Off-topic: family income / cost of living in the US

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Kenny Blankenship
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Re: Off-topic: family income / cost of living in the US

Post by Kenny Blankenship »

Tammer in Philly wrote: Oct 05, 2021 4:05 PM
Kenny Blankenship wrote: Oct 05, 2021 11:46 AM
Tammer in Philly wrote: Oct 05, 2021 10:52 AM
Kenny Blankenship wrote: Oct 04, 2021 12:55 PM
The thing about the US is that there is so much freedom (relatively speaking) that people can lose some sense of discipline, some moral compass, some sense of accountability and responsibility. Some take advantage of our freedom (see China, Russia). You occasionally get people who go off the rails. The US places an strong emphasis on individuality perhaps at the expense of family.

I think your assessment of European Union in general is spot on. Most of those countries just kind of "exist". They don't really go anywhere...don't progress. Not as good an environment for innovation. The exception is probably Germany.

This is something that is parroted often but not in alignment with reality. Depending on which dimension of freedom you look at, the US is near the top (but not at the top), or pretty far from the top.

There are many lenses of "freedom," from individual civil liberties to economic freedom to freedom of the press and others.

In this one for overall freedom (with 76 individual metrics), the US doesn't crack the top 10, coming in 15th: https://worldpopulationreview.com/count ... by-country

In this economic freedom assessment, the US does even worse at 20th: https://www.heritage.org/index/ranking

The Democracy Index has the US ranked 2nd ... of 2 in North America: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy ... By_country

If you want to say "we're so free it causes other problems," you have to actually be able to define what that means, and those who have put in the effort to define it would seem to disagree. It's also worth remarkable, of course, that your actual assertion seems to be "we're so free we have more crime because some people abuse their freedom," but the countries that outrank us on every single freedom index ALSO have far less crime!

Seems to blow that hypothesis out of the water.
Hong Kong #3 on the Human Freedom index? That alone invalidates the results of the study...
Interesting to take one data point out of context and thereby trash the rest. For those capable of reading, the presence of HK is actually called out as the only non-democracy included in the top ten and explained why. Reading is hard, though, when it contradicts one’s confirmation bias.

Note that one would expect HK to diminish as Chinese control extends into other aspects of life, but the rationale in the score lies in the various criteria considered.

Some people in the US talk about freedom while choosing to ignore the fact that armed agents of the state kill thousands of citizens each year with no due process and virtually no repercussions.

As one selects locations, here’s another interesting lens: what are the best states to have a baby in?

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/30/real ... abies.html
Confirmation bias? What exactly in my posts above points to confirmation bias? You are the one that seems to be quoting studies to support your bias.

And as far as Hong Kong? Hong Kong has been dead meat since 1997. There's no need to read more. A list is published and Hong Kong is #3. Human freedom along side various Nordic countries and New Zealand. Hilarious!

To the OP...well you have seen what we are dealing with. We're all "armchair quarterbacks". I can tell you are smart enough you will do your research and come up what is best for you. No country is perfect, some are better than others and you will decide for yourself. A common refrain in the US is "...people always vote with their feet.". Lots of criticism about the US, because we can (think about that). Very few seem to leave.
Tammer in Philly
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Re: Off-topic: family income / cost of living in the US

Post by Tammer in Philly »

Kenny Blankenship wrote: Oct 05, 2021 6:25 PM
Confirmation bias? What exactly in my posts above points to confirmation bias? You are the one that seems to be quoting studies to support your bias.

And as far as Hong Kong? Hong Kong has been dead meat since 1997. There's no need to read more. A list is published and Hong Kong is #3. Human freedom along side various Nordic countries and New Zealand. Hilarious!

To the OP...well you have seen what we are dealing with. We're all "armchair quarterbacks". I can tell you are smart enough you will do your research and come up what is best for you. No country is perfect, some are better than others and you will decide for yourself. A common refrain in the US is "...people always vote with their feet.". Lots of criticism about the US, because we can (think about that). Very few seem to leave.
Hmm, it seems you have a profound misunderstanding of what just happened. Let me recap:

Eric: "AMERICA IS SO FREE WE HAVE the CRIMES BECAUSE SOME FOLKS CAN'T HANDLE THE FREEDUM"
Tammer: "Actually, by multiple published measures of freedom that you are free to go read, if you are capable of doing so, the US is actually pretty poorly placed among developed nations"
Eric: <ignores 3 of 4 dimensions of freedom posted, focuses on 1 of 4, ignores the methodology and overall results, cherry picks one data point he doesn't like> "HK is on this list so it's invalid."

