Disclaimer: This is a rant. It will probably be long, and it will definitely cover multiple subjects. They will all have a common theme: Why the US is no longer a free country.
First let's talk about children. Specifically, let's discuss "free range children." Evidently some parents let their children roam further without supervision than other parents are comfortable with. And, those other parents take offense at this! Now, I totally understand throwing people in jail and taking their kids away, when they are starving their kids, beating them, or otherwise actively abusing or neglecting them. There are some things all children are entitled to. One of them is learning to do things on their own. No one has any business criticizing a parent for how they choose to do this, unless there is a very high probability of serious harm. Here is a news flash for anyone reading this who just said, "But without supervision, the child could be kidnapped." This happens only extremely rarely! For comparison, 22% of children in the US live in poverty. Poverty has repeatedly proven to cause serious harm to children. Letting your kids go a mile to park and back several times a week has an extremely low incident of harm (fractions of a percent), and most of the time, the harm done is very far from serious. All laws and social media attacks on these parents do is take away their freedom to teach their children responsibility in the best way they know how.
So, here is all of my advice to all of those entitled idiots who get involved in Twitter and Facebook attacks of any parent who let's their kid stray more than a few feet from the house without constant supervision: If you really care about the well being of kids that much, get off of Twitter and Facebook, and spend some of your time and money helping the 22% that are definitely being harmed by being in poverty. If you cannot bother to do that much, then please, shut up!
Now let's talk about putting kids in jail. In fact, let's talk about putting kids in jail for breaking school rules and some non-criminal legal violations. Evidently (I did not know this), while it is a crime for a non-minor to provide a minor with alcohol, it is not a crime for a minor to drink alcohol. It is illegal, but it is not a criminal offense. Naturally, this explains why so many minors in the US end up getting put in jail with actual criminals for drinking. Recently, a Virginia youth who happens to be autistic was charged with assaulting a police officer. What was the officer doing? He was detaining the boy illegally, for breaking a school rule. Further, the rule broken was an unofficial rule that applied only to the boy. The school made a rule that this boy was not allowed to leave his classroom until all other students had exited. When he chose not to follow this rule, the school administrators asked the police officer to step in. The police officer did so (despite the fact that no laws had been broken and there was no reasonable suspicion that a law had or would be broken) by attempting to force the boy to go to the principal's office. The boy attempted to escape, and the officer tackled him (wait, who is getting charged with assault here) and arrested him. By all counts, the officer was illegally detaining the boy, and then the officer assaulted the boy when he attempted to escape the illegal detention. Now, let me ask you one question: Since when do schools get to legislate laws? Is this how it works in a free country? We put people in jail for doing things that are not strictly crimes, and we allow schools to legislate highly specific laws without even documenting them. Right, and then we protect the police officers that enforce these "laws" and press charges against the victims. This does not sound like a free country to me!
Now I want to discuss one that is not related to children (at least, not directly). Did you know that if a well dressed man in a business suit decides to take a quick nap on a bench in the park during his lunch break, nobody cares! If that one does not surprise you, maybe this one will: If a man wearing dirty clothing that is not quite his size tries to do the same thing, he will be fined or even arrested! Since when do police in a free country treat people differently based on how they are dressed? I mean, think about it. The guy with the nice suit is doing the exact same thing, but because he has nicer clothing, he does not get in trouble. The fact is that in most cities where this happens, taking a nap on a park bench is not illegal. Homeless people don't get charged with "sleeping on a park bench illegally." They get charged with "disorderly conduct," which happens to be disorderly only because they are homeless and cannot afford clean, well fitted clothing.
Now, I understand the concern. No one wants their beautiful park to be tainted with a bunch of dirty, poorly dressed bums (if you just nodded your head to that sentence, shame on you, you horrible unfeeling bigot). If that is the case, then fix it. No, I don't mean fix it by discriminating even more against American citizens with the same legal rights as you that happen to have fallen upon hard times. I mean, buy them nicer clothes, help them find jobs, help them rent an apartment, or at least write your appropriate government representative a letter explaining how they have a moral responsibility to make sure that poor American citizens are not starving on the streets. If you want your park and your city streets to be beautiful, without people wearing old, dirty clothes, do something real about it. If all of the bums have nice clothes (which are not that expensive, you miserly scrooge), then you won't have to look at old, dirty clothes every time you walk by them. If all of the homeless people have homes, then you won't have to see them sleeping on the park benches. If everyone has sufficient food, then you won't have to see the lines outside the soup kitchens or the people handing out food to all of the bums in the park. You can fix it! Even if you don't have much money (who am kidding: if you have the time to complain and worry about this, you have enough money to help), you can still write letters to your mayor, your city council (heck, attend the meetings in person), you state legislature, your state governor, your Congressmen, and even the President. Instead of trying to push all of the homeless people out of your city (which, just for the record, will make you a murderer in my eyes, because they will probably starve or die of exposure out there), doing something real about it. Freedom is not just for the rich. The US is supposed to be a free country for everyone. As long as we are discriminating against the poor, the US is not a free country.
Alright, that is about it for now. I could discuss a lot more topics, but I am tired, and I have run out of steam. Maybe another day I will read a bunch of articles that remind me of how entitled and deliberately blind the middle and upper classes in the US are, and then maybe I will rant again. Thanks for listening, and please take my advice. Instead of buying that new yacht, think about all of the homeless people making your city ugly, and go out and buy them all a new set of clothes (and, it will be way cheaper than the yacht).
