PhD Economics, University of South Carolina, 1989. Research: economics of terrorism, ecommerce, real estate, and education. Libertarian nutcase. Christ's Church
Joined July 2018
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JohnVonEcon, Bastiat's First Apostle retweeted
I just bought a $1999 refrigerator.
It would have been about $1649 if not for the federal tariffs tax which I (not “South Korea”) paid.
I also paid $155 in sales tax.
Total cost $2154. Of which 25% is tariff tax and sales tax.
To pay for it, I had to earn $3,420 in gross salary, of which $1266 went to fed and state taxes.
So for $3,420 in labor I got a refrigerator worth $1,649 (48%).
52% went to the government in taxes.
Truth, @WriteGrlProbs
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JohnVonEcon, Bastiat's First Apostle retweeted
Yes, or their self-funded employers pay us or their cost sharing organization.
GKS
JohnVonEcon, Bastiat's First Apostle retweeted
For those of us smarting a bit from the election, at least we have (what's sure to be) an amazing new season of Rings of Power to look forward to.
JohnVonEcon, Bastiat's First Apostle retweeted
“God is non-binary!”
Why are you refusing to use His preferred pronouns?
We're doing OK without your advertisement. But thanks.
The mormon church spent $1M & the catholic church spent $300,000 to fight against women having access to comprehensive healthcare in Idaho, with the mormon church requiring a letter be read during sunday services to pressure members to vote against access to care.
Shameful.
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JohnVonEcon, Bastiat's First Apostle retweeted
It's not the Iran war or the tariffs or the immigration raids or the tax bill or any other event or decision.
The single best predictor of Trump's popularity at a given moment is the number of days he has been in office.
It's a linear trend down.
My guess: Now the Democrats go absolutely nuts and in 2028 their debacle will be about 80% of the 2026 Republican debacle.
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Why didn't anyone think of this before?
businessinsider.com/mark-zuc…
JohnVonEcon, Bastiat's First Apostle retweeted
Most people see 496 million people lifted out of poverty as a good thing, but sophisticated people know to be concerned that the gains were "uneven."
Only if everyone's income rises by exactly the same amount can it be just a good thing.
India saw about 496 million people lifted out of poverty between 2011 and 2023 in one of the world’s fastest declines in this metric, the World Bank said, although the gains remain uneven. bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
Sounds like it was almost a protected structure, so it was almost illegal to destroy it.
Like if someone bought alcohol on the day they turned legal, they were almost illegal, so if enough people got mad about it, they should be arrested for underage drinking.
In April 2015, developers illegally demolished London’s historic Carlton Tavern, a 1920s pub that was just days away from receiving protected heritage status. The owners reportedly intended to replace the building with luxury apartments, believing the consequences would amount to little more than a financial penalty.
However, the demolition sparked widespread public outrage, prompting Westminster City Council to take legal action. Rather than allowing the developers to move forward, authorities ordered them to reconstruct the entire pub at their own expense, carefully preserving its original design and incorporating materials recovered from the rubble.
Following a restoration reportedly costing between £3 million and £4 million, the Carlton Tavern finally reopened in 2021, nearly identical to its original appearance. The remarkable case became a rare example of developers being legally required to rebuild a historic structure after unlawfully destroying it, turning an attempted demolition into an extraordinary victory for architectural preservation.
Amelia Earhart disagrees.
As @BeccaBsarro pointed out, there have been over 25k fatal plane crashes since 1962 and only one of them was piloted by a woman. You people are embarrassing yourselves because you’d rather shit on a dead woman than take two seconds to find out that actually, plane crashes are a male problem >99% of the time, and fatal car crashes are caused by men >75% of the time.
Gee, I wonder if there’s some male trait like recklessness or insane overconfidence that makes men such bad pilots and drivers.
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In the free market, 40 times more is spent on consumer goods. Including military spending, 7 times more is spent on consumer goods.
nitter.gq/i/grok/share/bGVnYWN5_…
Capitalism doesn't promise that businesses will take care of you. It allows you to take care of yourself through production and trade.
There may or may not be more money in weapons than butter. The point is that there's still money in butter, which creates an incentive to produce and sell it.
The profitability of one product doesn't eliminate the profitability of another. Markets aren't limited to producing whichever single product offers the highest return.
And who's the biggest customer of the weapons industry? Governments.
You're blaming capitalism for businesses satisfying government demand while imagining that giving governments greater control over production would solve the problem.
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Here are my jobs/ages until I got my first real adult job. Some of these are summer jobs and one is a Christmas break job. I put the starting ages on them, but some continue for years, like tutor, office worker, teaching, teaching/research assistant, and night watchman.
Painting rocks and gluing googly eyes on them, selling them at art shows/flea markets where mom sold paintings. (10)
Arranging flowers in a bottle and on driftwood, selling at the above venues. (10)
Selling the weekly Grit national newspaper. (13)
Mowing lawns. (13)
Night watchman at Kenner and Stevens Funeral Home (weirdest) (15)
Bagboy/stockboy at Mac's Big Star in Jena. (16)
Gas station attendant at Billy Richardson's place. (17)
US Census worker (1980), final sweep (17)
Council on aging, carpenter/plumber helper (18)
Another gas station (18)
Carpenter's assistant (18)
Oil field worker (roustabout) (19)
Attendant at car wash and gas station (20)
Calculus/Statistics/Chemistry tutor (20)
Office worker (gopher/typing/etc) 21
Teaching assistant to professor (22)
Teacher of university courses as a grad student (24)
Research assistant to professor (26)
University professor (27)
My first paycheck came when I was 22.
That's normal in Japan. Many high schools don't allow part-time jobs. You study. Then one day you're an adult with a salary and a tie.
My coworker Doug's first job was delivering newspapers in Iowa. He was 11. Before school. In the snow. On a bike with one working brake.
$14 a week. He bought a fishing rod. He still has it.
So I asked around. Mowing lawns at 9. Detasseling corn at 12. Babysitting at 10 for "a dollar an hour and all the cereal I could eat."
I want to hear yours.
How old were you?
What was the job?
What did it pay?
And what did you buy with the first money you ever earned? 💵
(Mine was a tie.)
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