Forum Replies Created
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main idea(s)
• working people create supply and demand
• retired people create only demandthe “main idea” should also include the fact that the boomer generation has in general saved up a ‘yuge’ nest egg (According to the Federal Reserve data total net worth for boomers is $78.55 trillion)
just saying the boomer generation can’t take it with when they eventually kick the bucket, so they are opening down their nest egg,…
I’ve never taken a formal economics class BUT something the public at large needs to consider is baby boomers hold 51% of all wealth in the United States. [Source: Federal Reserve]
given the facts it should not take a rocket science degree to grasp the simple idea that the ‘yuge’ segment of wealthy of the boomer population, is the root cause of inflation
the inconvenient truth is American boomer because of their cumulative wealth and post WWII consumer mindset,… are “leading the way” toward a troubling future
PS the reason I’ve including this specific info-graphic is because it should make people (especially economists) realize that raw commodities (e.g. fossil fuels, water, various minded metals, lumber, etc.) to produce consumer goods have been used up since the post WWII consumer boom,… so the remaining scarce supply of raw commodities in turn pushes up the price for finished consumer products
https://www.unep.org/news-and-stories/story/were-gobbling-earths-resources-unsustainable-rate
<div id=”accel-snackbar” style=”left: 50%; transform: translate(-50%, 0px); top: 50px;”></div>The first EV I purchased was a two wheel electric beach cruiser,… rode it around for a few years but wanted an EV that was freeway legal that also could carry a few bags of groceries
So pre-covid put in some venture capital into a startup that designed and produced something classified as a motorcycle (but with three wheels),…
Thought the startup was going places (especially since Hollywood types were on board with the concept)
Sigh,… unfortunately the vehicle failed to catch the public’s imagination AND the Chinese made OEM components were not made to last, so basically am writing off a bunch of money “invested” along with the vehicle (because I can’t find electrical components needed to make the thing operate)
Basically at the moment the only EV I want to buy,… isn’t for sale in the USA
<div id=”accel-snackbar” style=”left: 50%; transform: translate(-50%, 0px); top: 50px;”></div>…What about “porn star” being a statistically significant career? I mean, with the availability of OnlyFans these days, it’s not really porn in the strictest definition. Some of these people make a fortune and cut the middleman producer right out these days.
…Doesn’t matter what your profession is. If you spend more than you make, then you’ll be broke when your career ends.
FWIW after reading the comment(s) about a “porn star” and long term financial planning, first thing that I thought of is the comedy scene
“…I’ve saved 42 grand, its in treasury bills earning interest, figure I have three more years on my back, I’ll have enough to retire on”
Ophelia (Jamie Lee Curtis)
https://videocelebs.net/jamie-lee-curtis-nude-trading-places-1983.html
perhaps Hollywood should make a comedy sequel to the movie (kinda like “risky business”) where Ophelia is the “millionaire/madam next door”
borrowing from real life news, the movie sequel plot would have Ophelia running an aspiring “teen” modeling agency
the comedy (aspect) would be the shenanigans of three amigos,…(a financier who is a good friend of a software company billionaire AND the last character in the movie is a no talent ass clown politician who is a sex addict and big narcissist),… trying to cover up their sexcapades
<div id=”accel-snackbar” style=”left: 50%; transform: translate(-50%, 0px); top: 50px;”></div>What about it blowing up and causing necessary economic harm?
