8,000,000,000 people!

[BeepBoo]

And I already pointed out that discussions of cheapness as it relates to "green solutions" are a function of quality of life and can't be separated from it. Again, you're welcome to climb down and admit you can't actually support your argument.

So tell me, if I can ignore externalities because I can insulate myself from them, is that not also a function of quality of life? Why do you get to write that off?

Or, as is more likely, you never have anything you deem sufficiently wrong to make it worth the cost of your deductible outside your annual visit.

Again, not sure why you think that. I go in exactly whenever I need it. Cost doesn't play a role. A few doctor visits a year would be like $300 out of pocket per visit since it would be below my deductible. Chump change for my peace of mind (If I even had to pay for such an exam... most of my friends are doctors of various disciplines). If I had a concern, I'd do it.

[Shadowferal]

Just like the op...it's all about you.

[Elegiac]

So tell me, if I can ignore externalities because I can insulate myself from them, is that not also a function of quality of life? Why do you get to write that off?

I can write it off because the wealth that allows one to insulate yourself from the externalities of what you consume is already in excess of the level of wealth that actually has a meaningful difference on your life outcomes in terms of happiness, health, ability to raise a family, etc. Being made to foot a portion of the complete cost of what you consume would not necessarily impact those outcomes.

Again, not sure why you think that.

Because you come off as the kind of person who'd actively lie about their lifestyle in order to service their political positions. Maybe if you didn't express such manifestly egotistical and sociopathic beliefs I'd be more charitable.

[BeepBoo]

I can write it off because the wealth that allows one to insulate yourself from the externalities of what you consume is already in excess of the level of wealth that actually has a meaningful difference on your life outcomes in terms of happiness, health, ability to raise a family, etc. Being made to foot a portion of the complete cost of what you consume would not necessarily impact those outcomes.

"Live smaller because *I* decided you can maintain a good-enough quality of life while contributing more"
No thanks.

Just like the op...it's all about you.

No, but it is about giving people the opportunity to decide for themselves exactly how many people they do or don't care about and the ability to use their position in life to the fullest extent they desire/are capable of.

If it were all about me, I wouldn't have bought my 6 friends who are worse-off event tickets this past weekend.

[Elegiac]

"Live smaller because *I* decided you can maintain a good-enough quality of life while contributing more"
No thanks.

Nah, it's more "live slower and smaller because it makes you less of a misanthropic twat while having the benefit of not exploiting others while destroying the environment for future generations."

[Endus]

I'm giving you an opportunity to pick whatever good you want so we can compare.

Why pick? Let's look at cost of living, which covers a wide range of goods and collects them to even out cases where Good A is cheaper but Good B is more expensive;

https://worldpopulationreview.com/co...ing-by-country
Second link (same data but map only covers CoL and is easier to read gradations on): https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-livin...by_country.jsp

The USA's is higher than most. A literal handful of standouts in Europe with more expensive costs of living, but mostly in northern regions with poor farming potential, which the USA doesn't have the excuse of. The USA is not comparatively cheap to live in. That's something you're making up. It's not true.

Public transit isn't something I'd ever utilize willingly.

Literally only true because American public transit is largely designed to suck. If you wouldn't use mass transit in, say, London, England, you're an elitist of the most performative and useless sort.

Education is hard because while a lot of EU colleges are "free", you also can't buy your way into them and have to be a good student to get access.

Stated like that's somehow "a bad thing". You listed two good things. Not a tradeoff between a good and a bad thing.

I'm trying to stick to cost of goods and quality of life from a materialistic standpoint 1) because that's easier 2) because that's the "quality of life" I'm personally interested in.

And you're still objectively wrong on those costs.

- - - Updated - - -

No, but it is about giving people the opportunity to decide for themselves exactly how many people they do or don't care about and the ability to use their position in life to the fullest extent they desire/are capable of.

You don't get that "opportunity". This is literally the reason government exists. If you don't want to live in a society, go carve out a log cabin in the woods and live off the land. If you do, you don't get to pretend you're free to make whatever choices you want.

At this point, you're literally arguing against the entire concept of government and rule of law, while simultaneously absolutely insisting you benefit from it.

[BeepBoo]

The USA is not comparatively cheap to live in. That's something you're making up. It's not true.

Cheap to live LAVISHLY in being the key determinant there. Also, it's pretty obvious I'm talking about a litany of my personally desired lifestyle choices and situation of "upper middle class in single-family detached homes land."

Again, pick some goods and not just some arbitrary "total life picture of what someone determines as 'reasonable' QOL."
The article you link even talks about the issue with the data at the end. Specific goods makes it easier to do a direct comparison.

"For example, the item "shoes" could list the price of basic sneakers in one country and the price of brand-name basketball sneakers in another, which would throw the comparison off balance. Even an item as simple like a dozen eggs can be problematic. Eggs can be white, brown, or blue; can have various sizes; and can be organic, free-range, Omega-3 or vitamin-enhanced, and so on. Each of these factors influences price, which can confound country-to-country data comparisons."-your article

Literally only true because American public transit is largely designed to suck. If you wouldn't use mass transit in, say, London, England, you're an elitist of the most performative and useless sort.

