#they need to be paid their state's average income

[justinspoliticalcorner]

WaPo: How car bans and heat pump rules drive voters to the far right

Shannon Osaka at WaPo:

More than a decade ago, the Netherlands embarked on a straightforward plan to cut carbon emissions. Its legislature raised taxes on natural gas, using the money earned to help Dutch households install solar panels. By most measures, the program worked: By 2022, 20 percent of homes in the Netherlands had solar panels, up from about 2 percent in 2013. Natural gas prices, meanwhile, rose by almost 50 percent. But something else happened, according to a new study. The Dutch families who were most vulnerable to the increase in gas prices — renters who paid their own utility bills — drifted to the right. Families facing increased home energy costs became 5 to 6 percent more likely to vote for one of the Netherlands’ far-right parties. A similar backlash is happening all over Europe, as far-right parties position themselves in opposition to green policies. In Germany, a law that would have required homeowners to install heat pumps galvanized the far-right Alternative for Germany party, or AfD, giving it a boost. Farmers have rolled tractors into Paris to protest E.U. agricultural rules, and drivers in Italy and Britain have protested attempts to ban gas-guzzling cars from city centers.

That resurgence of the right could slow down the green transition in Europe, which has been less polarized on global warming, and serves as a warning to the United States, where policies around electric vehicles and gas stoves have already sparked a backlash. The shift also shows how, as climate policies increasingly touch citizens’ lives, even countries whose voters are staunchly supportive of clean energy may hit roadblocks. “This has really expanded the coalition of the far right,” said Erik Voeten, a professor of geopolitics at Georgetown University and the author of the new study on the Netherlands.

Other studies have found similar results. In one study in Milan, researchers at Bocconi University studied the voting patterns of drivers whose cars were banned from the city center for being too polluting. These drivers, who on average lost the equivalent of $4,000 because of the ban, were significantly more likely to vote for the right-wing Lega party in subsequent elections. In Sweden, researchers found that low-income families facing high electricity prices were also more likely to turn toward the far right. Far-right parties in Europe have started to position themselves against climate action, expanding their platforms from anti-immigration and anti-globalization. A decade ago, the Dutch right-wing Party for Freedom emphasized that it wasn’t against renewable energy — just increasing energy prices. But by 2021, the party’s manifesto had moved to more extreme language. “Energy is a basic need, but climate madness has turned it into a very expensive luxury item,” the manifesto said. “The far right has increasingly started to campaign on opposition to environmental policies and climate change,” Voeten said.

The pushback also reflects, in part, how much Europe has decarbonized. More than 60 percent of the continent’s electricity already comes from renewable sources or nuclear power; so meeting the European Union’s climate goals means tacklingother sectors — transportation, buildings, agriculture.

[...] Some of these voting patterns have also played out in the United States. According to a study by the Princeton political scientist Alexander Gazmararian, historically-Democratic coal communities that lost jobs in the shift to natural gas increased their support for Republican candidates by 5 percent. The shift was larger in areas located farther from new gas power plants — that is, areas where voters couldn’t see that it was natural gas, not environmental regulations, that undercut coal.

Gazmararian says that while climate denial and fossil fuel misinformation have definitely played a role, many voters are motivated simply by their own financial pressures. “They’re in an economic circumstance where they don’t have many options,” he said. The solution, experts say, is todesign policies that avoid putting too much financial burden on individual consumers. In Germany, where the law to install heat pumps would have cost homeowners $7,500 to $8,500 more than installing gas boilers, policymakers quickly retreated. But by that point, far-right party membership had already surged.

The Washington Post explains what may be at least partially causing the rise of far-right extremist parties in Europe, Conservatives in Canada, and the Republicans in some parts of the US: rising energy costs that low-income people are bearing the brunt of.

In the US, right-wing hysteria about gas stove bans and electric vehicles are also playing a role.

[so-much-for-subtlety]

The thing that gets me so worked up about universal healthcare is how people say that it will be so expensive for the tax payer.

This is long rant warning so I added a break lol.

The TLDR is that even in a low tax state like Florida, someone making 50k a year will have an effective rate of of 32% (for taxes, healthcare, costs for an undergraduate degree).

Someone making 50k a year in a 'high tax' country like New Zealand has an effective rate of 21% (for taxes, healthcare, costs for an undergraduate degree).

For an American and a Kiwi with the same salary of $50k, if they have the same disposable income, the Kiwi will be able to save an extra $75,000 over 10 years that they can use for a downpayment on a home to further build wealth.

Low tax states just have the costs shuffled to other places, you end up paying a LOT more for the same services.

Here's a comparison of someone who makes $50,000 a year in New Zealand and Florida (I chose Florida as an extreme example because they have 0% state tax rate) and each person makes $15,000 worth of purchases that are taxable.

New Zealand

$7,658 in combined income taxes and levies

$2,250 in taxes on $15k of purchases (15% sales tax)

Total of $9,908 - an effective total rate of 19.8% paid to taxes and purchases and healthcare

Florida

$7,945 in combined taxes (federal taxes, social security, medicaid etc)

$1,050 in taxes on $15k of purchases (7% sales tax)

$1,700 average annual health insurance premium for Florida

$2,060 average annual health insurance deductible for Florida

Total of $12,755 - an effective total rate of 25.5% paid to taxes and purchases and healthcare

Even in a low tax state, you're already have less take-home income than someone with the same salary in New Zealand.

But

... in New Zealand with your taxes you're also getting public education. It's not completely free, but costs are fixed, and you get one year of your undergraduate free, so for example a Bachelor of Arts would cost a total of $13,548 (USD $8,347)

If you can't pay that upfront, you can get a 0% loan from the government, which you don't need to start paying off until you earn at least $23k per year. For someone making $50k that would be an extra 6.5% deducted from your income ($270/month) until the loan is paid off (which would be 2 years and 8 months).

In Florida the average student loan debt is 25k and if you're making the same payments as someone in NZ ($270/month) then you'll be paying that off for 11 years. [Note: I believe that some private loan interest rates go as high as 15%].

Bachelor of Arts in NZ $13,548, paid off over ~2.7 years.

Bachelor of Arts in Florida $35,539, paid off over ~11 years.

So lets look at effective payments over 11 years (for simplicity salary stays at 50k).

New Zealand works out to be 21% effective rate over 11 years (including taxes, healthcare, and undergraduate degree).

Florida works out to be 32% effective rate over 11 years (including taxes, healthcare, and an undergraduate degree) - you're paying 52% more!

That means someone with the same income will effectively be able to save an additional $5,000 per year over 11 years, if they invest that extra amount and get a 5% return, the New Zealander will have savings of about $75k which they can use for downpayment for a home etc.

In conclusion, even though it may seem like you're getting a good deal in a low tax state like Florida, you end up paying soooo much more in healthcare and education costs compared to a country where taxes are a little higher, but you get public healthcare and education.

Why is the U.S. so expensive? Well once place to look is defense, intelligence, and police. In the United States this costs on average $3,700 per person. New Zealand spends $1,600 per person (USD ~1,000).

[lesbianashleywilliams]

So those of you who have been following me may have noticed that I all but disappeared for about three months...well, that's because I've been planning to go to Japanese language school, and the wheels have really begun to start turning!!!!!!

I have been given the opportunity of my lifetime to be able to attend a Japanese language course at the International Study Institute in Tokyo's Shinjuku Ward. The course runs for a year, with the opportunity to extend it to two years, if my grades and money are sound [insert sound of children cheering here].

Being able to study Japanese locally and long-term has been a life goal of mine since I was fourteen. Though I'll probably never be able to fulfill my teenage dream of being an interpreter/translator for expats, this feels like the next best thing. Due to suffering from several comorbid chronic conditions that have majorly altered my life, most notably the beast known as systemic lupus erythematosus, I will probably never be able to seize another chance like this ever again. I won't be going in as a total novice, as I was able to take a year's worth of 1000-level Japanese language courses in college…before I had to drop out…… Since then I've been self-studying and using language exchange apps for practice, but nothing will beat the experience of using it in the day-to-day.

At this point in time (January 2024), my first six months of tuition have already been paid for. I am currently in a quiet waiting period while I wait to get to the next steps of the Certificate of Eligibility/Student Visa process. Before that, though, I need to secure my flight and housing. For the sake of my health, safety, privacy and comfort, a sharehouse will not be an option; I will have to seek a private apartment. I am here today to request assistance with the aforementioned flight and initial housing costs. It's still too early to commit to either of those, but:

The average cost of flexible one-way flights from where I am to either of the two Tokyo metro airports (Haneda and Narita) is running around $1200

I am doing some preliminary apartment scouting and am hoping not to exceed $800 per month (I will be traveling with suitcases and will need to properly store them). The apartments I am looking at do not require a security deposit or key money, but will probably come with a guarantor fee.

Now because I'm not going over there through one of the more common avenues - through a university or a job - I have to do it myself. Real life has meant that I've had to dig into my bank balance a bit, and after paying for the first six months I'm a little under the 2 million yen (~$14k) threshold that Immigration likes to see for a year's study. I'm lucky enough in that I will at least have a regular source of (unearned) income, as well as a financial sponsor; it's just the bank balance, flight, and accommodation that are hanging me up. Right now I am setting the initial goal at $3000, but I expect to move those goalposts at least once. Any extra will go towards a flight home for the Christmas holidays in December. After that, it'll go towards paying down my credit cards as much as I can prior to leaving the United States.

