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The Kids (Aren't) Alright - World Happiness Report


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If ever there was a time for the meme "Won't somebody think of the children?!?!?!?"  It's on a thread literally about children's mental state as we meander as Surly does.  

Private Sector, on the whole, is more efficient than the Public Sector.  I think we all agree.  We need a functioning public sector for myriad functions, on that we all agree.  Both sectors are failing our children, on that we all agree.  The State of Texas is woefully more ineffective and bloated as a State Government than most any other state.  On that, I think we all agree.  What we don't want to talk about at cocktail parties is who has had 25 years to course-correct that but won't.  And in the end, it's our children who will foot the bill and suffer the consequences.  And somebody get Brisket a goddamn McRib sandwich, stat!  

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3 minutes ago, Sawbonz said:

There is a certain type of person who can only see any given topic in terms of how it does or does not affect them personally 

We spent the whole last page talking about the 80/20 rule. And yet we still gaf about how they feel their life is going? Maybe they should tighten up and dip into the 20% and find some happiness.   

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2 minutes ago, fattyflattie said:

We spent the whole last page talking about the 80/20 rule. And yet we still gaf about how they feel their life is going? Maybe they should tighten up and dip into the 20% and find some happiness.   

The math doesn’t work out.

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11 minutes ago, BeardIP said:

Oh, and TIL Briskettexan's mom apparently works at the Austin DPS. The only explanation I can think of to explain his death on the hill of the last page or two. 

My old man worked for a safety regulator for 20+ years.

I regularly cross paths with people who bust their asses to make sure that shitheels like you don't die - whether it be from lack of water, sanitation, disease.  

And people like you treat those folks with nothing but disdain.  You're the assholes leaving your shit behind for "the servant class," about whom you give zero shits, to clean up.  You simultaneously take them all for granted, and heap scorn upon them.  Yet, they still keep doing their jobs.  Because even fucking assholes deserve clean water and pipe lines that don't explode next to their house.  They do their job, for you, in spite of the fact that you don't deserve a goddamned thing.

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5 minutes ago, YGIFS said:

If ever there was a time for the meme "Won't somebody think of the children?!?!?!?"  It's on a thread literally about children's mental state as we meander as Surly does.  

Private Sector, on the whole, is more efficient than the Public Sector.  I think we all agree.  We need a functioning public sector for myriad functions, on that we all agree.  Both sectors are failing our children, on that we all agree.  The State of Texas is woefully more ineffective and bloated as a State Government than most any other state.  On that, I think we all agree.  What we don't want to talk about at cocktail parties is who has had 25 years to course-correct that but won't.  And in the end, it's our children who will foot the bill and suffer the consequences.  And somebody get Brisket a goddamn McRib sandwich, stat!  

I don't agree with that at all.  And I doubt any of us has enough information to truly know.

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1 hour ago, Celery Man said:

the thing I was making light of is that you did so while quoting a comment that contains obviously bullshit totally not objective data

well, the thing is, fatty was right.  maybe not in the percentages, but the fact that the cost of eating out (black) matched wages (dashed red)-- specifically wages for individual, non-supervisory employees in mostly very blue collar jobs.  the other lines are cost of food at home, and blended total food spend.

you didnt specify a timeframe but mentioned "previous twenty years" so i rounded up to a nice 2000 start date.

fredgraph(1).png.c135317b866a12f457626371756fcb21.png

 

switching gears to talks of the "middle class stagnation/shrinking", these might rile people up a bit:

this is from the Congressional Budget Office's late 2023 publication of Distribution of Household Income, pages 26 and 28

Screenshot2024-03-21at10_31_38PM.thumb.png.5d74efff594f901c38971b853c65b2dd.png

and then this one...if you consider 20-80th income as middle class, its size has been constant.

in fact if you segregate the middle three quintiles as working class (20-40), middle class (40-60), and upper middle (60-80), itll show the "middle" did shrink because they promoted upwards into the upper middle! 

