Taking out a bad loan is not smart. Not being able to pay it back is not smart. We can argue whether this is good or not, but certainly these people are not smart or they would have solved the problem or avoided it in the first place.
See, the problem with successful people is they confuse intelligence for luck. And I'm sure you're a very lucky person yourself.
If you were smart, you would have seen the financial crash of year 2XXX. If you were smart you'd have seen that a foreign market for X would have opened up draining out all funding in the US and leaving that portion of the job market hollow. If you were smart you'd have seen that bill that allowed X thousand more people in the country in this job dropping pay rates by half.
And I'm sure you are smart for having been born in a family that was somewhere near middle class and didn't have crippingling addictions or otherwise have issues that would put education somewhere not number 1 on the priority list. I'll clap my hands at how brilliant you are...
But, what we're talking about here is those not born with all these gifts can lift themselves out of a pit of debt or worse a life that would lead to crime, so that all of us live in a better place. You have any suggestions on that. Or are you just going to lock yourself up in a gated community and not worry about that kind of thing?
If you were smart, you would have seen the financial crash of year 2XXX
Makes sense
If you were smart you'd have seen that a foreign market for X would have opened up draining out all funding in the US and leaving that portion of the job market hollow
Makes sense
If you were smart you'd have seen that bill that allowed X thousand more people in the country in this job dropping pay rates by half
Makes sense
And I'm sure you are smart for having been born in a family that was somewhere near middle class and didn't have crippingling addictions or otherwise have issues that would put education somewhere not number 1 on the priority list. I'll clap my hands at how brilliant you are...
Doesn't make sense and then there's unhelpful sarcasm at the end
But, what we're talking about here is those not born with all these gifts can lift themselves out of a pit of debt or worse a life that would lead to crime, so that all of us live in a better place. You have any suggestions on that. Or are you just going to lock yourself up in a gated community and not worry about that kind of thing?
Providing direct value to society and getting rewarded for doing so has been an evergreen suggestion that has always worked well.
This works well for the Chinese immigrant with literally no money and no grasp of English who starts off selling takeout and grows the business, as it does to the person who starts driving taxi cabs, again, with no money to start off at all and then saves some to lease their first taxi and hire their first employee and then the second taxi and then the second employee.
A morally just society should reward, not punish these people. We need to have more, not less of them and that happens my incentivizing the right behaviors and disincentivizing the wrong behaviors.
It's all about the mindset and taking responsibility for your own future. You can complain and blame your fate or you can give it the middle finger and grow.
But, what are some suggestions you have to lift people out of a pit of debt or crime?
Says every smart person before they end up in a situation they cannot respect their financial commitments...
Of course, it's easy for you just to take anyone that does out of the smart pool and put them in the dumb pool. The problem is this is in no way a predictive measure. With the rules you have henceforth set you will be unable to classify that a person is smart before any trouble occurs.
This is how the rules you setup look like
You: This person is smart because they put X money in savings and have a backup fund.
[nothing interesting happens to this person]
You: See they were smart...
----
You: This person is smart because they put X money in savings and have a backup fund.
[person gets crashed into and injured, then a poorly timed market crash eliminates 70% of their savings driving them into bankruptcy]
You: This person was obviously dumb...
---
See, the thing is you, and the vast majority of US on HN are far closer to that second person then we'd like to admin (well short of some of the multi-millionaires that post here). We can just make ourselves feel better by saying we're smart instead of lucky.
person gets crashed into and injured, then a poorly timed market crash eliminates 70% of their savings driving them into bankruptcy
I think you need to collide your imagination with reality by asking whether majority of the recipients of this subsidy ended up there due to these terrible situations outside their control similar to what you suggest.
The crash, injury, market crash are all events that have happened to everyone and sure, it does affect a few people worse than others, but, for the problem at hand, are those the root cause, or something else entirely?
and should society as a whole ensure people have the training and skills to be more resilient to impacts from crashes, injuries, market crashes?
