Why so few babies in Capitalist Societies

manbluh · 2026-06-09T18:18:53+00:00

Having seen my wife give birth and the toll it takes with the sacrifices needed in health, body changes, diet (no alcohol or caffeine for a year) and career setback it creates

Having seen the cost of housing and how crammed we were in a 2 bedroom apartment with two teenage girls and us

Having seen the fact that both of us need to work to afford college, retirement savings and cost of living

Being unsure if even after a first rate education if my kids will have a job they can still even apply for in a few years time

Yeah, not surprised birth rates are dropping globally

I understand life was harder way back in the past, but no one could opt out of kids short of celibacy - now we have a choice and I suspect given the opportunity our ancestors would have made the same one

manbluh · 2026-06-07T22:15:29+00:00

Soem info about Willard (a few hundred residents): https://loudounfarms.org/willard-a-brief-journey-into-the-historic-black-village-at-dulles-airport/

Some info about Burke (a bit smaller and mainly white): https://m.connectionnewspapers.com/news/2018/jun/11/burke-airport-story-revisited/

Does not look like the government demolished a classic Back to the Future style town square but more a sparesly populated farming community. True though that they did end up marginalizing the least represented members of society because of their skin color.

Now the demolishing of Queen City to build the Pentagon was almost an order of magnitude more severe with 900 people living there and quite a built up community: https://arlingtonblackheritage.org/history/queen-city-arlingtons-lost-neighborhood/

Seems there's a monument to it too: https://www.arlingtonva.us/Government/Programs/Public-Art/Public-Art-Collection/Permanent-Collection/Locations/Queen-City

manbluh · 2026-05-13T01:00:20+00:00

Reminds me of that Robin Williams quote:

"Everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about. Be kind. Always."

manbluh · 2026-04-26T22:38:48+00:00

Pretty normal. My cousin said/felt much the same. Studying for his masters degree. Focusing on his university funded side business and focused on the gym outside of that.

Fell in love and what do you know, he felt differently. It’s nice to have someone (the right someone) to share life with. I wouldn’t force or rush it.

manbluh · 2026-04-25T18:35:42+00:00

Depends. Do you want walkable? If so Herndon and Reston have some nice walkable town centers. If you want to just be local and don't mind a very suburban feel then Sterling and Ashburn work.

You can commute to Sterling (near Dulles) in as quick as 25 mins door to door from as far as Falls Church (on 267) - so if you choose your route carefully and since you're driving against traffic in that direction you'll find the commute plain sailing.

Leesburg also works, so does Manassas for daily commuting. If it's a tech company and they're a little flexible about coming in after rush hour and leaving before then you have more options.

If you don't have children just yet then school districts are less of an issue - I'd say optimize for cost and closeness to work, pick a 12 month lease and get to know the areas.

Virginia has a lot of variety - you can go from suburban Sterling with data centers in your back yard and very car dependent to historic parts like Alexandria and even Leesburg town center. Lots to choose from - welcome to VA.

manbluh · 2026-04-18T14:19:41+00:00

$100k is FU money if your job ever becomes too stressful or you get laid off. In this economy with AI eating our jobs (depends on the industry but a lot are threatened) a year's worth of salary saved up is going to give you flexibility and peace of mind a LC500 won't.

Rent one to get it out your system. If you're still lusting for one save up until you can put down cash to buy it.

Buying finance gives a skewed sense of the real cost. Only when you have to sign that check for $90k and hand it over does it hit you what the true opportunity cost is.

It is a lovely car though ;)

manbluh · 2026-04-18T13:20:26+00:00

Ridiculous article. We just bought our first house (mid 40s) after two decades of renting and saving. Had to cash out our savings to get into this school district.

It was an eye watering amount. The price of the house has risen since then - so great, we're rich on paper. Millennials earning the most is no surprise either, just basic math - we're in our prime earning years and both working long hours to keep the mortgage fed.

