If the government didn't break down monopolies, you'd be paying everything you made for basic survival items from the company store which was your only option.
Airline tickets would be double or triple what they are now.
Monopolies make things more expensive.
There is a barrier to entry around expensive or very old businesses.
Breaking up monopolies is in the government's responsibilities since we had the trust busters.
I get your point if we were talking about a million dollars a year to keep them alive.
But in many cases it's as simple as getting a colonoscopy now if you have money vs in january if you don't (true story - and yes in america).
It may be as simple as $6000 worth of pills a year to stay alive and healthy.
In a country as wealthy as america is, you have to ask how we can let people die.
It's not about suckers- it's about if you are willing to chip in a couple grand a year to make sure everyone in the country does well vs letting 40% of the country die an average of five years sooner. It's really appalling.
I guess if it were 60%- we'd already have decent health care. But talk radio has done a lot of damage. I listened to a guy on the local conservative talk radio.
He was 59-- his unemployment was about to run out- he wouldn't be eligable for social security until he was 62. He was going to lose his house-- his wife was divorcing him.
He couldn't get a job. And being conservative- you know he tried. And he was railing against unemployment. Saying we shouldn't extend it to 99 weeks.
He was literally slitting his own throat- he was so brainwashed.
Sure- for the first delivery but for any maintenance and addon projects the business (which never approves maintenance and refactoring and allows only enough time to add new functionality the kludgiest way possible) bears a lot of responsibility.
Yup. At all the companies I worked for- over the course of 30 years, we could always make changes to accommodate new profitable business quickly.
I think the insurance companies just need a little incentive- you know like fines, or make it easy for patients to submit the out of pocket receipts and not be liable for any more billing until the insurance software could prove the receipts had a problem.
This change has been coming for years. The problem was everyone in business believed Romney would win and turn over these policies. And he didn't. It was obvious from August when he refused to turn over his taxes that he wasn't going to win.
So they need to pay the piper instead of their bloated executive salaries for a little while.
A working rail gun- something that lowered the cost of getting materials into orbit by a factor of a hundred- would be a prerequisite.
Besides that, the station is large and has a huge amount of material. Essentially the cost of building a city. I don't think the rich have that much money yet.
But if Elysium started out earning money in some way, it could be built over time like cities are.
Also, advances in nano-technlogy (implied by the strength of the materials in a station that size anyway), might mean that you just need to provide raw materials and nano-constructors would build most of the ring. The mansions could be "printed" on the spot (already happening now on earth) at low cost.
There was no balance built over many millions of years. Snowball earth already happened twice. There was a severe mini ice age less than a 600 years ago.
The earth's climate fluctuates with or without humans.
Human waste (which is more of an issue with more people) shifts the average fluctuation point warmer.
I read that after I posted. It said the average book made less than $300.
Of course "average" is always a danger. We can't guarantee a profit to books as some (many) (most?) are probably not that good. So you have a lot of zeros in there from books which are essentially vanity efforts.
The cost of an ebook is well over 99% pure profit for someone after the first 10000-20000 sales at $10 a book. (you have sunk costs of editors, proof readers, the writer, person who listed the book and maintained its entry on amazon.)
There was a peak in about 2005, then temperatures fell down until 2001 when they had a similar temperature high (not a new high).
The five year mean temperature increased about.2 degrees between 2000 and 2005ish and then had held steady for a while.
I dislike many of these graphs because they are scaled to make the increase look very dramatic. Convincing people of the reality of global warming is as much political as scientific so I suppose such tricks are necessary.
Anti global warming folks do the reverse and set the scale such that the fluctuation looks meaningless.
Ice remains at freezing a long time but eventually it does melt.
Fundamental problem is TOO MANY PEOPLE.
And we are not going to address that so the rest is just pointless.
There are risks of talking on the phone. * If you get bad news ("I'm leaving you") * If you get really good news ("The project has been approved! You're going to be rich")
I think a lot of people can drive fairly safely while having trivial conversation on the phone while driving.
OTH, I do know from experience that one lady talking on her cell phone pulled out of a side street in front of me and STOPPED as I was about to T-Bone her. She was still holding her cell phone - didn't even drop it- but was completely unaware of me on the main road and then panicked as i hit the brakes.
