No individual owes me that, but this goes far beyond that. You have to keep in mind that any oppinion shared on line represents more than the person expressing it. And it may change the minds of others reading it. If anyone who works on controversial subject X gets a label of unethical that's not just "not owing them a reasonable discussion", you're impacting their life. Potentially ruining it.
Given your stance here, you're perfectly ok with the baker refusing to sell a wedding cake to a gay couple, right? Because the law was effectively the sea lion in your comic.
How so? Stating your thoughts with conviction ends any hope of a reasonable discussion? Maybe if you're afraid of confrontation. For me it's an invitation to debate.
You find labelling people is in invitation to a debate? So if you find yourself in a position where you desperately need a job but upper management says "I think people of race X are <racial slur>" you would take that as an invitiation to a debate? Saying a person is unethical is labelling them. That's what I object to, not debate or confrontation.
It's not a simplistic argument. It's a facts based argument and I'm the only one in this discussion so far that is actually using facts.
> Er, or it's not bordered by Mexico
Canada also isn't bordered by Asia. It allows in plenty of skilled Asian immigrants. What does bordering have to do with Canada's regressive immigration policies that prevent low skilled, low education persons from immigrating into the country?
The US isn't bordered by Pakistan, India, Vietnam, China, Philippines, or El Salvador. Six of the top 10 immigration countries for the US.
Borders don't mean much if you're not allowed to immigrate regardless.
The US is also not bordered by Colombia, Hondurus, Ecuador, Bolivia, Costa Rica, Panama, Peru, Brazil, etc.
> Why don't all the ex-coal miners in WV simply move to where the jobs are?
Well that's exactly how the US has worked in fact. People - over time - migrate toward opportunity state to state. That's why West Virginia's population hasn't grown in 80 years (!).
See: population growth over time in Nevada, Arizona, California, Florida, Texas, etc. Silicon Valley exists precisely because the US works that way.
> It's a facts based argument and I'm the only one in this discussion so far that is actually using facts.
Your facts-based argument is that people in Detroit would move to Canada if the immigration policy was relaxed? I see no facts at all around that assertion, which is the one I was calling simplistic.
> What does bordering have to do with Canada's regressive immigration policies that prevent low skilled, low education persons from immigrating into the country?
You said (paraphrasing):
>> Why are there no hispanic people in Canada, relative to the US
I said:
>> Because it's not bordered by Mexico
(And, by the way, Mexico is the #1 source of immigrants for the US).
> The US isn't bordered by Pakistan, India, Vietnam, China, Philippines, or El Salvador. Six of the top 10 immigration countries for the US.
Out of those 6 countries, one would qualify as contributing to the Hispanic or Black population in the US (the groups we were discussing).
Out of the top 10, none are from countries in Africa or the Caribbean (which we might also consider to be a "black" population).
So we can agree then, that the US's diversity w.r.t. black people has nothing to do with immigration?
> See: population growth over time in Nevada, Arizona, California, Florida, Texas, etc. Silicon Valley exists precisely because the US works that way.
Those are also states that have heavy immigrant populations because they're attractive for skilled workers or close to natural entry points. You'll have to cite a source stating that the growth in those populations is from internal movement.
The US as a whole is fairly close to replacement rate births, so we would actually expect populations to remain stable.
> Your facts-based argument is that people in Detroit would move to Canada if the immigration policy was relaxed?
My facts based argument goes back to the original parent discussion that you joined, which is: the US is considerably more diverse than Canada and that that is due to very different immigration policies over time. I've overwhelmingly backed that up.
Would poor people have immigrated out of Detroit and into Canada as Detroit collapsed, seeking a drastically superior social safety net, free universal healthcare, etc.? Hell yes they obviously would have.
> You'll have to cite a source stating that the growth in those populations is from internal movement.
You can't actually believe the US has historically lacked for internal movement (in fact it's only very recently that that has been the case).
California's population in 1960 was 16 million. The US total hispanic population in 1960 was 6.x million. As recently as 1970, California's white population was nearly 80%. In 1970, 16 million of California's 20 million people were white - how did they get there? Millions of people moved to California from other states, famously, in the post WW2 era.
Las Vegas, which makes up a quarter of Nevada's population, is 44% white, 11% black and 7% asian today. How do you think those people all got there? The Las Vegas population figure was 8,422 in 1940.