20 April 2015
09 April 2015
Missouri SNAP Restrictions
One Missouri state Representative, Rick Brattin, recently drafted a bill that would restrict what food stamp recipients in the state could buy with their SNAP benefits. Besides the fact that imposing new limitations is against Federal law, there are many problems with this.
The specific restrictions the bill would illegally impose include prohibiting the purchase of "cookies, chips, energy drinks, soft drinks, seafood, or steak." Brattin complains that he has seen people buying products like lobster and fillet mignon with their food stamps, and evidently he takes offense at this. In fact, he takes so much offense at this that he is willing to challenge Federal law by passing an illegal state law to prevent this.
The real problems with this bill are not related to Federal law at all, however. There are health implications as well as a question of discrimination. Besides that, expensive foods that are sometimes regarded as extravagant can easily be part of a very frugal diet.
"Seafood" is a huge category of foods, and nutritionists currently recommend eating at least two servings of fatty fish per week. Many recommend twice that, but since fatty fish are typically the more expensive types (salmon, for example), and many Americans cannot afford to eat it more often than that, they say twice a week is enough for a reasonably healthy diet. This bill would defeat the purpose of the SNAP program. The acronym stands for "Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program." If seafood is prohibited, it might as well be renamed SCAP (Supplemental Calorie Assistance Program), because a significant part of the "nutrition" part is being thrown out over whether poor people should be allowed to eat traditional rich person food.
This brings up the next problem. This is very blatant discrimination against the poor. This Representative seems to believe that poor people should not be allowed to eat traditional rich person food. He is acting like some kind of elitist foodie who cannot stand to see the rabble eating his precious steak and lobster. Now, I understand why energy drinks would be prohibited, as they are more like medication than food. Likewise, soft drinks are barely food (let's ban water too). Chips actually provide a decent amount of calories (at a very low cost per calorie), and with the recent discovery that diets high in plant oils are very beneficial, chips can be part of a very healthy diet (in moderation). Prohibiting cookies is absurd, as they typically contain a lot of healthy components, despite their higher than average sugar content. The steak restriction is even more absurd. Yes, people on SNAP probably should not be eating fillet mignon every night for dinner. If they are, then it is the state's fault for giving them far more SNAP money than they need. Real SNAP recipients do not eat steak and lobster dinners on SNAP regularly (because they cannot afford it). If Brattin did not actually see how those buying these products on SNAP used them, then he has no business judging them.
Let me share my personal experience with this matter. My family is on food stamps, and while we have never bought fillet mignon on food stamps, we have bought cheaper steaks and we buy about two lobsters each year. For our New Years dinner, we have also been known to buy a few crab legs. When we do this, we carefully budget our food stamp money so we can afford it. Would Brattin deny us this opportunity to learn good financial skills? (Actually, we are not poor due to poor financial skills. For the most part, we manage our money quite well, but apply this to the many people on food stamps who do benefit from the experience.) The steak is almost never cooked as whole steaks. Once in a while, I make an oriental beef and broccoli dish, which calls for one pound of thinly sliced steak. At $5.99 a pound (and we rarely buy it without a dollar or two discount), with $1 worth of broccoli and maybe $1 worth of rice, all seven of us eat a fairly nice (and healthy) meal at a cost of $8 or less. That comes out to about $1.15 per person. Most Americans spend two to three times that on a meal. Obviously, we could use chicken instead to get it under $1 per person, but would Brattin really be so petty as to deny us quality in our meal for a few cents, even though we already spend far less than the average? Evidently he would.
Now, the lobster is usually for special occasions, like anniversaries. Even we consider it a bit extravagant, which is why it is a once a year thing. Like I mentioned, we carefully budget for this. It seems rather absurd that the state would interfere in our food buying choices, when we are already being so careful not to abuse the system. Now, I recognize that others may choose to abuse the system, but punishing us for it is just plain wrong. Further though, lobster is actually not that expensive. On sale, where we live (Idaho, so not close enough to the ocean to make it seriously cheap), it is $4.00 for a medium sized lobster tail (we don't buy whole; the price is higher while the meat to shell ratio is lower). Not on sale it costs more like $5.99 a tail, though in the winter it sometimes gets up to $7.99. We don't buy it when it is not on sale. Now, we could probably eat lobster once a week without extravagant spending. Consider this: I can make a lobster sauce with one $4 lobster tail that is enough for the whole family (did I mention, we have 5 kids, so that is 7 people). Over rice (about $1 worth; I would actually use pasta, which might come out to $1.50 or $2.00 total), the entire meal could be $5, with maybe another $1.50 for some kind of canned or frozen vegetables. At $6.50 for the whole meal that is 93¢ per person (the flour, milk, and spices used in the sauce are almost negligible in cost). That is a meal with lobster that costs less than $1 per person. With pasta instead of rice, it would come out closer to $1.08 per person. We could eat that every day and not spend all of our SNAP money!
The point here is that even the most expensive foods can be part of a very fugal and healthy meal. Unless Brattin can prove that this is not how those people are using their purchases, then he is totally out of line condemning them for extravagant use of SNAP benefits. Even expensive fillet mignon or crab legs can be integrated into a meal that costs far less than what the typical American spends. In fact, even caviar could be used this way, though I have a hard time believing anyone would actually do this with caviar (I am not going to judge though). Anyhow, judging people based on what foods they are buying is stupid. Instead judge them on how they use the food that they buy, and if you don't know how they are using it, withhold your judgment!
