We can have shorter work weeks right now. Technological advances have enabled that long ago. The reason we don't have shortened workweeks has absolutely nothing to do with how productive tech has made workers, and everything to do with employers wanting long workweeks.

To most employers, the phrase "short workweek" means "I pay the same but get less out of my people, meanwhile my competitors pay the same but get more from their people." It is simply not rational for them to go for that.

If we want shorter workweeks in America, the means to obtain it is not new tech, but new legislation.

Corporations: We can afford to pay you much more, but we don't want to. We want to keep that money for ourselves. So, we will pay you only what you could get somewhere else, thus keeping your incentive to leave nice and low while saving money.

On the other hand, our rate of population growth has been dropping so quickly that many people are alarmed. So, the "there aren't enough jobs" problem and the "there aren't enough people" problem seem primed to cancel each other out.

I am sure it won't play out as neatly as that makes it sound. It never does. But after a generation of suffering it looks like it will balance itself out.

Though the "nobody wants to breed anymore" problem is likely to continue and get worse, since none of the root causes are being addressed (nor even admitted-to). So it may eventually overpower the "too many jobs are being automated-away" problem and leave us in dire straits. Hopefully by then the singularity will have happened and our enlightened future borg selves can solve the problem easily.

Oh you are just trolling. Ok. So that is why you accused me of saying things I didn't say, and believing things I don't believe. And also that's why you keep changing the subject to things outside the scope of my statements (but that are clearly more interesting to you).

Though I suspect there is a big hearty dose of generalizing in your responses, too. You seem to have lumped me in with a group of extremists, based on basically zero evidence.

So, it's clearly a discussion in bad faith. You are going to continue to "put words in my mouth" that I did not say, so you can then attack those words, and then get some kind of emotional payoff from that. You seem lucid enough to do better, but disinclined. I think that is unfortunate.

Indeed, "accelerating a space ship" is no way to get anywhere. What we need is to figure out how to open up holes in the warp so we can transport ships into and out of it. Travelling short distances through the warp equates to enormous distances in normal space. Though navigation through it is difficult, and the exposure to chaos can cause insanity or encounters with demons. So, we will need to develop defenses against those things as well.

Class 1 and 2 e-bikes limit assist to 20 mph, not 15. You can ride them faster than that, but you have to provide the power. 20 mph is well above what most recreational cyclists can maintain on a flat course, so if these classes arenâ(TM)t fast enough to be safe, neither is a regular bike. The performance is well within what is possible for a fit cyclist for short times , so their performance envelope is suitable for sharing bike and mixed use infrastructure like rail trails.

Class 3 bikes can assist riders to 28 mph. This is elite rider territory. There is no regulatory requirement ti equip the bike to handle those speeds safely, eg hydraulic brakes with adequate size rotors. E-bikes in this class are far more likely to pose injury risks to others. I think it makes a lot of sense to treat them as mopeds, requiring a drivers license for example.

What are you even talking about? I didn't say anything at all along the lines of what you are calling my "thesis". I am not blaming your for anything.

I was talking about historical use of words. "Aunt Jemima" as a slang term; the female version of "Uncle Tom." That is what the company wants to distance itself from.

You are making a mountain out of a molehill.

Would treating them as mopeds be so bad?

What weâ(TM)re looking at is exactly what happened when gasoline cars started to become popular and created problems with deaths, injuries, and property damage. The answer to managing those problems and providing accountability was to make the vehicles display registration plates, require licensing of drivers, and enforcing minimum safety standards on cars. Iâ(TM)m not necessarily suggesting all these things should be done to e-bikes, but I donâ(TM)t see why they shouldnâ(TM)t be on the table.

I am a lifelong cyclist , over fifty years now, and in general I welcome e-bikes getting more people into light two wheel vehicles. But I see serious danger to both e-bike riders and the people around them. There are regulatory classes which limit the performance envelope of the vehicle, but class 3, allowing assist up to 28 mph, is far too powerful for a novice cyclist. Only the most athletic cyclists, like professional tour racers, can sustain speeds like that, but they have advanced bike handling skills and theyâ(TM)re doing it on bikes that weigh 1/5 of what complete novice novice e-bike riders are on. Plus the pros are on the best bikes money can buy. If you pay $1500 for an e-bike, youâ(TM)re getting about $1200 of battery and motor bolted onto $300 of bike.

Whatâ(TM)s worse, many e-bikes which have e-bike class stickers can be configured to ignore class performance restrictions, and you can have someone with no bike handling skills riding what in effect is an electric motorcycle with terrible brakes.

E-bike classification notwithstanding, thereâ(TM)s a continuum from electrified bicycles with performance roughly what is achievable by a casi recreational rider on one end, running all the way up to electric motorcycles. If there were only such a thing as a class 1 e-bike thereâ(TM)d be little need to build a regulatory system with registration and operator licensing. But you canâ(TM)t tell by glancing at a two wheel electric vehicle exactly where on the bike to motorcycle spectrum it falls; that depends on the motor specification and software settings. So as these things become more popular, I donâ(TM)t see any alternative to having a registration and inspection system for all of them, with regulatory categories and restrictions based on the weight and hardware performance limitations of the vehicle. Otherwise youâ(TM)ll have more of the worst case weâ(TM)re already seeing: preteen kids riding what are essentially electric motorcycles that weigh as much as they do because the parents think those things are âoebikesâ and therefore appropriate toys.

