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Yep that is the answer the Chicago police should give when the people complain about the violent crime on the west and south sides of the city because why deal with problems when you can just tell them to leave. Brilliant, effective leftist governing.
My home value is $260k that is about as low as you can get a decent small SFH for in an ok suburb.
That's certainly reasonable if you make at least 70k/yr and have some savings which it sounds like you do. Unfortunately the highest salaries are found in blue states which makes a world of difference come retirement time.
At the local level you're correct Democrats basically use your taxes to pay themselves lavish pensions in some places retiring as young as 50. Local governments basically get away with outright fraud as the oversight for them is much lower than the federal government. Here in CA have absurd hidden fees here for building permits that go right back in to feed the monster. Then people complain about cost of housing and homelessness...
At the federal level it's harder to say. Republicans fight student loan bankruptcy protections, science funding, education and helping the poor but end up running huge deficits with their shady pork/slush fund projects with military contractors. Pharmaceutical companies, hospitals etc likewise gauge consumers partially due to laws passed by Republicans that prohibit Medicare/Medicaid from negotiating prices. And then there's big agriculture subsidies.
I have lived abroad before and suggest you consider trying it. It's nice when your taxes actually pay for useful things like affordable healthcare, college, public transit etc. Accomplishing such things with the greed of the US populace and the 2 party system (as opposed to a multi-party parliamentary system for the people) seems impossible.
That's certainly reasonable if you make at least 70k/yr and have some savings which it sounds like you do. Unfortunately the highest salaries are found in blue states which makes a world of difference come retirement time.
At the local level you're correct Democrats basically use your taxes to pay themselves lavish pensions in some places retiring as young as 50. Local governments basically get away with outright fraud as the oversight for them is much lower than the federal government. Here in CA have absurd hidden fees here for building permits that go right back in to feed the monster. Then people complain about cost of housing and homelessness...
At the federal level it's harder to say. Republicans fight student loan bankruptcy protections, science funding, education and helping the poor but end up running huge deficits with their shady pork/slush fund projects with military contractors. Pharmaceutical companies, hospitals etc likewise gauge consumers partially due to laws passed by Republicans that prohibit Medicare/Medicaid from negotiating prices. And then there's big agriculture subsidies.
I have lived abroad before and suggest you consider trying it. It's nice when your taxes actually pay for useful things like affordable healthcare, college, public transit etc. Accomplishing such things with the greed of the US populace and the 2 party system (as opposed to a multi-party parliamentary system for the people) seems impossible.
You've given yourself a lot of leeway there.
Some examples:
1. When corrected for local dollar values the notion that blue states have the highest paying jobs becomes unclear and literally incorrect in some cases. Relative to the national average $1 is worth minus ~35% in NY, minus ~26% in CA, minus ~28% in DC and plus several percent in several states.
2. So far as republicans fighting science funding.........Texas, which has been run by republicans for decades through something called CPRIT, is the number two public funder of cancer research in the country behind The NIH.
3. Quick analysis of larger European economies pushes the notion that paying for lots of things via taxes is better for everyone into the rubbish-pile. Italy and Spain seem mired in states of near permanent stagnation. France is only a little better.....both Germany and France even with all the largess you admire have educational problems and poverty metrics very similar to The US. Free college in Germany has already failed once and appears to be falling apart a second time.
What your employer spends isn’t part of your income though.
What your employer spends on health insurance coverage *IS* part of your total compensation package, it is a benefit. There are countless studies that show as employers have covered more of the health care burden, wages have grown more slowly.
What your employer spends isn’t part of your income though.
Quote:
Originally Posted by RJA29
What your employer spends on health insurance coverage *IS* part of your total compensation package, it is a benefit. There are countless studies that show as employers have covered more of the health care burden, wages have grown more slowly.
1. When corrected for local dollar values the notion that blue states have the highest paying jobs becomes unclear and literally incorrect in some cases. Relative to the national average $1 is worth minus ~35% in NY, minus ~26% in CA, minus ~28% in DC and plus several percent in several states.
2. So far as republicans fighting science funding.........Texas, which has been run by republicans for decades through something called CPRIT, is the number two public funder of cancer research in the country behind The NIH.
3. Quick analysis of larger European economies pushes the notion that paying for lots of things via taxes is better for everyone into the rubbish-pile. Italy and Spain seem mired in states of near permanent stagnation. France is only a little better.....both Germany and France even with all the largess you admire have educational problems and poverty metrics very similar to The US. Free college in Germany has already failed once and appears to be falling apart a second time.
1. Dollar Values do mean something at a certain level for professionals. Padding your 401k with pre-tax money is much easier when you make 100k in a blue state metro even with high rent vs 60k in a low cost of living area with lower rent (I've experienced this exact scenario first-hand). Also, social security is paid based on your nominal salary. If you have low wages it's better to live in a red state however. So you can take your money later during retirement and stretch it much further in say South Carolina than NY or CA.
2. Texas has pockets of blue too so there's balance. It's actually a well-run state fiscally and has decent schools. Let's not get into Trump gutting the CDCs funding, hiring scientists to head the EPA that think it's all a sham, or the state of science education and jobs in Mississippi or West Virginia however.