What this really comes down to is freedom. The U.S. is becoming less and less free as time goes by, with the government frequently thinking that it can make our decisions better than we can. If we are not allowed to decide for ourselves, how can the government ever expect us to get better at decision making? The first time some family buys enough steak and lobster on SNAP for every dinner for a week, they will quickly discover that their SNAP benefits won't feed them enough if they spend that way (unless they are doing what I suggested above). Maybe they will start shopping sales. They will probably budget more carefully the next month. Most importantly though, they will learn from their own experience. Maybe they will keep eating a lot of steak and lobster, but they will shop sales and add coupons to that, and if they are willing to do that much extra work to eat steak and lobster frequently, they deserve it just as much as the CEO who does an equal amount of work running his company (seriously, sale shopping and couponing is a lot of work). Some people like bacon gravy for breakfast regularly (a meal that I have heard is often considered a poor man's meal in the south, but which I consider to be gourmet food). It is reasonable to say that the guy who likes bacon gravy is more deserving of eating what he likes than the guy who likes steak and eggs, just because the prices are different? This is an elitist attitude. I don't think Brattin is actually bothered that SNAP recipients are spending some of their benefits on food that is expensive. I think he is bothered that poor people are eating his elitist gourmet food!
(Thankfully, Brattin is the only one actually interested in the bill. He has no co-sponsors, and the state legislature is not actually even considering the bill.)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/04/08/missouri-food-stamps_n_7026704.html
The specific restrictions the bill would illegally impose include prohibiting the purchase of "cookies, chips, energy drinks, soft drinks, seafood, or steak." Brattin complains that he has seen people buying products like lobster and fillet mignon with their food stamps, and evidently he takes offense at this. In fact, he takes so much offense at this that he is willing to challenge Federal law by passing an illegal state law to prevent this.
The real problems with this bill are not related to Federal law at all, however. There are health implications as well as a question of discrimination. Besides that, expensive foods that are sometimes regarded as extravagant can easily be part of a very frugal diet.
"Seafood" is a huge category of foods, and nutritionists currently recommend eating at least two servings of fatty fish per week. Many recommend twice that, but since fatty fish are typically the more expensive types (salmon, for example), and many Americans cannot afford to eat it more often than that, they say twice a week is enough for a reasonably healthy diet. This bill would defeat the purpose of the SNAP program. The acronym stands for "Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program." If seafood is prohibited, it might as well be renamed SCAP (Supplemental Calorie Assistance Program), because a significant part of the "nutrition" part is being thrown out over whether poor people should be allowed to eat traditional rich person food.
This brings up the next problem. This is very blatant discrimination against the poor. This Representative seems to believe that poor people should not be allowed to eat traditional rich person food. He is acting like some kind of elitist foodie who cannot stand to see the rabble eating his precious steak and lobster. Now, I understand why energy drinks would be prohibited, as they are more like medication than food. Likewise, soft drinks are barely food (let's ban water too). Chips actually provide a decent amount of calories (at a very low cost per calorie), and with the recent discovery that diets high in plant oils are very beneficial, chips can be part of a very healthy diet (in moderation). Prohibiting cookies is absurd, as they typically contain a lot of healthy components, despite their higher than average sugar content. The steak restriction is even more absurd. Yes, people on SNAP probably should not be eating fillet mignon every night for dinner. If they are, then it is the state's fault for giving them far more SNAP money than they need. Real SNAP recipients do not eat steak and lobster dinners on SNAP regularly (because they cannot afford it). If Brattin did not actually see how those buying these products on SNAP used them, then he has no business judging them.
Let me share my personal experience with this matter. My family is on food stamps, and while we have never bought fillet mignon on food stamps, we have bought cheaper steaks and we buy about two lobsters each year. For our New Years dinner, we have also been known to buy a few crab legs. When we do this, we carefully budget our food stamp money so we can afford it. Would Brattin deny us this opportunity to learn good financial skills? (Actually, we are not poor due to poor financial skills. For the most part, we manage our money quite well, but apply this to the many people on food stamps who do benefit from the experience.) The steak is almost never cooked as whole steaks. Once in a while, I make an oriental beef and broccoli dish, which calls for one pound of thinly sliced steak. At $5.99 a pound (and we rarely buy it without a dollar or two discount), with $1 worth of broccoli and maybe $1 worth of rice, all seven of us eat a fairly nice (and healthy) meal at a cost of $8 or less. That comes out to about $1.15 per person. Most Americans spend two to three times that on a meal. Obviously, we could use chicken instead to get it under $1 per person, but would Brattin really be so petty as to deny us quality in our meal for a few cents, even though we already spend far less than the average? Evidently he would.
Now, the lobster is usually for special occasions, like anniversaries. Even we consider it a bit extravagant, which is why it is a once a year thing. Like I mentioned, we carefully budget for this. It seems rather absurd that the state would interfere in our food buying choices, when we are already being so careful not to abuse the system. Now, I recognize that others may choose to abuse the system, but punishing us for it is just plain wrong. Further though, lobster is actually not that expensive. On sale, where we live (Idaho, so not close enough to the ocean to make it seriously cheap), it is $4.00 for a medium sized lobster tail (we don't buy whole; the price is higher while the meat to shell ratio is lower). Not on sale it costs more like $5.99 a tail, though in the winter it sometimes gets up to $7.99. We don't buy it when it is not on sale. Now, we could probably eat lobster once a week without extravagant spending. Consider this: I can make a lobster sauce with one $4 lobster tail that is enough for the whole family (did I mention, we have 5 kids, so that is 7 people). Over rice (about $1 worth; I would actually use pasta, which might come out to $1.50 or $2.00 total), the entire meal could be $5, with maybe another $1.50 for some kind of canned or frozen vegetables. At $6.50 for the whole meal that is 93¢ per person (the flour, milk, and spices used in the sauce are almost negligible in cost). That is a meal with lobster that costs less than $1 per person. With pasta instead of rice, it would come out closer to $1.08 per person. We could eat that every day and not spend all of our SNAP money!
