I'd argue that that's a bad deal, and not really a true sharing of costs.
Average fuel economy is 26.4mpg, according to Google. $3.65 per gallon is the current average gas price. That works out to $0.134 per mile, or only 24% of the US GSA's POV reimbursement rate. That implies that fuel accounts for only one quarter of the true cost of driving, and that you've got about $0.426 per mile of costs that must still be accounted for. You suggest oil and depreciation account for only $0.21 per mile, so that still leaves another $0.216 per mile in other costs. Brakes and tires are two more obvious consumables that I'm too lazy to estimate the per-mile cost of. Either way, I think charging as much as $0.56 per mile could easily be considered "sharing", not "selling", since that's what the US Government itself agrees is a fair rate to reimburse someone for putting miles on their own vehicle.
I agree, a 15% decrease in cost wouldn't do much when taking a cab adds 200% to the cost of getting drunk. Similarly, nobody would buy cars with airbags if the airbags added 200% to the cost of a car. I'd sooner not drink at bars, much like I'd sooner not buy a car.
No, I have money for neither, which is why I bought a two-tap kegerator for my apartment.
Should my taxes go towards your "free" taxi service?
$20 can get me properly drunk on shitty beer at a shitty bar.
$20 can get a cabbie to take me most of the way home. Getting there (or getting my car the next day) is another $20.
So, to go out and get drunk, it's roughly 200% more expensive to do it responsibly (ignoring the inconvenience factor as well). If you're on a budget, that's some serious motivation to drive drunk. Perhaps you can consider the finer points of how your taxes are spent after a drunk driver kills your friend or family member.
Cost to operate a vehicle: in the range of $.12 to $.25 per mile
I don't know where you're getting those numbers from, but the US Government currently reimburses for mileage put on privately owned vehicles to the tune of $0.56 per mile.
Are you even including anything more than fuel, or are you assuming that cars don't have any other consumables and don't lose value from miles driven?
I speak for myself and all of my close friends when I say that yes, price-sensitivity to cabs is the biggest reason people drink and drive.
If cabs were free, nobody I know would drink and drive. Not one of them. And I'm close friends with several people who have been convicted of DUI (and many more who haven't yet been caught).
However, to really get a complete picture regarding how effective gun control laws are at making people safer (safer in general, not just from guns), we'd also need a chart like the one your provide for gun crime, but for non-gun crime instead. If we could show that the drop in gun crime didn't coincide with a rise in non-gun crime, then we'd have an unassailable argument in favor of gun control.
I think that's the point, though. If gun bans don't result in an overall decrease in violent crime, then they don't work. If by banning guns, you just encourage people to take up knives and hammers, what's the point? Nobody's suggesting that banning guns will stop stabbings. However, if banning guns increases stabbings, it's quite reasonable to challenge the effectiveness of such bans. Nobody's claiming that gun bans don't decrease gun crime, but if the decrease in gun crime is matched (or dwarfed) by an increase in non-gun crime, what's the point?
Also, I wouldn't focus on the Bird or Nightingale stories, as they're anecdotes and not really relevant in a conversation about effectiveness of legislation (although I'm not surprised to see the news media jumping on an opportunity to promote sensationalism).
Of course, I'd like to just add that we live in possibly the safest times in history. We've never been as safe from violent crime as we are today, and yet there is still this overwhelming concern with safety, with neutralizing some mythical violent threat. I understand that people are still subject to violent crime on a regular basis, and because of that we must not abandon our quest for safety. However, I invite you to consider that we may be chasing the long tail of violence at this point, and the sacrifices we must make in order to do so might at some point be greater than the gains we make. Whether that line is drawn at banning guns or whether it's drawn at banning knives and hammers, I think we can agree that there is a point at which it doesn't really make sense to continue striving for increased safety. In the end, you can't stop every single determined asshole.
Regarding your first link, it's unlcear what the chart is depicting. The vertical axis is labelled "Numbers", with each data series corresponding to a different kind of weapon. Are these numbers of weapons? Numbers of violent crimes committed with these weapons? Numbers of homicides committed with these weapons? The chart, on its own, doesn't make that clear.
The article in the Beeb is fascinating, but the charts it includes refer only to "crime", not violent crime (although the article does state that "personal crime, including thefts from the person and violent crimes, fell by 9%. It also estimated violence had fallen by 13%, taking it to its lowest level for 33 years"). This seems to contradict the claims made in the WSJ article I linked to (which does not cite the Daily Fail).