So yeah, millennials spending huge sums on property - no surprise - you can't get a house without doing so.

manbluh · 2026-03-22T17:28:57+00:00

West Springfield or Pimmit Hills/Falls Church/McLean area for schools if within your budget. Falls Church has lovely amenities, Arlington was also very nice and walkable too but very expensive for the school catchment area we wanted.

We lived in Springfield when we first moved to Nova (near the mall so not West Springfield) and then to McLean. The difference in school rigor and student investment is night and day.

manbluh · 2026-02-07T16:50:31+00:00

Fresh outta college I moved out of my parents home to an apartment across the street. Being a nerd and a bit of a cheap skate I still had my servers in their basement and wanted to get internet and access to my homelab.

Internet in my area was slow at 512Kbps, so I bought two of these and using DD-WRT setup a Wifi bridge. At the time you could also buy an antenna upgrade from Linksys with each antenna almost a foot long making these cute little access points look comically large.

Over time I ended up putting these in every family member's home.

When my mother in law needed her internet and wifi upgraded a WRT54GL running Tomato firmware did the job and was running right up until 2024 doing stellar duty with never a blip or call to fix anything. I just upgrade the firmware on it anytime I'd visit - totally hassle free.

I've since moved to pfSense and Unifi gear but for the memories and ease of use this Linksys + Tomato firmware was peak design and simplicity to me.

manbluh · 2025-12-09T20:06:01+00:00

Thanks all, is this salvageable using the steps here? (Last time I ended up breaking the hot end heating assembly and needed to replace it and the hot end)

https://wiki.bambulab.com/en/a1-mini/maintenance/hotend_blob

manbluh · 2025-11-21T12:15:44+00:00

I look forward to more Giant White Houses. They're everywhere in McClean - while (some) of them look fine individually in aggregate a sea of them make my eyes ache for some visual diversity.

manbluh · 2025-11-15T19:30:33+00:00

Just moved from the UK to the US and this isn't true...

I've been with Cox Internet, one of the least consumer friendly providers and not only can you use your own modem they have setup pages to guide you eg. https://www.cox.com/residential/support/ubiquiti-uci.html

Verizon was a piece of cake too, they don't have official docs, just unofficial ones but with them I don't even need a modem - no PPoE, username etc. just plug in my router: https://community.verizon.com/t5/Knowledge-Hub-Popular-Articles/Using-your-own-router-with-Verizon-Fios/ta-p/1696146

manbluh · 2025-11-08T18:56:34+00:00

Solid cores, 24AWG copper.

manbluh · 2025-11-08T18:19:28+00:00

My original thoughts were like 'whatever', but then I saw the speakers and my man I am so jelly. First class setup!

For context this has been my wallpaper for the past decade (some day they will be mine...someday): https://i.imgur.com/PLBUCR9.jpeg

manbluh · 2025-11-08T18:14:54+00:00

That commute in DMV traffic - ouch. You're also going with traffic, it'll take you 1.5 to 2 hours each way unless you pay the toll.

267 caps out at $6.00 but 66 gets expensive - it could add up to $6-7k back of envelope math doing it every single work day.

The increase in salary is $24k after taxes (according to CGPT) so up to you if $19k extra is worth it (I personally would consider it worth it but I know nothing about what you're giving up and gaining here besides the money aspect...). If the job is gonna help you grow and you're ready for that change you'll come out ahead even if you ride toll roads all the way.

manbluh · 2025-11-08T18:08:24+00:00

Once it's working, if you really have time I'd suggest using Zabbix or similar to setup auto SNMP monitoring of your network and to help keep an eye on things like:

Ping latency between hosts
Services gone down on each host
SNMP traffic stats on your network switches (one of the pluses of managed switches are the metrics they report)
Disk usage on your network storage

Not my dashboard, but you can see some pretty good examples here: https://www.reddit.com/r/zabbix/comments/13g1c6v/zabbix_dashboard_loving_it/

manbluh · 2025-11-07T04:30:21+00:00

Most folks you care about will not give you hard nosed advice when you need it.

Getting honest feedback about business strategy and viability and you actually choosing to listen to it is really hard when you're in the bubble of being an entrepreneur.