The out of work guy was in relation to consumption of propaganda. I listen to a wide variety of news- conservative, liberal, wackjob left and right.
Talk radio seems unique in that many of the listeners are very poor and are very strongly against anything that would help them because they "might be rich someday" like the talk radio host.
In this case, since "unemployment is bad and only losers and layabouts use unemployment", the listener (who'd been unemployed for about a year) was about to lose his benefits, and with that everything else. He was solidly against any kind of government aid- even tho a small amount of aid might have made a huge difference in his life (he was 59 and not likely to work again until he got social security). I guess he just planned on starving to death homeless or on "getting rich someday" like the host.
--- On the libertarian point, I was hitting the elephant in the room on the nose. Libertarian will not work without a strong government by people indoctrinated in libertarian values in a quasi religious fashion.
I was a libertarian (mostly a result of reading Heinlein where war veterans formed the quasi religious basis of a noble libertarian government) and I grew out of it and came to realize libertarian government is basically a fantasy that is impossible in the real world.
In her case, the spiders were doing nothing to control the bed bugs. She'd been bitten at least 30 times before I found the pads online. I got the expensive "bed bug" kind but then we found they sell stacks of 100 to farmers for about the same price as 20. Same product.
They killed the bed bugs the first night. 100% effective. Only problem is mess (glue getting in carpet like chewing gum).
And you can play it on your TV easily with a ROKU box.
I'm seriously thinking of going to the local computer club's internet for $45 a month and cutting the cord (tho in my case it's Comcast and not time warner).
We got some inexpensive disposable containers, filled them with talcum powder, and put the legs of their bed in it. That stopped the bites right away (apparently they were elsewhere in the room and traveling to her bed. But, it didn't trap them. Apparently they couldn't climb up the plastic.
Next,we get the 6"x8" sticky pads and put them under each bed leg. It was a bit of a mess (stuck to the bed) but it trapped the bedbugs the first night and THEN proceeded to catch hundreds of other bugs over the course of 6 months (spiders mostly).
They are much cheaper in bulk and when not sold as bed bug pads.
After I searched for the, I got bed bug ads on lots of sites for about a month (I guess google was serving their ads. But it was creepy to get bed bug ads on a gaming site).
They do a lot of training but I don't think they hire 9% of their workforce every day.
I've worked with them and could believe the training. They do a lot of training and certification and it's higher priority than normal work to the employees. They would leave in the middle of just about anything to go do their scheduled training and testing.
The job required A certain degree. 2 years of X 3 years of Y and Certifications A,B,C.
She had all o these.
Apparently (and this is up to prove in court), Infosys then signed legal documents saying, "We tried but were unable to find anyone who met the requirements so we must bring in someone from overseas" in order to get the H1B visa.
Something they and many other companies had done before many times and gotten away with even tho they were breaking the law when they did it.
If this part of the law starts being enforced, it's going to have a lot of consequences.
GIven the rate of inflation overseas and the declining pool of qualified people there, I think it may not matter much either way in 3-8 more years.
I saw this too. In 2003, it was masters degree candidates working in bachelors degree jobs and doing extremely well.
In 2012, it was people who were being trained at our expense and eager to leave and go elsewhere once they had the skill set. In the end, everyone (well, 90%) was laid off.
Slashdot Mirror
If the government didn't break down monopolies, you'd be paying everything you made for basic survival items from the company store which was your only option.
Airline tickets would be double or triple what they are now.
Monopolies make things more expensive.
There is a barrier to entry around expensive or very old businesses.
Breaking up monopolies is in the government's responsibilities since we had the trust busters.
I get your point if we were talking about a million dollars a year to keep them alive.
But in many cases it's as simple as getting a colonoscopy now if you have money vs in january if you don't (true story - and yes in america).
It may be as simple as $6000 worth of pills a year to stay alive and healthy.
In a country as wealthy as america is, you have to ask how we can let people die.
It's not about suckers- it's about if you are willing to chip in a couple grand a year to make sure everyone in the country does well vs letting 40% of the country die an average of five years sooner. It's really appalling.
I guess if it were 60%- we'd already have decent health care. But talk radio has done a lot of damage. I listened to a guy on the local conservative talk radio.
