Suppose the actual speed limit is 60 for a particular stretch of highway, but the data was incorrectly entered as 30. Or due to signal interference, the computer temporarily thinks the car is on a different road with a low speed limit. All of a sudden the car slows down unexpectedly. That is a recipe for an accident.
"It can get extremely frustrating, being required by law to have Religious Education lessons until you're 16, when you know you're going to go into the IT field,..."
So what if you know you're getting into the IT field? You have no idea how long you'll stay there. The average American changes careers 2.5 times in their lifetime. That's careers, not just jobs. Both my parents changed careers. My younger brother has already changed his career and now he's studying for a Masters with plans to change again. You don't know what the hell you'll be working in 10, 20, or 30 years from now.
Software patents would have prevented the web from emerging today if it didn't already exist. It might have still come into existence, but only as an expensive proprietary protocol/service like Compuserve was.
"Before the U.S. government started counting tips as taxable income, that might have been true. Afterwards, however, that is nonsense. Because tips are taxable income, it means restaurants can pay waiters *less than the minimum wage*. Getting half or more of your income from tips is a very, very, very strong incentive to provide good service."
Given that the expectation of tips allows restaurants to pay less than minimum wage, tips have indeed become the last remaining important incentive. However, that's not what I'm comparing it to. Build the wait staff's wages into the price of the meal and pay them a decent wage, and the owners will then have an incentive to train the staff properly, hire better quality people, and provide other incentives for good service. But with tips forming the majority of their income, it shifts the burden of motivating them from the owner to the customer.
Because of tipping, some give deliberately bad service if they remember you didn't tip according to their expectations the previous time, or if by looking at you they expect you won't give a good tip (such as if you're black). That wouldn't happen much if they were paid a decent salary without tips. Trips to other countries have shown that tipping is not inherently necessary to ensure good service.
That's Italy. Maybe they just have bad service and tipping wouldn't have made it any different. Try Australia and Japan - excellent service, no tipping.
If tipping is required for good service, I guess that means that everybody in the 99% of occupations that don't involve tipping are doing a bad job.
"I'm still not sure whether the points system makes movies better, like tipping makes service in resturants better, or if it just means that most actors starve."
Tipping doesn't make service better. Go visit a restaurant in a country where tipping isn't done (i.e. most countries outside the US) and you'll see.
Tips are expected by the staff merely for showing up, so they're not a motivation for better service. Tipping is only insurance against getting deliberately bad service the next time you visit.
Most of the ridiculous verdicts in technical cases come from juries, who have no clue on the subject matter and only vote based on which lawyer gave a better dog and pony show.
They need to redefine "peers" in "a jury of his peers".
'What exactly is a "potentially dangerous" animal? Most animals are potentially dangerous.'
I don't know about Japan, but in the US the towns that implement pet restrictions explicitly spell out the species and breeds and sizes that are considered dangerous enough to warrant restrictive measures. It's not just left at "potentially dangerous". Incidents of people getting mauled can cause previously unrestricted animals to get added to the restricted list.
Money is an artificial construct, but it's not an artificial barrier of productive activities (with a few exceptions) or entry into any industry, it's an artificial catalyst.
Without money existing in the world, the natural alternative would be bartering (or maybe even coercion) in order to obtain the equipment or skills or people needed to provide the intended goods or service, which would be make entry into the industry even more difficult.
Private property may indeed be an artificial construct. But then it's also an artificial catalyst for productive activities (you work harder if you know you'll get to keep the rewards of your work), not an artificial barrier.
Every business has barriers to entry, which may include capital and skill.
However, the poster you responded to was referring an artificial barrier to entry, erected by the government. Building a factory or learning a skill isn't an artificial barrier if the current state of technology inherently requires either in order to provide the intended goods and services.
Without even considering productivity (which can be hard to measure), there is another advantage to treating employees well: you can pay them a bit less than other companies and they'll still stay.
It may be true that showing loyalty towards employees doesn't have much of a business benefit in some types of companies. However, such companies shouldn't be hypocritical and act as if they expect such loyalty.
"Summarizing that, A. the company expects loyalty from their workers, yet B. the company rarely if ever demonstrates loyalty to the worker. This behavior is not really deceitful or contrary, it's good business sense."
It's NOT good business sense, because they won't get much loyalty from workers if they don't demonstrate loyalty towards the workers.
People who earn millions per year and spend as if they will continue to make millions each year forever are fools and deserve the fate they get when that high income level stops.
The majority of people earning $1 million or more per year do not sustain incomes at that level for more than 3-4 years. Eventually their sports career tanks, they're no longer on top of the music charts, or the company's board ousts them from their CxO position. When you make that kind of money, you need to save as if each year is the last year you'll make that much, or eventually you'll end up just like those broke actors and athletes who were once millionaires.
If US corporations could increase profits by making children work and killing women, they would do it. They only don't do it because the PR backlash would hurt their profits.
This will only encourage other countries to set up their own satellite jammers. And guess what -- the US is more dependent on satellites than any other country, so America stands to lose more than anybody else in a satellite-jamming contest.