Indeed, the second link I provided does unfortunately cite the Daily Mail. That was actually the next google hit (after a wikipedia article), which is why I only provided the first two hits. I'm well aware of the Daily Mail's reputation, and made an effort to exclude it from my pool of evidence. It seems to have flew in under my radar regardless, and so I ask you to discount the second link I provided.
In any case, the WSJ article claims about the aftermath of the Firearms Act of 1998: "Within a decade of the handgun ban and the confiscation of handguns from registered owners, crime with handguns had doubled according to British government crime reports. Gun crime, not a serious problem in the past, now is. Armed street gangs have some British police carrying guns for the first time."
Now, you provide some more links to homicide data. That's not the same thing as violent crime. If banning guns results in half as many people dying, but twice as many people being the victims of non-fatal assault, can we really say we have decreased crime? How many stabbings is a prevented shooting worth? Either way, when we're looking at homicide data, we're comparing apples to oranges. It's entirely possible (and likely, according to at least some of the data) that gun bans result in decreased rates of homicide but increased rates of violent crime overall.
In the end, I'm curious as to why there's an apparent discrepancy between the claims made by the WSJ and BBC. It's sad that even with an issue that's so thoroughly documented, it's hard to get a straight answer.
The single issue is getting money out of politics. Simply abolishing corporate personhood (in the context of campaign contributions) would effectively outlaw campaigning, as corporate funds are what pay for the overwhelming majority of political campaigns today. Since the goal is not to get rid of democratic elections, but merely to remove the corporate influence, it is thereby necessary to secure an alternate unbiased source of campaign financing. Public financing meets these requirements. Think, AC. Think.
Instead of being bitter about having to pay your share of taxes, you should be gloating over how much wealth you're withholding from the masses wallowing in poverty. There's always a silver lining, you greedy bastard.
"*Note: The finished legislation will be worded differently and have to account for inflation, etc. This is simply to point the legislators in the right direction and make sure the final amendment accomplishes the goals we have outlined here."
From the URL you linked to. Reading comprehension for the win.
If you actually thought that was the verbatim text of the legislation, you must not read legislation very often. It needs to pass through the legalese encoder several times before it's even sponsored.
Runaway1956 used the premise "Time and again, when cities and states make gun laws stricter, crime increases. And, repeatedly, when gun laws are relaxed, there is a short initial period of increased violence, followed by a decidedly downward trend in crime." which is false. In the UK increased restrictions on gun ownership actually show the opposite pattern.
Citation needed. Google tells me the opposite. First hit, second hit. Of course, these articles focus on gun crime. Even in Australia, the gun bans have decreased gun crime but increased violent crime overall. Do you have any citations that support your claim, or are we all just arguing from emotion?
Actually, I should have phrased my post better. It does technically rescind "personhood", but not corporate charters. The personhood is a relatively minor interpretation at the edges of the issue.
That's where we disagree. WOLF-PAC is not some fringe group trying to abolish the corporation. WOLF-PAC is a single-issue grass-roots effort to undo the damage done by recent SCOTUS rulings. Corporate personhood is the very core of the issue.
Why doesn't Wolf-Pac support freeing the EM spectrum to the states and the people? Why not a large citizen/anything goes band? You would keep the MSM owned by the MIC. You think they care if tax dollars get funnelled to them directly?
Because those issues have nothing to do with elected political office being up for sale to the highest bidder (or very little to do with it, at best). The strength of WOLF-PAC is in focusing on the task at hand and not getting bogged down with everyone else's pet issues. First, elections must be fixed. Then, everything else can be fixed through free and fair elections.
Let me clarify. Wolf PAC is an American political action committee formed with the goal of "ending corporate personhood and publicly financing all elections in our country", to include the restriction of large monetary donations to political candidates, parties, and groups.
That being said, the quote you post is not the text of the propopsed amendment. I know that because there is no proposed amendment. We're not at that stage yet, with only a single state's legislature voting in favor of a constitutional convention, so far.
You reveal your lunacy by admitting that you have no problem rescinding every last corporate charter. Corporations are essential in an economy as large as the one we have today. You argue for throwing out the baby but keeping the bathwater. The problem today isn't the existence of corporations, it's the unbridled political power they wield. Indeed, I do "DICK" about corporations, and instead focus on limiting the corrupting influence they brandish. Of course, with the extreme disparity in wealth distribution we see today, some individuals control such vast sums of money that their personal wealth is on par with that of massive corporations. These people also wield an inequitable share of political influence in our country, and therefore these campaign contribution limits should rightfully be extended to individuals as well.