He was 59-- his unemployment was about to run out- he wouldn't be eligable for social security until he was 62. He was going to lose his house-- his wife was divorcing him.
He couldn't get a job. And being conservative- you know he tried. And he was railing against unemployment. Saying we shouldn't extend it to 99 weeks.
He was literally slitting his own throat- he was so brainwashed.
This on the fines.
I disagree on coders.
Sure- for the first delivery but for any maintenance and addon projects the business (which never approves maintenance and refactoring and allows only enough time to add new functionality the kludgiest way possible) bears a lot of responsibility.
Yup. At all the companies I worked for- over the course of 30 years, we could always make changes to accommodate new profitable business quickly.
I think the insurance companies just need a little incentive- you know like fines, or make it easy for patients to submit the out of pocket receipts and not be liable for any more billing until the insurance software could prove the receipts had a problem.
This change has been coming for years. The problem was everyone in business believed Romney would win and turn over these policies. And he didn't. It was obvious from August when he refused to turn over his taxes that he wasn't going to win.
So they need to pay the piper instead of their bloated executive salaries for a little while.
The wifi router. It's the built in antennas that go bad.
Started with a strong signal and degraded. Read an article about it. Replaced it-- fixed the problem. Few years later-- same thing, same solution.
http://ask.slashdot.org/story/12/10/21/1335208/ask-slashdot-why-does-wireless-gear-degrade-over-time
A working rail gun- something that lowered the cost of getting materials into orbit by a factor of a hundred- would be a prerequisite.
Besides that, the station is large and has a huge amount of material. Essentially the cost of building a city. I don't think the rich have that much money yet.
But if Elysium started out earning money in some way, it could be built over time like cities are.
Also, advances in nano-technlogy (implied by the strength of the materials in a station that size anyway), might mean that you just need to provide raw materials and nano-constructors would build most of the ring. The mansions could be "printed" on the spot (already happening now on earth) at low cost.
I recall an article here that wifi antennaes degrade within a few years.
I've had to replace wifi antennae after three or four years because they longer had a strong enough signal across the house.
There was no balance built over many millions of years. Snowball earth already happened twice. There was a severe mini ice age less than a 600 years ago.
The earth's climate fluctuates with or without humans.
Human waste (which is more of an issue with more people) shifts the average fluctuation point warmer.
I read that after I posted. It said the average book made less than $300.
Of course "average" is always a danger. We can't guarantee a profit to books as some (many) (most?) are probably not that good. So you have a lot of zeros in there from books which are essentially vanity efforts.
The cost of an ebook is well over 99% pure profit for someone after the first 10000-20000 sales at $10 a book. (you have sunk costs of editors, proof readers, the writer, person who listed the book and maintained its entry on amazon.)
Not fifteen years. About 8 years (since 2006).
http://climate.nasa.gov/images/616910main_gisstemp_2011_graph_lrg.jpg
There was a peak in about 2005, then temperatures fell down until 2001 when they had a similar temperature high (not a new high).
The five year mean temperature increased about .2 degrees between 2000 and 2005ish and then had held steady for a while.
I dislike many of these graphs because they are scaled to make the increase look very dramatic. Convincing people of the reality of global warming is as much political as scientific so I suppose such tricks are necessary.
Anti global warming folks do the reverse and set the scale such that the fluctuation looks meaningless.
Ice remains at freezing a long time but eventually it does melt.
Fundamental problem is TOO MANY PEOPLE.
And we are not going to address that so the rest is just pointless.
You forgot...
Putting on makeup.
Eating food.
Shaving.
Car Sex.
---
There are risks of talking on the phone.
* If you get bad news ("I'm leaving you")
* If you get really good news ("The project has been approved! You're going to be rich")
I think a lot of people can drive fairly safely while having trivial conversation on the phone while driving.
OTH, I do know from experience that one lady talking on her cell phone pulled out of a side street in front of me and STOPPED as I was about to T-Bone her. She was still holding her cell phone - didn't even drop it- but was completely unaware of me on the main road and then panicked as i hit the brakes.
Wow-- looked like 4 "video camera" sized batteries hanging down from the robot.
It seemed very slow and tentative- I bet in a few years it will be as fast as a human.