I'm certain I don't need to cover Arizona (boomed internally similarly to Nevada), Texas and Florida. Florida has very famously seen vast internal US migration as older people flooded the state over decades.
Your actual claim was that Canada immigration policy is anti-diversity. The only correct claim you've backed up is that the Canadian immigration policy is greatly favoring rich and educated immigration.
It's no wonder people feel offended. Saying Canada is anti-diversity is a close proxy to say it's systematically racist.
I actually agree with you that this is "drug dealer" tactics but for totally different reasons. I think this is a classic "the first hit is free" move.
It's a long-term play. I believe FB when they say they won't show ads to kids, or use their chats for ad scraping. What they really want is for those kids to become so familiar and dependent on the system (FB), that they naturally transition to being active FB users as adults.
It's not a secret that FB has a perceived "uncool with kids" problem - hence the rise of things like Snapchat. If you hook them when they're really young, though, then FB just becomes an unquestioned part of life.
As far as the tool itself, i dunno - I mean messenger tools have been a fact of life for quite some time now. AIM, ICQ, etc. I don't think FB messenger is particularly different other than the fact that it's attached to, well, FB.
Watching my children I would argue its a desperate attempt to get children under the age of 16 using Facebook as they just don't.
Both children attend a Music group which has used a facebook
group for years. The older children (17-18) all have active facebook profiles - the younger children don't they use Instagram and Snapchat...
>I believe FB when they say they won't show ads to kids, or use their chats for ad scraping.
why do you believe this? i have no reason to believe it (since their entire business model is targeted ads) except the "first hit is free" alternate hypothesis.
Because why say it otherwise? Facebook could've easily left all of that out and just said "Introducing messenger for kids! We're making sure it's carefully curated and safe for your children" etc. etc.
People would've speculated that it was being used for ads, sure, but it wouldn't have caused a major outrage. I'd bet significant sums of money that most (not all, obviously) parents don't really care about their children being advertised to or used for market research - I mean hell, TV was doing that way before FB was a thing. Most parents probably worry about more obvious things w.r.t. children chatting online: Bullying, talking to strangers, etc.
Saying "we're not scraping childrens' messages" and then turning around and doing exactly that would be such a monumental PR disaster if it ever came out. I don't think FB is quite that stupid. They're clearly focused on the long-term.
Another possibility is that they're actually just legally barred from scraping messages sent by children, and this is them putting a PR spin on "we're complying with the law!"
So basically, I just don't see a lot of benefit to promising not to scrape messages if they really want to do that.
> The problem is the rent control apartments in NYC skew the data and does make it apple to apple
Last time I checked, rent controlled apartments make up ~1% of housing units in the city, and that number decreases all the time (because the supply of rent controlled apartments is constantly decreasing). So, I think I'd need to see a citation that rent control has any serious effects on NYC housing prices.
I'm not saying that 1% couldn't have larger effects, but given the small amount of rent-controlled units I think the burden of proof is on you here.
> Rural NY to Rural TX, I will bet anytime that Rural TX is cheaper especially in the Rio Grande Valley and West Texas.
Why? I think you have a very different picture in mind of what rural NY looks like. There are a ton of extremely poor towns and cities up near Rochester and Buffalo. Lots and lots of rust belt remnants in the western part of the state that haven't recovered: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rust_Belt#/media/File:Total_mf...
Maybe it's $50 for a 1 bedroom in west Texas vs. $60 for a 1 bedroom on the outskirts of Hammond NY, but I don't think that's a very meaningful difference.
Yes, I was thinking more the Southern Tier for remote New York but Hammond is a good border town example of very un-NYC New York living.
My guess is remote parts of Texas are probably still cheaper. It's so big, remote towns can't be bedroom communities, they're less well-regulated so building costs are probably lower, and property taxes are probably lower (less expensive maintenance than in NY weather and they don't take care of their citizens as well).
Yeah, I mean it's easy to forget about places in NY with low costs of living like Binghamton.
Even in the city, it's easy to forget that most people don't live in Manhattan/the expensive parts of Queens and Brooklyn. A sizable minority, sure, but not most.
Never tried Williamsburg or Park Slope, but finding a good apartment for decent price is very hard no matter where. Of course prices drop if subway is harder to get to.
Granted it's Craigslist so who knows how legit it is, but if you're willing to share with roommates/etc. I don't feel like it's super hard to find a great apartment if you're willing to live further out.
> Most people have way more taxing jobs than IT. I've been in construction for 3 years, and that work is no joke.