In the end, many people agree that elections should not be bought. The solution, in our eyes, is to outlaw the purchase of elections. Not to outlaw corporations, or to return to a gold standard, but simply to outlaw the purchase of elections. That's what WOLF-PAC seeks to accomplish. If you disagree with this notion, and feel that it is in our country's best interest to continue to allow the purchase of elections, that's fine. You're entitled to your beliefs. However, a large segment of society does not share your views, and we're making ourselves heard through WOLF-PAC.
In particulare, because this is a constitutional amendment, the first amendment will be recast in the shadow of the 28th (proposed).
Why the first amendment? Why not the 2nd? or 3rd? or 27th? What makes the first amendment so special here? Is it because the SCOTUS wrongly decided that money equals speech? You believe that a 28th amendment that limits campaign contributions would necessarily allow the government to abridge the freedom of non-monetary speech as well? What is your reasoning there?
Why do you support the "publicly finance" of elections ("publicly finance all elections in our country")???
Because I believe elections that can be bought fundamentally undermine the stated goals of a democratic society.
You propose to take my tax dollars to give to politicians to convince me to vote for them so they can take more of my tax dollars?
Yes.
Why do I need more robocalls that circumvent 'do not call' efforts?
That's a loaded question. I don't know, when are you going to stop beating your wife?
Why do I need more subsidized junk mail?
Ditto.
Why do I need to pay for more commercials to skip? (and is it theft if I paid for that commercial to begin with?)
And again.
There are problems in this country, but a plan to take more tax dollars by force is not something I would support.
Indeed, you're entitled to such a stance. I'm not sure what this has to do with WOLF-PAC, though. If you believe their goal can best be described as "to take more tax dollars by force" then you haven't quite managed to understand them.
Keep in mind their reform will GUT the first amendment. All political speech will get routed through the government. The inch you think you're giving will soon be a mile.
You're entitled to your opinion. Some of us believe the first amendment has already been gutted, along with many of the others, and that it's better to take action now than to regret our apathy later. Also, please explain how rescinding corporate personhood will impact, let alone "GUT", the first amendment.
This is the most US-centric post I've seen under this story.
Believe it or not, many places in the world have gotten money out of politics (to the same extent that MAYDAY PAC wants to). Perhaps this may be surprising to you, but it actually is possible. I can only hope that my other fellow Americans aren't as defeatist as you are.
I support MAYDAY-PAC and WOLF-PAC, because I'm unwilling to bend over and take it. I invite you to clench your asshole and join me in taking a stand against our ass-rapist masters.
I've heard of people traveling with a "gun case" as checked luggage to avoid TSA meddling. Something about the gun case being illegal for anyone else to open, as long as you declare it as a gun case, even if there's no actual firearm inside. I've never tried this myself, and I recommend reading up on this before trying it yourself.
The first sentence that pops into my head that starts with 'Dude!' is 'Dude, you're gettin' a Dell!'
I guess the weed comment is still apropos either way:P
In any case, I'm just trying to convince everyone to be nicer to each other. The internet is so full of assholes, among which I frequently count myself. I sincerely say, can't we all just get along? Or at least maintain some semblance of civility? I'm turning over a new leaf myself, having recently abandoned trolling. I invite you to join me in striving to make the Internet more like Mr. Rogers' neighborhood, one poor bastard at a time.
Or perhaps it's me that needs to lay off the weed.:)
I wasn't just referring to the last reply. Even in your first reply to Noah, you asked him to "lay off the weed". Overall, I found Noah's tone to range from supportive to apologetic, while yours ranged from dismissive to smug. You catch more flies with honey than vinegar.
Thank you, and my apologies if I came across as a smart-ass. I recently ate a lot of cauliflower (for the first time) and was amazed by how much gas I was producing. Was geniunely curious how this worked, as I'm very ignorant of even the most basic biological systems.
I believe the opposite. The rich can already afford to be idle, so this development doesn't have much potential to improve their lives. It is the working poor who stand to benefit the most from universal automation, as it would allow them to live idle lives as well, if they so desire.
Slashdot Mirror
I'd argue that that's a bad deal, and not really a true sharing of costs.
