Folstar

@Folstar@lemmus.org

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨onions⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  I tried that once but I cried the entire time. So did god.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨92% of American adults aren’t going to a doctor because they cannot afford it. The health insurance industry must be dissolved & all of its executives criminally prosecuted for murder, conspiracy, an…⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Same. I had to have a CT brainscan this year. The scan was ordered during my annual physical based on routine questioning so I thought nothing of it. Many moons ago I had to have a CT brainscan in the ER and it cost like $25 with insurance. I figured, surely this scan that is being scheduled would cost the same or possibly less, so nothing to worry about. Nope! $500 for the exact same procedure on the exact same machine with the same insurance plan.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Drop your unpopular opinions here because c/unpopularopinions is filled with popular opinions⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  We need to bring back testing to vote. No, not the intentionally obtuse Jim Crow kind. Basic civics knowledge like what year it is, what are the branches of government, etc…

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨This is what Democratic voters are saying. Will the party listen?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Yes, voting based on wishful thinking instead of how things actually work. Why are we having this conversation if you agreed with that from the get go?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Housing prices⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Agreed. Another, less violent but better for local finances, path forward could be sky high property taxes alongside homestead exemptions. That and greatly simplifying the opaque web of first time homebuyer incentives and options. Passing such a set of reforms would boost tax revenues for a few years, drive up rents while driving down the cost of homes, and then have a tail end boost to home owner industries.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Housing prices⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Interesting claim. Let’s look into it.

  Average home price in 1970: $25k I found a few different figures on this one, and averaged them out.

  $25k 1970 dollars in 2026 per CPI: $220,251 data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc.pl?cost1=25000&year1…

  not necessary, but gives context: Average (not median) home price today: $502k fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MSPUS

  Median home price today: $410k fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MSPUS

  “The median money income of all families in 1970 was about $9,870” www.census.gov/library/…/p60-80.html

  Median family income in 2024 (most recent year reported): $105,800 [note: does anyone believe this? FRED is claiming median family income went up 45% in the past decade and I find that EXTRAORDINARILY suspect. Yes, few people get COLA over 3% and many getting fuckall.] fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEFAINUSA646N

  roughly a 10.7X increase

  My best guess is that Mr. Brooks, using slightly different numbers (sources vary, exact years, etc…), to arrive at: 1970 Home Price + Flat Income Gains = $138,000. This is not great methodology, as growth is looked at in percentages for a reason. To illustrate, suppose instead of a house we were looking at candy bars. Let’s say in 1970 a candy bar was a dime and today it’s $2. Grafting raw wage gains onto candy bars, we’re saving over $80k on each candy bar!!! Oh wait, that’s silly. Let’s stick with percentages.

  Using the official wage numbers, we arrive at “the average home today would be $267,500”. This is more accurate yet still a massive departure from where we are today.

  So… what actually broke?

  There are several explanations for this divergence.

  The Good: Houses today are bigger and have better construction standards. Please, before you start typing a survivorship bias based claim about your house from 1905 that’s still in great shape today, read up on survivorship bias. Yes, there are modern builders who do shoddy work (we’ve all seen the Youtube videos), but overall a house built to code in 2026 is significantly more advanced. A fair amount of the cost increase can be captured here.

  The Bad: Rent seeking. Figurative and literally. Somehow someone was like “hey, I’m going to get rich by making a basic necessity worse” and nobody beat them within an inch of their life to discourage others. Rookie mistake by our society.

  The Ugly: Official numbers are suspect at best. This was true before 2025 and whoa boy is it true now. Inflation is chronically under-reported BY DESIGN. That means actual inflation is driving up the cost of houses and cans of bean and things, while reported inflation is being used to determine your pay raise (that is, if you even get one). This divergence that started in the 90s is hitting critical mass here in the roaring 20s and we’re probably fucked as I haven’t heard anyone in a position of power even recognize this problem, let alone suggest how to fix it.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨This is what Democratic voters are saying. Will the party listen?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Good work. Your plan helped elect the most genocidal candidate. Voting how you wish things work versus how they actually work tends to do things like that.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Mars Bar from the 1990s found during house clearance - shrinkflation in action⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  That’s the official inflation numbers, which are lies. It’s an open secret that in the 90s there was a political movement among the owners to artificially lower reported inflation (see: Boskin Commission for example) because it would boost the economy (on paper) while letting them absorb the gains.

  Underreporting by 1-2% a year doesn’t seem like much until you do it for several decades. Looking at actual inflation instead of the reported lie, that mars bar is closer to $2 today. Shrinkflation had to happen to keep the bigger con going. Most businesses will, of course, cheat the margins at every instance.