Wonder if it could have some some kind of hovercraft effect to save battery life once it got inside.
The out of work guy was in relation to consumption of propaganda. I listen to a wide variety of news- conservative, liberal, wackjob left and right.
Talk radio seems unique in that many of the listeners are very poor and are very strongly against anything that would help them because they "might be rich someday" like the talk radio host.
In this case, since "unemployment is bad and only losers and layabouts use unemployment", the listener (who'd been unemployed for about a year) was about to lose his benefits, and with that everything else. He was solidly against any kind of government aid- even tho a small amount of aid might have made a huge difference in his life (he was 59 and not likely to work again until he got social security). I guess he just planned on starving to death homeless or on "getting rich someday" like the host.
---
On the libertarian point, I was hitting the elephant in the room on the nose.
Libertarian will not work without a strong government by people indoctrinated in libertarian values in a quasi religious fashion.
I was a libertarian (mostly a result of reading Heinlein where war veterans formed the quasi religious basis of a noble libertarian government) and I grew out of it and came to realize libertarian government is basically a fantasy that is impossible in the real world.
In her case, the spiders were doing nothing to control the bed bugs. She'd been bitten at least 30 times before I found the pads online. I got the expensive "bed bug" kind but then we found they sell stacks of 100 to farmers for about the same price as 20. Same product.
They killed the bed bugs the first night. 100% effective. Only problem is mess (glue getting in carpet like chewing gum).
One of the other posters said that bedbug sex is very painful and the females are hiding from the males after they have sex the first time.
And you can play it on your TV easily with a ROKU box.
I'm seriously thinking of going to the local computer club's internet for $45 a month and cutting the cord (tho in my case it's Comcast and not time warner).
Their service is okay- but it's up to $96 now.
That's $600 a year-- $6000 per decade.
Barter networks are kinda halfway between.
I do something for you and get credit in the system.
I use those credit to get something from a person besides you.
Leaders are needed but above manager, I think they are over compensated these days.
By almost 100%.
Hopefully when the employment situation tightens up in 2016 on wards, the shoe will shift to the employees.
Exactly- and very tiny areas like under the rail that supports the nightstand drawer.
I don't understand why they leave the bed and come back.
That speaks to selective pressures.
The 6"x8" sticky pads solved my friend bedbug problem and was inexpensive.
But, you need to keep all parts of the bed from touching the ground and the walls except the parts on the pad.
As a bonus it catches many other insects as well (lots of spiders).
We got some inexpensive disposable containers, filled them with talcum powder, and put the legs of their bed in it. That stopped the bites right away (apparently they were elsewhere in the room and traveling to her bed. But, it didn't trap them. Apparently they couldn't climb up the plastic.
Next ,we get the 6"x8" sticky pads and put them under each bed leg. It was a bit of a mess (stuck to the bed) but it trapped the bedbugs the first night and THEN proceeded to catch hundreds of other bugs over the course of 6 months (spiders mostly).
They are much cheaper in bulk and when not sold as bed bug pads.
After I searched for the, I got bed bug ads on lots of sites for about a month (I guess google was serving their ads. But it was creepy to get bed bug ads on a gaming site).
They do a lot of training but I don't think they hire 9% of their workforce every day.
I've worked with them and could believe the training. They do a lot of training and certification and it's higher priority than normal work to the employees. They would leave in the middle of just about anything to go do their scheduled training and testing.
She didn't have to be "more" qualified.
The job required
A certain degree.
2 years of X
3 years of Y
and Certifications A,B,C.
She had all o these.
Apparently (and this is up to prove in court), Infosys then signed legal documents saying, "We tried but were unable to find anyone who met the requirements so we must bring in someone from overseas" in order to get the H1B visa.
Something they and many other companies had done before many times and gotten away with even tho they were breaking the law when they did it.
If this part of the law starts being enforced, it's going to have a lot of consequences.
GIven the rate of inflation overseas and the declining pool of qualified people there, I think it may not matter much either way in 3-8 more years.
I saw this too. In 2003, it was masters degree candidates working in bachelors degree jobs and doing extremely well.
In 2012, it was people who were being trained at our expense and eager to leave and go elsewhere once they had the skill set. In the end, everyone (well, 90%) was laid off.
Be interesting to see how things turn out.