Average fuel economy is 26.4mpg, according to Google. $3.65 per gallon is the current average gas price. That works out to $0.134 per mile, or only 24% of the US GSA's POV reimbursement rate. That implies that fuel accounts for only one quarter of the true cost of driving, and that you've got about $0.426 per mile of costs that must still be accounted for. You suggest oil and depreciation account for only $0.21 per mile, so that still leaves another $0.216 per mile in other costs. Brakes and tires are two more obvious consumables that I'm too lazy to estimate the per-mile cost of. Either way, I think charging as much as $0.56 per mile could easily be considered "sharing", not "selling", since that's what the US Government itself agrees is a fair rate to reimburse someone for putting miles on their own vehicle.
I agree, a 15% decrease in cost wouldn't do much when taking a cab adds 200% to the cost of getting drunk. Similarly, nobody would buy cars with airbags if the airbags added 200% to the cost of a car. I'd sooner not drink at bars, much like I'd sooner not buy a car.
So, you have money to "bar hop" but not cab fare?
No, I have money for neither, which is why I bought a two-tap kegerator for my apartment.
Should my taxes go towards your "free" taxi service?
$20 can get me properly drunk on shitty beer at a shitty bar.
$20 can get a cabbie to take me most of the way home. Getting there (or getting my car the next day) is another $20.
So, to go out and get drunk, it's roughly 200% more expensive to do it responsibly (ignoring the inconvenience factor as well).
If you're on a budget, that's some serious motivation to drive drunk.
Perhaps you can consider the finer points of how your taxes are spent after a drunk driver kills your friend or family member.
Cost to operate a vehicle: in the range of $.12 to $.25 per mile
I don't know where you're getting those numbers from, but the US Government currently reimburses for mileage put on privately owned vehicles to the tune of $0.56 per mile.
Are you even including anything more than fuel, or are you assuming that cars don't have any other consumables and don't lose value from miles driven?
I find that very hard to believe.
I agree, that's unimaginably cheap. Over here they're over $1M.
I speak for myself and all of my close friends when I say that yes, price-sensitivity to cabs is the biggest reason people drink and drive.
If cabs were free, nobody I know would drink and drive. Not one of them. And I'm close friends with several people who have been convicted of DUI (and many more who haven't yet been caught).
I can't disagree with anything you've said.
However, to really get a complete picture regarding how effective gun control laws are at making people safer (safer in general, not just from guns), we'd also need a chart like the one your provide for gun crime, but for non-gun crime instead. If we could show that the drop in gun crime didn't coincide with a rise in non-gun crime, then we'd have an unassailable argument in favor of gun control.
I think that's the point, though. If gun bans don't result in an overall decrease in violent crime, then they don't work. If by banning guns, you just encourage people to take up knives and hammers, what's the point? Nobody's suggesting that banning guns will stop stabbings. However, if banning guns increases stabbings, it's quite reasonable to challenge the effectiveness of such bans. Nobody's claiming that gun bans don't decrease gun crime, but if the decrease in gun crime is matched (or dwarfed) by an increase in non-gun crime, what's the point?
Also, I wouldn't focus on the Bird or Nightingale stories, as they're anecdotes and not really relevant in a conversation about effectiveness of legislation (although I'm not surprised to see the news media jumping on an opportunity to promote sensationalism).
Of course, I'd like to just add that we live in possibly the safest times in history. We've never been as safe from violent crime as we are today, and yet there is still this overwhelming concern with safety, with neutralizing some mythical violent threat. I understand that people are still subject to violent crime on a regular basis, and because of that we must not abandon our quest for safety. However, I invite you to consider that we may be chasing the long tail of violence at this point, and the sacrifices we must make in order to do so might at some point be greater than the gains we make. Whether that line is drawn at banning guns or whether it's drawn at banning knives and hammers, I think we can agree that there is a point at which it doesn't really make sense to continue striving for increased safety. In the end, you can't stop every single determined asshole.
Regarding your first link, it's unlcear what the chart is depicting. The vertical axis is labelled "Numbers", with each data series corresponding to a different kind of weapon. Are these numbers of weapons? Numbers of violent crimes committed with these weapons? Numbers of homicides committed with these weapons? The chart, on its own, doesn't make that clear.
The article in the Beeb is fascinating, but the charts it includes refer only to "crime", not violent crime (although the article does state that "personal crime, including thefts from the person and violent crimes, fell by 9%. It also estimated violence had fallen by 13%, taking it to its lowest level for 33 years"). This seems to contradict the claims made in the WSJ article I linked to (which does not cite the Daily Fail).