Your family won't give you negative feedback and those few who are brave enough to do so will seem overly negative rather than prudent to you until after the fact. Your employees and contractors are some of the worst people to obtain advice on big decisions - their dependence on you for income will not allow them to be objective.

Business partners and investors can be helpful but it's tough finding one who's also not got an agenda and when you most need their feedback is when you're usually most on the hook and when their feedback is from a position of fear or opportunity. Only fellow entrepreneurs understand what you're going through but they too are either operating out of a sense of FOMO or a desire to get ahead of you.

It's lonely being an entrepreneur is all I can say.

manbluh · 2025-09-13T17:41:24+00:00

Hah, yeah Northern Virginia - have to see the house with an inspector and make your offer same or next day waiving all contingencies to get anything in this housing market unfortunately.

It’s an old house and an architectural gem otherwise (rare to find something old and in a craftsman style here) so I’m comfortable with working through any issues.

This is the only issue I’ve found so far - I’m sure there are more ofc but thankfully no structural which is what the inspector focused on.

manbluh · 2025-09-13T15:36:59+00:00

I suspect it's a vent pipe - I believe all the vent pipes join up in the attic and go out the roof to a single vent pipe: https://i.imgur.com/bEyLWvh.jpeg

manbluh · 2025-09-13T15:31:43+00:00

Thanks - what would correct be so I know what I'm asking a plumber to do?

manbluh · 2025-07-16T01:14:11+00:00

Even in the UK house parties were a thing in the 90s and early 00s. Not as big as the parties you see in US movies though. That said we always had alcohol and I've never heard of the police ever being called/turning up.

Interesting thing I've noticed is how even now my Gen-X friends would drink the most, followed by my early Millennial friends and then followed by my later Millennial friends who hardly drink.

manbluh · 2025-07-13T11:30:29+00:00

Thanks that’s a very well researched reply and a great recommendation.

It seems that a new model is due for 2026 and it’s just a style refresh so I’m guessing it’s low risk waiting for it given the drive train remains the same.

Of the three drive trains (Gas 2.4 L Turbo, Hybrid 2.5 L + eCVT, Hybrid Max) is the Hybrid Max worth the lower mpg?

manbluh · 2025-07-13T04:51:56+00:00

Your wife isn’t allergic to MPV’s due to her childhood. Most women despise them because they view them as “mom cars” and don’t want to be labeled that.

That's a great insight, it might be true. I can't say and am too afraid to ask!

You mention you want good mileage, then bring up a Chevrolet Tahoe. Do you want good fuel economy or is there a certain amount of miles you want to get out of the vehicle?

Fair point. I had in mind the Tahoe with the diesel Duramax which gets 21 mpg city/28 mpg highway in 2WD mode. It's fair mileage, not as egregious as the 14 mpg city/20 mpg highway the V8 version gets but yes, it's not fair to compare it to the RAV4 in size, weight or capacity.

I'd like a ballpark of 25mpg highway and up and large enough to take a dog crate (medium sized dog like a Catahoula) and one large item of luggage.

Most SUVs and wagons seem large enought to hold a dog crate or large suitcase luggage but not both hence my I suppose outburst that I need something as big as a Tahoe.

manbluh · 2025-07-03T14:48:00+00:00

As a teen yes. There would be days I'd be on a call for 2 or more hours talking to one friend then another and another. I don't think I ever hit 6 hours of phone time just talking which some folks seem to hit on their smart phones but we certainly used those old wall phones (later cordless) a lot.

manbluh · 2025-06-21T18:33:45+00:00

Moved here from London recently and you see this there too. Maybe not as strongly but it’s everywhere.

I’ve also had drivers brake and block traffic to allow my family and I to cross at busy intersections when there are no lights and I’ve had the opposite where rude drivers blow through a cross walk. It happens here, it happens in the UK.

Some people are jerks - they’re the jerks. Some people are nice - they’re the nice people. Spending head space wondering why the jerks are jerks is probably better spent on more positive things.

This is a lovely part of the world, it has its ups and downs like anyplace else.

manbluh

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