The point here is that even the most expensive foods can be part of a very fugal and healthy meal. Unless Brattin can prove that this is not how those people are using their purchases, then he is totally out of line condemning them for extravagant use of SNAP benefits. Even expensive fillet mignon or crab legs can be integrated into a meal that costs far less than what the typical American spends. In fact, even caviar could be used this way, though I have a hard time believing anyone would actually do this with caviar (I am not going to judge though). Anyhow, judging people based on what foods they are buying is stupid. Instead judge them on how they use the food that they buy, and if you don't know how they are using it, withhold your judgment!
What this really comes down to is freedom. The U.S. is becoming less and less free as time goes by, with the government frequently thinking that it can make our decisions better than we can. If we are not allowed to decide for ourselves, how can the government ever expect us to get better at decision making? The first time some family buys enough steak and lobster on SNAP for every dinner for a week, they will quickly discover that their SNAP benefits won't feed them enough if they spend that way (unless they are doing what I suggested above). Maybe they will start shopping sales. They will probably budget more carefully the next month. Most importantly though, they will learn from their own experience. Maybe they will keep eating a lot of steak and lobster, but they will shop sales and add coupons to that, and if they are willing to do that much extra work to eat steak and lobster frequently, they deserve it just as much as the CEO who does an equal amount of work running his company (seriously, sale shopping and couponing is a lot of work). Some people like bacon gravy for breakfast regularly (a meal that I have heard is often considered a poor man's meal in the south, but which I consider to be gourmet food). It is reasonable to say that the guy who likes bacon gravy is more deserving of eating what he likes than the guy who likes steak and eggs, just because the prices are different? This is an elitist attitude. I don't think Brattin is actually bothered that SNAP recipients are spending some of their benefits on food that is expensive. I think he is bothered that poor people are eating his elitist gourmet food!
(Thankfully, Brattin is the only one actually interested in the bill. He has no co-sponsors, and the state legislature is not actually even considering the bill.)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/04/08/missouri-food-stamps_n_7026704.html
07 April 2015
How to Help Your Children to a Successful Life
I keep coming across articles about success and education, and recently I came across one that reveals how screwed up American thinking is on this subject.
Many parents want their children to grow up to become part of the "elite." They ask experts how to accomplish this goal. Some parents think that studying to the exclusion of all else, in high school or even grade school is the answer. Recent studies have found that most of the successful "elite" participated in at least one extracurricular activity in high school or grade school. So maybe the answer is to enroll your children in at least one sport or music program every year of school. Unfortunately, this is not the answer. Really it is a game of odds, and evidently moderate extracurricular activities will increase those odds. If you want to know the odds, compare the number of upper class people in the U.S. to the number of middle and lower class people. Even if you do everything perfectly, the chances of your child becoming one of the successful "elite" are very low. Also keep in mind that many other parents are doing the same things. This is a large scale case of "Keeping up with the Joneses" that will just keep getting harder. Every year, parents are trying to one up each other, to give their children the advantage (often causing their children unnecessary misery). If you subscribe to this definition of success, then you are ultimately setting yourself, and your children, up for failure.
The U.S. upper class is shrinking. Anything anyone does, with the sole expectation of joining the upper class, is gambling. Further, the odds are getting worse. Some experts are even beginning the question whether the cost of a college education is worth the risk (the consensus is still yes, it is worth it, but there is significant disagreement, especially with regards to graduate degrees). If success is becoming part of the "elite" upper class, then then the odds are stacked against you and your children, no matter what you do. There is no way to even get close to even odds, unless you are already part of the upper class, and with the shrinking upper class, even that is not a guarantee. At this point, luck has a bigger impact than anything else, starting with whether you were lucky enough to be born to rich parents or not.
The problem here is the definition of success. Parents that are willing to put effort into "helping" their kids become part of the "elite" define success as working long hours to make huge amounts of money. In case you have not heard, income beyond about $20,000 a year per person does not increase happiness. In fact, there is significant evidence that it does the exact opposite. If rich and decadent misery is your definition of success, then I guess you are justified in gambling your time and money on the low odds that your child could join the "elite," at the cost of his or her happiness. If you want your child to be happy though, read on.
Most parents want their children to be happy. Some parents mistakenly associate happiness with wealth. As mentioned before, recent research has shown that increasing income increases happiness up to about $20,000 per person per year. As income increases further though, happiness tends to stay the same or decrease. Teaching your children good financial skills can lower the optimum income, and teaching them to be happy with less can lower it dramatically. Most families of 3 can live comfortably on less than $30,000 a year. That includes $400 a month for food, $1,200 a month for rent (in most places in the U.S., a two bedroom plus den home or apartment costs less than that for rent or even mortgage payments), $400 a month for insurance and maybe a car payment, with $6,000 a year left over for savings and retirement (or $3,000 a year for tithing and $3,000 for savings and retirement). Instead of preparing your child to spend his life working 60 to 80 hours a week (average in the U.S. is currently about 60 hours a week) to make $150,000 a year of money he or she will never have time to spend (on anything he or she will have time to actually enjoy, anyhow), why not prepare your child to work 20 to 30 hours a week earning $40,000 a year?