Nice opinion. I'm driving my car because I like cars, driving, and flexing. So, I suppose that second thing.

Stated like that's somehow "a bad thing". You listed two good things. Not a tradeoff between a good and a bad thing.

Nah. I'm a fan of people being able to compensate for their weaknesses by using their resources to do so. Meaning I'm a fan of people being able to buy their way into college even if they're not able to get there on merit alone. That's the point of having excess resources.

At this point, you're literally arguing against the entire concept of government and rule of law, while simultaneously absolutely insisting you benefit from it.

The entire concept of government and rule of law past a certain point, yes. You have your own lines in the sand and I have mine.

[Endus]

Cheap to live LAVISHLY in being the key determinant there.

Really not interested in entirely imaginary and bullshit attempts to move goalposts.

Again, pick some goods and not just some arbitrary "total life picture of what someone determines as 'reasonable' QOL."

No. I'm not going to cherry pick things out of context. You get to deal with the whole thing. Cherry-picking is intentionally dishonest.

The article you link even talks about the issue with the data at the end. Specific goods makes it easier to do a direct comparison.

"For example, the item "shoes" could list the price of basic sneakers in one country and the price of brand-name basketball sneakers in another, which would throw the comparison off balance. Even an item as simple like a dozen eggs can be problematic. Eggs can be white, brown, or blue; can have various sizes; and can be organic, free-range, Omega-3 or vitamin-enhanced, and so on. Each of these factors influences price, which can confound country-to-country data comparisons."-your article

Which means if I picked "shoes" as my "specific good", it would be much harder to make a reasonable comparison. Congratulations, you quoted a passage that explains why your approach doesn't work, and you somehow didn't recognize that.

Nah. I'm a fan of people being able to compensate for their weaknesses by using their resources to do so. Meaning I'm a fan of people being able to buy their way into college even if they're not able to get there on merit alone. That's the point of having excess resources.

You're literally describing corruption. Bribing a college to let you in because you can't meet the entry standards. And you think that's a positive.

The entire concept of government and rule of law past a certain point, yes. You have your own lines in the sand and I have mine.

Not "past a certain point". You're arguing against any point. Except for all the bits you insist have to protect your position. You're completely hypocritical on this point.

[BeepBoo]

When your point boils down to "America is easy to live in when you have so much superfluous cash that entire metric of challenge is nullified", you should just admit you don't have a point, because everywhere is "easy" to live in following this same methodology, and worst case, you have the cash to leave. . .

My point isn't that it's easy to live here. My point is that at comparatively lower percentiles of wealth, you get more stuff compared to most of Europe.

Say it takes 90th percentile wealth in EU to get a 3000sqft detached house with premium fixtures, two luxury cars, and luxury goods like boutique PC, newest iphone, etc. In the US, it would be something like the 75th percentile of wealth.

[BeepBoo]

Which means if I picked "shoes" as my "specific good", it would be much harder to make a reasonable comparison. Congratulations, you quoted a passage that explains why your approach doesn't work, and you somehow didn't recognize that.

Not what I mean at all. I mean SPECIFIC goods, as in brand and all. Like "NVIDIA GTX4080" or "IPHONE 14 pro" or "Honda civic" or something.

You're literally describing corruption. Bribing a college to let you in because you can't meet the entry standards. And you think that's a positive.

Colleges don't have those types of minimum entry standards here. You apply to them and they decide if you get to come or not. They don't really have a "set" number of slots available, for instance. Medical school, OTOH, works more like european colleges, and it likewise is strictly based on performance. Why are you trying to restrict access to college so much? If someone wants to go to school and can shell out for it, more power to them. Everyone who is well qualified here gets in, as well. A lot of them even get full ride scholarships.

Not "past a certain point". You're arguing against any point. Except for all the bits you insist have to protect your position.

Oh.. so you mean like.... a certain point? ANY point is "a certain point." I think government should exist to stop and protect against murder and property theft/damage (there's more, but I digress). That's definitely "to a point"

[Coolface330]

This is why the video game series Wakfu theorized there is no Good and no Evil -

Just growth and regulation.

Too much growth in an enviroment can lead to ecosystem extinction.

But the overtly opptimistic and blind - "Just shoot out more kids! Spread your genes! It's what your parents did blindly!" When even a basic video game like Anno 1800 can teach you, you grow too fast, too stupid, and literally everyone dies with you.

Which was actually, historically, a common cause for war. The Danes bred beyond control, had no farm land no nourishment, so they resorted to war with their newfound population growth to make ends meet. Which isn't exactly a universally applicable, recommendable tactic. "Just go to war to solve your problems - hopefully you kill them before they kill you!"

But it does make you think, that even murderers and sociopaths, could be puppets to the Human Race's demand to cull the population.

[Endus]

Not what I mean at all. I mean SPECIFIC goods, as in brand and all. Like "NVIDIA GTX4080" or "IPHONE 14 pro" or "Honda civic" or something.