  TLDR; shrinkflation is a symptom, not the disease

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The woke liberals are making our wars gay⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Which just makes the “warrior ethos” talk that much hilarious while also concerning.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨This is what Democratic voters are saying. Will the party listen?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  The lefties I asked said they couldn’t vote for a genocidal party or candidate. Seems pretty reasonable to me.

  There, someone said it. People seem to be under the mistaken impression that we’re voting for which hero will save us. No. We’re voting for which villain we can live with. By not voting for the villain you more closely align with, you are failing to cancel out a vote for the villain you least align with. Congrats, you helped get the way more genocidal villain in power. People wish this wasn’t the way our system works, and let that belief in wishful thinking dictate action. In doing so they make token gestures like not voting which gets completely lost in the noise of legions of others not voting for other reasons.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Take-Two CEO Says We'll All Be Streaming Our Games In 3 Years⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Do you have to fail a test on how time works to be a CEO? Is that why movies are always set waaaaaaaay too soon in the future to make any damn sense?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨This is what Democratic voters are saying. Will the party listen?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  There is, sadly, a popular idea on the left that people should vote how they wish the system works instead of how it actually works. Somehow, they haven’t quite figured out that they are working against their own interests in a token gesture that is lost in the noise. I’m fairly certain this started as intentional sabotage out of some conservative thinktank, but now has diehard believers who keep this very, very bad idea perpetuating.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Theft⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Geez, all that sounds like a good idea for making the world a better place, but what if instead we just stay at home and refuse to vote for politicians who don’t pass our purity tests? What if instead of working to make the world work the way it ought to we just pretend it works the way we want it to. Then hold ourselves in high regard for not participating or making token gestures that work against our interest?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Theft⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Talarico signed up for three debates and said he’ll show up even if Paxton doesn’t.

  Yes. Get up there and laugh at am empty podium if you have to. It was beyond frustrating in 2024 when the Harris campaign was like “ok, I guess the debates are cancelled”. No! Make a show of it. Stand on stage for an hour and read everything wrong your opponent has every done. Dare them to show up next time. Do something.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨"Don't unionize, just get a better job." When you unionize, you ARE getting a better job.⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  The dumbest are made bosses, nothing works right its a shit show.

  This is different from everywhere else how?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Every time⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  The opening makes fun of blue and people who like blue.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Correlation == Causation?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  To test whether stupid people are psychic, or, if the smart part of their brain (that refuses to help their conscious mind or, more likely, is actively ignored) foresaw what was coming?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨In a healthy society Zohran Mamdani would be a centrist.⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Yes, and the left needs to get better at NOT pre-compromising and instead saying what they actually want. Leaving no room for negotiations is not viable in a two party system. This was the great failure of the Clintonista “Third Way” that literally drove GOP policy further right.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Local Walmart just installed cameras in the aisles…⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Sounds like two sides of the same coin.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Local Walmart just installed cameras in the aisles…⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  It must take a lot of compute to have AI review all those cameras and calculate surge pricing. I wonder where they will find it?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨In Star Wars, what would it mean "to bring balance to The Force?"⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  There’s this all powerful force that binds the universe together and controls our destinies. It’s like gravity, but different and possibly sentient. We call it “the force”.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Are datacenters in space more lucrative than on earth?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Absolutely. Data centers on earth are subject to the laws of physics. Data centers in space, per SpaceX’s white paper on the subject, operate beyond paltry thermodynamics, material sciences, and several other fields of science. When you’re that much of an IPO boosting gigachadalphabro it’s all profit.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I just released my first fully free Android game: Wandering Alchemist (GPS walking game)⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  we shall watch your career with great interest

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨modern classic⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I like the height and thickness of the couch back pillows on the right. End of list of positive changes. Replacing the carpet was probably a good move too, but they did it wrong.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Our bold, brilliant leaders and innovators once again doing what everyone else is doing, even when it is stupid.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why is AOC a big deal? She just speaks common sense and calls out absurdity. Have we really gone that far off the rails where we don't do it ourselves?⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  It was nothing compared to the horrors of MTG

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨POV: You just said something the Tesseract Developer didn't like⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  “Disagree. Agree. Agree again. Agree with the tacit point being made.” -you for some reason

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨POV: You just said something the Tesseract Developer didn't like⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Power doesn’t corrupt, it reveals corruption. For some people, it takes shockingly little power to go full mask off. This guy will probably go on to make some HOA legendary.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨[deleted]⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Is this the stupid bitch who decided to try to shadow censor other people’s experience? That’s some insane projection. Bonus points for including the DDOS just to leave no doubts.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Can anyone confirm?⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Indeed. Commuter costs is a funny one because people will move here thinking they can share a car with a spouse. That lasts about a week, less if they have children. Suddenly the lower mortgage or higher wages don’t look so great when the average new car is $49k.

  No wait, what I meant to say is living in TX is great. Everyone should buy a house here. Drive up the market, then buy mine.