According to chatgpt, lettuce harvesters in America are usually seasonal workers who get paid either hourly ($15-$18 an hour) or per head harvested (which comes out to anywhere from $100-$400 a day depending on pay rate and worker skill and endurance). Some farms provide free housing seasonally. They generally don't provide health insurance to seasonal workers, though some might get a year-round deal that would then come with health insurance.

Some farms use machines instead of humans to harvest lettuce, and the machines generally require three operators each. These workers get paid $18 - $25 an hour, and also will only get heath insurance if hired year-round. This work is less labor intensive than manual harvesting.

You are correct. Though I think the belief that realtors drive the prices up is a common misconception from the basic intuition that realtors want to push the prices up since they get paid by percentage. It's an easy mistake to make.

I think the real cause for the housing crisis in the USA is simple: contractors stopped building houses after the last housing market crash (which was clearly caused by overdevelopment). They allowed the supply to naturally shift, so now demand outstrips supply and that is driving prices up. BUT, it is not driving sales up, because the prices are now so high that most people can't afford them. So that's why high-priced houses are sitting on the market.

I read, right here on slashdot, some time ago, that some states have made efforts at getting more houses built, but the only houses any contractors are interested in building are high-end luxury homes since those have a higher profit margin. They will sit unbought as well, since they will still be out of most buyer's price ranges.

I don't know the latest on "affordable housing" efforts, though I am aware of companies like "Boxabl" making affordable-yet-modern tiny houses to try to hit that market. I just don't know how widely-deployed these are, or are set to be in the near future.

This problem will sort itself out if we just wait long enough. With plummeting birth rates, demand will fall to the point where it no longer outstrips supply. That will force prices down, though it will clearly come with other economic problems.

Building more houses, especially low-end houses, is the fastest way to address the housing crisis, though even that will have an overall price-lowering effect which a lot of current home-owners clearly don't want (and they are a significant voting demographic, so their collective pressure against building more houses is non-trivial).

Calm down. Recessions come and go. It's normal. We have seen it before and the world didn't end. We can see it again and find a way to pull through, just like we did before.

The unemployment level is not the only metric of economic health. The stock market is doing quite well, for example. And, it's all connected. A growing stock market winds up presenting capital and incentives for businesses to expand, which in turn creates new jobs. It doesn't happen overnight, of course. All of these things take time.

And anyway, Trump will not be president forever. That pendulum swings back and forth. In fact, "change" is pretty much the one thing we can always count on (even if we don't know the exact nature of what that change will be).

Uncertainty creates fear, of course, but it also brings hope. Don't over-focus on the negatives, as that will harm your mental health. You can, instead, get involved in something positive, as having a positive impact can help you to see the silver linings that were there all along.

You were born long after slavery had been eradicated. The culture in which you were raised was marked by many years of change. As such, much of the significance of the name "Aunt Jemima" and the imagery associated with it was lost on you. All it ever meant to you was "smiling sweet woman who brought me delicious pancakes and syrup," because you never experienced the use of the phrase as a racial slur, nor the depiction of servile black women as a slavery-associated image. You were simply too far removed from those historical roots.

But the historical roots are still there, and those who have studied their history know them. Personally, I don't know precisely who stirred up the controversy over this, and I have no idea how many "liberal white women" were involved, nor how many people of other genders and skin colors were involved. But I DO know that they have a solid case that these terms are tainted by harmful historical use, and that is enough of a reason to replace them.

So I don't see this event as evidence of some widespread, racist, movement to erase anything other than white. Maybe such a movement exists, I am not arguing against that, I am just not sure that this is the best example, given the legitimacy of the complaint.

Is there much on max that will keep people subscribed?

I imagine that a price hike would just drive more people to become transients; subscribing for a month each year or two to watch the new stuff, and then cancelling.

Of course, that is what I do with all streaming, so that's just kind of how the world looks to me. I realize that many other people watch stuff a lot more than I do, so maybe they will stay.

MS products have been horrible since before Bill Gates stepped down. They survive on brand recognition, compatibility, treachery, and having the greatest marketing team in the world.

And, that's clearly sufficient.

I don't think Microsoft will suffer as much harm from this brain drain as we would like to believe they will. We don't like work-from-office mandates so it pleases us to think that those who make us suffer will naturally suffer because of it. Poetic irony, and all that. But really, Microsoft is too big and too rich to suffer from that. They can still find a way of retaining top tier talent, and abusing it too.

It is also natural for the higher-ups to distrust remote workers. They think it is fine for themselves, of course, but not for their underlings. So the push to return to the office was always inevitable. Employers are going to continue with this push, and smaller businesses will do the same as more and more big ones do this, thus eliminating better options for their own employees.