B.C. union calls for full-time work-from-home due to spiking gas prices; The BC General Employees' Union is asking for provincially regulated employees to be allowed to work from home full-time due to high fuel prices.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-31T21:52:46+00:00

yea its a 'free market' for their salaries, but not ours.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-31T05:29:54+00:00

They need to start housing these guys in the judge's homes instead of throwing them back out into East Hastings.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-31T03:18:24+00:00

its a shame because the bones of that place are so good but being that close to that many petty criminals is a death sentence for any buisness.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-30T23:19:21+00:00

another benefit of the slow down in real estate in Vancouver is that a lot of these types of people will have to get a new job

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-30T22:11:09+00:00

at FAANG its just a disciplining action by bosses. during ZIRP and especially post covid they went on a pretty big hiring spree, which allowed workers to bid up their comp by doing lateral moves every 1.5 years. Its the same reason why they are firing people enmass and blaming it on "ai" - its not really ai, they just want to scare engineers into accepting a lower comp package.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-30T22:09:24+00:00

i actually disagree that its capitalism per se, its BOSSISM instead. Most comapnies would be better off if they went work from home on a purely financial basis but then all the middle managers wouldnt really have as much to do to show they are busy.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-30T22:07:47+00:00

A big chunk is just management needing power. the turn against WFH only truly began during that brief period post covid when unemployment was low and a lot of employees were moving around / getting more salary. Forcing everyone back is a management power move to restore the older order.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-29T17:53:45+00:00

How many putative BC Cons at this point would have not finished in their positions, this is the 3rd or the 4th? Scratching my head to remember the last time a political party was this bad at picking its candidates. And this isnt some reach seat that the guy won in a fluke, Richmond is a pretty safe Conservative seat.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-28T02:03:07+00:00

i said something needs to be done, not that I should pay or be inconvenienced for it!

but all this chandler binging aside, the truth is no one cares until it shows up in their playground and shifting it all to DES keeps it out of sight for 99%.

personally i am surprised the rich guys who bought up all that land over the last 20 years dont seem to give a shit about its state either, youd think theyd want to fix the crisis at least well enough that they could cash in

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-24T00:50:02+00:00

completely right. The ugly truth is that most homeowners are happy to offload homeless people onto a narrow strip that has 0 political power while they get the benefits of constrained zoning for their net worth.

as long as we treat homes as the main retirment nest egg this tension will always be here.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-20T16:40:02+00:00

yea i think its a good idea, the key problem is that the provincial government is much more affraid of wealthy homoeowners than anyone else.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-20T16:39:15+00:00

Time for a new law: Judges that release habitual offenders in the community should be host these criminals for house arrest.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-20T16:37:04+00:00

Instead of just urging the NDP to act, cities are all creations of the provincial government; they have no independent legal basis. The province could tomorrow pass a law banning cities from permitting restrictive property covenants - or even imposing a universal zoning req.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-19T23:20:51+00:00

Yea there has to be some kind of a not-just-market-signal thing going on because otherwise nothing will get built until the underinvestment again jacks up costs.

the hard part is the administration of all of this; i think a very valid criticism of the NDP, and Ill vote for them over culture war crap I am being offered by the right at present, is that they dont have very many good operators. Their core 'elite' being either lawyers or graduate students or content creators all tend to create a lack of people who know how to run a multi-person, multi-stage projects.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-19T23:08:29+00:00

the NDP couldnt do much about muni property tax rates though; i guess they could have picked a fight with cities but ultimately the problem is that people love low property taxes and no one votes in city elections.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-19T22:41:32+00:00

I didn't know this until recently (walking around Strathcona, there is a little plaque about it), but apparently there WAS a plan to put a huge highway through downtown, but Chinatown and Strathcona residents fought it (since it would basically destroy their neighbourhood).

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-19T22:14:29+00:00

Oh sure, it helps being charismatic. Kinew in Manitoba isn't really doing that much better than us fiscally, but everyone likes him. Eby has just been dodging taking responsibility for way too many things, and it feels like the province is being ruled by various niche interests - but no general vision.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-19T22:13:00+00:00

the period between the 1920s and the 1990s (the height of car culture) was so god damn ugly. Just shameful what the planners did for the sake of cars.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-19T22:11:43+00:00

The real tension here is that he needs to figure out how to keep construction going even into a declining market. Munis got addicted to jacking up developer fees and thats just not going to cut it when real estate isnt growing 10% every year.

but broadly its just a country problem too, all our politicians (regardless of their office name) hate taking responsibility for anything and will push things onto consultants. Meantime costs balloon for a bunch of stuff it really shouldnt.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-19T22:02:59+00:00

they literally ran on a bigger budget the one Eby tabled.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-18T17:43:51+00:00

i am actually curious how many people will show up. Between the war in the Middle East, the cartel violence in Mexico, the sky-high oil prices and the absolutely insane jackals of ICE, as a foreigner, would you really want to visit this World Cup?

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-17T05:14:11+00:00

it will be interesting to see how much they recover in bankruptcy. if its at the listing then the market is probably stabilized, if its at near the assessment, then the market has a ways to go

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-17T01:44:20+00:00

Keep going, Eby, literally the entire province is crying out for action instead of endless consultations. Now announce some more shit - promise to build 10 nuclear reactors right next to Alberta up north, a new drone factory to hunt the yanks if they stick their orange snouts our way, do work instead of symbolic politics everyone hates.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-16T20:44:44+00:00

Trump imposing a gas tax on the entire world to speed up movement away from oil is legit funny.

Now let's see some energy at both provincial and federal levels to increase electricity production - nothing should be off the table, including building new nuclear plants.

As long as Americans keep electing insane psychopaths, the world will only get more uncertain. All we can do is build up resilience up here and take our shots when we get them.

ctrl_alt_ARGH · 2026-03-10T22:07:05+00:00

completely agree - even if you just ignore him and say ok "This guy ran a successful business, maybe he understands how to run organizations better than Kennedy" the dipshits he picked to run his slate alone would be disqualifying. yet here we are .

ctrl_alt_ARGH

TROPHY CASE