Still cherry picking, still dishonest. Particularly as some of those aren't even directly comparable; a Honda Civic that you buy in Berlin is not the same as the Honda Civic you buy in Albuquerque.

Colleges don't have those types of minimum entry standards here.

They absolutely do, they're just willing to forgo them for money. That's all American schools changed; the willingness to accept money in exchange for admitting students who don't meet academic standards. It may be legalized, but it's still fundamentally bribery. You're just pro-bribery since you're part of the class that benefits from bribing people.

[Cthulhu 2020]

I legitimately don't know what you're trying to say or indicate here, but the reason most things are able to be made cheaper is because it's the easiest way to do something. If you're talking about exploitative labor of people, "green" ways of doing things don't magically get cheaper just because you start paying everyone more.

But then people have more money to spend on more expensive goods that aren't produced via slave wages.

The price of the green solution goes up equally.

The only people who think that prices will go up in EQUAL AMOUNTS as compared to wages has absolutely zero fucking idea of how economics or the market works. A significant rise in wages only increases the price of goods minorly. Consider that the price of most goods is only single digit percentage based on labor. The only way in which prices would increase at the same rate as wages would be if everything ever had a 100% cost of wages. No labor, no shipping, no overhead, no nothing else. Only goods and services whose price are 100% labor go up with the price of labor.

If you start trying to force externality costs into goods, that's effectively removing choice, because you're trying to encourage behavior and stop people from doing the easiest/cheapest thing by tacking on artificial costs that don't arise from the simple economics of the creation of the good.

"If you don't give people the choice of whether they want to support 25 cents per day wages in china or living wages in the US..."

Yes yes we get it, a certain political sphere loves to support slave wages because they don't personally make enough money to support at home living wages. Which is ironic, because if everyone started getting paid more, they could all afford those goods that cost slightly more overall.

Also, before you say that organic US grown etc etc. goods cost so much more than cheap chinese goods, that price increase is not due primarily or even minorly because of wages. There's a lot more expected of US companies. Safety conditions in working cost a lot of money. So does abiding by other safety regulations.

- - - Updated - - -

Moreover, "goods being cheaper" is not automatically an indicator of improved quality of life for one simple reason: planned obsolescence. Cheaper goods tend to be significantly less durable, meaning that people ultimately need to buy more of them to the point there's not actually a net reduction in cost for the consumer; all the while generating vastly higher amounts of waste. "Green solutions" entail higher product durability which can and does ultimately save people money over the long term. See: Boots Theory.

This is companies throwing out the concept of replaceable parts for increased profits. Sell someone a tool that will last them 20 years for $400 as well as being easily repairable, or sell them a tool that will last them 2 years for $75. Most companies these days have opted to have cheaper goods that cost less but wear out and break far easier, and often do not offer repair solutions.

Some people don't even realize it, but the natural progression of capitalism has made many goods objectively worse because it makes the companies more money to make them more easily breakable.

[Shadowferal]

Cheap to live LAVISHLY in being the key determinant there.

The op said clearly in the inflation thread that here in the US people can live off of $5/hr. He has never said how that's possible. Maybe you can answer how.

[Daedius]

Global climate tackling by politicians with more taxes on everything, but no one wants to address the overpopulation that drives up emissions with increased demand of resources and land for living or agriculture causing deforestation...

[PC2]

but no one wants to address the overpopulation

How do you address something that isn't real?

that drives up emissions

That's fine because the value created by the additional people on the planet is higher than the negative effects of their emissions.

with increased demand of resources

We can always create more resources as long as people keep choosing to create more knowledge.

and land for living

There is a large abundance of livable land for people and there is massive room for improvement when it comes to the density of cities.

or agriculture causing deforestation...

For that we just have to figure out how much value is created by a natural area compared to the value that would be created by developing the land for human activities. There will be some cases that go in different directions, sometimes a natural area is already in its optimal state and sometimes it is not and needs to be developed.

[XDurionX]

How do you address something that isn't real?


That's fine because the value created by the additional people on the planet is higher than the negative effects of their emissions.


We can always create more resources as long as people keep choosing to create more knowledge.


There is a large abundance of livable land for people and there is massive room for improvement when it comes to the density of cities.


For that we just have to figure out how much value is created by a natural area compared to the value that would be created by developing the land for human activities. There will be some cases that go in different directions, sometimes a natural area is already in its optimal state and sometimes it is not and needs to be developed.

Oh boy, i can't even decide which of these claims is the most wrong.

[PC2]

Oh boy, i can't even decide which of these claims is the most wrong.

If you believe there is a problem here then what is the solution?

[Calfredd]

If you believe there is a problem here then what is the solution?

Toxic positivity and inaction due to "let's not fix the problems now because people in the future will fix it for us!" certainly aren't the solutions.

[PC2]

Toxic positivity and inaction due to "let's not fix the problems now because people in the future will fix it for us!" certainly aren't the solutions.

No you've got things backwards. People like you are the ones being toxic because you're trying to convince us that the population is a problem, which isn't true. People should be viewed as a solution and not the problem.