One idea would be to have a tax on ISP services that is paid out to websites in proportion to how much people use them. Presumably hours of engagement would be a decent metric.

But then, how can you be sure you're measuring what you think you're measuring? If I open up 10 tabs on my browser, do I get recorded as being active on all ten websites despite only paying attention to one of them? This would be a very difficult problem to solve. You could simply go by the number of packets transmitted, as that is much easier to measure, but then that would weight even more heavily towards video (YouTube, Netflix, and Hulu would take up most of the Internet's money), and then what would you do about peer-to-peer services?

Advertising is only important because of the way we've structured our economy. Yes, we need advertising for things like most of the Internet to exist. But that's only because we don't have an alternative model to pay for services designed for public consumption.

Also, advertising really doesn't have as strong a check as you imagine here. If a company advertises a product and makes it really really cool, despite the fact that it's pretty crappy, then many people may still buy it because they buy into the hype. Some of the worst examples here are medical advertisements: medicine is notoriously difficult for the person taking it to know how it effects them. Lots and lots of drugs on the market really don't have all that much benefit (industry studies tend to overestimate benefits), or no more benefit than much cheaper drugs. But if people are convinced by an ad that the drug is that much better, then they may be able to get their doctor to pay for it (note: in this case the even worse travesty is the fact that pharmaceutical companies essentially bribe doctors to prescribe their medications).

It's because if you give any substance to lab mice and wait long enough, they'll get cancer.

Labeling laws like this convey no real information to the consumer. They just add a word to the food item that many people interpret as frightening, a word that has literally zero impact on the safety or sustainability of the food item. This is definitely a win for people everywhere in the US.

I do have free access to public transportation (my employer covers the cost). I sometimes use this because parking at work is horrendous at the moment. But it takes something like twice as long to get to work, so I often feel it isn't worth it. To really make public transportation worth it, it has to be much more convenient. The subways in NYC are like that (at least in Manhattan). I really wish we had more investment in public transportation around the US, so that we had more public transportation systems that were convenient to use.

This is because the refusal to bake the cake was of minimal consequence to the size of the judgment. The size of the judgment was primarily about the harassment that the Kleins subjected the couple to after they lodged a discrimination complaint (the refusal to serve a couple because of their sexual orientation is illegal in Oregon).

See more here.

The article includes the following quote from the ruling:

The Agency's theory of liability is that since Respondents brought the case to the media's attention and kept it there by repeatedly appearing in public to make statements deriding Complainants, it was foreseeable that this attention would negatively impact Complainants, making Respondents liable for any resultant emotional suffering experienced by Complainants. The Agency also argues that Respondents are liable for negative third party social media directed at Complainants because it was a foreseeable consequence of media attention.

That's certainly what it sounds like. Requiring insurance should be an absolute no-brainer here. There is no sense in which NASA should be on the hook for launch failures by private companies.

What does his retirement package have to do with how much others should listen to him?

If you're going to be in any supervisory position related to technology, learning to code is pretty darned important. If you don't understand what is or isn't doable with regard to the work you are supervising, then you'll be completely incapable of making good decisions. Sure, everybody doesn't need to learn to code. There's no reason for most writers to learn, or a manager in a supermarket chain, or a lawyer, or one of many other positions. But if you can't be an effective "idea person" with regards to software if you don't understand software.

One big contributing factor is the conflation of wealth with virtue. Pervasive in US culture is the idea that the poor are poor because of some moral failing, and the rich are rich because they are "hard working". If you take as axiomatic that income is correlated with virtue, then any action at all to increase income becomes justified.

If you doubt this, listen to the rhetoric that people use to justify cutting aid to the poor, justifications for not helping homeless people, or the whole "job creator" line you hear from the Republicans.

I don't know about the OP, but I haven't had my wallet in my back pocket for many years, and switching to a standing desk has significantly improved my back pain. Even just a couple of hours a day helps dramatically.

I know some veterans who get nasty PTSD reactions from fireworks. I can't imagine what it must be like to get continual flashbacks to battle and all the emotions that come with that when fireworks go off.

It seems more than a little ironic to me that so many Americans celebrate veterans for "protecting our freedom," and then traumatize those same veterans when it comes time to celebrate our freedom.

Please be courteous with your use of fireworks, especially if you know that any veterans live nearby.

Inflation is exactly what Greece needs. But because Greece has a primary surplus, there is no reason for them to do this. Simply defaulting on their existing debt will leave them with a positive yearly balance. So they don't need to print money to pay the bills. Instead, they are free to have monetary policy focus on maintaining stable inflation, which is beneficial to economic growth (printing money to service the debt is comparatively uncontrolled and can lead to runaway inflation which isn't so nice).

Greece has had that massive bank run, to the point of closing banks and imposing capital controls. As the primary problem with exiting the Euro is that it would likely result in a massive bank run, I think they should probably default on their debt exit the Euro. The cost has already been paid. But exiting the Euro will give them the tools to recover.

"Productive?" Productive workers don't have salaries of millions of dollars. And few rich people can move overseas to avoid their tax burden because their money is made within the country (and you can bet your ass that to the extent they are able to shift their tax burden overseas, they already do that). But rich people are leeches on society. They're not productive workers. They just exploit their own privilege and the rule of law to fleece everybody else of their money.