Screenshot2024-03-21at10_31_52PM.thumb.png.d17adba1540d9667c128fc40d2dbceb5.png

 

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It's an aggregation of how much we spend as a state from state tax dollars, how much we spend as a state from federal tax dollars, how much the real estate upon which our state facilities sit is actually worth (and pay no taxes obviously), personnel wages for all of the above, and the debt service obligations.  Just because we have a budget surplus doesn't hide the fact that we're a very unhealthy, slow transiting, dirty, and under-educated state.  We also, for a "no federal dollars on our watch" still receive over a quarter-trillion dollars from the federal government.  Now we rank low in per capita spending because we don't invest in our citizens, particularly our young people.  But we sure as shit toss money around on buildings and meaningless personnel.  The new Capitol Complex in Austin is a shining example of that.  No reasonable 'small government' advocate should have green-lit that real estate disaster.  Took hundreds of millions off the property tax rolls so one guy could go into a building once a year to talk with somebody in person about an issue.  

Anyway, we're in a race to the bottom.  Our kids will meet us there.

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5 minutes ago, Sawbonz said:

The DPS office in Waxahachie is filled with the most pleasant, helpful people you can imagine. Honestly seems like it can’t really be a DPS office

I absolutely love the "new" DPS policy of making appointments. Sure they can book up well ahead of time, but if embracing that discipline of scheduling early, means I'm not waiting hours upon hours in a Beetlejuice-like hellscape of first-come first-served, then I'm completely down for it.  And the people I've interacted with have been quite lovely ever since the transition.

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1 hour ago, Frank Drebin said:

City parking enforcement pretty much anywhere I have been are some ruthlessly efficient bastards.  They and Chic Fil A are the gold standard of efficiency.

I think there's unexplored, untapped potential in the government identifying the most difficult problems to solve... and then deploying a squadron of ex- meter maids on those jobs.

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13 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

My old man worked for a safety regulator for 20+ years.

I regularly cross paths with people who bust their asses to make sure that shitheels like you don't die - whether it be from lack of water, sanitation, disease.  

And people like you treat those folks with nothing but disdain.  You're the assholes leaving your shit behind for "the servant class," about whom you give zero shits, to clean up.  You simultaneously take them all for granted, and heap scorn upon them.  Yet, they still keep doing their jobs.  Because even fucking assholes deserve clean water and pipe lines that don't explode next to their house.  They do their job, for you, in spite of the fact that you don't deserve a goddamned thing.

Emotion and “experience”. Got it.

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Posted (edited)
17 minutes ago, 52-80 said:

well, the thing is, fatty was right.  maybe not in the percentages, but the fact that the cost of eating out (black) matched wages (dashed red)-- specifically wages for individual, non-supervisory employees in mostly very blue collar jobs.  the other lines are cost of food at home, and blended total food spend.

you didnt specify a timeframe but mentioned "previous twenty years" so i rounded up to a nice 2000 start date.

fredgraph(1).png.c135317b866a12f457626371756fcb21.png

 

switching gears to talks of the "middle class stagnation/shrinking", these might rile people up a bit:

this is from the Congressional Budget Office's late 2023 publication of Distribution of Household Income, pages 26 and 28

Screenshot2024-03-21at10_31_38PM.thumb.png.5d74efff594f901c38971b853c65b2dd.png

and then this one...if you consider 20-80th income as middle class, its size has been constant.

in fact if you segregate the middle three quintiles as working class (20-40), middle class (40-60), and upper middle (60-80), itll show the "middle" did shrink because they promoted upwards into the upper middle! 

Screenshot2024-03-21at10_31_52PM.thumb.png.d17adba1540d9667c128fc40d2dbceb5.png

 

Lol a FRED graph showing averages, which we know are extremely top heavy thanks to median data, and then a couple of percentage increase graphs which really nicely conceal the truth of how fucking far apart those pay numbers are

Truly, you are a master of graph based communication. 

Edited by Captainant
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2 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:


Yes. I have direct hands on experience in the very thing that we are talking about. And jackasses like you see that as a negative. Hell of a world we live in.

 

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13 minutes ago, YGIFS said:

It's an aggregation of how much we spend as a state from state tax dollars, how much we spend as a state from federal tax dollars, how much the real estate upon which our state facilities sit is actually worth (and pay no taxes obviously), personnel wages for all of the above, and the debt service obligations.  Just because we have a budget surplus doesn't hide the fact that we're a very unhealthy, slow transiting, dirty, and under-educated state.  We also, for a "no federal dollars on our watch" still receive over a quarter-trillion dollars from the federal government.  Now we rank low in per capita spending because we don't invest in our citizens, particularly our young people.  But we sure as shit toss money around on buildings and meaningless personnel.  The new Capitol Complex in Austin is a shining example of that.  No reasonable 'small government' advocate should have green-lit that real estate disaster.  Took hundreds of millions off the property tax rolls so one guy could go into a building once a year to talk with somebody in person about an issue.  