'Or a big queue at the supermarket, the person on the checkout goes home saying "I've been productive enough today" leaving everyone just stood there with full trollies.'
No. The next cashier would take over.
The supermarket near me is open 24 hours/day, but no individual works 24 hours in a day. Ever heard of a concept called shifts?
"I'm on the Cable Advisory Board in my hometown, and I'm 100% sure that the license we've issued to Comcast is non-exclusive."
And I'm 100% sure that unless your hometown just started having cable TV less than 10 years ago, the original license to Comcast was monopolistic (even though it may be currently non-exclusive).
"When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion--when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing..."
"Don't get me wrong, I got a good chuckle out of that but CEOs make a lot of money because they're worth a lot of money."
It's one thing when they're actually performing well. But they aren't worth an 8-figure severance package when they screw up the company and get kicked out.
"The second point is less dishonest and more just a victim of bad economic understanding. Companies are willing to pay a certain amount of money for a certain type of work. If a country were to outlaw child labor, it wouldn't suddenly raise the wages of the country."
No, my position is well thought out and is consistent with studies of nations that have changed their laws (or increased the enforcement) to reduce child labor.
Child labor creates a catch-22 situation... the parents are so poor they have to make the children work, and the children working depresses the parents' wages. Child labor is a ticket to everlasting poverty, not a tool for uplifting a nation.
The companies don't raise the adult wages overnight, but over time the competition for labor forces them to do so, and the increased wages force them to invest in equipment and training to make the adult workers more productive to sustain the higher wages. Of course, some companies will pull out of the country because of it, but the increased wages of the adults helps to keep more money in the country and fuel the economy in other ways.
"And since I don't believe that unfettered Internet access (however nice it is) falls in the category of a "Basic Human Right", I don't think that the companies that help China with the Great Firewall are committing any great sin."
Unfettered access to publicly distributed information (of which the Internet is a part) is very much a basic human right. Not in the sense that somebody must give you unfettered Internet access, but in the sense that the government should not interfere with your Internet access once you do have the equipment to access the Internet.
Similarly, freedom the press is a basic human right, not in the sense that people or government must give you a printing process, but in the sense that they aren't supposed to take away your printing printing press or prevent you from circulating what you have printed.
Slashdot Mirror
Suppose the actual speed limit is 60 for a particular stretch of highway, but the data was incorrectly entered as 30. Or due to signal interference, the computer temporarily thinks the car is on a different road with a low speed limit. All of a sudden the car slows down unexpectedly. That is a recipe for an accident.
If you deduct the full price of an item against your taxes, when you get a rebate you're supposed to record it as taxable income.
Either you deduct only the net after-rebate price, or pay tax on the rebate.
"It can get extremely frustrating, being required by law to have Religious Education lessons until you're 16, when you know you're going to go into the IT field,..."
So what if you know you're getting into the IT field? You have no idea how long you'll stay there. The average American changes careers 2.5 times in their lifetime. That's careers, not just jobs. Both my parents changed careers. My younger brother has already changed his career and now he's studying for a Masters with plans to change again. You don't know what the hell you'll be working in 10, 20, or 30 years from now.
Software patents would have prevented the web from emerging today if it didn't already exist. It might have still come into existence, but only as an expensive proprietary protocol/service like Compuserve was.
"Before the U.S. government started counting tips as taxable income, that might have been true. Afterwards, however, that is nonsense. Because tips are taxable income, it means restaurants can pay waiters *less than the minimum wage*. Getting half or more of your income from tips is a very, very, very strong incentive to provide good service."
Given that the expectation of tips allows restaurants to pay less than minimum wage, tips have indeed become the last remaining important incentive. However, that's not what I'm comparing it to. Build the wait staff's wages into the price of the meal and pay them a decent wage, and the owners will then have an incentive to train the staff properly, hire better quality people, and provide other incentives for good service. But with tips forming the majority of their income, it shifts the burden of motivating them from the owner to the customer.
Because of tipping, some give deliberately bad service if they remember you didn't tip according to their expectations the previous time, or if by looking at you they expect you won't give a good tip (such as if you're black). That wouldn't happen much if they were paid a decent salary without tips. Trips to other countries have shown that tipping is not inherently necessary to ensure good service.
That's Italy. Maybe they just have bad service and tipping wouldn't have made it any different. Try Australia and Japan - excellent service, no tipping.
If tipping is required for good service, I guess that means that everybody in the 99% of occupations that don't involve tipping are doing a bad job.
"I'm still not sure whether the points system makes movies better, like tipping makes service in resturants better, or if it just means that most actors starve."
Tipping doesn't make service better. Go visit a restaurant in a country where tipping isn't done (i.e. most countries outside the US) and you'll see.
Tips are expected by the staff merely for showing up, so they're not a motivation for better service. Tipping is only insurance against getting deliberately bad service the next time you visit.
Most of the ridiculous verdicts in technical cases come from juries, who have no clue on the subject matter and only vote based on which lawyer gave a better dog and pony show.