As a client of First Republic (for over a decade), thought their customer service and business model was solid,… what I neglected to factor in is poor planing and panic (by others)
Basically was careful to structure my own deposit accounts so things were covered by FDIC insurance (but seems 2/3 of First Republic deposits were NOT covered by FDIC insurance)
The other thing I found out is unlike many other First Republic clients, I actually paid down the mortgage principal,… whereas from what I gather a great majority of other First Republic clients structured their mortgages as interest only (the reason being most people wanted to max out cash on hand AND/OR were not planning keeping their properties more than seven years,… so why pay down a loan when the RE market is going UP & your planning to flip into something else)
Long story short First Republic was a regional bank that worked to accommodate people in unique financial situations (e.g. the “Eagle Community home loan program”)
https://www.creditkarma.com/home-loans/i/first-republic-bank-mortgage-review
…which is something I didn’t see at Chase (full disclosure I have business accounts at both Chase AND First Republic and of over a decade have been using them both in parallel,… during the period of essentially zero interest rates)
https://www.macrotrends.net/2015/fed-funds-rate-historical-chart
Actually when news broke (in march 2023) that FRC was dramatically down and various banks put together a 30 billion dollar unsecured lifeline
…figured that was a good sign, so bought shares of FRC @29 (thinking it was a bargain)
What I didn’t factor in and only realized after the fact that bonds various banks (have on their balance sheets) have lost 600+ billion in market value (AND is the explosive debt charge that just needs a spark to set things off)
I lost some money betting that FRC was a fluke,… sad truth is, it wasn’t’!!!
<div id=”accel-snackbar” style=”left: 50%; transform: translate(-50%, 0px); top: 50px;”></div>[quote=barnaby33]Over the course of my short (very handsome) life I’ve watched San Diego go from a massive exporter of fruit and veg to an almost total importer because of the cost of water. It’s not even subtle. That shift while maintaining supply was only possible because oil was cheap. Well now were running out of water and gas/oil/energy are relentlessly climbing in price. A lot of the bleating I hear about cost of living increases is food. That food all has to be imported because we don’t grow it here, why?
– Expensive land
– Expensive water
– Too many people (which is why the aforementioned are expensive)Maybe dog will bless us and end the drought, but I doubt it. We should probably have a plan B.[/quote]
A Colorado River Doomsday is inevitably going to happen,…
The only way to avoid A Colorado River Doomsday is when elected political leadership and something like 90+% of the public at large admit and understand there are limits to growth (i.e. grasp water is a limited natural resource),… in addition to people taking into account the scientific idea of feedback loops
[quote]
…faced with doomsday projections from the Bureau of Reclamation about major reservoirs, officials agreed that harmony has not yet extended to how best to address the shortfalls triggered by more than two decades of drought, which have dramatically constricted both the river’s flows and water storage…Officials from seven states — Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming in the Upper Basin and Arizona, California and Nevada in the Lower Basin — spent three days publicly discussing which state or region must bear the brunt of any reductions, and privately deliberated on a multistate agreement.
Faced with a Feb. 1 [2023] deadline to provide an agreement to the Interior Department — and potentially circumvent a federally imposed fix — water managers acknowledged in interviews with E&E News they are still short of a deal.
[quote]
In his time at the California State Water Resources Control Board, Max Gomberg has witnessed the state grapple with two devastating droughts and the accelerating effects of climate change.Now, after 10 years of recommending strategies for making California more water resilient, the board’s climate and conservation manager is calling it quits. The reason: He no longer believes Gov. Gavin Newsom and his administration are willing to pursue the sorts of transformational changes necessary in an age of growing aridification.
[quote]
Irrigation accounted for most total withdrawals in the CRB [Colorado River Basin], excluding instream use for hydroelectric power and interbasin transfers, averaging 85 percent from 1985 to 2010.http://pubs.er.usgs.gov/publication/sir20185049
[/quote][quote]
With agriculture responsible for roughly 80 percent of California’s water use, many question the practicality of crops that cannot be fallowed and the viability of producing food for export.[quote=barnaby33]Phaster I vehemently disagree, it’s “self inflicted,” not “self inflected.”
We are about (at least in my area) to get a 25% rise in the price of water, not because of shortages, but just to fix our pipes. Dios mio I can’t imagine the usage charge increases that will come on top of that.