3. Northern Europe is doing quite well (my German friends laughed at the idea their college system was failing) and places like Denmark regularly win happiest citizens award. But I was actually thinking of places like Australia or Singapore. Presumably as an American with an education you can choose the best countries. Southern Europe has had a poor economy for decades. France is mixed depending on your skillset.
Another generalization that doesn’t make sense to many. For example, my income in 1985 (in California then) was double the amount shown, and my housing cost then was far more than health care and vehicles combined. We were a family of 4 then, 5 as of 1987. We had no college cost, my wife and I both worked and paid our way through college and graduate school. Health care today is a very small portion of our expenses, with good employer plans, back in 1985 it cost us a lot more than now.
The cost of college has increased to the point of just working your way through isn't possible anymore. From CNBC, "Students at public four-year institutions paid an average of $3,190 in tuition for the 1987-1988 school year, with prices adjusted to reflect 2017 dollars. Thirty years later, that average has risen to $9,970 for the 2017-2018 school year. That’s a 213 percent increase." I worked my way through college too, but no way could I do it now.
Healthcare costs have increased substantially as well. So if you are paying less than you were in 1985, then you are basically a unicorn in the US. Here's information from 2016:
"According to eHealthInsurance, for unsubsidized customers in 2016, “premiums for individual coverage averaged $321 per month while premiums for family plans averaged $833 per month. The average annual deductible for individual plans was $4,358 and the average deductible for family plans was $7,983.”
That means that, last year, the average family paid $9,996 for coverage alone, and, if they met their deductible, a total of just under $18,000. Meanwhile, an average individual spent $3,852 on coverage and, if she spent another $4,358 to meet her deductible, a total of $8,210.
These figures do not take into account any additional co-insurance responsibility she might have."
None of this pays any attention to the fact that the middle class often has a totally unrealistic expectation of what life should look like relative to their incomes. It's like they think there was this ideal time maybe in the 1950s or 1960s when everyone just had way more money to spend and life was grand. Have they known people from this era?!
When my dad grew up, and most of his friends, it was extremely common for kids to share a bedroom, for an entire house even with a family of 5 or 6 to be no larger than 1,800 square feet, and often smaller than that, for the family to have just one car, for there to be a common family TV, just one, in the living room, nobody had a computer, nobody had a cell phone, nobody went on international vacations unless they were insanely rich, and a family trip meant driving to the beach or the lake or going camping. Families didn't eat out much, they cooked at home far more often. That was middle class life!
Now, you have Millennials sitting here posting pictures from their international travels, having lots of affordable options with hostels and AirBnB and backpacking, they posted those pictures from their brand new smart phone, now they check the comments and likes from their laptop, they have at least a 50" TV, their own car, they eat out often and take an Uber to the bars for drinks with friends. Then at the end of the day, they complain that life is just hard, it's so unfair, they barely have any savings at all, they have student loans to pay off from their unnecessary Russian lit or gender studies degree, and it's all because rich people and big evil greedy corporations won't pay enough money and they deserve better!
Where is the sense of reality here? Who said that middle class should mean you buy the newest phones, get every streaming service, eat out all of the time, go on crazy trips, and all of this nonsense?! Even having kids, that is a CHOICE, a luxury item of the highest variety, it is not a human right for you to create yet more people the world doesn't need. If you can afford to have them and want them, great, but these studies, "Family of 4 can't survive on average income from one wage earner in large cities!" OMG, STOP THE PRESSES! That is craziness, how DARE a family of 4 people can't survive on a single unskilled worker's wages?!
Does reality touch some of these liberals at ANY point in their lives or do they just live totally apart from reality in fantasy land?
1. Dollar Values do mean something at a certain level for professionals. Padding your 401k with pre-tax money is much easier when you make 100k in a blue state metro even with high rent vs 60k in a low cost of living area with lower rent (I've experienced this exact scenario first-hand). Also, social security is paid based on your nominal salary. If you have low wages it's better to live in a red state however. So you can take your money later during retirement and stretch it much further in say South Carolina than NY or CA.
2. Texas has pockets of blue too so there's balance. It's actually a well-run state fiscally and has decent schools. Let's not get into Trump gutting the CDCs funding, hiring scientists to head the EPA that think it's all a sham, or the state of science education and jobs in Mississippi or West Virginia however.
3. Northern Europe is doing quite well (my German friends laughed at the idea their college system was failing) and places like Denmark regularly win happiest citizens award. But I was actually thinking of places like Australia or Singapore. Presumably as an American with an education you can choose the best countries. Southern Europe has had a poor economy for decades. France is mixed depending on your skillset.
1. False. Local dollar values are important along the entire income spectrum.
2. There is no real blue/red balance in Texas and it's been been this way for decades. And the blues have literally nothing to do with CPRIT. Blues have railed against CPRIT for many years.
3. I'm betting you don't really have friends in Germany.
I disagree. In 2020, more households than not are dual income and this chart does not reflect that.
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