I can provide my conditional letter of acceptance from ISI, as well as the school invoice and receipt of the bank transfer for the first six months of tuition upon request (identifying information redacted, of course).

Because there's still a couple of months until I'm set to fly out I put together a GoFundMe (now that's a name I haven't used in a while) to idly collect whatever help I can. At the very least I just need this post to circulate enough to eventually cast a wider net outside of Tungle.hell.

GoFundMe

If you can't use GFM, V3nmo and P4ypal are also options:

V3nmo: @/venus3palette

P4ypal: @/fantasytheater

Again: I'm not in that much of a hurry, and the situation isn't dire! Thank you for combing my wall of text!!!!

[lynnuvo]

₊✩‧₊˚Your Biggest Fan! ˚₊✩‧₊

Characters: Streamer (Y/N) x Yandere!Fan Potential to become a series. If you're interested, stay tuned and stay wary ♡ .ᐟ

You are the literal embodiment of a college student: stressed yet laidback at random times, too tired to put a lot of effort to dress up unless it counted, and--most relevant of all--broke. And in this instance, you are disastrously broke.

After the most heated argument with your parents you ever had in your life, they sent a text message when you got home stating that they would no longer be providing financial support unless there is an dire emergency. To say you were panicked would be an understatement. Your parents typically refused to not send you money when you told them you didn't need it (you did). As much as the family bickered and made up as fast as temperatures change, they always threw money your way. The argument was spontaneous and could not have come at a worse time. Before it happened, you shared with them that you had just gotten fired from your part-time job.

You flop on your bed and pull out your phone to doomscroll the afternoon away. Classes have taken the energy out of you. You could job search, but you decide you deserve a break.

After an hour, you come across a video of a big streamer talking about their income with their chat. Your interest piques at the revealed amount of money they receive from streaming alone and from sponsorships. Getting paid to do whatever you want? It sounded like a dream.

It starts as a simple thought, but it wakes up with you the next morning and trails with you to class. More videos of streamers pop up while you try and dine to entertainment. You distract yourself at night with games, but you wake up still thinking of it.

After two weeks of overthinking about expenses, you decide to give in to the temptation. You were lucky your dorm was already paid for, but groceries are becoming harder to obtain already.

You make an account on CommLines one night and decorate your profile--fonts and all. You didn't expect for research to come into play, but you need as much engagement as possible.

The next night, you prepare to do your first stream. You're going to need to get the hang of things and a fanbase before you're eligible for payment.

The first five streams go as expected: the only viewer you receive during one of your gameplays leaves after 10 minutes without saying anything. You end your last stream with a sigh. Admittedly, it's a bit awkward talking to yourself, but you needed to add some clips to another social media account you made.

After talking about your family predicament with a friend in class, they offer you a job at their family's restaurant. It's only for one day a week since their parents are skeptical about their child's friends all the time, but you take it anyway. Any income is better than no income. Thankfully, the restaurant colleagues treat you better than your last job. You actually find yourself enjoying the place (save for the lunch rush, of course).

You're no longer as desperate for money, so the next time you stream, you let yourself loose. You're getting bored of the popular FPS you've been streaming, so you try out a niche RPG you saw another streamer play. It's quite fun thinking of yourself as a YooTube creator now! You're not worried about your reactions and the best way to play as much anymore. From then on, you stream when you have free time and feel like it.

Over the span of four months, your platform grows at a tremendous rate due to someone making one of your clips grow viral (though they title the video embarrassingly: "Top 5 Screams from New Players of Scary Scary Town: Horror RPG!!"). Your numbers aren't quite there to get monetized yet, but you average 100+ viewers per stream now. Your heart beats with passion when you start one after finals.

"Hey everyone! Nice to see you all again! Mwah!" you greet, throwing a silly little kiss at the camera. "I'm having a great day today. First one to guess is getting pinned why is getting pinned. Even if no one guesses, I'll tell you anyway~!"

Messages flood the chat.

You grin as you finally spot an answer. "I see someone! Mr.OWO--I can't believe I just said that--you got it so fast. I'm guessing you might also have classes. Lemme figure out--sorry, this is my first time pinning someone, but I know it's possible....there! That's it; I passed all of my finals!"

Praises and cute emojis pile up. You thank your followers and open a video. "As the title suggests, I'm not gaming this time. I'm doing a bit of hobby-exploring. See here, a friend gifted me this wooden box to store some stuff. I want to paint it, but I'm not the best at coming up with ideas. I was hoping you guys might be able to help me."

And so, you begin. You answer questions from chat while taking suggestions as you paint. Your hands get messy, your job isn't perfect, but you're having a great time. There ends up being no theme, but you love the doodles regardless.

Another suggestion rolls in. You read, "'I think you should paint a fox with a bowtie. By the way, I'm surprised you got this far.' That's a cute one, though I'm not sure how to take that last sentence....SheepyWolf23."

Huh. That name looks familiar.

SheepyWolf23: i was your only viewer in one of your streams a few months ago. you were playing GotchaHand2.

You gasp. "Oh my gosh! It's you! How did you find me again?!"

SheepyWolf23: i just saw you on my FYP streaming page but with much more subs. just wanted to check in but ended up staying and subbing XD SheepyWolf23: cant wait to join more

A laugh escapes your lips as heat rushes to your face. "Thank you so much for coming back! Everyone, SheepyWolf23 is my first viewer of all time. Crazy how things change, huh?"

You continue the stream as normal, though your inner feelings are otherwise. By midnight, your box is finally complete. It certainly has personality that you thank the chat for gifting. With a wave, you end the stream and wipe your eyes with your wrist. It's late and you need to clean up before bed.

The next morning, you wake to get ready for school. All is typical until you skim your phone while packing lunch. You nearly drop your tupperware.

A notification from a direct message on CommLines reads:

SheepyWolf23: hey! hope i'm not disturbing. i see you haven't set up donations yet. how do you feel abt donos?

Your heart beats in your chest. This is your first private message from a subscriber. The alarm on your phone blares, making you flinch. You hurriedly prepare to leave the dorm to get to class on time. The sun shines bright and the breeze tickles your legs on the way to campus--a good sign, you hope. You're a bit early, so you slip into a seat quietly and take out your note-taking necessities. No one in real life knows you stream yet; you're shy at the thought. Despite having already shown your face to the internet, you wish no one in real life approaches you about your online activities. Therefore, you hold off on opening the app until after classes.

When that time came, you drive home as quick as possible and throw yourself on the bed. You take a deep breath before replying.

Streamer(Y/N): hi! no, you're not, don't worry! to be honest, i'm not sure how to receive them and whether im at the right level to

Ping!

Wow. They're fast. Then again, it is the time when both workers and students of all grades start leaving their buildings.

SheepyWolf23: wdym level? Streamer(Y/N): im not sure how to describe it. i guess what i mean is that i'm not "big" enough? tho i dont really emphasize getting big as much as it is to have fun! SheepyWolf23: ohhh. don't worry about that! you have to be a certain "level" to be monetized, but donations can come at any time! i can help you Streamer(Y/N): really? that would be nice if it's no trouble! Streamer(Y/N): you're not gonna hack me, are you? SheepyWolf23: of course not XD promise

The user messages you instructions and suggestions for resources that can be useful. You spend the next hour examining them and finally choose one. They guide you, from making the app account to linking it to your streaming account. As part of the promise, they do not ask for your personal identifiers of any kind--not even once. The only thing he does have is the username, which is the same as your username for streaming.

Streamer(Y/N): i think it's done! SheepyWolf23: yup, that should be all. let me try something just to be sure.

You don't have time to wonder what it could be before a ping! resounds from your phone. On it is a notification from the money transfer app stating that you received $50 from SheepyWolf23. You gape and frantically fly your fingers across the keyboard.

Streamer(Y/N): you didn't have to donate! i'm grateful for your help and that's enough for me, i promise SheepyWolf23: haha don't worry about it. please don't send the money back. it's part of my fun money. and n e way, you deserve it for the sudden growth! i get to be your first viewer and your first donator XD Streamer(Y/N): omg you're right. thank you so much!! i srsly mean it SheepyWolf23: ur welcome! im going out with friends tonight, so i should get ready now. see you next stream ᵔᴥᵔ Streamer(Y/N): oh okay okay, have a good night! thank you again!

SheepyWolf23 doesn't answer back, concluding the conversation. Your grin could break your face. It's been forever since you felt you were on the right track of something. Maybe this was the start of your path to be part of the Top 10 Streamers online.

Oh, who were you kidding? You weren't going to get that far yet, but you're going to enjoy trying to your fullest.

Your next couple streams are all successes. A few people went out of their way to clip parts of the recording themselves to post on Yootube, which both enlightened and terrified you. You were going to have to be more careful about what you say, but to be honest, you haven't run into any problems with that so far. Still, it's a little scary to think that strangers anywhere in the world are viewing you. That's a cost of your streaming content you were willing to take.

You're in quite a chipper mood in class one day when you feel a tap on the shoulder. Turning around, you find your friend, Sherry, behind you with a smile. She gestures for you to hurry up and pack your things so you both can leave for lunch together. You do so. It wasn't a normal occurrence to eat out with friends during the weekdays, so today was extra special!

