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Tesla...............the Betamax of future cars?
Frugal Git replied to Maghull Mike's topic in House prices and the economy
I was just in California and saw a couple of cybertrucks. Sat in one in one of the Tesla Dealerships. Bloody thing looks awesome. I'd have one over there for sure. Nice wide roads, huge parking garages, it works there. It'd be an absolute disaster over here of course. My S is already terrifying with width restrictions and my lack of spatial awareness. -
Warning of almost 20 years of pay stagnation
Frugal Git replied to Housepricecrash91's topic in House prices and the economy
I used to think the same too - and for once, 100% I agree with you entirely. I think it's more like this now if you actually want to feel rewarded monetarily by work as experience grows. 20 - 30k (1.5x) 30 - 60k (2x) 40 - 120k (3x) 50 - 200k (4x) I realised too late that you needed to push extremely hard for your value. At 38, I was still languishing on full time equivalent of £50k (£30k for 3 day week) Fortunately I think I'm almost back on track now in mid forties for the figure mentioned at 50, and higher if I need to adjust for inflation🙏 -
Whose view do you find more convincing on inequality?
Frugal Git replied to sell2rent's topic in House prices and the economy
Both have validity. Stephenson isn't wrong in pointing out the wealth distribution is a fundamental issue and is leading to a society sleepwalking towards a really dark outcome. We have long debated the types of things he talks about on here. Peterson on the other hand is absolutely right on individual responsibility - one of the few things these days he is right on. You have to make the best of the situation you find yourself in and take personal action to improve it. You shouldn't be relying on anyone else or having a victim mentality. The issue is to truly embrace Peterson's meritocratic absolutism means dog eat dog. Many people don't have the stomach for that fight, or the ability / confidence to do it, and we can't completely shut them out and say 'too bad chump'. For me - I support Stephenson's general stance with some nuance, but I generally live like Peterson would approve of. In reality, someone like me – a healthy, balanced individual – can benefit from Peterson's emphasis on personal responsibility. Taking charge and making the best of your situation is crucial for individual growth. However, focusing solely on the individual ignores the systemic factors that create disadvantages for many. There will always be people who, through no fault of their own, lack the resources or opportunities to pull themselves up by their bootstraps. We need to acknowledge these societal inequalities and work towards solutions that create a fairer playing field. (Thanks to Gemini for the last paragraph 🤣) -
If you had said gross income, I would have nodded and thought yep, probable. That could be £11k before pension contribs if it's two 100k earners, or £9.5k. Very nice, but I can see not 'feeling rich'. Net income of nearly £17k a month and still not feeling rich I think requires self examination if I'm honest. Who are you comparing yourself too? What are your expenses like such that you don't have a very, very comfortable savings rate?
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(edit) - Basically - stupid quiz.
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Interesting and disjointed article. Stuck it into an LLM and it had this to say. "The first half deals almost exclusively with domestic British issues – crumbling infrastructure, social decline, lack of economic opportunity, and political failures albeit in a hyperbolic manner." The second half - well we can all read it. Here's the LLM analysis. "While an unfortunate tactic, the author then goes onto subtly link Britain's broader societal problems with external or minority groups (like the resurgence of AS). It's an underhanded attempt to create a scapegoat rather than a constructive examination of complex factors" "The first half of the article, if stripped of its hyperbole and disconnected ending, speaks to legitimate concerns felt by some Britons. The issues raised (infrastructure, housing, etc.) warrant continued examination and policy debate. However, it presents a one-sided, incomplete narrative that serves primarily to stoke a sense of decline rather than inspire informed discussion."
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Hold on. Apologies if I've missed something - The most crucial detail of this insane scheme is missing. Do you get taxed on the withdrawal from the pension (I.e. pay back your tax relief that you got putting it in), or not? If not then no-one interested in buying a house has any reason to save anywhere other than a pension, SIPP full stop, surely? If you're salary sacricing and saving NI too, and get employer contribs even more so. Currently I can take net income of around £5800 per £10k earned, but I could easily have a more onerous marginal tax rate. And I could save that in an ISA, or I could put it in the pension where it magically becomes £11380. That's a substantially faster way to build a deposit.
