HN user
I highly recommend watching the Indian movie: The great Indian kitchen. It does really offer a different perspective to anyone who believes that a housewife's job is better than a corporate drone's :)
It's not quite the same thing though, is it? You can walk away from one employer and go to another as long as you have employ-able skills. It's much harder to walk away from a marriage that is not working out for one and if some financial independence makes it easier to, then so be it!
Reading this was nostalgic for me as this was how we'd write essays in my Indian high school. It's not so strange when we grow up developing our style to look like this :)
I couldn't agree more! :)
You're absolutely right that, ideally, this would be a conversation with a professional, non-moralizing doctor.
But there could be many scenarios where one doesn't have access to such care - think of the uninsured, think of teenage girls who don't want their parents to know, think of women in abusive relationships who don't want to get pregnant, the list goes on. If you were on your partner's/parent's plan, there is no way you could visit an OBGYN without them knowing. In addition to this, like the other commenter mentioned, this has also somehow devolved into a political issue here.
I was on birth control for 5 years and had some friends on it too. My very anecdotal data is that: while none of us faced any mental health changes, there were some physiological changes that I did not like.
You're right that there are women who maybe severely impacted mental-health wise. But I think the benefits outweigh this as the lack of ability to control one's reproductive life can also be debilitating, mentally. And I like to think that impact is not much worse than what alcohol, drugs, even cough syrup can do to one's mental health. At least birth control can be stopped and is not addictive.
I'm sure that's a contributor - thank you for highlighting the other side of this issue! :)
Huh, this is even more interesting because I always thought that homeless folk gravitate towards city centers and not that urban areas cause homelessness. I'm not looking to contradict you, just saying it's funny how we look at the same things and completely reverse the cause and effects in our heads :)
My thinking is that homeless folks tend to move towards city centers because they are more noticed, have more footfalls go past them and hence is easier for them to get food/change etc. They would not be likely to go to the suburbs because they are harder to get around, there are fewer people around to help, and it's very easy to get the police called on you for loitering around someone's lawn.
Interesting, because I have a theory that less dependence on cars would actually lead to fewer crazy, homeless people and more vibrant neighbourhoods: the reason being that lower income folks wouldn't have to spend so much time and money on cars. As tempting as it is to look away, we're only fracturing our society more by drawing lines between different income classes, if we don't invest in things like walkable neighbourhoods and public transport.
I mean, they're still not wrong. Over 95% of US schools do have active shooter training [1] which is what the commenter was referring to.
1. https://everytownresearch.org/report/the-impact-of-active-sh...
I was merely trying to show how such strawman statements could be made for anybody and any country. I keep forgetting how tone and subtext can be lost in text format :)
Similarly outrageous things could be said about any country. <faux outrage> Would you prefer politicians who are in the pockets of lobbyists? Politicians who repeal regulation that keeps a bank with subpar risk management from getting too big to fail? </faux outrage>
No one has to blindly copy anyone. However, nuance seems to missing in western discussions these days (I say western because these are the discussions I'm mostly aware of). Nuance is difficult. When everything becomes hyperbole, it gets harder to learn best practices from other countries.
Edit: Added <faux outrage> tags
If I were an economist/social scientist/political scientist, I would be grinning ear to ear right now. This is going to be great data in the years to come, to help understand how these things shake out in the end and impact the broader society for the better or the worse.
It's good to see at least a few comments further down that wish that similar steps to break up TBTF companies were taken here in the west.
One former customer service employee estimated that 60%-70% of the accounts they reviewed during a typical shift would have more than a dozen linked accounts. Another two former employees estimated 40% and 75%, respectively.
I don't think this necessarily means that 40%-75% of the accounts on Block's books were fake (as I took it to first mean from the summary). Could it just mean that the accounts that were set up for review based on high risk activity were predominantly fraudulent (as they should be)?
Address verification is where the bureaus like Transunion and Experian come in. These vendors have a gold mine of information that should allow a company to verify a host of their users' attributes - not just addresses.
I was wondering about this same question today. The reason was a PBS documentary[1] and Jeff Bezos' advice to not make big purchases[2] (which is a stunning stance for the CEO of an online shopping company). I don't know enough to know whether these folks know what they're talking about - I don't think anyone does. Maybe it's a wait and watch game since this is a complex system with millions of variables.
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EpMLAQbSYAw
[2] https://www.businesstoday.in/latest/world/story/dont-buy-tv-...
That's my understanding as well. I bet the 996 culture, 69-hour max workweeks, and constant rat race definitely don't help with this. Add to this a younger generation that thinks that they don't want to make the "sacrifices" that their parents did and would rather maximize their own quality of life (though I don't think this latter is just an Asian problem).
I think the problem is during this transition from a bottom heavy to a top heavy population distribution. Suddenly, you don't have enough of a young and robust workforce to support your aging population. Labour shortage means you can't focus enough on growing and you have to focus more on maintaining the existing infra. You see signs of this happening in Japan already [1]. On the other hand, a situation like this may be ripe for deploying automation across sectors!
[1] https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2001/03/muhleise....
I do live in the North east so I partially understand. I would love to go around more of the US and understand these differences. Thank you for your measured response!
You're right. Thank you for adding a level of nuance for me to chew on!
Europe is definitely on my list! Some things like economic conditions in the likes of UK and Germany give me pause, but I would love to live in all these different places and experience life there. Such a short life and so many places to be (and such tedious immigration forms)!
I appreciate your question because I have spent a lot of time in the past thinking about this :)
I’m genuinely curious because every person defines personal freedom differently. And great society is very subjective.
I couldn't agree more! I believe that all of us have to give up some personal freedom if we want to live in a functional society. I may want to blast music from my rooftop at 3AM but I must curb that urge out of respect for the society I live in. How much of this personal freedom we are willing to give up is different for different people. On this spectrum, I think I lie towards giving up more if it gives me a comfortable society in return.
I am willing to mask up if it means that fewer people in my vicinity may "possibly" get sick less. I am okay with video cameras and facial recognition in public places if it means less crime in my neighborhood. I am willing to pay more taxes if it means public infrastructure can be improved and schools can get better teachers. I might be wrong though, because these things can clearly be taken to an extreme.
Thank you for sharing your experience - I appreciate that a lot of my views around China (and even DACH where I've also considered moving to) may be too rosy. I will definitely visit any place a few times before I move there!
Thank you for sharing your experience. I'm Indian and I'm on my third country I've lived in now. I'm beginning to think I should learn to be optimistic and appreciative about wherever I live than trying to find that perfect country to settle down :)
Thank you for your balanced view! I will definitely learn the language and visit the place a few times before I consider moving anywhere :)
It's so interesting to read this perspective since it drives home "the grass is always greener.." for me. I've lived a pretty charmed life in the US for the past few years (like the majority of HN, I imagine) but I find myself longing to move to a country with dense cities, affordable housing in the city center, great public infrastructure and a modicum of agreement among the citizens and China fits the bill pretty great for me. I understand that it might come at the cost of some personal freedom but I'm willing to pay that price for a great society in return. But reading this makes me think this is part of "the human condition" - the more time we spend in a bubble in a place, the more we either become blind to it's shortcomings or become overly rosy about a foreign place that would solve all our problems.
As a sidenote, the author says he does not like his kids playing "war" in Chinese playgrounds - I wonder how he will feel about the active shooter drills that are now part of every kids life in the US.
Note: I'm not Chinese.