You two hop into Sherry's car and head to her restaurant--the one you work at. You'd guess most wouldn't want to dine at their workplace, but Sherry's employees make mean meals. You're both quickly escorted to a booth and delivered food; Sherry, with the power of the daughter of an establishment, receives only the best service.

"Thank you again, girl," you cheer as you feast immediately. "I'm so glad things are doing well here, from what your dad said last shift, anyway."

Sherry chuckles. "Yeah, you know you're doing great in the food service when the rushes are torture. I'm so sorry. You're on your feet much more than I am."

"Oh, don't worry about it! I'm grateful for the job, and you have to deal with the nasty customers at the register. I hate hearing old ladies yell at you. I just want to punch them!"

"Please don't!" Sherry chides half-heartedly, pointing her straw at you. She suddenly whispers, "Anyway, I heard my mom and dad talking about raises last night. You're for sure getting one. It's not by a lot, but I figure you need it."

Your eyes brighten, and you jump forward to hold her hand. "Really?! Oh my gawd, thank you, Sherry! I love you so much! I could kiss you!"

Sherry laughs aloud as you mimic kissing her. You catch an elderly couple side-eyeing, but you don't care. You finally sit back down and release a light sigh. "I feel like I've been dreaming lately. Things are going so well, and I actually feel alive!"

"That sounds good! How come?"

"Well, first of all, this job. Then, uh--" You flicker your eyes to the wall and hide your smile a bit. "--my hobbies have been making me real happy. Like painting and playing games, you know? I also started clay-making. It's harder than I thought, but I think I'll get the hang of it sometime."

Much to your surprise, Sherry's smile falls. Her mouth opens and closes hesitantly before she finally says, "(Y/N), can you be honest with me?"

"Huh? Yeah, of course. I've always been."

"Are you....streaming?"

Your heart drops. Your mind shouts at you to laugh it off, but your voice is caught in your throat. Was it really necessary to lie to someone who's helped you this much?

You don't need to make the decision. Sherry rests her elbows on the table and offers a tiny smile. "You do, don't you."

"Yeah...I do. How did you know?"

"I saw one of your clips on YooTube. I chalked it up to similarity at first, but I searched a couple more videos and couldn't deny it was you." She chuckled. "Thank goodness I was right. It would have been embarrassing if I was wrong."

"Please don't tell anyone, Sherry."

"I won't. I haven't. I'm glad you're doing something that makes you happy, but...just be careful, okay?"

"I am, don't worry!"

"I mean it, (Y/N)." She fiddles with her fork and drops her gaze to her plate. "I know it might not be my place to say, but I saw some....things people said. They're mostly good things, though! It's just...in the comments of a video, I saw someone talking about your shirt...hanging a bit--um--down, you know?"

"Oh my gosh. I wasn't exposing myself too much, was I?"

"No no. I was just a bit of cleavage, but the person was making it a bigger deal than it was." She rolled her eyes. "Some guys act like they've never seen a woman."

You take a bit of your food with furrowed brows. "I can't believe it. Thank you. I'll be more careful. I was having fun--I didn't realize. Oh. How much of my streams do you watch, if you don't mind me asking?"

She waves her hand. "I don't pay much attention to videogames, even less streams. The only streamer I know except you is the big one with red hair. Don't worry about whether I'm watching! No offense, but I'd rather go thrifting and make vlogs for my TappyGram!"

"Oh right. I saw the new video you posted. The pink top with bows was so cute! Who was that girl shopping with you?"

"My cousin! We both like pastels, so we went to the mall together to find some. Let me show you the stuff I didn't post!"

Sherry pulls out her phone, and the day continues. After lunch, she drops you off and bids you farewell before heading home. You head to your car yourself, grateful your professor cancelled class. When you get to your dorm room, you shower, change, and search the comments of every YooTube video of you you could find. It's probably best not to look for the comments Sherry told you about, but you're curious--too curious for your own good.

You finally find it.

RedCarsAre_Sexy: aw man, almost saw her tits ⤷ 608x: wtf? ⤷ TwinkleMonster: people like you are why police exist

Your stomach twists. It's okay. It's the internet, after all. There's bound to be people with thoughts that are better kept in their dirty minds. Should you address these thoughts with your subscribers? It'll definitely tell them you absolutely do not want this kind of behavior, but what if it draws the wrong attention instead? What if it somehow becomes controversial?

Discouraged, you opt to focus on your studies and friends. They do a great job of distracting you from the matter, so much so that three weeks passed since your last stream.

You're eating alone at a fast food joint while watching videos when a notification from CommLines pops up.

SheepyWolf23: hey! everything okay? just checking since u normally stream at least once within two weeks

"I do?" you mumbled with a fry in your mouth. You two haven't conversed since they helped you with setting up donation, so it was a bit of a relief to hear from them again. A little touching that they're concerned enough to inquire about it too. You open the app and message back.

Streamer(Y/N): hi again! im doing okay, no worries! i didnt realize that much time has passed since my last stream. i've been so focused on irl stuff i never really planned a time when i'd come back SheepyWolf23: oh that makes sense. sorry if this made you uncomfortable Streamer(Y/N): no no, pls dont be sorry. i should have put something in my bio saying im taking a rest SheepyWolf23: true but i dont think a lot of ppl would go to your CommLines bio for that. how abt making a server instead? like on DisKord? it would be easier to make announcements and talk to fans. Streamer(Y/N): huh, maybe i should. i'll make one when i finish eating SheepyWolf23: yay! can i be your first member? yknow, to match the first streak XD Streamer(Y/N): LOL sure!

SheepyWolf23 doesn't respond. You read your message again. Did it sound mean? It is kind of dry. You shake your head. People exist outside of you. Perhaps they became busy.

You finish your meal and return to your dorm. Your eyes skim the bedroom. Although you had decorated it to become somewhere cozy, the room unexpectedly feels solemn. You grab your laptop and sit at your desk to begin making the server. Eyes flicker to your phone. You tap it once or twice, but the screen is blank save for your background and the time.

Once the server is finished, you immediately message SheepyWolf23 about it. You go about random activities until a ping! sounds from across the room an hour later. You sprint over and unlock your phone as fast as lightning.

SheepyWolf23: thanks for the invite! um. i know this might be much to add, but would you be comfortable with giving me permissions so i can decorate the server, no offense! it's great, you have the right channels, but i have some experience and think i can make improvements you might like. just give me a theme and i'll do it to your liking!

Admittedly, you did the bare minimum that you guessed a streamer might need in a server. You were more focused on finishing to send the invite to SheepyWolf23. Their offer was generous, but it'd be bad if their permissions affected you negatively. Well, you were the owner. You have the power to remove someone's permissions.

Streamer(Y/N): that would be nice. are you able to finish it tonight? SheepyWolf23: if i get started now, i can have it done by 11:30pm sharp. Streamer(Y/N): awesome! i'll send a reference photo of the type of style i wish for the server to have. most of all, i want it to be a friendly & safe place for subscribers to talk in. anyone can join, even nonsubscribers.

After sending the photo, you spend the day doing chores while waiting in anticipation. Your steps have a beat, and you let happy music echo throughout the room.

SheepyWolf23 sends a message of his completion just as you settle into bed. You check the server and are amazed. The titles of the channels are decorated, the channels are more organized, and they've even added a few of their own: Rules, Clip Dump, and Suggestions.

Streamer(Y/N): wow! thank you so much again for helping me. i'm so lucky to have your attention! Streamer(Y/N): oops, that kind of sounds strange haha SheepyWolf23: XD NOOO, it's alright dw! i appreciate it a lot! i just thought i'd help since i have some experience with marketing and streamers is all

Oh. So you weren't the only one they've worked with? That's definitely benefit your...career? Or was it a hobby? It'd probably have to wait until you actually make a livable wage to call it a career. You never thought about going beyond posting clips of your own videos to market yourself, but SheepyWolf23 might know other ways that'd suit your niche of viewers. They might even know of secrets and tricks to the platform you're on.

A question pops into your mind. You lick your lips, wondering if this is even a concern you should bring up at all. Searching for an answer online was fine, but personal guidance just felt more....considerate. You give in.

Streamer(Y/N): i have a question that might sound a bit personal for a streamer to ask. you don't have to do anything for me, but i'd like some advice if you're willing to share

SheepyWolf23: i'll try to help as much as i can. what do you wanna know? Streamer(Y/N): someone brought to my attention that a person left an unsavory comment about my body in a YooTube video. i know people saying things you don't like is part of streaming, but i want to know how to deal with my discomfort. i want to avoid blocking people from my streams as much as possible, though SheepyWolf23: hm. tbh part of dealing with it is exposure, but i know that sucks. how abt this: in exchange for helping you this far, i can be your (first!!!) moderator. i don't intend to do anything sketchy with the position. this way, i can remove chat privileges from users and make your stream flow easier

Streamer(Y/N): omg yes please! can i message you before my next stream to give you the permissions you need? SheepyWolf23: of curse! SheepyWolf23: of course* SheepyWolf23: im gonna head to bed. getting kind of sleepy and gotta work tmrow. take care, Streamer(Y/N)! Streamer(Y/N): goodnight SheepyWolf! thank you again for helping me, sleep well!