Indeed, the second link I provided does unfortunately cite the Daily Mail. That was actually the next google hit (after a wikipedia article), which is why I only provided the first two hits. I'm well aware of the Daily Mail's reputation, and made an effort to exclude it from my pool of evidence. It seems to have flew in under my radar regardless, and so I ask you to discount the second link I provided.
In any case, the WSJ article claims about the aftermath of the Firearms Act of 1998: "Within a decade of the handgun ban and the confiscation of handguns from registered owners, crime with handguns had doubled according to British government crime reports. Gun crime, not a serious problem in the past, now is. Armed street gangs have some British police carrying guns for the first time."
Now, you provide some more links to homicide data. That's not the same thing as violent crime. If banning guns results in half as many people dying, but twice as many people being the victims of non-fatal assault, can we really say we have decreased crime? How many stabbings is a prevented shooting worth? Either way, when we're looking at homicide data, we're comparing apples to oranges. It's entirely possible (and likely, according to at least some of the data) that gun bans result in decreased rates of homicide but increased rates of violent crime overall.
In the end, I'm curious as to why there's an apparent discrepancy between the claims made by the WSJ and BBC. It's sad that even with an issue that's so thoroughly documented, it's hard to get a straight answer.
It is defeatist to simply accept the corrupt government we have today.
I will need further work because the people proposing it explicitly state that the finished legislation will be worded differently.
The single issue is getting money out of politics. Simply abolishing corporate personhood (in the context of campaign contributions) would effectively outlaw campaigning, as corporate funds are what pay for the overwhelming majority of political campaigns today. Since the goal is not to get rid of democratic elections, but merely to remove the corporate influence, it is thereby necessary to secure an alternate unbiased source of campaign financing. Public financing meets these requirements. Think, AC. Think.
Instead of being bitter about having to pay your share of taxes, you should be gloating over how much wealth you're withholding from the masses wallowing in poverty. There's always a silver lining, you greedy bastard.
"*Note: The finished legislation will be worded differently and have to account for inflation, etc. This is simply to point the legislators in the right direction and make sure the final amendment accomplishes the goals we have outlined here."
From the URL you linked to. Reading comprehension for the win.
If you actually thought that was the verbatim text of the legislation, you must not read legislation very often. It needs to pass through the legalese encoder several times before it's even sponsored.
Runaway1956 used the premise "Time and again, when cities and states make gun laws stricter, crime increases. And, repeatedly, when gun laws are relaxed, there is a short initial period of increased violence, followed by a decidedly downward trend in crime." which is false. In the UK increased restrictions on gun ownership actually show the opposite pattern.
Citation needed. Google tells me the opposite. First hit, second hit. Of course, these articles focus on gun crime. Even in Australia, the gun bans have decreased gun crime but increased violent crime overall. Do you have any citations that support your claim, or are we all just arguing from emotion?
Actually, I should have phrased my post better. It does technically rescind "personhood", but not corporate charters. The personhood is a relatively minor interpretation at the edges of the issue.
That's where we disagree. WOLF-PAC is not some fringe group trying to abolish the corporation. WOLF-PAC is a single-issue grass-roots effort to undo the damage done by recent SCOTUS rulings. Corporate personhood is the very core of the issue.
Why doesn't Wolf-Pac support freeing the EM spectrum to the states and the people? Why not a large citizen/anything goes band? You would keep the MSM owned by the MIC. You think they care if tax dollars get funnelled to them directly?
Because those issues have nothing to do with elected political office being up for sale to the highest bidder (or very little to do with it, at best). The strength of WOLF-PAC is in focusing on the task at hand and not getting bogged down with everyone else's pet issues. First, elections must be fixed. Then, everything else can be fixed through free and fair elections.
That being said, the quote you post is not the text of the propopsed amendment. I know that because there is no proposed amendment. We're not at that stage yet, with only a single state's legislature voting in favor of a constitutional convention, so far.
You reveal your lunacy by admitting that you have no problem rescinding every last corporate charter. Corporations are essential in an economy as large as the one we have today. You argue for throwing out the baby but keeping the bathwater. The problem today isn't the existence of corporations, it's the unbridled political power they wield. Indeed, I do "DICK" about corporations, and instead focus on limiting the corrupting influence they brandish. Of course, with the extreme disparity in wealth distribution we see today, some individuals control such vast sums of money that their personal wealth is on par with that of massive corporations. These people also wield an inequitable share of political influence in our country, and therefore these campaign contribution limits should rightfully be extended to individuals as well.