Anyway, we're in a race to the bottom.  Our kids will meet us there.

You were comparing us to other states.  Which ones should we emulate?  And how do you know enough about how other states are run to make any kind of meaningful comparison?

I have meaningful information on and experience with governments in Texas, California, Colorado, and Montana.  I am not sure I would say any of that lot are run well.  

 

13 minutes ago, utee94 said:

I absolutely love the "new" DPS policy of making appointments. Sure they can book up well ahead of time, but if embracing that discipline of scheduling early, means I'm not waiting hours upon hours in a Beetlejuice-like hellscape of first-come first-served, then I'm completely down for it.  And the people I've interacted with have been quite lovely ever since the transition.

Last time I renewed in person I went to the DPS office in Hempstead.  I literally sat on a back porch of a trailer in a white plastic chair for 5 minutes before going in.  That was the waiting area, and it was awesome.

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21 minutes ago, 52-80 said:

well, the thing is, fatty was right.  maybe not in the percentages, but the fact that the cost of eating out (black) matched wages (dashed red)-- specifically wages for individual, non-supervisory employees in mostly very blue collar jobs.  the other lines are cost of food at home, and blended total food spend.

you didnt specify a timeframe but mentioned "previous twenty years" so i rounded up to a nice 2000 start date.

fredgraph(1).png.c135317b866a12f457626371756fcb21.png

 

switching gears to talks of the "middle class stagnation/shrinking", these might rile people up a bit:

this is from the Congressional Budget Office's late 2023 publication of Distribution of Household Income, pages 26 and 28

Screenshot2024-03-21at10_31_38PM.thumb.png.5d74efff594f901c38971b853c65b2dd.png

and then this one...if you consider 20-80th income as middle class, its size has been constant.

in fact if you segregate the middle three quintiles as working class (20-40), middle class (40-60), and upper middle (60-80), itll show the "middle" did shrink because they promoted upwards into the upper middle! 

Screenshot2024-03-21at10_31_52PM.thumb.png.d17adba1540d9667c128fc40d2dbceb5.png

 

The specific metric was wages quadrupling over 10 years, which is stupid. Of course as we’ve discovered, what he meant was something somehow even stupider.

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5 minutes ago, Frank Drebin said:

You were comparing us to other states.  Which ones should we emulate?  And how do you know enough about how other states are run to make any kind of meaningful comparison?

I have meaningful information on and experience with governments in Texas, California, Colorado, and Montana.  I am not sure I would say any of that lot are run well.  .

To your point, no state is run "well", it's degrees of less suckitude (insert South Austin Mom joke here).  Admittedly, the choke point in the assembly line of all states is the actual state government of which we have little knowledge because they're all purposely obfuscated.  But we can see inputs and we can see outcomes.  That much is somewhat known.  For a small government state, we onboard an awful lot of resources (taxes, land, and people) and turn out pretty shitty eventualities (education, health, transportation, infrastructure, power, water/air quality and abundance, corruption, etc.).  But yes, to your point...in the inner workings of what happens between taking in and kicking out is hard to make a meaningful comparison with.  There's a "Yellowstone" episode in here somewhere.  

Okay, back to the kids.  Said the Baptist Preacher.....................

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16 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:


Yes. I have direct hands on experience in the very thing that we are talking about. And jackasses like you see that as a negative. Hell of a world we live in.

But you don't have anything more than most of us also have. In fact, your "direct" experience is actually indirect and secondhand. 

And to extrapolate those experiences and peanut butter spread it across the public sector as a whole is so mind-numbingly and frustratingly emotional, I question if there is actually any testosterone at all coursing through your old veins.

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But you don't have anything more than most of us also have. In fact, your "direct" experience is actually indirect and secondhand. 
And to extrapolate those experiences and peanut butter spread it across the public sector as a whole is so mind-numbingly and frustratingly emotional, I question if there is actually any testosterone at all coursing through your old veins.

Wait…so it’s GOOD for yall to extrapolate across the public sector as a whole to say it’s shitty and they suck, based on your experiences…but when I extrapolate based on my decades of direct experience with the public sector, that’s MIND NUMBING and bad. Fascinating.
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Posted (edited)
1 hour ago, Brisketexan said:

I confess that I have a weakness: I think that mean people suck.