Imagine this future: You have taught your child how to spend money very wisely. He works a 30 hour a week freelance job that pays around $40,000 a year. He could work 40 hours a week and earn a bit over $50,000 a year, but he does not need to, and frankly, he would rather spend that extra 10 hours a week taking care of his family and enjoying his life. His wife works 10 hours a week on the side but not because they need the money. She enjoys the work she does, but she also enjoys taking care of their 2 children. His flexible 30 hour a week schedule allows her to work those 10 hours, because he can take care of the children during that time (and he enjoys that extra time he gets to spend with the kids). Their total yearly income is about $47,000 (he earns $40k a year, and her 10 hours a week brings in another $7k). They live in a high end trailer park in a double wide trailer (3 bedrooms and a den, with about 1,500 square feet). They own the trailer, which they paid off the $35,000 cost in 5 years. They are paying $400 a month (fairly high, but the park is fairly high end) in lot rent. They splurge a bit on food, so they are paying $450 a month for it. You taught him well, so they bought their current car with cash. As such, they have no debt at this point. Car insurance costs them $80 a month, utilities (electric, gas, internet, phone, and maybe cable TV) cost around $500 a month (rounding up; we pay half that). They go on regular dates (one important way of maintaining a good marriage relationship), which costs $40 a week for diner and maybe an activity, add another $30 for the two hours of baby sitting (costs in the U.S. range from $10 an hour to $18 an hour, so $15 is on the high end; comes out to $220 a month). Add in gas costs around $200 a month. This all comes out to $1,850 a month. Their yearly costs for monthly expenses is $22,200. Other expenses, like clothing, car maintenance, medical costs/insurance and such might max out around $5,000 a year on average (you taught him well, so he carefully selected a car that is easy to fix in a driveway, and even when it is not, the parts are easy to get and reasonably priced). After the $27,200 with maybe about $800 of emergency and entertainment expenses, your son is living fairly well on $28,000 a year to support a family of four. Just to stack the odds against him, let's assume that he is part of a religion that advocates paying exactly 10% of your income in tithing. That is $4,700 a year. That leaves him with $14,300 a year going to savings and retirement. If he puts $4,300 into retirement (just under 10%), then $10,000 a year is going to savings (hopefully you taught him well enough that some of that is going to mutual funds and other lower risk investments that offer a better return than a savings account). They plan to start looking for a house in 5 years, once they have $50,000 saved, but they are seriously considering buying land and moving the trailer to a permanent foundation on that land, because the cost of the land is $50,000, and the cost of moving the trailer is $50,000, but the cost of a smaller plot of land with an equivalent house is more than $200,000.
Based on how he is living, your son is quite well off. He might not live in a mansion with servants, but he does not have to spend any time managing those servants, and he does not have to work harder to keep them paid. He spends more time with his family each week than most rich people do in a month. He takes jobs that he wants, and no one tells him when he has to start and end work each day. If we wants a vacation, he can just avoid accepting contracts that will require him to work during that time. He is saving enough money that if he does decide to buy the $200,000 home, he can pay $80,000 down (the trailer depreciated $5,000 while they lived there), and with the budget surplus, they can pay the rest of it off in 10 to 15 years, without changing their standard of living at all (if they move the trailer, they can pay it off in 2 years). Once the house is paid off, the rest of that $10,000 a year going to savings will ultimately be retirement money (ok, so some might go to the kids' college, but if he taught them to manage their money as well as you taught him, they will be able to do it mostly without help). Your son could probably retire at 45 on this budget, if not sooner. If he enjoys his work enough to keep it up until 65, he will be able to live like a millionaire when he retires (because he will be one).
Your children do not need to be among the successful "elite" to be happy. They can be perfectly happy among the successful average, if they learn to be happy with less and manage their money well. Even simple things, like renting a yacht for a weekend a year instead of buying one, can dramatically reduce expenses without giving up too much luxury. Frankly though, most expensive luxuries don't get used often enough to justify buying them. A huge house with giant rooms, a hot tub, and an indoor swimming pool might be nice, but unless you use those rooms, that hot tub, and the swimming pool at least weekly (for the rest of your life), you would be better off just spending the weekend at a nice hotel once in a while. If you want the pool and hot tub to yourself, rent a party package at a local pool and don't invite anyone. Besides avoiding the massive expense of a largely useless home, you also spare yourself the maintenance costs. Likewise, instead of buying a house with a huge great room, you can rent one of the conference rooms at a nearby Marriott. Unless you are having parties every week, it will cost less, and with the rental, you don't have to worry about the cleanup. No one needs a big house to be happy. For any major luxury item, renting as needed is almost always cheaper than buying, and doing without is even cheaper. With this kind of financial sense, not only can your children be happy without being among the "elite," but they will also be much happier even if they do get lucky enough to join them.
Most people who start out poor or middle class and get rich don't do it because they are so successful in college. They start with good financial sense. Even highly successful inventors have died penniless (see Nicola Tesla, who largely invented the AC electric grid along with the electric motor). Those who rise to the upper class begin with wise financial sense and either get rich starting businesses or investing. Those who get rich through traditional employment still have to have good financial sense, otherwise they end up getting themselves into so much debt that they have to live like paupers in their extravagant mansions with their expensive cars. Those who are not funded by rich parents all have one thing in common: They know how to manage their money and do without unnecessary luxuries. If you want your children to be happy, teach them this, and they can be happy whether they get lucky enough to join the "elite" or not.
