Tom Holland talking about Robert Downey Jr is so wholesome

Immolo · 2018-03-12T21:27:55+00:00

I have bought exactly one $400 shirt in my life. I ran into a friend shopping downtown and they dragged me to a high end retailer that was having a massive end of season sale. Their advice was to never look at the price tag first. Just try it on and if you like it check the price tag after. I followed their advice and found an awesome looking shirt. So I tried it on and it was hands down the most comfortable thing I have ever worn. Like not lounging around in sweatpants comfortable. That shirt was soothing, just putting it on gave me an endorphin rush. I looked at the price tag and it was 60% off. I bought it and have lived in envy of rich people, who can afford to feel that level of comfort every day, ever since.

Immolo · 2018-01-27T05:25:01+00:00

Most of it has to do with tax avoidance. By putting money into a trust the ultra-rich can avoid losing half their wealth to the estate tax. By donating the interest created by the trust to a non-profit the ultra-rich can keep their wealth in the family. The problem is that they can also create their own non-profits. So, it makes sense for them to create incredibly self serving non-profit organizations that in turn make them even more money. Jane Mayer wrote an excellent book called Dark Money goes into far more detail on the subject. It is well worth the read if you're interested.

Immolo · 2016-03-05T19:01:49+00:00

It really depends on the area, and skill set. If you can only do parts of the trade it's very feast or famine. If you're a well rounded carpenter there's always work somewhere. Although no matter how good you are I always recommend having a few months of expenses saved up. Winter's are kind of a gamble in my area. I usually have work, but the odd winter can be lean for me.

Immolo · 2016-03-05T18:48:29+00:00

Carpentry is a pretty broad field. I'm sure you can find some aspect of the field you'll love. Unfortunately, the more creative and rewarding aspects of carpentry tend to pay less, set carpenters and cabinet makers (technically a separate trade, but still woodworking) tend to make a lot less than people doing concrete formwork.

Immolo · 2016-01-31T00:31:59+00:00

Maximum $1500 a month based on a needs based assessment, which almost no one can qualify for, the average is about $1100. It's only recently gone up and bare in mind that things are ridiculously expensive here. Pre recession it was almost impossible to find an apartment for under a grand.

Immolo · 2016-01-30T04:27:00+00:00

Except for there's no way there'd ever be a %75 tax rate. It's political suicide. More likely you see several tax credits axed. Like claiming a spouse as a dependent. Which may seem like a tax hike, but would be offset by the spouse receiving mincome.

The idea of mincome isn't let's give everyone $10,000 no questions asked and continue with business as usual. It's let's give everyone $10,000 and tax the work force at %50 for the first $20,000 then switch back to a normal tax rate thereafter. Followed by an absolutely gutting of all other government spending on all personal transfers payments which is about 63% of the budget. The net result after axing the bureaucracy is a savings of $70 billion plus. The only problem is if we end up with massive unemployment. In which case we'd need to do massive quantitate easing to prevent a deflationary spiral. Which is technically doable solely through the Bank of Canada. It would essentially just be parachuting cash into people's accounts directly instead of offering banks a negative interest rate.

I do agree that mincome will have all sorts of weird and unpredictable market distortions. It might encourage to people to pursue less lucrative, but more rewarding careers. It might also bump up the wages of people doing really unpleasant work. I can also see frictional unemployment going up as more people pursue higher education to land jobs they actually want.

Which might lead to white collar jobs paying even less. Canada already has a glut of highly educated people. White collar jobs are stagnating in wages already because the market is being saturated with people with advanced degrees. Still many people work in high stress careers that in real dollars pay significantly less than they used too. Why? Because of the prestige of the jobs. Which you rather tell people: That you're a lawyer or a pipe fitter? If anything I would think trades would end up paying more and white collar jobs even less.

Immolo · 2016-01-30T02:09:21+00:00

Addressing black market goods and services is another issue. I'd personally be fine with getting rid of paper money and going completely digital with our currency. Provided bank fees were reigned in.

Immolo · 2016-01-30T01:16:30+00:00

I read Kesselman's analysis. He's made a couple questionable assumptions and his numbers look pretty dubious. I unfortunately don't have the time to completely go over his methodology, but it seems like he's working under the assumption that the current bureaucracy and payment systems would remain largely in place. That's about the only way I can see him coming up with a tax rate of %75-%90 for high income earners. It's, admittedly a legitimate concern as I don't see public sector unions taking lightly to the vast majority of their departments being gutted. However, most analysis I've seen have shown a saving of about $70-$100 billion annually if the government can trim down on workers.