Extrapolating exceptional situations and weaving them into a story that feels good and fits an evil narrative that will have a terrible impact on future generations to come isn't a step in the right direction.
This is a political trick that exploits people in bad situations and does nothing to ensure that future generations don't end up in similar bad situations.
Comments
Nice. Since I paid mine back 100%, where do I get my $33k refund + 21 years interest ?
Not only you won't get it back, you're helping pay the cancellation.
Good. More smart people leads to better outcomes for everyone. Unless of course you're saying you demand an underclass?
Taking out a bad loan is not smart. Not being able to pay it back is not smart. We can argue whether this is good or not, but certainly these people are not smart or they would have solved the problem or avoided it in the first place.
See, the problem with successful people is they confuse intelligence for luck. And I'm sure you're a very lucky person yourself.
If you were smart, you would have seen the financial crash of year 2XXX. If you were smart you'd have seen that a foreign market for X would have opened up draining out all funding in the US and leaving that portion of the job market hollow. If you were smart you'd have seen that bill that allowed X thousand more people in the country in this job dropping pay rates by half.
And I'm sure you are smart for having been born in a family that was somewhere near middle class and didn't have crippingling addictions or otherwise have issues that would put education somewhere not number 1 on the priority list. I'll clap my hands at how brilliant you are...
But, what we're talking about here is those not born with all these gifts can lift themselves out of a pit of debt or worse a life that would lead to crime, so that all of us live in a better place. You have any suggestions on that. Or are you just going to lock yourself up in a gated community and not worry about that kind of thing?
Makes sense
Makes sense
Makes sense
Doesn't make sense and then there's unhelpful sarcasm at the end
Providing direct value to society and getting rewarded for doing so has been an evergreen suggestion that has always worked well.
This works well for the Chinese immigrant with literally no money and no grasp of English who starts off selling takeout and grows the business, as it does to the person who starts driving taxi cabs, again, with no money to start off at all and then saves some to lease their first taxi and hire their first employee and then the second taxi and then the second employee.
A morally just society should reward, not punish these people. We need to have more, not less of them and that happens my incentivizing the right behaviors and disincentivizing the wrong behaviors.
It's all about the mindset and taking responsibility for your own future. You can complain and blame your fate or you can give it the middle finger and grow.
But, what are some suggestions you have to lift people out of a pit of debt or crime?
smart people don't typically land themselves in a situation where they cannot respect their financial commitments.
Says every smart person before they end up in a situation they cannot respect their financial commitments...
Of course, it's easy for you just to take anyone that does out of the smart pool and put them in the dumb pool. The problem is this is in no way a predictive measure. With the rules you have henceforth set you will be unable to classify that a person is smart before any trouble occurs.
This is how the rules you setup look like
You: This person is smart because they put X money in savings and have a backup fund.
[nothing interesting happens to this person]
You: See they were smart...
----
You: This person is smart because they put X money in savings and have a backup fund.
[person gets crashed into and injured, then a poorly timed market crash eliminates 70% of their savings driving them into bankruptcy]
You: This person was obviously dumb...
---
See, the thing is you, and the vast majority of US on HN are far closer to that second person then we'd like to admin (well short of some of the multi-millionaires that post here). We can just make ourselves feel better by saying we're smart instead of lucky.
I think you need to collide your imagination with reality by asking whether majority of the recipients of this subsidy ended up there due to these terrible situations outside their control similar to what you suggest.
The crash, injury, market crash are all events that have happened to everyone and sure, it does affect a few people worse than others, but, for the problem at hand, are those the root cause, or something else entirely?
and should society as a whole ensure people have the training and skills to be more resilient to impacts from crashes, injuries, market crashes?
Extrapolating exceptional situations and weaving them into a story that feels good and fits an evil narrative that will have a terrible impact on future generations to come isn't a step in the right direction.
This is a political trick that exploits people in bad situations and does nothing to ensure that future generations don't end up in similar bad situations.