You shut off your phone, drop your phone to your chest, and squeal while kicking feet in the air. You got your first moderator, and you didn't have to make a posting! SheepyWolf23 is so kind to not only return to you but also be your companion. It wouldn't be so professional to become friends with them, but just the thought sends electricity through your body.

A yawn escapes your lips. You close your eyes and daydream about becoming part of the Top 10 Streamers on the internet. There would never be a need for you to clock in during early hours. Rarely will you have to hear the screech of an alarm. You'd live a double life: a student by day and an entertainer by night. People would laugh at your jokes, tune into your gameplay with friends and family, and mourn when you'd go on break. You would be on stage to receive an award for your performance, and you'd wipe a tear while thanking the fans that made it possible. A party would conclude the ceremony. Your favorite streamers would approach you with glasses of wine and congratulate your success. One or two would ask for your phone number. The group would clink glasses and cheers.

Once the party simmers down, you'd gather your items and head for the door. A person lacking physical characteristics would approach you and take your hand to whisk you into their--your--shared car.

The day kisses you farewell.

──────────────────── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆────────────────────

In a house far away from where your campus, a man older than you by only two years hugs his phone close to his chest in bed. He stares at his DMs on CommLines, a streaming platform he's all too familiar with. Euphoria rushes through his veins as he reads a message his newfound favorite streamer had sent.

Streamer(Y/N): wow! thank you so much again for helping me. i'm so lucky to have your attention!

He's received thanks before, but it's never been phrased like that. He didn't think he really needed to help with anything since you already had his attention because of your success journey. It isn't that much different from other streamers, admittedly, but it was different enough in the mere fact that HE was your number one.

He screenshots the message and adds it into his Hidden photo album. Your words are a blessing to poor him, who's been needing to find more enjoyment in his boring life.

He'll need to be careful not to take anymore overtime work. Your streaming schedule wasn't set yet, and he wasn't planning on missing one moment.

Not when your career was in his care.

[thethirdromana]

Mina's class conundrum

For some of the characters in Dracula, it's very clear-cut which class they belong to - e.g. Arthur, who is 100% a member of the upper class. With Mina, however, it's less clear:

She was a childhood friend of Lucy, who is upper-class or upper-middle class (from a high enough class background to marry a nobleman).

She is engaged to marry Jonathan, a newly qualified solicitor (a middle-class profession) who was recently only a clerk (one of the worst-paid white-collar jobs in Victorian England).

Mina expects to be short of money in their married life, and "shall have to try to make both ends meet".

Lucy considers her to be a suitable match for Jack, a man who is "well off" and "of good birth".

She has to work for a living as an assistant schoolmistress.

She's a orphan who has never known her parents.

Some of this (the friendship with Lucy, the idea of marriage to Jack) points towards an upper-middle class background. But the rest (marrying Jonathan, working for a living) is less consistent with that.

So I thought it might be interesting to tease out what the options are. Dropping the rest of this under a cut because it's long.

Quick disclaimer: whatever the finer details of her background, Mina is still in the top 15% of 1890s society. She's not working-class; she's an educated professional who's probably earning 50% more than the average full-time salary.

But there's still a big gulf between the entry level of the Victorian middle class (household income around £150/year, employing one servant) and the top end of the upper-middle classes (four-figure household income, large numbers of servants, potentially enough passive income for no one to need to work).

Mina's job

I realised in writing this that we don't know a huge amount about what Mina's job actually is. She's an assistant schoolmistress, and she says:

you can't go on for some years teaching etiquette and decorum to other girls without the pedantry of it biting into yourself a bit

but that doesn't imply that etiquette is all she teaches. She could equally have said "you can't go on for some years teaching other girls to keep their shoes shiny and in good order without becoming self-conscious when your own shoes are scuffed", without it implying that her teaching career is all about shoes.

The Dracula Daily fandom has also generally assumed that Mina was a pupil of the school, before becoming a pupil-teacher, then a full-time teacher; I think that's a reasonable assumption from Mina teaching "for some years". We've also generally assumed that Mina and Lucy attended the same school where Mina then became a teacher. That's implied here:

It was my privilege to be your friend and guide when you came from the schoolroom to prepare for the world of life.

I think there could be other ways of interpreting that sentence, but most of them are a bit of a stretch.

There were a variety of different schools for girls in Victorian England: chiefly board schools, private schools, and a small number of academic schools that aimed to give girls an equal education to that received by boys, targeting university entrance. I'm going to leave out the latter, because I don't think Mina works for one of the academic schools; there just weren't that many of them.

Board schools were primary schools for the general population, run by the state though funded partly by fees. Working at a board school would be stressful, with huge class sizes. Board school teachers were generally middle-class: for instance, Margaret McCallum, the daughter of a shopkeeper (a lower-middle class occupation), who became a pupil-teacher at her local elementary school in her early teens, then went to college for further qualifications, eventually becoming a headteacher.

Board school teaching was promoted as a career for upper-class women, but very few of them did it: Eglantyne Jebb, who went on to found Save the Children and drafted the document that became the Declaration of the Rights of the Child, was a rare exception.

There's also no way that Lucy attended a board school. Her education was much more likely to have been at a private school, which were run by women from a genteel background. Fees for pupils ranged from £3 to over £150 (bearing in mind £56 as the average male full-time salary).

This made it a difficult way to earn a living: women who ran and taught at these schools had to keep up the appearance of a genteel lifestyle while not usually making enough profit to support it. They were often not well-qualified; their qualification was coming from the correct social background, which meant upper-middle class or upper-class ("gentlewomen", broadly), though by definition they were also poor enough to need to work for a living. (Source, p139-141)

Possible options for Mina's class

Putting my cards on the table, I would strongly prefer Mina to be of a distinctly lower class than Lucy (who is upper-class or upper-middle class). That would mean that the Crew of Light spans different genders, different ages, different faiths, different nationalities and different classes (rather than just upper-middle and upper, which is a difference, but a small one), which really appeals to me. Unfortunately, the evidence doesn't really go my way.

Mina as upper-middle class I think this has to be the more likely option, however much I don't like it.

Mina's parents could have been upper-middle class, potentially connections of the Westenras, but their untimely deaths meant that they didn't have as much by way of savings to pass on to their daughter as they would have liked. They might have left Mina enough to be educated at a good school (with Lucy) and to care for her needs as a child, but not so much that she could afford not to work as an adult. At the same time, being from established upper-middle class background would give Mina the standing that she would need to work as a teacher in a private girls' school.

This could suggest that Mina is marrying down, at least a little, in her engagement to Jonathan, leading to this line in Lucy's letter:

We met some time ago a man that would just do for you, if you were not already engaged to Jonathan.

I don't much like this reading. But it does seem to be the one that fits best with the facts we have.

Mina as lower-middle class OK, now let's see if I can make my preferred reading work.

This puts Mina in a class that would naturally marry a solicitor's clerk. She would work in a board school or potentially one of the cheapest private day schools. How she came to be childhood friends with Lucy is harder to figure out, but if Lucy is from new money (possible!) then the connection might go back to before the Westenras became wealthy.

Suggesting Jack as a match for Mina, "good birth" and all, could simply be the relatively innocent Lucy thinking that if Mina and Jack met, love would conquer all regardless of a class barrier. (Which is plausible given how much Jack admires Mina when they do meet).

This reading does fit better with Mina's dedication to autodidacticism and her interest in supporting Jonathan through his work, not just by being a better housewife. This would be consistent with coming from a background where women routinely worked before marriage, and I would guess might work alongside their husbands more as well (e.g. a shop-keeper's wife working in the shop).

As for being Lucy's "friend and guide" when she came from the schoolroom... well, being her teacher is the most logical way to read it, but she could arguably have been guided by an older friend, especially if the age gap between them is more like 3-5 years rather than 1-2 years.

Yeah, it's a stretch. But I think either option is possible, just about. I'd be keen to hear what other people think!

[mathsbian]

You know what I was thinking about last night?

In the US, we pay into various accounts that are set up by the government to help us out later if/when we need it. These include unemployment insurance (UI), social security retirement benefits, and social security disability benefits (SSDI). These accounts are directly connected to how long you have worked and the amount of money you were paid, and are only for you to access.

We also pay into programs that are for anyone who needs them, no work required to get assistance. These include social welfare programs like SNAP (food stamps) and TANF (cash assistance for families with children so they can buy clothes for their kids and stuff that isn’t covered by SNAP) and SSI, which is another kind of disability insurance but is specifically for poor disabled people who are possibly still working but can’t afford their cost-of-living expenses which are higher than the average person thanks to their disability.

If you want to get money from SNAP or TANF, you have to prove that you need it. The government will be checking if you have a job and how much you get paid, they’ll look at your bank accounts to see how much money you have on hand, you send them copies of bill statements to prove your expenses eat up most or all of your income. Since SSI is a similar program, I can understand why there’s hoops to jump through to get money from that program.

However, if you want money from your UI account or your social security retirement account, you pretty much just have to tell the government you’re in the group that account is for now. For UI, you have to show you’re still looking for new work (at least in my state) but it’s a very lax requirement compared to the requirements for SNAP/TANF. I’m not entirely sure how one goes about collecting their retirement benefits but I assume it involves a similar process of filing with the government that you’ve retired instead of being between jobs, and they’re only check that that admission from you is true.

