Not really. In rural and semi-rural areas, this doesn't work at all. And Walmart excels at dealing with rural customers - it's truly one-stop shopping.
I'd rather none of them were networked; I know enough about computer security for that to scare the hell out of me. But IT insists (though it's not their idea), and I don't have a veto.
I'm an anesthesiologist. I need IV pumps to work now. Not five minutes from now, but NOW. Could you make them more secure? Sure, you could require some kind of patient/drug/pharmacist-verification code, but I don't have the luxury of waiting for that to happen, because the patient needs it NOW. Nurses do the same thing on a slightly slower schedule. Go watch someone actively trying to die and a medical team trying to prevent that (a "code") and tell me your solutions.
FFS, I had the state board of nursing tell me that nurses couldn't push drug X when under my direct personal supervision, because an RN can't give that drug, only an MD or nurse anesthestist - despite my being right there. So the really scary part, managing the airway to make sure the patient can breathe, is done by an RN two days out of nursing school, while I walk away from it to pump some drugs into their IV. Makes sense, right?
People in healthcare have a very broad appreciation of the ways in which things can and do go wrong, and technological solutions to physical problems are not the way to go.
No, Medicaid does not automatically apply if you're poor. Source.
Note: "There is currently no federal requirement that states provide health coverage to adults without dependent children. These adults qualify for Medicaid coverage only if they have a disability or are age 65 or older. However, about half of states provide some coverage through federal waivers or state-funded programs for non-disabled adults who have limited incomes but do not otherwise qualify for Medicaid."
Bottled water isn't about the water, it's about the bottle and the temperature. You can buy a 2 liter soda at room temp for less than a 0.5 L cold for the same reason. I drink tap water at home, but traveling? Yeah, pretty much stuck drinking the bottled stuff.
Chase really has wonderful service. Card declined? Call customer service, it immediately rings to an American call center with people who have the authority to fix your problem. Five minutes later, the transaction goes through.
Google does this, although the effect is inconsistent on audio-only guidance. Sometimes you get lots of warning, sometimes not. Standalones usually have lane guidance, as will Goog if you leave the screen on.
As in the past, the optimal solution is to use maps to aid a human navigator who can feed info to the driver as needed.
Been a long time (almost 15 years) since I was in Barca, but there was very little traffic along La Rambla and in the old town. The most touristy were the least trafficked areas. Whereas the tourist areas of SF are along major arteries...
Not saying you're wrong, but isn't "just let Google Maps figure it for you" a viable solution? Especially since the Waze purchase, they've been really really good. Last time I was in SF, it was during the San Mateo bridge closures this spring, and we were routed onto some really small roads to escape the traffic returning from Napa to the city. We were planning to come back in over the Golden Gate anyway just to show it off, but it turned out to be a great idea. They were having hour-plus transit times across the Bay Bridge on a Sunday afternoon.
If you have building security, why don't they just sign for all packages and put them in a storeroom until you claim them? Just like the baggage claim at a hotel, really. You have to check out by noon, flight isn't until late, you leave the bags with the hotel and pick them up when ready to leave.
I do this whenever I go to the west coast: schedule a redeye back east on Saturday night, go eat a nice dinner, pick up the bags around 9-10, head to the airport, enjoy a nice, quiet lounge, and spare myself a night's hotel stay. Catch the connecting flight to my home city and I'm back before noon, plenty of time to unpack and wash clothes before work Monday.
Dude, nobody wants to live where I do, and we have UberX and will soon have fiber (if you're in the right neighborhoods). If you have even minimal density, it can be done. Maybe not as cheap as muni fiber, but we have a company walking into a Comcast + AT&T area and competing (and based on what my neighbors say, they are going to do really well). I'm already relishing the phone conversation where I tell Comcast to go to hell.
The funny part is that this used to be Time-Warner, before the big trade. Every time I see people complain about TW service, I laugh. They're like Neiman-Marcus vs Walmart when it comes to comparing customer service with Comcast.
They always made much better trucks than cars, not really sure why. My wife still drives an '01 Tahoe. She wants something newer, but it just keeps working, and there's always something we'd rather spend the money on than another car, especially as it's strictly a commuter vehicle.
I'm getting fiber in six months. I haven't yet decided to give up the TiVo, so I may keep Comcast cable for a while, but their internet can go fuck itself sideways with a chainsaw. I'm done.