In case you didn't follow:
1) I didn't state a bias or even a position. I simply refuted your claim.
2) I, unlike you, provide information and context when I make or refute a claim, to enable others to know why I believe what I write has some validity.
3) You, unlike me, are cherry picking information to defend an otherwise-unsupported claim. I see you didn't, in fact, provide any positive support for your claim about America's relative "freedom," nor for the link you imply between freedom and crime.

If you go to the actual published report that puts HK in 3rd for freedom, this is literally the 2nd paragraph in the Foreword of the document. And one of the publishers is the Cato Institute, which is a libertarian outfit.
Cato Institute wrote:"As this foreword is being written, the world watches the citizens of Hong Kong attempt to protect their freedom and the people of Venezuela struggle to obtain theirs. Those are just two of the many demonstrations now breaking out across the globe, but arguably they are the ones that are most focused on freedom. Communist China threatens to strip from Hong Kong its long-held status as one of the freest places in the world and to relegate it to the cellar, where the rest of China unfortunately dwells. The people of Venezuela hope to escape tyranny’s deepest dungeon: Venezuela ranks 161st out of 162 jurisdictions in freedom. (China is 126th.)"
So, I reject your critique of my sources, because your critique makes it clear you are totally ignorant of what the source even says.

I'm reminded, sadly, of the last time I engaged with you online. I believe that was the last week of February or first week of March, 2020, when you were telling me that the novel coronavirus was no big deal and I was blowing it out of proportion. Funny that you thought to try to school someone who has done actual epidemiological work for a living. And here we are again with the same information imbalance, and the same dismissal of informed claims.
Kenny Blankenship
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Re: Off-topic: family income / cost of living in the US

Post by Kenny Blankenship »

No, I know exactly what happened. Same MO. Your arrogance is astounding. I'll make it simpler for you:

Your quote of me (not even a paraphrase): "AMERICA IS SO FREE WE HAVE the CRIMES BECAUSE SOME FOLKS CAN'T HANDLE THE FREEDUM" (writes in all caps, uses poor grammar and purposely misspells freedom to humiliate a segment of our population).

Actual quote: "The thing about the US is that there is so much freedom (relatively speaking) that people can lose some sense of discipline, some moral compass, some sense of accountability and responsibility. Some take advantage of our freedom (see China, Russia). You occasionally get people who go off the rails. The US places an strong emphasis on individuality perhaps at the expense of family."

What is exactly wrong with this assessment? I even qualified "so much freedom" with "relatively speaking" without any intention of comparing to other countries, yet your agenda seems to be bombard with studies and prove me wrong? So what if America is #25? You're telling me that just across the border Canada at #5 is so superior we should be rushing across the border? I can't tell what your so eager to do, prove me wrong at every turn or demonstrate some sort of superior intelligence to everyone else.

Even simpler...Hong Kong is #3 on the Human Freedom list? If somebody publishes a study like this and prints it, nobody says "This doesn't make sense, perhaps we should relook at the results and make adjustments. Do you publish something that completely ignores common sense? Hong Kong lost their freedom from Day 1 of the 1997 handover when China was telling Tung Chee-hwa what to do. For a study to say Hong Kong is free at this point of the game surely demonstrates flaws in the study. Either that or the study is too old to be relevant.

OK, I'll answer you one by one:

1) I didn't state a bias or even a position. I simply refuted your claim.
My claim is that there is that because of the freedom the US offers, people can lose some sense of discipline, moral compass, accountability and responsibility. How exactly do your studies address that??? I make no comparisons to how much freedom in other countries. You made the post about something I never claimed.

2) I, unlike you, provide information and context when I make or refute a claim, to enable others to know why I believe what I write has some validity.
Perhaps, fair enough, but when the information and context doesn't even address the claim, that's a problem.

3) You, unlike me, are cherry picking information to defend an otherwise-unsupported claim. I see you didn't, in fact, provide any positive support for your claim about America's relative "freedom," nor for the link you imply between freedom and crime
Your "cherry-picking" comment was about Hong Kong. We're changing to something else now? So basically what you're telling me about Hong Kong is I'm cherry picking because a result that is published is staring me straight in the face but I should ignore it. About the link between freedom and crime, if you want to refute that, go ahead.

I'm just amazed that the OP comes here to ask for help about where to live and you choose to trash this thread to make your point (which doesn't even address the claim I'm making). You're hardly ever in this website. What's your agenda? This is your typical MO. You even want to dig up old trash? We can discuss you (and another compatriot) ganging up on me on Krieger's Facebook thread. Even he couldn't rationalize with you guys.