Many parents want their children to grow up to become part of the "elite." They ask experts how to accomplish this goal. Some parents think that studying to the exclusion of all else, in high school or even grade school is the answer. Recent studies have found that most of the successful "elite" participated in at least one extracurricular activity in high school or grade school. So maybe the answer is to enroll your children in at least one sport or music program every year of school. Unfortunately, this is not the answer. Really it is a game of odds, and evidently moderate extracurricular activities will increase those odds. If you want to know the odds, compare the number of upper class people in the U.S. to the number of middle and lower class people. Even if you do everything perfectly, the chances of your child becoming one of the successful "elite" are very low. Also keep in mind that many other parents are doing the same things. This is a large scale case of "Keeping up with the Joneses" that will just keep getting harder. Every year, parents are trying to one up each other, to give their children the advantage (often causing their children unnecessary misery). If you subscribe to this definition of success, then you are ultimately setting yourself, and your children, up for failure.
The U.S. upper class is shrinking. Anything anyone does, with the sole expectation of joining the upper class, is gambling. Further, the odds are getting worse. Some experts are even beginning the question whether the cost of a college education is worth the risk (the consensus is still yes, it is worth it, but there is significant disagreement, especially with regards to graduate degrees). If success is becoming part of the "elite" upper class, then then the odds are stacked against you and your children, no matter what you do. There is no way to even get close to even odds, unless you are already part of the upper class, and with the shrinking upper class, even that is not a guarantee. At this point, luck has a bigger impact than anything else, starting with whether you were lucky enough to be born to rich parents or not.
The problem here is the definition of success. Parents that are willing to put effort into "helping" their kids become part of the "elite" define success as working long hours to make huge amounts of money. In case you have not heard, income beyond about $20,000 a year per person does not increase happiness. In fact, there is significant evidence that it does the exact opposite. If rich and decadent misery is your definition of success, then I guess you are justified in gambling your time and money on the low odds that your child could join the "elite," at the cost of his or her happiness. If you want your child to be happy though, read on.
Most parents want their children to be happy. Some parents mistakenly associate happiness with wealth. As mentioned before, recent research has shown that increasing income increases happiness up to about $20,000 per person per year. As income increases further though, happiness tends to stay the same or decrease. Teaching your children good financial skills can lower the optimum income, and teaching them to be happy with less can lower it dramatically. Most families of 3 can live comfortably on less than $30,000 a year. That includes $400 a month for food, $1,200 a month for rent (in most places in the U.S., a two bedroom plus den home or apartment costs less than that for rent or even mortgage payments), $400 a month for insurance and maybe a car payment, with $6,000 a year left over for savings and retirement (or $3,000 a year for tithing and $3,000 for savings and retirement). Instead of preparing your child to spend his life working 60 to 80 hours a week (average in the U.S. is currently about 60 hours a week) to make $150,000 a year of money he or she will never have time to spend (on anything he or she will have time to actually enjoy, anyhow), why not prepare your child to work 20 to 30 hours a week earning $40,000 a year?
Imagine this future: You have taught your child how to spend money very wisely. He works a 30 hour a week freelance job that pays around $40,000 a year. He could work 40 hours a week and earn a bit over $50,000 a year, but he does not need to, and frankly, he would rather spend that extra 10 hours a week taking care of his family and enjoying his life. His wife works 10 hours a week on the side but not because they need the money. She enjoys the work she does, but she also enjoys taking care of their 2 children. His flexible 30 hour a week schedule allows her to work those 10 hours, because he can take care of the children during that time (and he enjoys that extra time he gets to spend with the kids). Their total yearly income is about $47,000 (he earns $40k a year, and her 10 hours a week brings in another $7k). They live in a high end trailer park in a double wide trailer (3 bedrooms and a den, with about 1,500 square feet). They own the trailer, which they paid off the $35,000 cost in 5 years. They are paying $400 a month (fairly high, but the park is fairly high end) in lot rent. They splurge a bit on food, so they are paying $450 a month for it. You taught him well, so they bought their current car with cash. As such, they have no debt at this point. Car insurance costs them $80 a month, utilities (electric, gas, internet, phone, and maybe cable TV) cost around $500 a month (rounding up; we pay half that). They go on regular dates (one important way of maintaining a good marriage relationship), which costs $40 a week for diner and maybe an activity, add another $30 for the two hours of baby sitting (costs in the U.S. range from $10 an hour to $18 an hour, so $15 is on the high end; comes out to $220 a month). Add in gas costs around $200 a month. This all comes out to $1,850 a month. Their yearly costs for monthly expenses is $22,200. Other expenses, like clothing, car maintenance, medical costs/insurance and such might max out around $5,000 a year on average (you taught him well, so he carefully selected a car that is easy to fix in a driveway, and even when it is not, the parts are easy to get and reasonably priced). After the $27,200 with maybe about $800 of emergency and entertainment expenses, your son is living fairly well on $28,000 a year to support a family of four. Just to stack the odds against him, let's assume that he is part of a religion that advocates paying exactly 10% of your income in tithing. That is $4,700 a year. That leaves him with $14,300 a year going to savings and retirement. If he puts $4,300 into retirement (just under 10%), then $10,000 a year is going to savings (hopefully you taught him well enough that some of that is going to mutual funds and other lower risk investments that offer a better return than a savings account). They plan to start looking for a house in 5 years, once they have $50,000 saved, but they are seriously considering buying land and moving the trailer to a permanent foundation on that land, because the cost of the land is $50,000, and the cost of moving the trailer is $50,000, but the cost of a smaller plot of land with an equivalent house is more than $200,000.