SSDI, though? You pay into that account your entire career. But then if you suddenly need the money, you have to go through a ridiculously complicated and drawn out process to be approved. UI approval takes a week at most in my state. I assume retirement benefits get approved in under a year at the very most. But getting approved for SSDI when you don’t have one of the limited diagnoses that automatically qualify you (and not even just a diagnosis in the list, a diagnosis with the right stipulations such as mental health conditions having to be present for over two years without much documented improvement despite consistent treatment)? That can take up to TWO YEARS because they can just deny you over and over again and force you to appeal the decision as many as like 5 times, and each appeal has a 6 month waiting period. And on top of that, once you stop working, the account starts counting down to self-destruction. You only have so much time before you lose access to the money entirely. If I am not found disabled on this application (I’m halfway through all the possible appeals), I will not be able to get my SSDI money AT ALL.

It’s fucking bullshit. I paid into that account so I would have money set aside for if I became disabled. I don’t have to prove I need the unemployment money, which I’m no longer qualified to receive, they’ll basically give it to me no questions asked. But when I’m disabled and barely scraping by for years I keep getting told that “actually from our review of your case it seems like you totally can have a desk job, go fuck yourself” despite me constantly including the detail that I cannot sit upright at a desk for more than an hour without needing to lie down completely flat for two hours immediately after. It’s MY MONEY. They’re not saving it for someone else, they’re going to just eat it if I don’t get it, why can’t they just GIVE IT TO ME???

[nsomniacsdream]

You don't think there's problems (or at least aren't that bad) because they're all hidden from you.

The Housing Insecure people in this country is a way bigger problem than you could possibly imagine. They make it illegal to be homeless almost everywhere. And that's getting worse. Cant stay in an RV, can't live in your car. Can't park somewhere overnight. Can't stay with family for more than 3 days or they could lose their housing. When you see people on Fox news or whatever talking about walking down the street in Portland and seeing like 3 homeless encampments, you need to understand that those are the most hardcore of homeless people. There are hundreds more who've been shoveled off into the surrounding county, or they're in jail, or hiding in alleys and shit because they just can't handle being arrested or harassed again. Even in your small towns, like in Oregon, you would see the same homeless people all the time, people knew them by name. They were literally part of the neighborhood. But there were dozens more who were rotated through the jail and dropped outside of town every time they were seen by the cops.

You accept the wage you're getting because "everyone else gets around the same". There's whole states where the standard of living is an order of magnitude higher or lower than their neighbors and people make all kinds of excuses for it, state taxes, cost of living, whatever. It's because they get paid more(or less). That's all it is. Cross this imaginary line and your average wage is ten dollars higher? That's fake. You accept your standard of living because economic classes are physically seperated. Gated communities. Police presence. "Neighborhood Watch" that only exists to call the cops if there's a stranger driving thru the area. You can't live in this entire area code unless you make above this yearly income level. I grew up in a pretty small town in Illinois (10k people) and we had "Upper (town)" which wasn't upper or on the north end or anything, it was just a neighborhood that you couldn't get into. It was gated, at 4 of the 8 cross streets, which made it a huge pain in the ass for traffic in the surrounding neighborhoods.

There's a lot more of it, like how the media just flat out didn't cover police violence until recently. It's always been there and it's always been a problem, but no one was telling you it was even happening. Everything you know about life in the United States is probably an elaborate ruse to cover up an even uglier truth.

[stevishabitat]

Soil: The Secret Weapon in the Fight Against Climate Change - EcoWatch

www.ecowatch.com

Soil: The Secret Weapon in the Fight Against Climate Change

EcoWatch

7 - 8 minutes

By Claire O’Connor

Agriculture is on the front lines of climate change. Whether it’s the a seven-year drought drying up fields in California, the devastating Midwest flooding in 2019, or hurricane after hurricane hitting the Eastern Shore, agriculture and rural communities are already feeling the effects of a changing climate. Scientists expect climate change to make these extreme weather events both more frequent and more intense in coming years.

Agriculture is also an important — in fact a necessary — partner in fighting climate change. The science is clear: We cannot stay beneath the most dangerous climate thresholds without sequestering a significant amount of carbon in our soils.

Agricultural soils have the potential to sequester, relatively inexpensively, 250 million metric tons of carbon dioxide-equivalent greenhouse gasses annually — equivalent to the annual emissions of 64 coal fired power plants, according to National Academy of Sciences.

But we can’t get there without engaging farmers, turning a source of emissions into a carbon sink. Here are just a few of the ways the Natural Resources Defense Council works to encourage climate-friendly farming:

Creating New Incentives for Cover Crops: Cover crops are planted in between growing seasons with the specific purpose of building soil health. Despite their multiple agronomic and environmental benefits, adoption is low — only about 7% of U.S. farmland uses cover crops. NRDC is working to scale up cover cropping through innovative incentives delivered through the largest federal farm subsidy: crop insurance. We’ve worked with partners in Iowa and Illinois to launch programs that give farmers who use cover crops /acre off of their crop insurance bill. And partners in Minnesota and Wisconsin are exploring similar options. While we’re delighted at the benefit this program has for farmers in those individual states, we’re even more excited about the potential to scale this program to the 350 million acres that utilize subsidized crop insurance nationwide. A recent study suggests that cover crops sequester an average of .79 tons of carbon per acre annually, making cover crops one of the pillars of climate-friendly farming systems.

Supporting Carbon as a New “Agricultural Product”: Championed by Senator Ron Wyden, the 2018 Farm Bill created a new program, the Soil Health Demonstration Trial, that encourages farmers to adopt practices that improve their soil health, and tracks and measures the outcomes. NRDC worked alongside our partners at E2 and a number of commodity groups, farmer organizations, and agribusinesses to secure passage of this provision. The Demonstration Trial will create a new, reliable income stream — farmers will get paid for the carbon they sequester regardless of how their crops turn out, and it builds the data needed for confidence in any future carbon markets. USDA recently announced the first round of awards under this new program, totaling over million in investments to improve soil health. Senator Cory Booker has since drafted legislation that would increase funding for the program nearly 10-fold to 0 million annually; Representative Deb Haaland released a companion bill in the House.

Scaling up Regenerative Agriculture: Regenerative agriculture is an approach to farming that looks to work with nature to rebuild the overall health of the system. Regenerative farmers use a variety of tactics, including reduced chemical inputs, diverse crop and livestock rotations, incorporating compost into their systems, and agroforestry, among others. Our team is in the midst of interviewing regenerative farmers and ranchers to learn more about what’s working for them and what challenges they’ve faced in their shift to a regenerative approach. We’re planning to analyze our interview results and combine them with a literature review to identify what role NRDC could potentially play in helping to scale up regenerative farming and ranching systems. We’ll also be sharing quotes and photos from our interviews on social media every Friday starting in January, so stay tuned for some inspiring farm footage!

Supporting Organic Farmers: Organic agriculture by design reduces greenhouse gas emissions, sequesters carbon in the soil, does not rely on energy-intensive chemical inputs, and builds resiliency within our food system. Practices integrated into organic production will become increasingly more important in the face of a changing climate. NRDC supports organic farmers through policy initiatives like the Organic Farm-to-School program that was introduced in the California legislature last year. In the coming year, we’ll continue to work to support organic farmers in California.

Reducing Food Waste: Food waste generates nearly 3% of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S., and NRDC is working hard to reduce that number, and improve soil health in the process. Some of our policy proposals include securing passage of date labelling legislation to eliminate confusion about whether food is still good to eat, working with cities to reduce waste and increase rescue of surplus food, and supporting efforts at all levels to increase composting of food scraps. Adding compost to soils improves their ability to sequester carbon, store nutrients, and retain water. Composting food scraps also helps to “close the loop” on organic matter and nutrients by returning them to the agricultural production cycle, rather than sending that organic material to landfills, where it generates methane (a powerful climate pollutant).

Climate-friendly farming also offers a host of important co-benefits. For example, when farmers use complex crop rotations to break weed, pest, and disease cycles, they can reduce the amount of synthetic chemicals they need to use. When they use practices like cover crops, no-till, and adding compost to protect and restore the soil, they reduce the need for synthetic fertilizers that emit greenhouse gasses. And when farmers can reinvest the oppressive amount of money they had been previously spending on expensive, synthetic inputs into the additional labor required to carbon farm, they bring new jobs to economically-depressed rural areas.

Farmers understand better than many of us the harsh realities of climate change, regardless of their opinions about what’s causing those changes. And tight margins and trade wars make the potential of new value streams particularly attractive for farmers right now. By working alongside the farmers and farmworkers who tend the land, we can bring new allies into the fight against climate change, restore the health of our soil, and create a healthy, equitable, and resilient food system.

[mariacallous]

Over the past few decades, much of the media and policy debate around labor issues have focused on low wages. Labor issues related to work schedules have received far less attention. In fact, 17% of the U.S. labor force works on unpredictable or unstable schedules with short advance notice (Golden 2015). They are disproportionately concentrated in lower paid occupations in the retail and service sectors. According to a national survey on retail jobs, 87% of retail workers report hour variations in the past month with the average variation equivalent to 48% of their usual work hours, 50% report a week or less advance notice, and 44% say that their employer decides their work hours without their input (Lambert et al. 2014). The prevalence and the rapid growth of unpredictable and unstable schedules has resulted in many social issues, including difficulties arranging childcare and threats to households’ economic security (Henly and Lambert 2014).

