• 2 Posts
  • 23 Comments
Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 19th, 2023

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  • I don’t think anybody here is siding with ISPs. We’re just happy to hear that they’re having difficulties policing piracy.

    When I say individual rights I mean any and all rights an individual has or should have. In the case of piracy, an individual should have a right to entertainment media at a reasonable cost. The more corporations increase the cost of media access, the more piracy proliferates. In the case of AI, an individual should have the right to earn a living. Corporations are using the works of individuals to ultimately increase their own profits without due compensation to the individual.

    I don’t know how you got to pro conservative capitalism from a single anti-corporatist statement, but it likely took you several leaps of logic that I’m not going to even try to follow.











  • Hm, interesting.

    I can also have images when trying to figure certain things. For example, if I’m moving then I will have images of where to place boxes and furniture in the truck or in the apartment, but these images are typically combined with words like “if I put this here, then…” Or if I’m trying to remember where I put something then it’s memory combined with “after I got home I…”

    In fact, the easier a problem is, the fewer words I use. But when something is really stumping me, the words are more prevalent. And angrier. More like “This doesn’t make sense! If the positive and negative are both connected then power should flow through. Maybe this f*cking thing is broken”








  • Getting older means losing mobility, dexterity, and mental acuity. It’s not a question of if you will need assistance, it’s a question of when you will need it. Most retirees go on living independently for as long as possible until an event. Sometimes they set the kitchen on fire, sometimes they get in the car and get lost, and most often they fall and break a hip. Once they hit this event it changes their life dramatically.

    The best case scenario is that you will have enough money to afford 24/7 care after your event. Idk what the current rates are, but 10 years ago it was $25/hr for CNAs and $50/hr for RNs. This means that the cost to have a CNA care for you around the clock was over $200,000/yr. This doesn’t include the additional costs of food, shelter, utilities, insurance. I’m sure that things haven’t gotten any cheaper.

    The best case scenario is that your $1M nut grows enough to cover all your expenses before you die. Every other scenario means you will run out of money. So it’s really a question of how long you intend to live.


  • My scenario focuses solely on interest income for simplicity’s sake. There are other investments one can make to increase your gain, but such investments are more volatile. You could end up doing quite well and increasing your nut, or you could invest in the wrong stock and lose a large chunk of it.

    I also left out other considerations for simplicity’s sake like the fact that most retirees are couples and past the age of 65 the odds that one of you will require significant medical treatment increases every year. Some elderly couples are getting divorced so as to only bankrupt one of them when this happens.

    Life is messy and $1M will only work in the best case scenario. It’s just not realistic. By allowing people to think that $1M is enough, you’re actually leading them into ruin. We need to be aware that retirement is becoming a dicey proposition and we should be taking steps to ensure that the elderly will be provided for in the coming decades, especially since a large number of millennials won’t have children to make sure they are properly cared for.

    Source: I worked in the elder care industry in Florida for a decade. I saw what happens when people run out of money.


  • This isn’t how retirement works.

    If you try to retire on $1M you’re going to end up in a medicaid facility. Interest rates are high right now, so $1M in the bank may get you as much as $5,000/mo if you’re lucky. This is $60,000/yr and can be supplemented with social security to allow a person to live well enough at today’s cost of living.

    However, inflation is a constant and is ideally restricted to 2-3% per year. This means that every year you live after you retire, your spending power is reduced by at least 2%. So even if interest rates stay high (they won’t) then by the time you hit 85 your $60,000/yr will feel more like $24,000. This will still be supplemented by social security, but you will also find that your needs are increasing by this age and you will likely need to start using your savings to pay a lovely nurse or two to help with, well, everything. In-home care and even nursing facilities are quite costly and will eat away at your savings, so if you only have $1M you better start dying soon after needing them.

    This all assumes best-case-scenario. It doesn’t account for runaway inflation rates, pandemics, recessions, catastrophic events (it’s not uncommon for the elderly to accidentally set things on fire), or other possibilities that can take a bite out of your retirement savings.

    When your money runs out you won’t be kicked out on the streets, thankfully. But a medicaid facility in the US can be nearly as dangerous for the elderly.