Josh[/quote]infrastructure does not last forever AND infrastructure needs to be updated to keep water safe to drink
sigh,… people here in the USA have no clue what it is like to live w/ out a safe and abundant supply of water
I actually have a somewhat different take on the price of water since I’ve had the opportunity to travel in other parts of the world where there was not a safe and abundant supply of water
ever hear how fucked up Venezuela is???
the reason I mention Venezuela is because they have lots of oil reserves and really low gas prices ($0.02 USD/Liter)
http://take-profit.org/en/statistics/gasoline-prices/venezuela/
point being the power that be don’t want to raise gas prices because this appeases the citizen’s enough to keep the politicians in power BUT the trade off is an economy that does not functional very good over all
sadly as I see things, seems politicians here in the USA do pretty much the same thing as politicians do in Venezuela,… simply stated politicians do their best to suppress the prices of various natural resources like gasoline and water, which keeps everyone happy for the short run,… BUT over the long run this really fucks things up
WRT to the issue of “self inflicted” wounds,… actually suppressing the prices of various natural resources like gasoline and water, keeps everyone happy for the short run,… BUT over the long run this really fucks things up,… an example is “aridity”
which is caused by Big-Ag wanting to make as much profit as possible in the short term
[quote=USGS]
Irrigation accounted for most total withdrawals in the CRB [Colorado River Basin], excluding instream use for hydroelectric power and interbasin transfers, averaging 85 percent from 1985 to 2010.http://pubs.er.usgs.gov/publication/sir20185049
[/quote]ever consider looking at the economically suppressed gasoline and water price problem in terms of military command doctrine (when it come to fighting a war)???
since a picture is worth a 1000 words
…point I’m trying to make is, basically politicians, business interests and consumers all around the world are operating at the “tactical” level,… here everyone wants to try and lock in as much short term gains/profits as possible,… BUT few are pondering the “operations” level of of war AND essentially no one is considering the “strategic” (i.e. big picture) level of of war
when no one has the “strategic” (i.e. big picture) level of of war, it is impossible to win a war,… for example WRT the Colorado River Basin, which is the key water supply for 40+ million people, since politicians, business interests and consumers don’t want to give up their gains, there is a very real possibility than the water will be all used up (because no one will care and the water will flow from taps, up until the point there is no more water in Lake Powell, Lake Mead, Lake Mohave, etc.)
FWIW here is a news item that appeared on todays front page of the SDUT
[quote]
Growing fears of ‘dead pool’ on Colorado River as drought threatens Hoover Dam waterThe Colorado River’s largest reservoirs stand nearly three-quarters empty, and federal officials now say there is a real danger the reservoirs could drop so low that water would no longer flow past Hoover Dam in two years.
That dire scenario — which would cut off water supplies to California, Arizona and Mexico — has taken center stage at the annual Colorado River conference in Las Vegas this week, where officials from seven states, water agencies, tribes and the federal government are negotiating over how to decrease usage on a scale never seen before.
Outlining their latest projections for Lake Powell and Lake Mead, the nation’s two largest reservoirs, federal water managers said there is a risk Lake Mead could reach “dead pool” levels in 2025. If that were to happen, water would no longer flow downstream from Hoover Dam.
“We are in a crisis. Both lakes could be two years away from either dead pool or so close to dead pool that the flow out of those dams is going to be a horribly small number. And it just keeps getting worse,” said Tom Buschatzke, director of the Arizona Department of Water Resources.
He said there is a real danger that if the coming year is extremely dry, “it might be too late to save the lakes.”
[quote=spdrun]Looks pretty, but the rear windows seem like they’re claustrophobic as hell, and not good for visibility. What looks pretty from the outside isn’t always terribly functional.[/quote]
the shape of cars like the pious are due often times are due to the fact that designers want the vehicle to have the lowest aerodynamic drag as possible because low aerodynamic drag means lower engine power is needed to propel the vehicle forward for a given speed,…
said another way lower engine power requirements mean increased gas mileage
outside visibility is another engineering design consideration, which is why the older exterior design of the pious has a rear window, that made the overall appearance “functionally ugly” (but helped the drivers “situational awareness”)
since consumers are vein,… sex appeal (over function) is a trade off many are willing to make
With the new sex appeal of the pious, pretty certain the its going to be very popular w/ consumers,… even though the 2023 pious redesign isn’t going to be as functional or reliable (I mention this because the outgoing design of the pious used NIMH batteries which are more robust than Lithium-Ion batteries which are more energy dense)