If you can't have a rational discussion with people who have differing opinions (funniest thing is you don't truly know my opinions) and can't speak without a condescending attitude, why don't you just leave?

I've been around a long time, and I've got to say you are the most arrogant and vindictive person I've ever met by far.

And to the OP? I'm sorry you had to see this.
RobertRO
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Re: Off-topic: family income / cost of living in the US

Post by RobertRO »

Gentlemen, despite the debate, all your feedback in this topic is valuable information for me. Thank you all.
stuartinmn
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Re: Off-topic: family income / cost of living in the US

Post by stuartinmn »

Geez, mellow out dudes.
RobertRO
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Re: Off-topic: family income / cost of living in the US

Post by RobertRO »

Since you've mentioned Nordic European countries, let me comment a bit about one of them that I know quite well: Denmark.

From a bird's eye view, Denmark is probably one of the best countries in the world. The system is very protective about each individual, and one has to be reckless and struggle quite hard to really fail. I will just mention two real life examples I know of.
FIrst example, a person who worked a few years in a certain job, but all of a sudden she decided she doesn't like it anymore. So she quitted, and then enrolled in a training for a totally different kind of activity. She may linger in that training for a few years (yes, years, no typo here), while getting paid by the Danish state a significant amount of money every month, enough for her to afford almost the same standard of living as before.
Second example, a guy who had a car crash about a year ago. It was a very bad one, however he was also lucky. He spent several weeks in hospitals, but he eventually came out in quite a good shape physically, although somewhat challenged psychically. To put it short, a health condition that in most countries would be considered as "good to go". However, he doesn't yet feel fit to resume work. Of course, he had to pay zero in medical bills. For a couple of months right after the crash, his wife was granted a fully paid holiday from her work, to care about the family. And, during all this time, he has been paid his full salary, although he hasn't showed up at work since the day of the crash.
Don't imagine that the people I mentioned above are some kind of highly skilled rocket scientists. No, they are just having meager jobs.

The Nordic countries probably have the best implementation of socialism, in the whole world. Still democratic, no cult of personality... but socialist. The system helps you when you're down, but eagerly inflicts ever growing taxes on you, as your income goes up.
Let's say you want to buy a new car in Denmark. Great. First, shove 25% of the value of the car on VAT (kind of sales tax). VAT as a tax is common all over EU, but it varies - in Germany it's only 19%. Oh, you also want to register the car? That's another tax. If the value of the car is below ~$30K, the registration costs you 85% of the car value. Is the car more expensive than $30K? Well, you need to pay 150% of its value as registration tax - again, no typos here. Welcome to Denmark.
This doesn't mean that one cannot find very rich people in Denmark. Let's just mention the families owning controlling stakes in companies like Lego Jysk, Ecco or Maersk.

In almost any statistics, Denmark ranks above Germany, Austria or Netherlands. But, as you get deeper in details, all those countries may be better places to live in, than Denmark. At the end of the day, it is a matter of personal preference.
Kenny Blankenship
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Re: Off-topic: family income / cost of living in the US

Post by Kenny Blankenship »

Robert, you are absolutely correct.

The US always debates how much to tax and what benefits the government should provide. We're going through that right now. I recall a Rick Steve's travel program where he visited Denmark and he asked this couple how much of their paycheck goes to taxes and they said about 50%. So our government taxes less but other benefits come from private sources at a cost.

You'll have to determine what lifestyle suits you best.
WilNJ
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Re: Off-topic: family income / cost of living in the US

Post by WilNJ »

Since this has been resurrected almost 1-1/2 later, I'm not sure it's relevant anymore but here's my $0.02.

If you're in a business not tied to the local economy, you have an infinite number of possibilities.

Earning $200k with a family in the "Rust Belt" will afford you a comfortable lifestyle. In a suburb of NYC, LA or SF, not so much.

I would work backwards. How much do you think you can make in a year? Back off 40% for payroll taxes and health insurance costs and divide that by 52. That would be a comfortable budget for a monthly mortgage.

Now, depending on where you're looking, that budget could be substantially impacted by property taxes and insurance.

In a suburb of NYC for example, you could very easily pay $10,000 - $20,000 per year in property taxes alone. Insurance likely wouldn't be a significant impact. Conversely, if coastal Florida is something you're interested in, the inverse may apply. Your property taxes might be significantly lower but the insurance due to Hurricane risk may be significantly higher.

If I were starting from scratch, I would look at a lower cost of living area. I'm a Big Ten fan but as far as opportunities, this map represents it best.

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