The economic trade-off of predictable schedules and the ongoing policy debate

Unpredictable and unstable schedules are so prevalent in service businesses, because labor accounts for a significant part of the operating cost of service businesses, especially in retail, food, and hospitality services. Having just enough (but not too many) workers on hand is essential to balancing customer service and profitability. As firms try to strike that balance, many—especially those in the service and retail sectors—practice “just-in-time” (JIT) scheduling, which entails managers scheduling their employees “on the fly” based on immediate workplace needs. By using just-in-time scheduling, service firms mitigate the uncertainty they often face in customer demand and employee no-shows. This helps them reduce the labor hours needed and thus labor cost (Terwiesch and Cachon 2012). While JIT scheduling can be effective in reducing firms’ labor costs, it also leads to highly unpredictable and fluctuating schedules for workers, which negatively impact their quality of life, especially among low-income workers. In short, firms have been using JIT scheduling to transfer business risks to their employees.

Recent local and state policies aim to reduce this practice. Since 2014, one state (Oregon) and multiple cities (e.g., Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Seattle, and Emeryville, California), have passed various forms of “predictive scheduling laws,” sometimes also referred to as “fair workweek laws.” In general, they require employers to post work schedules in advance and provide additional pay for any last-minute schedule changes. Some versions of such laws, (e.g., the ones in New York City, Seattle and Emeryville, California), also require employers to offer part-time workers the chance to increase their hours before adding new staff (Wolfe et al 2018).

Service firms, especially those in the retail, food, and hospitability industries, argue that such requirements remove the staffing flexibility they need to operate their businesses effectively, which may lead to bankruptcy and eventually loss of jobs. Indeed, such policies have received strong resistance from employers in the service and retail sectors and are still pending or have failed to pass in many cities and states across the U.S. States including Arkansas, Georgia, Iowa, and Tennessee even prohibit jurisdictions within the states from passing predictable scheduling laws. Predictable scheduling laws also differ in the level of advance notice they require firms to inform their workers about their schedules. For example, the city of New York requires 72 hours advance notice (for its retail workers) and the state of Oregon initially required one-week advance notice but later increased to 14 days, while most other cities require 14 days advance notice.

Is JIT scheduling really that beneficial to service firms?

In light of this debate, Masoud Kamalahmadi (University of Miami), Yong-Pin Zhou (University of Washington) and I conducted a study to answer whether and to what extent the flexibility created through just-in-time scheduling benefits the firm and how policy makers can better design predictable scheduling laws (Kamalahmadi et al. 2021). On the one hand, it is clear that just-in-time scheduling helps firms reduce their labor cost as explained earlier. On the other hand, the potential impact of just-in-time scheduling on the workers’ productivity, and thus the firm’s revenue, was not well understood. It was the goal of our study to seek objective evidence that can shed light on this important issue.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

[Political cartoons 2020]  :: Los Angeles Sentinel :: David Brown

* * * * *

Here is my principle: Taxes shall be levied according to ability to pay. That is the only American principle.

-Franklin D. Roosevelt

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

May 23, 2023

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

Both President Joe Biden and House speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) have stated publicly that the U.S. will not default. They are negotiating over the budget. For my part, I’ve started to wonder if the whole debt ceiling crisis isn’t about Republicans’ determination to cut taxes for the wealthy at all costs. When Ronald Reagan called for tax cuts in 1980, he argued that tax cuts would concentrate money in private hands, enabling investors flush with cash to build the economy. That growth would keep tax revenues stable even with the lower rates. That was the argument, but it never came to pass. In fact, a 2022 study by political economists David Hope and Julian Limberg shows that “tax cuts for the rich…do not have any significant effect on economic growth or unemployment,” but they do “lead to higher income inequality in both the short- and medium-term.” Indeed, Estelle Sommeiller and Mark Price of the Economic Policy Institute, an independent, nonprofit think tank, noted in 2018 that 1% of all families in the U.S. take home 21% of all the income in the U.S., making 26.3 times more than the bottom 99%, whose average income is slightly more than $50,000 a year. On average in the U.S., someone would need an annual income of slightly more than $420,000 to be a member of that top 1%. In 2020, annual wages for the top 1% grew by 7.3% while those in the bottom 90% grew just 1.7%. A 2020 study by Carter C. Price and Kathryn A. Edwards of the RAND Corporation showed that the changing economic distribution systems of the past forty years have moved a staggering $50 trillion upward, out of the hands of the bottom 90% of Americans. (The national debt is currently about $31.5 trillion.) Nonetheless, today’s Republicans continue to insist that cutting taxes promotes growth. Today, Representative Bob Good (R-VA) talked over journalist Katy Tur to defend his support for extending the Trump tax cuts, which are due to expire in 2025 and which the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates will add $3.5 trillion to the debt. Good insisted that tax cuts are “incentivizing the right things.” Leaving the White House today, McCarthy told reporters that he would not entertain rolling back the 2017 Trump tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations. “[T]he problem is not revenue,” he insisted. “The problem is spending.” But the Trump tax cuts and Trump's increased spending even before the pandemic ultimately added $7.8 trillion to the national debt, about $23,500 for every person in the country. The increase in the annual deficit under Trump was the third-biggest increase of any administration, relative to the size of the economy. He was beaten out only by George W. Bush and Abraham Lincoln. Bush, of course, led the U.S. into two foreign conflicts that were financed almost entirely through debt (in the past, the U.S. paid for war through taxes and war bonds), after Congress cut taxes by about 8% for the wealthiest Americans. Lincoln fought the Civil War. “It’s not that Americans are taxed too little, it’s that Washington spends too much,” Russ Vought, Trump’s acting budget director, wrote in 2019. He was defending Trump’s 5% budget cuts to nondefense discretionary spending. President Biden’s 2024 budget proposes to reduce the federal deficit by $3 trillion over the next decade by raising taxes on those who make more than $400,000 a year. His budget would effectively repeal the Trump tax cuts for the wealthy, restoring the top tax rate to 39.6% rather than the 37% the 2017 cuts established. It would also raise corporate taxes from 21%, to which the 2017 tax cuts dropped them, to 28%, lower than the high of 35% before the Trump tax cuts. Biden’s budget also calls for taxing capital gains at about the same rate as income for those making more than $1 million, and it calls for a new tax on unrealized capital gains. It also seeks to close loopholes that enable high earners to avoid taxes. Funding for the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) that was passed in the Inflation Reduction Act will enable the IRS to go after tax cheats who make more than $400,000 a year, netting an estimated $204 billion through 2031. But the Republicans say they will not agree to any tax hikes of any sort, and the right-wing extremists in the Freedom Caucus have said they would not agree to anything but the bill McCarthy muscled through the House by promising it would never become law. That bill, called Limit, Save, Grow, would cut discretionary government programs by at least 18%—more if Social Security, Medicare, and veterans’ benefits aren’t included. “My conservative colleagues for the most part support Limit, Save, Grow, and they don’t feel like we should negotiate with our hostage,” said right-wing Representative Matt Gaetz (R-FL). As Catherine Rampell of the Washington Post pointed out last week, the bill also forces Congress to approve every “major” regulation proposed by a government agency, with the recognition that Congress is unlikely to agree to any such regulation, thus unraveling the federal government. Senator Rick Scott (R-FL), who before the 2022 election called for sunsetting all laws every five years, forcing Congress to repass all discretionary spending, today fell back on the idea that Democrats calling for addressing the deficit through taxation are socialists. Poking fun at the recent travel advisories by LGBTQ, immigrant, and Black rights organizations warning against visiting Florida, he issued a “formal travel advisory” for “socialists” “in direct response to the Biden Administration attempts to erase capitalism and the system that has brought prosperity to Florida and the entire United States.” And yet it was the Republican Party that originally established the pattern of turning to increasing revenue to enable the government to meet its financial obligations, a pattern members of both parties relied on until 1981. Faced in 1861 with funding the Civil War, members of the Republican Party invented the U.S. income tax and graduated it to make sure that “the burdens will be more equalized on all classes of the community, more especially on those who are able to bear them,” as Senator William Pitt Fessenden (R-ME) put it. Justin Smith Morrill (R-VT) agreed. “The weight [of] taxation must be distributed equally,” he said, “Not upon each man an equal amount, but a tax proportionate to his ability to pay.” The government had a right to “demand” 99 percent of a man’s property for an urgent necessity, Morrill said. When the public required it, “the property of the people…belongs to the Government.” Far from objecting to taxes, Americans asked their congressmen to raise them, out of concern about the growing national debt. In 1864, Senator John P. Hale (R-NH) said: “The condition of the country is singular…I venture to say it is an anomaly in the history of the world. What do the people of the United States ask of this Congress? To take off taxes? No, sir, they ask you to put them on. The universal cry of this people is to be taxed.” Those taxes helped to pay for the war and, after it, to repay the debt. And in 1866, when Confederate-sympathizing Democrats tried to undermine support for the government by changing the terms of that debt to make it less valuable, Republicans wrote into the Constitution that “the validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned.”

—

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[enbyhyena]

So I talk sometimes about how piss-poor the SSI payout amounts are, but I did my math on something slightly different today and I just thought I ought to share my findings. I also just wanted to do a more in-depth, comprehensive post in general. So here you go.