There's some discussion of this above, but I think it's interesting that the alternative to software development is seemingly always construction, or delivering food, or being a waiter.
Wouldn't the more apt comparison be something like law? Or medicine?
Or has software development truly reached blue-collar status and we're essentially plumbers/electricians?
I'm not accusing you of anything specifically, just using your comment to ponder.
> Wouldn't the more apt comparison be something like law?
An often stressful profession, requires extensive post-graduate education (which most developers don't have), has strict licensing requirements to keep out people. Doesn't pay as well as software development, relative to the requirements and responsibility.
> Or medicine?
A highly stressful profession (your patients could die), requires extensive post-graduate education (which most developers don't have), has strict licensing requirements to keep out people, and high liability for making mistakes. Also doesn't pay as well as software development, relative to the requirements and responsibility.
Software development comes out well ahead there too.
> Or has software development truly reached blue-collar status and we're essentially plumbers/electricians?
Maybe I'm just getting jaded but I'd say yes. Outside the big 4 and a few other niches, most developers seem to just be gluing together whichever pre-made web frameworks and libraries happen to currently be in vogue. Patience with the endless yak-shaving needed to get anything to work rather than any particular technical brilliance is the primary requirement for career longevity.
I'm not sure I buy that attorneys are significantly better educated, especially in some more traditional firms (e.g. MS) where a masters isn't unusual. It's only an additional year of schooling on top of that.
Fair point on the licensing though. Maybe that's what most commonly separates blue collar from white collar these days - licensing? Trying to think of other professions I would compare software development to, and they all require licenses (traditional engineering, for example).
> Maybe I'm just getting jaded but I'd say yes. Outside the big 4 and a few other niches, most developers seem to just be gluing together whichever pre-made web frameworks and libraries happen to currently be in vogue. Patience with the endless yak-shaving needed to get anything to work rather than any particular technical brilliance is the primary requirement for career longevity.
Yeah, I'm starting to get that impression as well.
To be fair, though, I think many US physicians would tell you a similar thing (being brilliant isn't nearly as important as how adept you are at navigating the healthcare/insurance system).
> Outside the big 4 and a few other niches, most developers seem to just be gluing together whichever pre-made web frameworks and libraries happen to currently be in vogue
Interestingly, in the last conversation I had with a friend who is a lawyer, he made a similar argument about how his career has shaped up. Most days he's just repurposing portions of existing documents into a single new one.
>There's some discussion of this above, but I think it's interesting that the alternative to software development is seemingly always construction, or delivering food, or being a waiter.
My guess is that the popularity of these professions is that they are all relatively low-qualified ones suitable to people working while studying or "filling gaps" before getting a "good job" in IT.
>Wouldn't the more apt comparison be something like law? Or medicine?
It could be, but I doubt that there are many people that after having invested in an education in either law or medicine and actually had a suitable job in those professions left them to become a full-time programmer, particularly an employed full-time programmer.
Not that it cannot happen or that never happened, but surely it is less common, and the probabilities that additionally these people will be commenting on HN are even smaller.
>Or has software development truly reached blue-collar status and we're essentially plumbers/electricians?
Since every other guy here seems to be well in the hundred of thousands US$/year or more, I would say, if this is the case, "exceptionally well paid plumbers/electricians".
> My guess is that the popularity of these professions is that they are all relatively low-qualified ones suitable to people working while studying or "filling gaps" before getting a "good job" in IT.
Yeah, I mean I don't doubt that's why they show up frequently. It's more like: In a discussion about attorney/physician burnout, I don't often see people say "well you think being an attorney is hard? Try construction..."
The discussion in that case would be something more like, "if you don't like being an attorney go be an accountant" - something like that, if that makes any sense.
> It could be, but I doubt that there are many people that after having invested in an education in either law or medicine and actually had a suitable job in those professions left them to become a full-time programmer, particularly an employed full-time programmer.
I see what you're saying, but my point was more like: Shouldn't we be comparing software development to those professions? As in, "software development is incredibly easy compared to being an attorney"?
> Since every other guy here seems to be well in the hundred of thousands US$/year or more, I would say, if this is the case, "exceptionally well paid plumbers/electricians".
I thought that was becoming more and more common in those professions (electricians especially seem to be well compensated)?
Well compensated, yes. As well compensated as software developers, no.