Funny thing is, my local cable system used to belong to Time-Warner. Were they great? No, they were really expensive, and the speeds weren't that great - but the customer service was actually customer service.
Let's call a "sub-livable wage" X. Let's say the EITC or similar supplement to get to "livable" is Y. If Megacorp pays X, and the government pays Y, how exactly is that worse than having the government pay X + Y? What happens when all the people who only used to cost Y a year now cost X + Y, plus they're still spending their disposable income at Megacorp & Friends to improve their bottom line? You really think that's preferable?
it would drive up the wages of these menial jobs
I'd love to hear the plausible explanation for this one. If you were only worth X before, you're not worth more now. The most likely outcome is that people drop out of the labor force en masse, figuring they'd rather sit at home and smoke weed than get up and work. After all, if you can't be denied a "livable wage" just for breathing in and out, and you're a low-skill worker, what's the point? Nobody's going to clock 40 hours a week for $1 an hour. Given the high tax rates needed to pay a mincome, employers aren't going to be able to pay you $15 an hour for flipping burgers.
This is like the arguments for higher minimum wages. Yeah, at the margins, you don't see widespread layoffs with modest increases. But if doubling it is fair, and there are no downsides, why not triple? Quadruple?
Canada also has a much stronger federalist nature than the US (your provinces are a lot more powerful than our states) and a skills-based immigration system.
You hope it's reduced in size, but it's hard to predict. Let's put it this way: if we had a mincome, would you be totally okay with dismantling every other welfare program and, if they blow their cash, they get to starve in the street? Do you think most people would?
Basic income is the idea that everyone gets it, regardless of need. Even Bill Gates. The only bureaucrats required are those who verify your citizenship status and some people to write the checks. Citizen? Here's a check.
This is very efficient. Administration costs almost nil as a percent of expenditures. The problem is that some people tend to spend all their money on vices rather than their children. So now you have to introduce housing vouchers, food stamps, etc... and you get the same welfare system you have today, plus a basic income.
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Not really. In rural and semi-rural areas, this doesn't work at all. And Walmart excels at dealing with rural customers - it's truly one-stop shopping.
I'd rather none of them were networked; I know enough about computer security for that to scare the hell out of me. But IT insists (though it's not their idea), and I don't have a veto.
Pretty much this.
I'm an anesthesiologist. I need IV pumps to work now. Not five minutes from now, but NOW. Could you make them more secure? Sure, you could require some kind of patient/drug/pharmacist-verification code, but I don't have the luxury of waiting for that to happen, because the patient needs it NOW. Nurses do the same thing on a slightly slower schedule. Go watch someone actively trying to die and a medical team trying to prevent that (a "code") and tell me your solutions.
FFS, I had the state board of nursing tell me that nurses couldn't push drug X when under my direct personal supervision, because an RN can't give that drug, only an MD or nurse anesthestist - despite my being right there. So the really scary part, managing the airway to make sure the patient can breathe, is done by an RN two days out of nursing school, while I walk away from it to pump some drugs into their IV. Makes sense, right?
People in healthcare have a very broad appreciation of the ways in which things can and do go wrong, and technological solutions to physical problems are not the way to go.
You paid taxes for programs for the poor. You thought you were investing in something to help you if you had a few rough months, but you were wrong.
No, Medicaid does not automatically apply if you're poor. Source.
Note: "There is currently no federal requirement that states provide health coverage to adults without dependent children. These adults qualify for Medicaid coverage only if they have a disability or are age 65 or older. However, about half of states provide some coverage through federal waivers or state-funded programs for non-disabled adults who have limited incomes but do not otherwise qualify for Medicaid."
It's not cold, and it's not portable.
Bottled water isn't about the water, it's about the bottle and the temperature. You can buy a 2 liter soda at room temp for less than a 0.5 L cold for the same reason. I drink tap water at home, but traveling? Yeah, pretty much stuck drinking the bottled stuff.
Chase really has wonderful service. Card declined? Call customer service, it immediately rings to an American call center with people who have the authority to fix your problem. Five minutes later, the transaction goes through.
Why do you people work such shitty jobs for megacorps? Makes sense if you're in a startup where you might hit the jackpot, but Microsoft?