As of the 2023 calendar year, the maximum SSI payout amount is $914 per month.

A full-time worker will work 40 hours a week, or 160 hours a month.

If you take the payout amount and divide it by the hours of a full-time job, you get...

🥁🥁🥁

$5.71/hour.

The federal minimum wage is $7.25.

In order to be completely financially secure and comfortable, you need to make about $233k a year. As of 2021, the median household income is $71,000 a year.

According to this calculator, $914/month ($10,968 a year) is 75.23% below the federal poverty line.

Put another way, if I never spent a single cent of my SSI (which I can't do and I'll talk about why further down), and if my wages were not to increase at all (which it does by a small amount each year, but for the sake of this analogy), it would take me 21 years to make the amount of money that it takes to be comfortable for just one year. (I got this figure by taking 914 and multiplying it by the number of months (12), and then dividing 233k by the outcome [$10,968].)

Multiple resources state that people should aim to not spend above 30% of their monthly income on rent.

30% of $914 is $274.20.

Median rent cost in the United States has climbed to $2,011 per month.

Recipients of SSI are not allowed to have ANY amount above $2,000 in combined income and assets at ANY time, or else they will lose their benefits cold turkey. Meaning that even if they COULD come up with 200% of their monthly income JUST for rent (not factoring in the cost of food, meds, transportation, etc), they would be instantly cut off.

Don't even get me started on what a shit-show Section 8 is. Especially post-pandemic.

Marriage brings the income/asset limit to $3,000. So if you're a double-disabled couple, your limit is cut in half (strongly discouraging marriage). If you're a disabled person and marry to someone who works, your SSI will almost certainly drop or disappear completely—which can trap disabled people in financially abusive situations.

If you claim SSI and try to work to make a little extra money, every other dollar after $63 subtracts a dollar from your SSI payout, BEFORE taxes. So say you work full time for 2 weeks making $9 an hour—$720 before taxes.

Subtract the initial $63, and you're left with $657. Now divide that by two (for every other dollar).

SSI has just taken $328.50 from your SSI payout. Your $914 payout is now $585.50. Subtract another $328.50 for your second paycheck in one month, and that's a $256.50 payout.

This leads to a lot of disabled people, who break their bodies trying to make just a little more in spite of their illnesses, to largely break even. Usually making about the same amount they would have made if they'd just stayed home and taken care of themselves instead.

And to make it EVEN worse, earnings take 2 months to reflect on your payouts. So say you work over the holidays to treat yourself for Christmas. You may get $914 in December and January as normal, but only come February will you finally see that deduction take effect—meaning if anything happens, you have several hundred less dollars to work with.

When I worked, it took over a year AFTER I quit for my payouts to finally go back to normal, as they kept readjusting my earnings and deducting from my payouts saying that they "paid me too much".

So I don't think it needs to be said that you can fight tooth and nail to get accepted onto this program, and be shamed by society for being on it once you finally win, but as an extra kicker be FORCED to stay there with no options to escape without severe punishment.

I have known people who fought for four and ten years. While being considered, you cannot work AT ALL or they will immediately throw out your case. The average wait time is 2 years, but most wait longer. If SSA says no, you'll be sent to court to appeal. If the judge denies you, you have to start all over again. And you can get caught in the same loop over, and over, and over, and over again, getting denied support that you desperately need, and many die hoping to receive.

8,000 people file for bankruptcy and 10,000 people die a year while waiting for their SSI to be approved.

And it just keeps getting worse and worse the further down the rabbit hole you go. I made this post partially to vent my frustration with this system after being abused by it for the past 5 years (and it abusing the people I care about). But I also wanted to create a resource with citations for people to share around and throw in the faces of ANYONE who dares to think that people on welfare/claiming SSI somehow "have it easy".

As a disabled person, I spend over half of my given days either in bed too ill and/or in pain to function, or at a clinic begging a doctor to not call me fat or a hypocondriac or drug-seeking and take my (documented and diagnosed!!) illnesses seriously. I rarely ever get to just SIT there and BE sick. I often have to get up and get shit done in SPITE of being sick, even doing OTHER people's jobs and holding their hands just to make sure they're actually doing what THEY'RE being PAID to do (insurance agents, doctors, etc). Disabled people don't GET days off. Just because we don't work a "conventional" job doesn't mean we're just sitting on our asses mooching off the system. Every single goddamn day is a fight just for the basic human right to survive. And I never want to hear anyone saying that ableist, invalidating, and blatantly untrue shit around me.

[hoperays-song]

Why The Gang Became Robbers

CW: Discussions of Poverty and Money

So, it’s somewhat theorized that the gang started stealing because of financial reasons. There’s actually some allusions to this in the movie itself, with them planning to stop stealing after the heist they were eventually caught for, them seeming to live in the shop, Johnny’s clothes seeming to be hand-me-downs (his dad’s jacket, a shirt that’s a few sizes too big with worn out sleeves, well worn-too large jeans), and mostly using walkie talkies instead of their phones (data is expensive). I started to wonder how deep in debt they actually were sooo... I did some calculations.

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Disclaimer: All of these were based of the average costs of everything in the state of California (Calatonia is based on LA and San Francisco). There were some generosity here in debt calculations including giving them a good credit score when they applied for the loan and assuming they had only been in the states 7 years. Oh and that they had a bit money when they came to the US.

----------------------------------------------------

Debts

The Garage Itself

Building Price: $2,250,00

Down Payment (20%): $450,000

30-Year Fixed Loan Plan with Interest of 5.395%

Credit Score (I’m trying to help them out here): 729

Annual Property Tax: $28,125

Annual Home Insurance: $7,875

Monthly Payment: $13,102

Annual Total Building Payments: $193,224

Plus Other Expenses (calculated from average 2 person household costs)

Food, Water, Electricity: $24,475.8

Health Insurance: $0

Car Insurance: $0

----------------------------------------------------

Now, the total mortgage would be around 4.62708 million when calculating in 7 years of interest rates. And if we look at the average yearly income of a mechanic in California... 

Yeah, Marcus is only taking home around $16,958 dollars per year, and that’s being generous with both rates and overtime. So, without even factoring in the debt, as well as assuming that Stan and Barry are not included in their household income, the Taylor family is almost $2,000 dollars below the Californian poverty line.

Now, let’s take a look at their plan here. We know that the gold shipment they were planning on stealing in Sing 1 was around 25 million dollars worth. Well, that would clearly pay off their entire mortgage, as well as probably help Stan and Barry with whatever financial issues they might be facing. It would also give them a good cushion for a few years going forward, preventing them from going into debt easily again.

With the seven years of payments totaling $599,844, and assuming that they have stolen at least $2.163,677 to pay towards the debt before, in Sing 1, they only owe a much more reasonable $1,863,559.

And while that is still a lot, if a rich person, say an old musical theatre star, wanted to guarantee that the performers at their old theatre troupe wouldn’t be falling onto a bad path, they could pay that off much easier than the full mortgage.

So, in conclusion, Johnny and his family, stolen money included in this, are still some of the poorest characters in all of Sing. They probably didn’t want to steal in the first place either, judging by how they were planning on stopping after the flubbed heist anyway. They were just desperate. they needed money, and clearly the garage plus whatever side jobs Johnny could have potentially had were not enough. 

I believe that the main reason we don’t see them still stealing in Sing 2 is that their debts were paid off, more than likely by Nana Noodleman as she’s the only one with that amount of money lying around. This allowed them to begin working again without a immediate threat of debt, and with the money Johnny’s bringing in from the theatre, the family is probably in a bit better shape.

[wendykw]

Living on Social Security Part 2

What I did in the months before I retired to be sure I could survive on just my Social Security check.

PLANNING Steps:

I researched how much money I would have in my SS check before I decided I could retire at 66 instead of waiting until 70. My SS check is about 1/3 higher than the average. So I have that going for me. You can find this information at ssa.gov. You'll have to create a password to access your data.

I researched how much Medicare was going to cost me. Medicare is NOT free. With Parts B & D plus a Medicare Supplement, it costs me $393 per month. You need to know these things before hand. My late husband had retired before I did, so I was aware of these costs. I learned a lot about how Medicare works & the options for Medicare supplements when Hubby and I were looking at his options. He retired at 62 & died at 65. He had a lot of medical issues during those 3 years.

Taxes are another issue to research. My state (NC) does not tax Social Security, but it does tax withdrawals from retirement accounts like IRAs. I have an IRA that I use as my emergency fund. I've used it for paying a plumber, replacing appliances that died, etc. I haven't taken out enough in any year to pay income tax on those withdrawals. The Feds tax half of your SS check, plus other income, if it exceeds the exemption for your filing status. I haven't paid income tax since 2019, the year I retired & still had work income.

I made a budget based on what my net SS check would be. My take-home from my job was >$1k more per month than my SS check. I did this a few months before I retired, so I could figure out how to reduce my expenses that much.

I researched ways to cut expenses.I read books. I watched & still watch several youtube channels that are about frugality. Search frugality & or minimalism on youtube, & you'll find lots of channels. I like Under the Median, Frozen Pennies, Homegrown Hilary, Living on a Dime to grow Rich, and Kate Kaden. If you find someone else that you like, let me know about them. Most of the you-tubers have kids, so a lot of the advice isn't applicable to a retired person or couple.