Based on how he is living, your son is quite well off. He might not live in a mansion with servants, but he does not have to spend any time managing those servants, and he does not have to work harder to keep them paid. He spends more time with his family each week than most rich people do in a month. He takes jobs that he wants, and no one tells him when he has to start and end work each day. If we wants a vacation, he can just avoid accepting contracts that will require him to work during that time. He is saving enough money that if he does decide to buy the $200,000 home, he can pay $80,000 down (the trailer depreciated $5,000 while they lived there), and with the budget surplus, they can pay the rest of it off in 10 to 15 years, without changing their standard of living at all (if they move the trailer, they can pay it off in 2 years). Once the house is paid off, the rest of that $10,000 a year going to savings will ultimately be retirement money (ok, so some might go to the kids' college, but if he taught them to manage their money as well as you taught him, they will be able to do it mostly without help). Your son could probably retire at 45 on this budget, if not sooner. If he enjoys his work enough to keep it up until 65, he will be able to live like a millionaire when he retires (because he will be one).
Your children do not need to be among the successful "elite" to be happy. They can be perfectly happy among the successful average, if they learn to be happy with less and manage their money well. Even simple things, like renting a yacht for a weekend a year instead of buying one, can dramatically reduce expenses without giving up too much luxury. Frankly though, most expensive luxuries don't get used often enough to justify buying them. A huge house with giant rooms, a hot tub, and an indoor swimming pool might be nice, but unless you use those rooms, that hot tub, and the swimming pool at least weekly (for the rest of your life), you would be better off just spending the weekend at a nice hotel once in a while. If you want the pool and hot tub to yourself, rent a party package at a local pool and don't invite anyone. Besides avoiding the massive expense of a largely useless home, you also spare yourself the maintenance costs. Likewise, instead of buying a house with a huge great room, you can rent one of the conference rooms at a nearby Marriott. Unless you are having parties every week, it will cost less, and with the rental, you don't have to worry about the cleanup. No one needs a big house to be happy. For any major luxury item, renting as needed is almost always cheaper than buying, and doing without is even cheaper. With this kind of financial sense, not only can your children be happy without being among the "elite," but they will also be much happier even if they do get lucky enough to join them.
Most people who start out poor or middle class and get rich don't do it because they are so successful in college. They start with good financial sense. Even highly successful inventors have died penniless (see Nicola Tesla, who largely invented the AC electric grid along with the electric motor). Those who rise to the upper class begin with wise financial sense and either get rich starting businesses or investing. Those who get rich through traditional employment still have to have good financial sense, otherwise they end up getting themselves into so much debt that they have to live like paupers in their extravagant mansions with their expensive cars. Those who are not funded by rich parents all have one thing in common: They know how to manage their money and do without unnecessary luxuries. If you want your children to be happy, teach them this, and they can be happy whether they get lucky enough to join the "elite" or not.
06 April 2015
3D Printed Gun Control
The issue of control of undetectable 3D printed guns is coming back to Congress soon. With the substantial advances since the last time the question came up, some believe it is time for another round. As before, the emphasis is not on how easy it is to print the guns but rather on their stealth nature. Current gun law prohibits owning guns that are less detectable (in a metal detector) than 3.7 ounces of steel. Current 3D printed gun models satisfy this law by adding a chunk of steel of that weight to the gun as a non-functional part (typically internally). The bill currently being drafted would require that specific functional parts of the gun be made of metal, which would make it impossible to legally print a gun with current 3D home printing technology (the industrial version includes support for printing in several metals that could be used for the metal components). The major concern is that terrorists or felons could 3D print guns that would not be detectable by any modern security, and the assumption is that making it illegal to do so would stop them.
The big problem with this is that last line: The bill assumes that making undetectable guns illegal will somehow make a difference to those who would use them for terrorism. Now, in the past, gun control advocates have used this same excuse to demand mandatory registration of firearms as well as increasing seller accountability. These things would at least make it harder for felons and terrorists to obtain firearms, but the argument that criminals will get them anyway has largely prevented Congress from strengthening gun control. With 3D printed guns, it is far worse.
Modern 3D printers are cheaper than handguns. Blueprint files are extremely easy to obtain, and it is nigh on impossible for the government to do anything about this, since they are available over BitTorrent and other P2P file sharing services (and legally, because they are licensed to allow free redistribution). In other words, for maybe half the price of a decent handgun, a criminal can obtain the equipment to print any number of 3D printed guns. The print media is cheap enough that once a criminal has the 3D printer, he can print guns at $10 to $20 a piece. The government cannot do anything about this. Just catching one marginally careful criminal would be difficult and costly. Catching even a majority would be almost impossible. Individual criminals that used specialized security software would be almost impossible to catch, even if the government was already keeping a close eye on them.
The biggest hindrance to criminals wanting to 3D print guns is the technical complexity of setting up the 3D printer system. Careful criminals will have the buy components for the printer, instead of buying a pre-assembled one, to avoid government detection (and simply having the printer is still not enough to justify law enforcement action). The task of assembling a 3D printer is not trivial to anyone without significant electronics experience. Likewise, setting up the software and learning to use it is also not a straightforward task. The average criminal that would need a gun would likely give up before making even one 3D printed gun, because it is so much easier to just steal a few hundred dollars and buy one on the black market.