I guess they really are the poor, mistreated portion of our society.  We should definitely treat them with kid gloves, and empower their shittiness.

Naah, I'll keep on loathing people who don't give a shit about others/have zero empathy for their fellow human beings, who celebrate cruelty, and champion being shitty.  I'm good with that.  The one group I'm not very tolerant of is that group.

Surly's own Al Sharpton race baiter thinks mean people suck LOL. Almost every single one of your posts is an attack on other posters. I can provide examples if you prefer. 

I say with no hostility, you should take a break. You are out of control.

Edited by Thetexashammer
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1 hour ago, Captainant said:

Lol a FRED graph showing averages, which we know are extremely top heavy thanks to median data, and then a couple of percentage increase graphs which really nicely conceal the truth of how fucking far apart those pay numbers are

Truly, you are a master of graph based communication. 

Fellas, dont let the federal reserve, the census office, the bls, or the cbo trick you with numbers and lines. 

Its the weaboo cisco technician and his gut feelings that really has a pulse on the national economy. 

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We all know averages are fake news because theyre skewed by all those high earners in fabrication and warehousing and shipping; and the upper crust of the slice of people in below-supervisory roles, like assistants to the regional manager. Theres a real hiearchy down there too! 

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None of that “FRED” fucking bullllshit is going to convince me that cost of groceries isnt out of control until its compared against the bottom earners of people working in diners and coffee shops using a superior statistical measure like median. 


Rigor!


IMG_5541.thumb.jpeg.65f2e66e70c1e88d20c7eccca2b39ff4.jpeg

3 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

Plenty of corporate drones give zero fucks, too. 

Only on mondays. 

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2 hours ago, Celery Man said:

The specific metric was wages quadrupling over 10 years, which is stupid. Of course as we’ve discovered, what he meant was something somehow even stupider.

No it wasn’t, dumbfuck. It was my anecdotal experience, and that was clear.  You aren’t really this fucking stupid?  Or maybe you work in govt? 

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3 hours ago, 52-80 said:

well, the thing is, fatty was right.  maybe not in the percentages, but the fact that the cost of eating out (black) matched wages (dashed red)-- specifically wages for individual, non-supervisory employees in mostly very blue collar jobs.  the other lines are cost of food at home, and blended total food spend.

This is impossible. Food companies make profit, I mean gouge. And for profit corporations barely even pay living wages. Some people even die trying to make it to director.  
 

4 hours ago, Captainant said:

Hard work is not rewarded. Networking and "working smart" is rewarded. I've watched many of the adults in my life growing up work themselves to death in dead-end jobs believing that if they worked hard enough, they'd get recognized and finally get that promotion to director. But it turns out that it doesn't make a shit how hard you work, and it's really about if you're drinking buddies with the hiring manager.

 

This post tells me so much.  I wish you would have posted this years ago, I’ve spent a lot of time trying to figure you out. I got the healthcare thing, and now, the economics   

 

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4 hours ago, Brisketexan said:

My old man worked for a safety regulator for 20+ years.

I regularly cross paths with people who bust their asses to make sure that shitheels like you don't die - whether it be from lack of water, sanitation, disease.  

And people like you treat those folks with nothing but disdain.  You're the assholes leaving your shit behind for "the servant class," about whom you give zero shits, to clean up.  You simultaneously take them all for granted, and heap scorn upon them.  Yet, they still keep doing their jobs.  Because even fucking assholes deserve clean water and pipe lines that don't explode next to their house.  They do their job, for you, in spite of the fact that you don't deserve a goddamned thing.

Please thank them for their service for the rest of us.  

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Posted (edited)
5 hours ago, Brisketexan said:

You're a piece of shit, who treats people like shit, and then wonders why they don't all bend over backwards to serve you.  

851edc6bab183ca54bafdead3d8a5eba.jpg

Wait, this is from the guy whose entire online existence here and in thousands of posts is bitching about how everyone in Texas and the United States he encounters are selfish assholes?

spacer.png

 

Edited by Frank Drebin
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This thread is a microcosm of America. Just a bunch of people arguing with each other and flinging shit at each other over the dumbest of things.

Our politicians, media, and social media have increasingly polarized the country. There is very little room for respectful discourse anymore. Everyone thinks they are right and the other side is wrong on every single topic (education, religion, climate, immigration, womens’ rights, LGBTQ rights, healthcare, guns, electric vehicles, crypto, Russia, Gaza), and eventually people find justifications for being mean to each other or outright hating each other. They actually trained people to hate each other merely on the basis of wearing a mask or not wearing a mask during a pandemic. Unbelievable.

