I had an in-person old fogey moment when we were going down geek memory lane talking about modem banks and rotary dial phone. The intern didn't know what a telephone modem was and had never seen a rotary dial phone!
I'm not surprised at all. The average staff programmer at a big corp isn't making much more than $50/hr. Programmers at small companies are usually making much less.
Have you ever been to Denmark or Canada? If so, were you tripping on something?
I have never been to Denmark, but I have been to several places in Canada, and there are plenty of poor people. Don't criticize people for rationalizing the whether poverty is ok or not if you're living in some fantasy-world.
You're looking at this and seeing the wrong problem. You have a family that is doing well enough that they can save sufficient money to retire at a similar level and put their kids through college to be able to attain a similar economic and social status.
In doing that, they aren't netting out a ton of money. The problem is, that wasn't always the case. My grandparents in the 60's and 70's were able to own a home in NYC, own new or late model cars without loans, and put 5 kids through college with minimal debt on a single, blue-collar income.
Most of the replies in this thread are whining about elitism, blah blah blah. $250k of earned income sounds like alot, but this hypothetical family is just as much a wage slave as anyone else. They just have more stuff to lose than you.
I think this article really captured why it is so important to be honest with yourself. Instead of making work your life, you found a way to make life your work.
How many people are wearing golden handcuffs and wasting their life away out of inertia? How many brilliant people apply themselves to make informed decisions and do amazing things at work, and treat life as an afterthought? Your story is inspiring, and thanks for sharing it.
Bankers rarely want a "free market". They do want to be free of restrictions to their potential to make money.
Here's an example:
In a "free market" the government wouldn't mandate that all banks that offer credit/debit cards provide liability limits for fraudulent activity. Those liability limits (which apply to everyone) in effect subsidize inherently insecure payment methods and impose enormous barriers for competitors to enter the market.
Seriously, a big issue that the article missed is the obvious safety issue associated with having a bunch of kids on a bus with metal latches attached to 3 ft long strips of canvas: kids beating the crap out of each other.
I grew up in the country town with a 1 hour bus ride to school, with kids ranging from K-12. The superintendant personally cut the belts out of our bus after a fight resulted in a broken hand inflicted by a swinging belt and a broken window.
I used to sympathize with your position, (esp. re Facebook, which is just a creepy company to me) but do you really want to setup yet another account with some random website? A website that may have Gawker-style security?
I prefer the approach that StackOverflow took, which lets you use basically any OpenID provider.
I think this is a great article as it touches on a perspective on how the world works that is often ignored. Its also great in the sense that the article itself is an example of the phenomena that it is talking about.
The analysis of the ICC is great... de-regulating trucking in 1990 allowed the invisible hand to do its thing! But wait a sec... are the trucking companies maintaining the roads like the railroads do?
IMO, a big issue is that many PhDs are simply not doing research that is actually useful to the real world... many of these folks are hyper-specializing in some arcane subject. Toiling away for a few years to come up with a new analysis of 20th century feminist literature or a sociological study of rodent societies exposed to mozart 24x7 is probably fascinating to someone, but doesn't necessarily translate into something more useful.
Another issue is that higher education in the US has turned into a consumer of federal loans. Universities cry poverty with respect to grad student employment while building lavish health clubs and football stadiums. They raise tuition at rates 2-4x inflation, but have multi-billion dollar endowments or only hire part-time professors to lower faculty costs.
You don't have the context to understand the anger held by many of Columbia University's neighbors towards the university. Columbia U has a long history of being a bad neighbor and bad citizen, including being both directly and indirectly one of the larger slumlords in Northern Manhattan, and pushing down the property values of neighboring property through active neglect.
They also timed the use of political weapons like eminent domain to acquire properties at the worst possible time instead of using the free market. 2010 is the worst possible market to sell property for an operator of a self-storage business, and eminent domain almost always results in a below market payments to property owners with significant delays -- and ruined businesses. Who is going to rent storage space from someone whose property is about to be seized?
The article is dressed up a bit because Kunstler (the author) is someone who seems to exclusively write and speak on this topic. (And by "topic", I mean says the same thing over and over and over and over again, then repeats himself.)
He lives somewhere where I live near Saratoga Springs, NY, which is a late-blooming, but vivid example of the sprawl that he talks about. I've heard him speak a few times... nice guy, good points, but just like a politician on the stump, it gets tired after awhile.
I laughed out loud when I read this, and taken at face value it is certainly not the best advice for most people. But, asserting yourself and calling people on BS is generally a smart thing to do.
How do you calculate the DES hash of a password on the Linux or Mac command line so I can match common passwords to the compromised passwords?
I use a password manager for newer accounts, but still have some not so good passwords for older accounts... I'd like to see if the hashes are published and in the wild with this leak.
At first glance, yes. But consider that datacenter floor space can cost $300/sqft or more. And you need people to negotiate with landlord, process utility bills and manage vendor relationships.
I've been involved in building out datacenter space for a large application -- out upfront costs before collecting a dime of revenue were over $500k -- and that was to refurbish an existing raised floor space! Few entities have that sort of money around, so now you're borrowing $500k at 6-9% interest. You're probably leasing your hardware as well.
The paygo model with AWS has other advantages too. What if your app is a failure, or you need to change your deployment model? With AWS, your costs disappear when your consumption does... with a solution you own, you may carry those costs for years.
So keep in mind that while Amazon may not be the cheapest option from a high level, when you actually look at the costs and risks associated with rolling your own, it may offer the best value. But it's a tool that isn't right for everything -- buying a nailgun is great if you are putting a new roof on your house, but a waste of money if you're hanging pictures in your living room.
I know several folks who have done it, and 75% are really, really happy with it. I know of 4 who have side effects (night glare, starbursts, etc) that they complain about, and 2 who needed one or more revisits.
Personally, I'm a borderline candidate, and glasses have served me well for most of my life anyway!
These sorts of unauthorized flights, combined with model rockets from hobby stores and household cleaners could have created a terrorist nightmare. Where are the feds?