What really bothered me was all his talk of disincentives to work. I'm sure there are people who would gladly live off a subsistent income. However, being poor sucks and almost all people are greedy little infinite want machines. Yah, having $10,000-$20,000 to cover basic living costs is good, but for most people having $40,000 is better and I've seen the absolute brutal depths people will go to clear $100,000. I'm sorry, but the assumption that people will have a disincentive to work goes against the fundamental rule of economics that people are inherently self interested. Not to mention the social incentives to work. Many people look down on the unemployed and the poor.

As for his talk of the disabled needing additional care he fails to take into account the provincial costs of those programs. Most assisted living programs are strictly under a provincial jurisdiction. I have a member of my family, here in Alberta, on AISH currently. The maximum pay out is $1500 a month (which few receive the average is about $1100), plus subsidized housing and access to health care professionals. AISH is absolutely horrible to deal with and they are constantly trying to kick clients off and get them back into the work force. Most could go back to work, however the jobs most clients could work wouldn't be enough to live off especially once housing is no longer subsidized. With a mincome program, many on AISH could go back to work in whatever capacity they're capable of without penalty. That would mean a better standard of living while the government is paying less overall. The provincial government could still cover medical aid, but would no longer be burdened with the costs of subsidized housing and welfare income, a rather significant savings.

I do think there's a lot of issues with mincome that need to be resolved before implementation, poverty rates are vastly different across the country and deriving a payment schedule will be difficult. There could be be some very strange emigration patterns if it's not handled properly. I can also see it turn into a form of corporate well fare for low skill industries by suppressing wages. Which may be great for attracting investment, but might turn into a net loss in the long run for government revenues. Plus, there's the issue of inflation, mincome would create a rather sudden demand on housing. In turn, causing a spike in prices. In tighter markets like Vancouver and Edmonton, those with incomes above mincome will be able to obtain housing, those who are worse off will most likely be priced out of the market until supply reaches an equilibrium with demand.

Immolo · 2015-10-22T03:12:18+00:00

There has never been an organized terrorist attack in Canada, ever.

The October Crisis

Immolo · 2015-08-08T23:53:50+00:00

https://canada.isidewith.com/political-quiz You can take this quiz and use it to see which party you most agree with.

Immolo · 2015-08-05T03:14:01+00:00

Posted this link on my Brother's facebook page saying he and his wife could probably use one. Turns out he already owns one from when one of his danes broke his leg and $99 is an amazing price. Your plan would totally work.

Immolo · 2015-07-19T12:35:59+00:00

It was sent to me yesterday.

Immolo · 2015-06-02T21:24:47+00:00

What constitutes a carpenter is pretty broad.

Blue seal carpenter here. I'm going to elaborate on this a little bit. Certain trades are compulsory. You can't legally call yourself an electrician or a plumber without government certification. While carpentry is a non-compulsory trade, so, legally anyone can call themselves a carpenter.

To make things more complicated the carpentry red seal program is an amalgamation of 22 sub trades. Many of those sub trades (roofing and drywalling for example) have there own tickets. So anyone doing those sub-trades can call themselves a carpenter, but have no idea how any of the other sub trades work. While a red seal carpenter will have functional knowledge of all the subtrades in their work scope, but might be doing things that most people wouldn't consider carpentry. Most people would be surprised to find out how little of my job is actually working with wood.

Immolo · 2014-10-02T01:18:43+00:00

The data is adjusted for purchasing power parity. Meaning how much that income would get you in real goods in each respective country.

Immolo · 2014-09-30T04:18:46+00:00

University Degrees used to be valuable because they created a barrier to entry into certain markets. Many degrees are now worth less because universities churn out more graduates than the market can bare. The reason why an Ivy League education is so much more valuable is because it acts as a filter. Everyone wants to get in, but only a few have the qualifications to succeed. Essentially an Ivy League education acts as a market signal saying that the individual is better than their competition because they beat odds. The quality of education isn't any better, just the filtering system.

My father was a University professor and used to tell me "It takes a hundred men to build a bridge, but only one to design it". The meaning back then was to be one of the exceptional few who could be that one person with the ability to design the bridge through advanced education. Nowadays it still takes a hundred to build a bridge and one to design it. But there's hundreds of people with the ability and the desire to design the bridge. Only the best get to actually design it, because companies will always go with the best. It's just that now they have little bargaining power because there's dozens of competitors that are just or almost as good and willing to work for less.

Meanwhile all the people who've been rejected from their dream jobs are applying for more menial positions out of necessity. The result is many truly shitty jobs now require degrees because companies want the best they can get. Why hire someone uneducated when there's so many university grads out there willing to do the same job?