A median software developer makes $100k [1], a median electrician makes $52k [2] and a median plumber makes $51k [3]. Some of that disparity is because of software developers being more concentrated into high COL areas, but even comparing the same metropolitan areas there is still a large disparity. For the NYC metro area, the mean wages are $114k/$79k/$76k respectively, for Chicago $99k/$80k/$80k, for LA $107k/$65k/$58k, for Dallas $107k/$43k/$43k, for DC $114k/$58k/$55k, for Atlanta $104k/$48k/$47k.
Software development is centered in a few global headquarters cities; the trades are as dispersed as the populations they serve.
I would expect wages to be drastically lower in the trades even if standards of living are much higher. The construction contractors in my hometown own houses and late-model trucks. My software engineering colleagues rent with roommates and ride the bus for hours each day.
There really aren't a lot of high paying jobs that are needed in quantities that software developers are. Take this data: https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_nat.htm sort by Employment per 1000 jobs and then look for jobs with median wages no less than 15% below the median wage for "Software Developers and Programmers". The only ones you will find with a higher employment numbers are "Engineers" (all engineering occupations combined just barely beat out software developers and programmers in number employed) and a variety of management and executive categories. Lawyers have a bit more than a third of the number of jobs; physicians and surgeons are less than a fifth.
>There's some discussion of this above, but I think it's interesting that the alternative to software development is seemingly always construction, or delivering food, or being a waiter.
You don't need a degree--or even any formal education at all--to become a software developer.
That's why it's often compared to blue-collar jobs.
For people like us, if we weren't developers, then blue-collar is our only other option.
Yeah, and I think that's the interesting divide to me: I did receive a formal education, and even a Master's, in CS.
Despite that, there's very little difference between myself and another developer who has no formal education at all.
I guess I always thought of myself as a white-collar worker because of that, and this whole discussion is making me re-evaluate that. Not that the distinction is super important obviously, or that I think of myself as "better than", but I always thought of my peers as attorneys and people in finance, not construction workers.
Yes it is company that is larger, more influential, and more relevant than the entire industries of TV or Radio and even print/online journalism at large.
The implications and consequences of the consolidation of this power and influence into one company is a different discussion entirely (and an important one).
> It is seriously gross that a tax reform bill that is by basically all accounts enormously, even proudly regressive is being sold to tech nerds with a marginal improvement in stock options accounting.
As with all things, worth remembering who's writing this: Fred Wilson is an extremely wealthy venture capitalist. He stands to benefit a great deal from provisions like the repeal of the estate tax.
Well, to be fair, _he_ won't benefit from the repeal of the estate tax. But his heirs will benefit from all the free unrealized capital gains they get to inherit and owe no taxes on.
I don’t think it’s fair to say he’s just looking out for his self interest here. If you read his post, he’s not advocating for or against the tax bill, just talking about this one particular term that affects startups.
"This means that the Senate has now made the tax reform bill a win for those who work in startups instead of a loss."
Not the provision about options - "the bill."
So he's clearly saying that the bill as a whole is better for startup employees than the current system. GP point is that the bill may now be better from one single perspective but on the whole is still much worse than what we have today due to other issues.
Here's what's confusing me: Why would this make any sense, at all?
From the government's point of view, they were trying to maximize tax revenue, right? And theoretically that occurs when the security price is at a (local) maximum, which would also likely be when employees choose to exercise.
Or is the idea here that they can tax options at the short-term rate as opposed to the long-term rate?
And even then, does that really make up for the substantial difference in market price (and thus taxes)? The "market price" (whatever that means here) of an early-stage startup's options has to be significantly lower than a post-IPO company.
You’re still taxed on all of the gain. The initial taxation upon vesting would reset the basis. Any additional gains would be taxed when you sell the underlying shares. It would have done two things: a. Pull in revenue to an earlier date (a key factor in this tax plan, since all of the gain/loss calculations are on a 10-year timeline) and b. Lock in gains, even if the shares are later worthless. Yes, you can theoretically write off the losses, but only a few thousand dollars at a time if you don’t have offsetting gains.
The government could lamely argue that a lot of tax money is being left on the table as options are only exercised when sold or leaving a company, if at all. Exercising can trigger a tax burden, if an Inceptive Stock Option (ISO), because of alternative minimal taxes. Although, I didn’t like the proposal, it would have simplified taxation of stock options.
> I haven't shut down any argument by saying this
You're being naive if you think that saying this doesn't end any hope of a reasonable discussion.