The fact, however, is that this really is a valid concern. The average felon will probably not go to the effort to print an undetectable gun. The real concern is terrorists. Plastic guns could easily be carried through all sorts of government checkpoints by terrorists, and the consequences could be dire. Before jumping to conclusions about the best solution to this problem though, we should consider the facts. The first fact to consider is that terrorists living in the U.S. long term have managed to get bombs through government checkpoints, despite much stronger legislation against bombs. Unfortunately, criminals and terrorists do not allow themselves to be governed by mere laws. In other words, making undetectable guns illegal is not going to make any difference where it really counts. Not only can criminals easily 3D print guns without any real chance of detection, they can print them in massive amounts, and nothing short of banning 3D printing outright, along with at least half of the necessary components for building 3D printers (components that power enough of our technology that banning even one would be absurd), will make any difference.
The point here is that anyone rushing to legislation banning 3D printed guns is totally out of touch with the technology. This technology is here to stay. In fact, as soon as 3D printing was invented, using it to make guns became inevitable. The long term consequences of this may result in a lot of harm, but there is nothing that can be done at this point to stop it. If legislation to ban 3D printed guns, detectable or not, does eventually go through, all it will do is turn 3D gun printing into a completely criminal activity. It won't make detecting those criminals any easier. The one good thing about this will be that honest people will still be able to obtain traditional firearms. Consider, however, who will have more and better access to firearms if honest citizens have to pay $300 or more for anything decent, while criminals can make functional firearms for well under 10% of that.
The only thing laws against making undetectable guns will do is make prison sentences longer for criminals that have them when they get caught. Most crimes that would be committed with such a weapon are already worthy of a life sentence, so the added gun charge will be trivial. Frankly, it would be equally effective without infringing on the rights of the rest of us to simply make committing crimes with 3D printed guns more illegal than committing those crimes without. At this point though, firearms (including undetectable ones) are only going to become easier to obtain, and there is nothing any government can do to stop it.
The big problem with this is that last line: The bill assumes that making undetectable guns illegal will somehow make a difference to those who would use them for terrorism. Now, in the past, gun control advocates have used this same excuse to demand mandatory registration of firearms as well as increasing seller accountability. These things would at least make it harder for felons and terrorists to obtain firearms, but the argument that criminals will get them anyway has largely prevented Congress from strengthening gun control. With 3D printed guns, it is far worse.
Modern 3D printers are cheaper than handguns. Blueprint files are extremely easy to obtain, and it is nigh on impossible for the government to do anything about this, since they are available over BitTorrent and other P2P file sharing services (and legally, because they are licensed to allow free redistribution). In other words, for maybe half the price of a decent handgun, a criminal can obtain the equipment to print any number of 3D printed guns. The print media is cheap enough that once a criminal has the 3D printer, he can print guns at $10 to $20 a piece. The government cannot do anything about this. Just catching one marginally careful criminal would be difficult and costly. Catching even a majority would be almost impossible. Individual criminals that used specialized security software would be almost impossible to catch, even if the government was already keeping a close eye on them.
The biggest hindrance to criminals wanting to 3D print guns is the technical complexity of setting up the 3D printer system. Careful criminals will have the buy components for the printer, instead of buying a pre-assembled one, to avoid government detection (and simply having the printer is still not enough to justify law enforcement action). The task of assembling a 3D printer is not trivial to anyone without significant electronics experience. Likewise, setting up the software and learning to use it is also not a straightforward task. The average criminal that would need a gun would likely give up before making even one 3D printed gun, because it is so much easier to just steal a few hundred dollars and buy one on the black market.
The fact, however, is that this really is a valid concern. The average felon will probably not go to the effort to print an undetectable gun. The real concern is terrorists. Plastic guns could easily be carried through all sorts of government checkpoints by terrorists, and the consequences could be dire. Before jumping to conclusions about the best solution to this problem though, we should consider the facts. The first fact to consider is that terrorists living in the U.S. long term have managed to get bombs through government checkpoints, despite much stronger legislation against bombs. Unfortunately, criminals and terrorists do not allow themselves to be governed by mere laws. In other words, making undetectable guns illegal is not going to make any difference where it really counts. Not only can criminals easily 3D print guns without any real chance of detection, they can print them in massive amounts, and nothing short of banning 3D printing outright, along with at least half of the necessary components for building 3D printers (components that power enough of our technology that banning even one would be absurd), will make any difference.
The point here is that anyone rushing to legislation banning 3D printed guns is totally out of touch with the technology. This technology is here to stay. In fact, as soon as 3D printing was invented, using it to make guns became inevitable. The long term consequences of this may result in a lot of harm, but there is nothing that can be done at this point to stop it. If legislation to ban 3D printed guns, detectable or not, does eventually go through, all it will do is turn 3D gun printing into a completely criminal activity. It won't make detecting those criminals any easier. The one good thing about this will be that honest people will still be able to obtain traditional firearms. Consider, however, who will have more and better access to firearms if honest citizens have to pay $300 or more for anything decent, while criminals can make functional firearms for well under 10% of that.
The only thing laws against making undetectable guns will do is make prison sentences longer for criminals that have them when they get caught. Most crimes that would be committed with such a weapon are already worthy of a life sentence, so the added gun charge will be trivial. Frankly, it would be equally effective without infringing on the rights of the rest of us to simply make committing crimes with 3D printed guns more illegal than committing those crimes without. At this point though, firearms (including undetectable ones) are only going to become easier to obtain, and there is nothing any government can do to stop it.
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