist at the same time; they are not mutually exclusive. In fact it is exceedingly rare to find an atheist that is not also agnostic. Your question is not good enough to determine whether someone is an atheist, only whether they are Gnostic or Agnostic about the existence of god(s).
A better question to determine if they are an atheist would be: "Which deities do you believe in?"
If they answer anything but "None" then they are an ex-atheist.
It is not a lack of belief. It is a belief that there is no god. It's as much a dogma as those who do believe in a god. It is certainly a belief system.
Incorrect. It is the lack of belief. Saying atheism is a belief system is no less ridiculous than saying not collecting stamps is your favorite hobby.
Atheists certainly do hold belief systems. Some believe religion is harmful. Some believe killing animals is wrong. Some believe bacon is the best food ever. But being atheist is not a belief system by any sensible definition of the term.
Different regimes make it harder/easier to compel strangers to help you — and Socialist regimes, being the least free, are exceptionally "good" at it, leading to the oft-repeated perception you just cited. But it is hardly a good thing...
The bottom lines (conclusions) are: it is better to be rich than poor. It is better to live in a wealthy nation, than in a poor one. Incidentally, Socialism quickly ruins one's chances of both.
Such a horrible outlook on life. There really isn't any point in arguing when our opinions on the type of society we would like to live in vary so much. I can only hope your viewpoints change over time, although I guess you think the same of me.
or you could remit that money to the government instead which is governed by the people.
Or he could realize he has already amassed enough money to do meaningful change, unlike the rest of society that needs to pool their money into the government to amass wealth of a similar scale. Now that he has this wealth, I feel there are two "best" options based on where his motivations lie:
1) He doesn't care about helping people: Start a charity to funnel money into and avoid as much taxes as possible.
2) He does care about helping people: Start a charity to do enact meaningful change in a much more efficient manner than giving it to the government.
In both scenarios, giving his money to a charity that he and/or people he trusts have control over is the best play.
Socialist nations are doing much better in results per cost when it comes to health care
People with money rarely care about the results per cost when it comes to staying alive. They care about the progress that allowed an innovative solution to be created 20 years earlier than it would have been if there were no market forces. They are okay with it being 10x as expensive because of those same market forces, because the new medicine is keeping them alive.
If you have money, the US is arguably the best health care system in the world. Cancer survival rates among those with good health care are by far the best in the world. We also have one of the worst health systems in the developed world if you don't have money though. I'm not sure if there is a way to have the best of both worlds.
So just to be equivalent you would have to make around $80 an hour.
His statement was he could make 3x his current hourly rate as a freelancer, or $150 per hour (assuming he makes $50 per hour salaried). If this is the case, he could work 5 months out of the year and match his old salary. 7 months could be spent learning new frameworks or whatever else he wants. It gives plenty of buffer to be out of work and still pay the bills, along with keeping his skills up to date.
With a suit and tie, I was better dressed than the hiring manager and CEO.
For the vast majority of job interviews, you will be much better dressed than the person interviewing you. For them it is just another day at the office. I have never been interviewed by someone in a suit, but I have never went to an interview without one. Unless you are very confident their culture would look down on a suit, its much safer to wear one. Your appearance is a very visual indicator of how much you respect the person interviewing you, and how much you respect yourself.
I didn't get the job because the CEO said he couldn't afford me even though the job was at a fixed rate.
This most likely had nothing to do with the suit. And if it did, this is the exception not the norm. No different than an anecdotal story of someone whose life was saved by not wearing a seat belt.
What counts most in business is connections. Freelancers by definition don't have connections. When work dries up, no one has has their back.
While freelancing has its downsides, this is absolutely not one of them. Almost no one has better connections than a good freelancer / consultant. It can be hard to build a good network when you stick with a single company for years. When you are constantly meeting new people at new consulting gigs, you will build a network very quickly. And these are people with the power to make buying decisions, or else they couldn't hire you as a freelancer. So your connections on average will be with much more influential people than most full time employees.