Windows ME? Why? You had 98SE and 2000 to choose from, and either one would be better than the hybrid abortion that was ME.
Google does this, although the effect is inconsistent on audio-only guidance. Sometimes you get lots of warning, sometimes not. Standalones usually have lane guidance, as will Goog if you leave the screen on.
As in the past, the optimal solution is to use maps to aid a human navigator who can feed info to the driver as needed.
Fair enough.
Been a long time (almost 15 years) since I was in Barca, but there was very little traffic along La Rambla and in the old town. The most touristy were the least trafficked areas. Whereas the tourist areas of SF are along major arteries...
80, 280 and 101 don't count?
Not saying you're wrong, but isn't "just let Google Maps figure it for you" a viable solution? Especially since the Waze purchase, they've been really really good. Last time I was in SF, it was during the San Mateo bridge closures this spring, and we were routed onto some really small roads to escape the traffic returning from Napa to the city. We were planning to come back in over the Golden Gate anyway just to show it off, but it turned out to be a great idea. They were having hour-plus transit times across the Bay Bridge on a Sunday afternoon.
If you have building security, why don't they just sign for all packages and put them in a storeroom until you claim them? Just like the baggage claim at a hotel, really. You have to check out by noon, flight isn't until late, you leave the bags with the hotel and pick them up when ready to leave.
I do this whenever I go to the west coast: schedule a redeye back east on Saturday night, go eat a nice dinner, pick up the bags around 9-10, head to the airport, enjoy a nice, quiet lounge, and spare myself a night's hotel stay. Catch the connecting flight to my home city and I'm back before noon, plenty of time to unpack and wash clothes before work Monday.
Dude, nobody wants to live where I do, and we have UberX and will soon have fiber (if you're in the right neighborhoods). If you have even minimal density, it can be done. Maybe not as cheap as muni fiber, but we have a company walking into a Comcast + AT&T area and competing (and based on what my neighbors say, they are going to do really well). I'm already relishing the phone conversation where I tell Comcast to go to hell.
The funny part is that this used to be Time-Warner, before the big trade. Every time I see people complain about TW service, I laugh. They're like Neiman-Marcus vs Walmart when it comes to comparing customer service with Comcast.
You'll have a much better basis by which to judge the quality of the work done.
Beats going to prison.
Hey, it does the job.
They always made much better trucks than cars, not really sure why. My wife still drives an '01 Tahoe. She wants something newer, but it just keeps working, and there's always something we'd rather spend the money on than another car, especially as it's strictly a commuter vehicle.
I'm getting fiber in six months. I haven't yet decided to give up the TiVo, so I may keep Comcast cable for a while, but their internet can go fuck itself sideways with a chainsaw. I'm done.
Funny thing is, my local cable system used to belong to Time-Warner. Were they great? No, they were really expensive, and the speeds weren't that great - but the customer service was actually customer service.
it would drive up the wages of these menial jobs
I'd love to hear the plausible explanation for this one. If you were only worth X before, you're not worth more now. The most likely outcome is that people drop out of the labor force en masse, figuring they'd rather sit at home and smoke weed than get up and work. After all, if you can't be denied a "livable wage" just for breathing in and out, and you're a low-skill worker, what's the point? Nobody's going to clock 40 hours a week for $1 an hour. Given the high tax rates needed to pay a mincome, employers aren't going to be able to pay you $15 an hour for flipping burgers.
This is like the arguments for higher minimum wages. Yeah, at the margins, you don't see widespread layoffs with modest increases. But if doubling it is fair, and there are no downsides, why not triple? Quadruple?
Canada also has a much stronger federalist nature than the US (your provinces are a lot more powerful than our states) and a skills-based immigration system.
You hope it's reduced in size, but it's hard to predict. Let's put it this way: if we had a mincome, would you be totally okay with dismantling every other welfare program and, if they blow their cash, they get to starve in the street? Do you think most people would?
Basic income is the idea that everyone gets it, regardless of need. Even Bill Gates. The only bureaucrats required are those who verify your citizenship status and some people to write the checks. Citizen? Here's a check.
This is very efficient. Administration costs almost nil as a percent of expenditures. The problem is that some people tend to spend all their money on vices rather than their children. So now you have to introduce housing vouchers, food stamps, etc... and you get the same welfare system you have today, plus a basic income.