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That ship has long since sailed. You'll need full time work now to make it workable to be on the system without being continuosly sanctioned or hassled unless you have much more specific circumstances. Yet the shit wages remain. Ok, minimum wage is now 23k. Whoopy doo. I'll ask a question with no judgement, and no right or wrong answer : Who should wr 'blame' for the system? The government and policy makers or the people on it who were acting rationally? As you said - the jobs themselves being advertised were like that. The companies themselves realised they could pay minimum wage, and the state topped it up, so no incentive for them to do more - especially as that obviously leads to larger profits. If they also worked out that they had to advertise 16 hour jobs to make that happen, then of course it's their 'fiduciary responsibility to maximise shareholder value' to do that too. Gordon brown of course is one, but the Tories I believe f**king love this system too, despite what they say. It's manna from heaven for their primary customers. Noone wins either way except shareholders.
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You know tax credits HAVE been scrapped yeah? And anyone who is still on it will be taken off it in 2024. Most have been migrated to UC by now. UC is no cakewalk in terms of hours etc - unless you can qualify for LCWRA, recipients will be hassled mercilessly. It is however still an active disincentive to work more and better yourself if you're on it. It's *worse* than tax credits in some very meaningful ways in terms of being a trap. The savings taper is a particularly contentious way to keep people from betterment. Anyway, these 'armies of people' are conduits of public funds to listed companies and landlords, through shite wages and rent floors. And that's probably by design, so I wouldn't expect it to change. The only thing that will be done is to demonise and demoralise the funnels of said funds further.
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Working Voluntary For CRUK
Frugal Git replied to Social Justice League's topic in House prices and the economy
Couldn't agree more 👍 Relative to someone doing care work as you said - I and many others like me are paid a silly amount of money because venture capitalists and stock market investors etc put a value on companies like my employer, people buy stuff and they need people to do some work. But let's be real - whilst I like to think I'm very good at what I do, most of this type of stuff is a bit 'dubious luxury'. It's not exactly going to get us to be interplanetary, it's not going to tackle poverty, more than half of the things made are pillaging the environment and not even adding to getting the average human towards self actualisation or something nobleole that. its probably actively hindering it. It's all a bit pointless indeed 😂 But of course, yeah, it's the bennies people who are to blame for the ills of the world 🙄 Even if they don't volunteer and just sit on their arse, at least they aren't out sitting in traffic for 1 hour per day spurting out carbon monoxide just to go and sit somewhere and do something for bits of fiat. -
I've noticed - and it's about time, house prices are an increasingly smaller facet of the overall issue - that more and more of the chatter on here is about the job market from the perspective of taxation, the philosophy of truly being rewarded for work, people increasingly looking for ways to optimise for their circs (benefits, part time, salary sacrifice) etc. The compression of the value of money for hours worked in relation to lifestyle is reaching absurdly low levels. The 'tax avoiders r us' manifesto will be written here hopefully. Stewy's plausibly fake new job on £200k a year don't impress me much. He might be crowing but I'd wager his lifestyle is barely better than a low level BT engineer of 30 years ago and probably with worse pension provision.
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Almost 10 million people between 16-64 do not work
Frugal Git replied to NoHPCinTheUK's topic in House prices and the economy
Sorry I should have been less subtle with what I meant; what you say is true of course. i meant a person regardless of pay could easily make a positive net contribution (perhaps non financial) to society in 1 minute of work, or 160 hours by crafting something worthwhile. Alternatively a person could do 1 minute or 160hrs of ‘stuff’, end up caning in money or whatever and pillaging society with their effort. -
Almost 10 million people between 16-64 do not work
Frugal Git replied to NoHPCinTheUK's topic in House prices and the economy
Great philosophical question. I suppose we could define working as making a ‘positive net contribution to societal progress’ in a sense. Possible to do in 1 minute per week, and possible that you could be doing a job for 160 hours per week and be doing the opposite.