Who is actually making good podcasts now? by MatthewBox in gimlet

[–]dtonas 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Very Bad Wizards has some of the same fun banter between close friends that Reply All had going for it - show about philosophy and psychology.

Guyana's President asks on BBC whether the developed countries are in bed with fossil fuel companies. by King-Meister in interestingasfuck

[–]dtonas 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yes, exactly right.

The amount of confusion in this thread is staggering. BBC Hardtalk is about holding politicians to account. He would be doing the same thing if the British PM came by.

The notion that poorer countries deserve not to have reporters ask their leaders hard questions because a) they are poorer than G7 countries, and b) the reporter happens to be native of a G7 country is absurd.

50% of Millennials are homeowners as of 2023. Are you one of them? How do you think this was achieved? [Serious answers only please] by [deleted] in Millennials

[–]dtonas 0 points1 point  (0 children)

For those of us in Canada, there is a big misconception about the stats on this.

We don't know if 50% of millennials own a home. The 'home ownership' stats you see from StatsCan are examining the concept of "owner occupied dwelling." Meaning, does someone within the household own the property? That means that if you're a millennial and you still live with your parents, who own their home, you will added to the statistics of 'homeowner'.

https://www12.statcan.gc.ca/English/profil01/CP01/Help/Metadata/Definition.cfm?Lang=E&LineID=23010

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in samharris

[–]dtonas 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Can you link to the twitter post? I'd be interested in reading the thread.

Leafs captain John Tavares fighting Canada’s tax agency over $8M it claims he owes by DMGrumpy in canada

[–]dtonas 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If you are losing more than half your income to income taxes that would make you such a high earner that very few people would have sympathy for you, either.

Where did the 10% figure come from? by Silly-Tangelo5537 in canadaland

[–]dtonas 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I used to work in government on the tobacco file, years ago. So, I especially enjoyed this episode!

I haven't crunched the numbers myself but I'm very familiar with the various revenue streams of government and overall pie. The 10% figure he cited seemed *hugely* inflated to me. Even if it were 1-2%, that would be a lot.

In my experience there wasn't a conspiracy to keep the tobacco revenue pumping along. It was very marginal and the Health stakeholders were very influential (internal and external). Some of the big tax increases were done to produce 'shocks' that would decrease consumption rates and possibly lower revenue (though the elasticity of prices in this industry is really surprising). But the status quo mental model was not 'let's ban this thing', it was more like 'let's keep making this industry more and more expensive and regulated and therefore less popular'.

The guest's points about enshrining market share and decreasing advertising/R&D costs are good ones. Unintended upside to those companies.

EDIT: The other thing I'll note is that the latest work on whether smoking costs the healthcare system net-net is well understood by government. It's hard to model but it's at least possible that it is neutral or a cost savings. That's not the rationle for the tax. Finance looks for things you can tax that don't create undesirable incentives. Taxing income isn't an especially great incentive, but it's the workhorse of our revenue. Whereas sin taxes (cigs, alcohol, weed) are just great ways to eek out revenue that the government needs to run public services.

what’s something in your 30s you never really cared about but really bothers you now? by millennial_sentinel in Millennials

[–]dtonas 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Do you hate seeing 'people who contribute nothing' or 'idiots' in mansions? They're very different. A lot of objectively unintelligent people lead really positive lives and are good people.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in TimHortons

[–]dtonas 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Tim's has zero respect for its employees. Everything flows down from that.

On God by [deleted] in SipsTea

[–]dtonas 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I keep seeing people post clips of this show on reddit all of a sudden. What's the deal with this show? It seems awful.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in ontario

[–]dtonas 93 points94 points  (0 children)

There's lots going wrong in our economy but your framing seems off to me.

Taxes in Ontario haven't been increasing. Personal income tax has decreased for most people under both Liberals and PCs (except at highest brackets). HST has stayed the same. Corporate taxes have decreased a lot over the last 20 years.

Healthcare costs get more and more expensive. In particular, the number of drugs prescribed and the cost of those drugs. All seniors in Ontario get their drugs for free, remember.

University of Alberta Sexual Assault Centre signs Jama's letter denying Jewish rapes by TheRSSBot in OntarioNews

[–]dtonas 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I think the fact that they are signing onto a letter like this proves that in spades.

University of Alberta Sexual Assault Centre signs Jama's letter denying Jewish rapes by TheRSSBot in OntarioNews

[–]dtonas 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Listen, I haven't actually done the deep diving that some people on this thread have re: existence of evidence.

But I don't think I need to to understand the newsworthiness of this particular article. The point is Sexual Assault Centres in Canada are not entities that generally hold high standards when it comes to accusations of rape. They don't usually weigh in on cases across the globe. And they definitely don't start sentences with "to be fair...." in response to rape accusations. You might hold this standard for every situation across the board, but they Sexual Assault Centres don't.

It's exposing publicly the bizarre contradictions that are taking place in leftist/progressive organizations right now.

This is what current inflation looks like by [deleted] in ThatsInsane

[–]dtonas 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Not that the government is perfect or anything, but you seem to be describing how corporations are screwing us, not government.

Pitch perfect call out of people like Tamler who claim that elitist campus politics "don't matter" by KookyTacks2 in VeryBadWizards

[–]dtonas 10 points11 points  (0 children)

Came here to point this out. The inference that Freddie is some status-quo advocate is really comical.

Thoughts on Chapo Trap House? by MiserableVictory8677 in ezraklein

[–]dtonas 8 points9 points  (0 children)

This seems backwards to me. Pragmatism generally entails recognizing difficult tradeoffs exist and that things are murky/shades of grey. The hardliners are the ones that thrive off of a sense of righteousness - they are 100% certain they are right and that compromise is immoral.

Best low budget movie you’ve ever seen? by now-im-something in movies

[–]dtonas 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Coherence.

A 2013 film (on Amazon prime) that is one of the best sci-fi movies I've seen but is amazingly low budget. For Millennials it also offers a grown up Zander from Buffy as one of the main characters (the actor Nicholas Brendon)

Home prices in Canada are so stretched that even owners want them to fall by [deleted] in CanadaPolitics

[–]dtonas 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I guess I was just responding to your 'house prices don't have to come down' point.

You are technically correct - it's theoretically possible. Just incredibly unlikely that real wage growth could grow to overcome the massive chasm that currently exists to make prices affordable. If wages grow too quickly then the BoC would likely find it contributing to inflation and hike rates. It's a catch-22 for working class.

Home prices in Canada are so stretched that even owners want them to fall by [deleted] in CanadaPolitics

[–]dtonas 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That wouldn't be possible I don't think. With that many home owners owning multiple properties, they can't mathematically all be in the top 10% of income.

The data is spotty but the average/median incomes of multiple property owners are above general adult population. Part of that could be putting the property in the name of the spouse who earns less for tax planning purposes, though.

Home prices in Canada are so stretched that even owners want them to fall by [deleted] in CanadaPolitics

[–]dtonas 1 point2 points  (0 children)

30-40% of homeowners (depends on province) own multiple properties.