My references from businesses I worked as a FTE are mostly other senior level developers and some mid-level managers. My references from my time as a consultant are directors and senior VP's at multinational corporations, and owners of small to medium sized businesses. Guess which ones I hand out to prospective employers? I don't even plan on using them as references anymore, because last time I did 2 out of 3 of my references called me upset that I didn't ask them for a full time position first. I'll just ask my network for an opportunity next time.
the freelance rates I charge are over 3 times my day job's hourly rate
So much of what you wrote does not mesh with your statement above. Lets say you make $100k per year, so your hourly rate is roughly $50 per hour. That puts the freelance rate at $150 per hour. Lets add in a great family insurance plan that would cost you $15k per year, the employer's portion of your taxes at $8000 per year, and an extra $2000 per year in hardware purchases since you can't use the company laptop anymore. Add in another $5k for good measure, and you would need $130k to make the same as your last job. That is 22 weeks of work, or roughly 5 months.
I can't afford to not know how much I'm going to be making month to month because the work has dried up for a couple of months
Yes you can. You can go 7 months with no work as long as you work the other 5. A couple months out of work is nothing at the rates you feel you could make freelancing. Its still may not be as certain as a full time job at an established company, but making it sound like a couple months "on the beach" would be dangerous financially is dishonest. Being out of work for 6 months or more is the real danger.
I need that steady paycheck so I can budget how much we can spend on necessities, how much we can spend on niceties, and how much we can save.
If you need a steady paycheck for those things then you are by definition not budgeting. That's not meant to be an insult; almost no one budgets their money. But if you actually budget your money you could go all year with a single paycheck and not be any different than someone with 26 paychecks.
I don't think anyone is saying they have figured out the perfect way to evaluate teachers
No, we do. You just said it in your last post. You said teachers believe we have perfect metrics for other professions. ALL other professions.
What's good for the goose is good for the gander. If there are teachers who believe other professions have perfect metrics, then there must be people from other professions who think we have or can have perfect metrics for teachers.
I said nothing of the sort. I sarcastically said they must believe that or else their argument is incredibly dishonest. I don't actually think they believe this; I think their argument is incredibly dishonest.
It is no different than saying "if you believe that then you must believe pigs fly." You don't actually think they believe pigs fly, you are making a comment about how ridiculous their other belief is.
Every other industry has limits on the raw materials they accept. Teachers are basically craftsman who don't get to pick their raw materials.
Even if I agreed with your premise (and I don't), you may be correct that someone decides what raw materials to accept but it is rarely the craftsmen. It is more likely their boss's boss's boss who found he could save two dollars per cabinet by buying lower grade wood. The craftsmen is still expected to do his job though, and have his ability be evaluated when it is time for a raise.
I don't think anyone is saying they have figured out the perfect way to evaluate teachers. It will always be difficult. But it is difficult for almost every profession, but we still do it anyway since it is still better than treating everyone as if they are equally capable.
Umm what kinda daycare do you use? I would think the amount of school children whose parents work during school hours and now need daycare because the kids are out of school would trump the few dozen (if that) teachers who now can care for their kids instead of using a daycare. Also since most teachers are under paid they need to work other jobs in the summer.
To be more specific they only reduce the number of part time workers / floaters. The school aged children are in a different center, so for all I know these part time workers are just shifted to a different location. I also go to a very expensive day care center in an affluent area, and being a teacher is among the few predominantly female professions with a high enough salary to justify daycare instead of just being a stay at home parent. This may be why it seems about 1 in 5 kids are out of daycare during the summer.
Even then you have to ask yourself if it makes more sense to hire managers where the jobs are ... in India or China.
I doubt you have ever managed a team of workers across multiple continents.
I have been the lead developer on a couple of these, and I assure it makes more sense to hire managers where the users are, where the decision makers are, and where the jobs are. It also makes the most sense to have skilled staff members in all three locations. In both cases where I have worked with teams on multiple continents, the decision makers where in the US. This meant the most skilled workers were in the US. As long as the C-level executives and very top VP's are in the US, most of the top staff members will be in the US.
This is the main reason I am a strong proponent on programs like the H1B (even if management of it is a shit storm). Keeping a large pool of skilled workings in the US is what keeps the CEO's here. If other countries started having a better pool of tech talent, foreign companies will start to take over companies based in the US. Then your doom and gloom prophecies will start to become a reality. The longer we can take advantage of the brain drain of the rest of the world the better we will be. We may lose our preeminence regardless of our best efforts (simple population size works against us), but the longer we can hold on the better.