So this all gets amplified by social media and of course this trickles down to kids because they see it in their parents’ behaviors, so naturally everyone is less happy.

I personally feel happy with my life but I sense despair in the world around me and it’s hard to not think this country is doomed. We are riding on past successes and that will eventually dry up if we don’t get our affairs in order, find a way to treat each other better, and work together for the common good.

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24 minutes ago, Herbie Hancock said:

You and Brisket both suck. And as annoying as he is, and believe me it’s substantial, he’s quite tolerable as compared to you.

Herbie Hancock jumping in from the top rope.

48021e320c857a623df57a0c68932bd6f28c072b

 

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re: muh kids are overly politicized!

https://krdo.com/news/2024/03/20/students-hold-walkout-calling-for-resignation-of-three-widefield-school-district-board-members/

Maybe it's that a bunch of adults are just acting like shit heel bullies and throwing around slurs like "retard" and "schizo", and the kids are just calling out bullshit amirite @52-80

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Posted (edited)
10 hours ago, Captainant said:

Networking and "working smart" is rewarded. I've watched many of the adults in my life growing up work themselves to death in dead-end jobs believing that if they worked hard enough, they'd get recognized and finally get that promotion to director. But it turns out that it doesn't make a shit how hard you work, and it's really about if you're drinking buddies with the hiring manager

Did you really think this wasn’t the case?  

Edited by Da Fino
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8 hours ago, MissingInAction said:

Can confirm. Shit you're lucky to get the bare minimum from most.

In my experience it breaks down like this:

20% actually give a shit and want to make a difference 

40% can't get a job anywhere else.

20% Contractors

20% completely fucking useless.

If only the government was as well run as Boeing, X and Purdue Pharma, all our lives would be hunky dory.

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16 hours ago, F250 said:

My youngest had to make several attempts to register to vote and numerous attempts to get his license. He also has a non-American name. He had no issues getting a passport.

I'm not trying to be an asshole here, but what exactly is a non American name? I assume you mean something ethnic sounding, verson something like Smith or Jones?

We're supposed to be a melting pot. It makes me sad that you have to think of you and your sons own names in that light.

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5 hours ago, Thetexashammer said:

 

lofl.

i have a ton to say on this stupidity but I'll have to wait until after work. 

but this sounds a lot like "some people are saying that these people falling down and shaking are actually sick! everyone knows it's demons and if they pray harder and ignore their disease it'll go away."

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17 minutes ago, SydneyCarton said:

I'm not trying to be an asshole here, but what exactly is a non American name? I assume you mean something ethnic sounding, verson something like Smith or Jones?

We're supposed to be a melting pot. It makes me sad that you have to think of you and your sons own names in that light.

I understand what he’s saying, even knowing there’s no such thing as an “American” name (names like Smith, Jones, Miller, etc didn’t even originate in America) I have a very generic hispanic name,  but it was pretty standard in the part of the country I grew up in so I never really thought twice about it till I was an adult and traveled other places in the US. I know F250 doesn’t live in the same kind of area. 
 

Ironically I think the most American names would be something like De’Shonthony or Quantavion. You won’t find names like those anywhere else in the world. 

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18 hours ago, Brisketexan said:

Now......tell me how that differs materially from most every other workplace -- Dunder Mifflin Paper Company, Initech, etc.

It doesn't.  The 80/20 rule applies fucking EVERYWHERE.  Private sector, public sector, church committees, all of it.

no, it doesn't.  the incentives to succeed are different.  your life as a private company depends on your ability to succeed. the directors have skin in the game beyond their paycheck (if they're receiving a paycheck at all).  as a public agency you're pretty much guaranteed a job-  i worked in a public agency.  my wife works in one now.  we have BOTH been told to slow down our work pace because the results are outpacing the agency's expected output which would result in less funding next year.  in my current private company (finance) we have 5% reviews every year-  the bottom 5% are fired.  it works the same way at microsoft, google, apple, etc.  that doesn't happen at TCEQ or TRS.  

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11 hours ago, BabaYaga said:

Difference is how easily they can be fired and replaced.  

Theoretically, yes, but the vast majority of private-sector employees don't work in some competitive thunderdome.  A whole hell of a lot of em just get by.

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