Next time, I'll write about what I did financially in the 5 years between when my husband died & when I retired. I had to rebuild my retirement savings (401k), because we had to use some of it when Hubby got laid off in 2009, and then when I was unemployed in late 2013 & early 2014. Hubby died 3 months after I started a new job.

[persofina]

Why You Should Use a Personal Loan to Pay Down Debt

The average American with credit card debt carries a balance of approximately $6,354, according to USA Today. But the news is even worse in some states like Alaska, New Mexico, and Louisiana, according to an analysis of credit card debt from creditcards.com. Consumers in these three states carried an average of $10,685, $8,323, and $8,110 in credit card debt, respectively, as of 2017. This is unfortunate, but it's not completely unexpected. It's easy to lean too hard on a credit card when you face a job loss or a loss in income, and high interest rates don't help matters much. The average credit card today carries an APR of well over 17%. With so much interest charged on revolving credit card debt, it's difficult to make a dent in the principal of your balance. This often leaves people languishing in debt for years, and even racking up more debt over time. Consumers use many strategies to get out of debt, one of which involves applying for balance transfer cards. With a balance transfer card, you qualify for 0% APR for a limited time — usually 12 to 21 months. However, you're normally required to pay a balance transfer fee of 3% or 5% of your balance, and the introductory offer won't last forever. Some people use balance transfer cards to successfully pay down debt at 0% APR, but others simply make the minimum payments and never make real progress against their debts. Those consumers usually end up exactly where they started once their card's introductory offer ends — with plenty of debt and a crushing APR. There may be a better, more predictable way out of debt, however, and it involves a personal loan. (See also: 5 Times Personal Loans May Be Better than Credit Cards) How a personal loan can help you climb out of debt Applying for a new loan to work your way out of debt may go against the grain of common sense, but there are plenty of reasons a personal loan can work. For starters, personal loans come with low fixed interest rates that never change — even as low as 4.9% APR for consumers with good credit. Second, personal loans have fixed repayment schedules that tell you exactly when you'll become debt-free. Because personal loans have fixed rates and fixed repayment terms, you also have a fixed monthly payment that stays the same. This is much different from the way credit cards work since your payment will change based on your APR and how much you owe. With a personal loan to pay down debt, you know exactly what you're getting into. You know how much you'll need to pay each month, when your loan will be paid off, and what your interest rate will be the entire time. The best part is, a personal loan is not a line of credit you can borrow against. So once you use your loan proceeds to pay off and consolidate your credit card bills, you won't have the option to use your loan to rack up more debt. (See also: 10 Things You Need to Know Before Taking Out a Personal Loan) How to do it the right way If your goal is getting out of debt this year, a personal loan could be exactly what you need. But you'll be in the best position to help yourself if you go about repayment the right way. Compare personal loan offers Personal loans are offered by large financial institutions like banks and credit unions as well as several online lenders. Because there are so many options to get a personal loan, your first step is shopping around to compare offers in terms of their interest rates and fees. The best personal loans come without an origination fee, any application fees, or hidden fees. If you want to shop around among multiple lenders in one place, you can also check out LendingTree. This website lets you fill out a single loan application and get offers from multiple banks and lenders in one place. (See also: 5 Personal Loan Fees You Should Never, Ever Pay) Find your best match now with this handy comparison tool. Select the type of loan you’re looking for, the amount, your credit rating and state, to… http://dlvr.it/T3qJvs As seen on Wisebread.comsincerely yours Persofina: Personal Finance Hacks

[sheriff-t-money]

-headcanon: 001

Let's talk about some boring slice of life stuff in regards to Travis' career. A typical county sheriff earns around $80,000+ a year. More experienced sheriffs tend to make around $120,000 with sheriffs in large cities earning more.

We don't know the exact population of North Kill, but the game seems to go with a sort of small-town, rural, vibe. This means that as a sheriff pretty early in his career (a reminder that a sheriff is an elected position in most states, but that's whole different headcanon), Travis is probably earning around $80,000-$100,000 a year.

In a rural town, he'd likely be able to afford a house on his own provided he kept within his means. As far as I've seen, the game seems to hint that Travis still sleeps at home with his parents or on a cot in the station where he holds Laura and Max.

Why is this important?

This sort of feeds into my headcanon that Travis was providing a lot of monetary support to the Hacketts. We know that they were struggling financially. The summer camp (which seems to only run for two months/year?) and scrapyard are their two main sources of income as far as I'm aware.

With a huge amount of land, I can only imagine that their property taxes are rather ouchie. Even if their house is paid for (which it likely is), they still have to pay taxes on their property. Add the maintenance expenses need to keep a house like that habitable, not to mention the expenses to keep the scrapyard and summer camp functional.

Now, if we take the average cost of sleep-away camp ($448) and give it a generous 60-day camp window, that means the camp earns around $26,880 a year.

That's barely enough for a single person to live on let alone a family of seven. We know the family money has all but run out at this point. Otherwise, they'd have had no problem restoring the summer camp, let alone their own house which looks like it's ready to crumble at any moment, honestly.

We have no figures on how much the scrapyard earns as far as I saw. If Travis is pulling in around $80,000 a year, I think most of that just goes toward keeping his family fed, clothed, and taking care of maintaining the house as much as he can.

It also means he can't escape. We know that the Hacketts brothers were basically raised to put the family first. And with his desire to earn respect and love from his mother (again, a whole other headcanon to delve into), this is a duty that he takes on likely without anyone asking. It's just expected.

The idea of buying his own place, using his money for his own future, is unthinkable. It's not an option.

Travis doesn't just sacrifice his soul for his family. He financially supports them at the cost of his own independence and freedom.

[fantasticallydysfunctional]

I find interesting (as in very suspicious) that part time employees don't get sick days or vacation time. When 29% of the adults who are working part time jobs are disabled and can't work more than what they currently are.

And by interesting/suspicious I mean that society/companies value disabled people less than able bodied or able minded people. So they don't think we deserve the same benefits that our abled colleagues get.

At my old job part timers could ONLY miss 30 hours of work in a six month period that covered sick leave, emergencies, and personal. That's only 7.5 days that I had to be sick. And they wouldn't have cared if I had to get surgery. During COVID they let a full time guy go because he kept getting exposed and was quarantining (we were custodians) cause he was "calling in too much".

Even with a Union I'm not afforded many benefits. There's a system where we can work a 7 hour shift to make up the time we missed working to erase the points against us. But I CAN'T work more than 20 hours here without seriously jeopardizing my SSI. So MAYBE the union could help me negotiate with the company for that amount of time to be reduced.

I genuinely do not understand how part time workers can not be afforded vacation time or at the very least the same amount of sick time as full time workers.

I do not want to hear "But what is the incentive to work full-time if you get the benefits as a part timer?" You know what the incentive is? The increase in income. You work more you make more money. That's the incentive.

I should not have to worry about losing my job if heaven forbid I have to get treatment. If I have to be in the hospital for 2 weeks. I shouldn't have to worry about how I'm going to afford my place when I get out because I don't have sick time or vacation time I could use.

But I hear some of you say "They have SSI they'll be fine they're obviously getting enough to survive on." No they aren't the MAXIMUM amount you can get paid by SSI is 841 USD.

Let me repeat THE MAXIMUM AMOUNT YOU CAN RECEIVE FROM SSI IS 841 USD. And that is if you DON'T work. You cannot survive off 841 USD a month. That'll barely cover housing and utilities. You also don't get the maximum amount if you are working.

I might hear someone say "But disabled people are on SSDI and not SSI so they make more"

Slightly more, they make slightly more. The average individual on SSDI will receive 1,236 USD a month. Which is still not enough to live. Seeing that the amount an AVERAGE person needs to live in the United States of America is about 5,000 USD.

Also a lot of disabled people like myself cannot qualify for SSDI. I barely qualified to get SSI. I have like 8 diagnosed mental disorders, chronic pain, early onset arthritis, asthma, etc. And I still do not qualify for SSDI. And even if I did I couldn't earn more than 1,350 USD a month or I'd lose my Disability.

All this to say what is incredibly obvious to anyone that is disabled they don't care. They do not care if we have to destroy our bodies or minds further. They don't care if we survive. We are not worthy of existence in a lot of people's eyes. Especially when it comes to our corporate overlords. If we cannot produce a product. We haven't earned the right to exist. They can just decide that we aren't worth saving during a pandemic (they seriously did this with COVID-19. There were blanket DNRs. And yes I do understand triage.) That I am tired with how many times jobs have tried to fire me for having a disability. Or tried to take advantage of perceived naivety.

To anyone who is able bodied or able minded. If you don't think this effects you you are wrong. A bad enough injury can make you part of this community. A disease could put you in this exact same boat. Maybe you have a mental illness or neurological condition that will only show up later in life. Hell they could just decide that something you already deal with is a disability. They will find a way to discriminate against you. This could be something you have to suddenly worry about tomorrow. So maybe help us. Help us to help your family.

But seriously final thing. Why wouldn't anyone in the workforce not want part timers to have sick time or vacation time. I'm pretty sure everyone has been part time at some point and would have appreciated it. Would help with morale. Would also help with people desiring to stay at that job. This would benefit people who weren't disabled as well. Like give em PTO. The corporations can definitely afford it. The CEOs and stuff would maybe have to make slightly less than they already do. And well they already make an absurd amount of money.