They need to redefine "peers" in "a jury of his peers".
'What exactly is a "potentially dangerous" animal? Most animals are potentially dangerous.'
I don't know about Japan, but in the US the towns that implement pet restrictions explicitly spell out the species and breeds and sizes that are considered dangerous enough to warrant restrictive measures. It's not just left at "potentially dangerous". Incidents of people getting mauled can cause previously unrestricted animals to get added to the restricted list.
Money is an artificial construct, but it's not an artificial barrier of productive activities (with a few exceptions) or entry into any industry, it's an artificial catalyst.
Without money existing in the world, the natural alternative would be bartering (or maybe even coercion) in order to obtain the equipment or skills or people needed to provide the intended goods or service, which would be make entry into the industry even more difficult.
Private property may indeed be an artificial construct. But then it's also an artificial catalyst for productive activities (you work harder if you know you'll get to keep the rewards of your work), not an artificial barrier.
Every business has barriers to entry, which may include capital and skill.
However, the poster you responded to was referring an artificial barrier to entry, erected by the government. Building a factory or learning a skill isn't an artificial barrier if the current state of technology inherently requires either in order to provide the intended goods and services.
Without even considering productivity (which can be hard to measure), there is another advantage to treating employees well: you can pay them a bit less than other companies and they'll still stay.
It may be true that showing loyalty towards employees doesn't have much of a business benefit in some types of companies. However, such companies shouldn't be hypocritical and act as if they expect such loyalty.
"Summarizing that, A. the company expects loyalty from their workers, yet B. the company rarely if ever demonstrates loyalty to the worker. This behavior is not really deceitful or contrary, it's good business sense."
It's NOT good business sense, because they won't get much loyalty from workers if they don't demonstrate loyalty towards the workers.
You should get a bit of the profit ... from the clothes you sell.
People who earn millions per year and spend as if they will continue to make millions each year forever are fools and deserve the fate they get when that high income level stops.
The majority of people earning $1 million or more per year do not sustain incomes at that level for more than 3-4 years. Eventually their sports career tanks, they're no longer on top of the music charts, or the company's board ousts them from their CxO position. When you make that kind of money, you need to save as if each year is the last year you'll make that much, or eventually you'll end up just like those broke actors and athletes who were once millionaires.
If US corporations could increase profits by making children work and killing women, they would do it. They only don't do it because the PR backlash would hurt their profits.
This will only encourage other countries to set up their own satellite jammers. And guess what -- the US is more dependent on satellites than any other country, so America stands to lose more than anybody else in a satellite-jamming contest.
Passengers kick terrorist ass. That's the most reliable way to stop a terrorist on a plane. Remember Richard Reid?
'Or a big queue at the supermarket, the person on the checkout goes home saying "I've been productive enough today" leaving everyone just stood there with full trollies.'
No. The next cashier would take over.
The supermarket near me is open 24 hours/day, but no individual works 24 hours in a day. Ever heard of a concept called shifts?
"I'm on the Cable Advisory Board in my hometown, and I'm 100% sure that the license we've issued to Comcast is non-exclusive."
And I'm 100% sure that unless your hometown just started having cable TV less than 10 years ago, the original license to Comcast was monopolistic (even though it may be currently non-exclusive).
"I don't know about you, but in my hometown the polls were put in by the electric company who also pay tax to the town for the property they use."
I'm sure the electric company has or had a government-granted monopoly in the town.
"When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion--when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing..."
They call that "software patents".
"Don't get me wrong, I got a good chuckle out of that but CEOs make a lot of money because they're worth a lot of money."
It's one thing when they're actually performing well. But they aren't worth an 8-figure severance package when they screw up the company and get kicked out.
"The second point is less dishonest and more just a victim of bad economic understanding. Companies are willing to pay a certain amount of money for a certain type of work. If a country were to outlaw child labor, it wouldn't suddenly raise the wages of the country."
... the parents are so poor they have to make the children work, and the children working depresses the parents' wages. Child labor is a ticket to everlasting poverty, not a tool for uplifting a nation.
No, my position is well thought out and is consistent with studies of nations that have changed their laws (or increased the enforcement) to reduce child labor.
Child labor creates a catch-22 situation
The companies don't raise the adult wages overnight, but over time the competition for labor forces them to do so, and the increased wages force them to invest in equipment and training to make the adult workers more productive to sustain the higher wages. Of course, some companies will pull out of the country because of it, but the increased wages of the adults helps to keep more money in the country and fuel the economy in other ways.
"And since I don't believe that unfettered Internet access (however nice it is) falls in the category of a "Basic Human Right", I don't think that the companies that help China with the Great Firewall are committing any great sin."
Unfettered access to publicly distributed information (of which the Internet is a part) is very much a basic human right. Not in the sense that somebody must give you unfettered Internet access, but in the sense that the government should not interfere with your Internet access once you do have the equipment to access the Internet.
Similarly, freedom the press is a basic human right, not in the sense that people or government must give you a printing process, but in the sense that they aren't supposed to take away your printing printing press or prevent you from circulating what you have printed.