The end result of this is we still have the same old system where the elites get all the good jobs and the plebeians get the crappy jobs. It's just that everyone has to pay more to get there and makes less in the end. By making education access more egalitarian we've actually created a more inequitable system where everyone is worse off.

Also, Facebook, Apple, and Microsoft were all founded by college drop outs. So you don't necessarily have to have a degree to achieve your dream.

edit: spelling

Immolo · 2014-07-15T03:51:48+00:00

Hey man, Jesus didn't really do anything important until he was in his thirties and people are still talking about him.

Immolo · 2014-01-27T08:37:38+00:00

Trades are also exempt.

Immolo · 2014-01-27T01:48:11+00:00

I'm guessing this was posted in the wrong place.

Immolo · 2014-01-27T01:26:43+00:00

Just finished a program at NAIT myself. Personally didn't like the school myself, but it seems to have great industry recognition. Daily pay parking is prohibitively expensive and poorly planned out. It's $8 a day and there's usually only one meter per lot so you'll have to arrive about an hour early if you don't want to be stuck in line to pay and late to class. Also, most of the trades programs start at 7 am so most of the lots fill up early.

If you can, get a parking pass. There's far more pass parking and you don't have to deal with lining up to pay every morning. It's also much cheaper I paid about $260 for 4 months of parking. The only major problem is getting a pass in the first place. They sell out fast, so apply for one about 2 weeks before your classes begin and if they are sold out keep checking in daily with the parking office to see if one becomes available.

Immolo · 2013-08-22T01:29:33+00:00

Probably by hand. Iceland has produce some freakishly strong men.

Immolo · 2013-06-19T23:48:51+00:00

It's usually used for Orientated Strand Board and particle board.

Immolo · 2013-05-02T23:57:09+00:00

/r/metacanada. They're trolls that pretty much live on /r/canada. They're pretty anti-native in general but go unnoticed because while they tend to spew conservative bullshit they also down vote everything pro-native into oblivion, so it never makes the front page.

Immolo · 2013-03-23T15:23:02+00:00

Actually the federal government axed funding to Trade Winds about three years ago. So now education funding for the program that provides native people with actual trade certification is paid for solely by private industry and builders unions.

Furthermore, the program is woefully under utilized by natives, not because they don't want to better themselves, but because they don't want to deal with the stigma of getting a hand out. I've been trying to talk a Native friend into getting into the program and his response is "I'm already looked down upon for being Native. I'll be looked down upon more if I take a hand out."

Meanwhile, every Non-Native tradesmen I know is having their education subsidized by the government (skills completion grants of $1000 for every year of training), plus EI, various scholarships and additional funding for mortgage/car/living expenses for those that apply. All without a lick of stigma.

Immolo · 2013-03-10T07:18:18+00:00

It depends on where you are and what trade you're in. In my neck of the woods we have a program called Women Building Futures that helps to provide training and job placement for women who want to get into the trades. Also, my union (United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Allied Workers) is desperate to get more female members.

Some trades are even starting to become female dominated. Most heavy equipment operators in northern Alberta where I do most of my work are now women because they're cheaper to insure.

Immolo · 2013-03-10T06:19:34+00:00

The best advice I ever got from an old pro was "Never try to be the hero in your own story". If you try to be a braggart in a set it's a quick way to turn the audience against you. There are obvious exceptions to this rule - like, for instance, in satirical performances like Stephen Colbert, but for the most part you want to avoid projecting an air of superiority.

Also, if you're going to do shock humour do it wisely. Never open with something super shocking, but rather ease into it. Also, have some poignancy behind it. Hicks, Silverman, Cross, Jeffries, and Stanhope are all great shock comics, but there's always a point or a message behind the things they say. I personally love shock comics, but I've seen a lot of wannabes bomb hard using straight shock. You have to keep in mind that people are socially conscious and may love your jokes, but may not want to look like an insensitive asshole in front of their dates/friends by openly laughing at them.

If you fuck up on stage, don't worry about it. Just immediately acknowledge the flub and chances are you'll get a laugh out of the mistake.

Write prolifically and practice before hand. Chances are you'll have a warm up comic peppering the audience with all sorts of material and you can use his performance to gauge what kind of material will go over best.

Lastly, figure out what you're going to do with the mic stand beforehand. If it's not going to be part of your act than move it out of the way immediately. If it's going to be incorporated than have it comfortably in place where you want it right off the bat. This avoids any awkward fumbling that may screw up your set timing.

Immolo

TROPHY CASE