In the end, many people agree that elections should not be bought. The solution, in our eyes, is to outlaw the purchase of elections. Not to outlaw corporations, or to return to a gold standard, but simply to outlaw the purchase of elections. That's what WOLF-PAC seeks to accomplish. If you disagree with this notion, and feel that it is in our country's best interest to continue to allow the purchase of elections, that's fine. You're entitled to your beliefs. However, a large segment of society does not share your views, and we're making ourselves heard through WOLF-PAC.
In particulare, because this is a constitutional amendment, the first amendment will be recast in the shadow of the 28th (proposed).
Why the first amendment? Why not the 2nd? or 3rd? or 27th? What makes the first amendment so special here? Is it because the SCOTUS wrongly decided that money equals speech? You believe that a 28th amendment that limits campaign contributions would necessarily allow the government to abridge the freedom of non-monetary speech as well? What is your reasoning there?
Why do you support the "publicly finance" of elections ("publicly finance all elections in our country")???
Because I believe elections that can be bought fundamentally undermine the stated goals of a democratic society.
You propose to take my tax dollars to give to politicians to convince me to vote for them so they can take more of my tax dollars?
Yes.
Why do I need more robocalls that circumvent 'do not call' efforts?
That's a loaded question. I don't know, when are you going to stop beating your wife?
Why do I need more subsidized junk mail?
Ditto.
Why do I need to pay for more commercials to skip? (and is it theft if I paid for that commercial to begin with?)
And again.
There are problems in this country, but a plan to take more tax dollars by force is not something I would support.
Indeed, you're entitled to such a stance. I'm not sure what this has to do with WOLF-PAC, though. If you believe their goal can best be described as "to take more tax dollars by force" then you haven't quite managed to understand them.
Keep in mind their reform will GUT the first amendment. All political speech will get routed through the government. The inch you think you're giving will soon be a mile.
You're entitled to your opinion. Some of us believe the first amendment has already been gutted, along with many of the others, and that it's better to take action now than to regret our apathy later. Also, please explain how rescinding corporate personhood will impact, let alone "GUT", the first amendment.
This is the most US-centric post I've seen under this story.
Believe it or not, many places in the world have gotten money out of politics (to the same extent that MAYDAY PAC wants to). Perhaps this may be surprising to you, but it actually is possible. I can only hope that my other fellow Americans aren't as defeatist as you are.
I support MAYDAY-PAC and WOLF-PAC, because I'm unwilling to bend over and take it. I invite you to clench your asshole and join me in taking a stand against our ass-rapist masters.
Do you have a better idea? (I also support WOLF-PAC)
If you don't already know who Larry Lessig is, you're obviously new here.
I support MAYDAY-PAC and I support WOLF-PAC. If you're tired of elections being bought, you should too.
I've heard of people traveling with a "gun case" as checked luggage to avoid TSA meddling. Something about the gun case being illegal for anyone else to open, as long as you declare it as a gun case, even if there's no actual firearm inside. I've never tried this myself, and I recommend reading up on this before trying it yourself.
The first sentence that pops into my head that starts with 'Dude!' is 'Dude, you're gettin' a Dell!'
:P
:)
I guess the weed comment is still apropos either way
In any case, I'm just trying to convince everyone to be nicer to each other. The internet is so full of assholes, among which I frequently count myself. I sincerely say, can't we all just get along? Or at least maintain some semblance of civility? I'm turning over a new leaf myself, having recently abandoned trolling. I invite you to join me in striving to make the Internet more like Mr. Rogers' neighborhood, one poor bastard at a time.
Or perhaps it's me that needs to lay off the weed.
I wasn't just referring to the last reply. Even in your first reply to Noah, you asked him to "lay off the weed". Overall, I found Noah's tone to range from supportive to apologetic, while yours ranged from dismissive to smug. You catch more flies with honey than vinegar.
Thank you, and my apologies if I came across as a smart-ass. I recently ate a lot of cauliflower (for the first time) and was amazed by how much gas I was producing. Was geniunely curious how this worked, as I'm very ignorant of even the most basic biological systems.
I believe the opposite. The rich can already afford to be idle, so this development doesn't have much potential to improve their lives. It is the working poor who stand to benefit the most from universal automation, as it would allow them to live idle lives as well, if they so desire.