See Campos at LGM for more in the same vein as Witt's post.
From the link in 1:
These otherwise unsustainable trends are being maintained by a combination of unlimited federal educational loan money and, to a lesser extent, poor information regarding the actual relationship between the costs and benefits of acquiring a law degree. Any significant change in either of these factors, but especially the first, will lead to a massive disruption in the current economic structure of legal education in America.
Is federal loan money ever tied to the viability of the career options of the degree? I wouldn't want us to limit the loans available for art history degrees.
The link in 1 is well worth reading.
The world is hardly suffering from a lack of lawyers
I disagree, sort of, with this. The world, or at least the US, really is suffering from a lack of people who provide legal services at low rates to low or moderate income people who need those services. (Criminal defense, benefits law, and landlord/tenant are just three of many, many examples). But the current law school cost structure, among many other things, makes it difficult for this to be an economically viable option for most people. Broadly speaking I think the best course would be to have much cheaper public law schools that are focused on professional training, with a 2 year, not 3 year degree, and there are a number of other pie in the sky changes I could think of.
I wouldn't want us to limit the loans available for art history degrees.
If we don't know art history, art will repeat itself and I'm sick of sunflowers.
and there are a number of other pie in the sky changes I could think of.
But you won't share them with us because this forum is one of hardheaded realism.
Is federal loan money ever tied to the viability of the career options of the degree?
In certain circumstances, yes.
Losing your job is no fun, although I tend to assume that even administrative workers in a law school have more alternative careers open to them than people in other types of jobs.
I'm not sure why you'd assume this. Low- to mid-level administrative workers aren't exactly hard to come by, and if you were working at a law school that was in danger of going under, it's clearly not one of the prestigious/monied ones.
3, 7: For my money, they could have gone farther. This NYT article from June briefly mentions the push-back that the for-profit trade schools gave the Obama administration on proposed regulations.
I'm glad to see companies getting sued as well.
The for-profit schools are the most egregious offenders, but nonprofits have a lot to answer for too. I remember a friend of mine in the late '90s recounting the sleazy ethics of one very respected liberal arts school, regularly encouraging low-level applicants to pony up $300 for an application they knew had no chance of success.
8: I'm thinking in comparison to a lot of the people I see who get laid off from a manufacturing or other similar job. If you're working in an administrative job, you can definitely read and you can probably use a computer, at least at a beginner level. That alone puts you in front of an enormous number of people.
In this city, barely 50% of students graduate from high school in four years, and the number doesn't get much higher if you stretch it to six years. The number of adults walking around who cannot read is astounding.
So yeah, unemployed secretaries -- not an easy position to be in, for sure, but could be a lot worse.
9: the for-profits actually won that fight. Absolutely shameful.
Oh, and to 4 -- I couldn't agree more. But I think the solution is something equivalent to a physician assistant, not more full-fledged lawyers.
I dream about the day when some philanthropists makes it her/his mission in life to fix the divorce and family law system for poor and working class people.
12: I do think that divorce is a genuinely hard problem -- that is, that any solution for poor people is going to be more about providing them with advocates of some sort than about radically simplifying divorce procedure. Dividing property is an individually difficult problem, and even fairly poor people often own something worth arguing over, let alone worrying about child custody.
even fairly poor people often own something worth arguing over
No, they dont. Property is an economic issue. It has a value.
So yeah, unemployed secretaries -- not an easy position to be in, for sure, but could be a lot worse.
This sentence is annoying the shit out of me, and I can't quite put my finger on why.
I think because while "It could always be worse!" is surely something that people often need to remember about their own situations (recognizing their own privilege, etc), it is nevertheless a highly unhelpful thing to say to/about someone in an obectively shitty situation.
I dream about the day when some philanthropists makes it her/his mission in life to fix the divorce and family law system for poor and working class people.
I believe that most jurisdictions have a free mediation program to help resolve issues of custody and support.
The difficulty comes in that mediators come with their own biases and assumptions and and untrained consumer doesnt know how to advocate for himself or herself.
Do lawyers still buy those T-shirts emblazoned with the Shakespeare line "The first thing we do is kill all the lawyers"? I remember them being very popular in the 1980s.
This is one of those questions though where I feel like even really sensible policy solutions are pretty much pie-in-the-sky* for any reasonable progression from the status quo. Law schools are cash cows for big universities, like other master's programs. Big firms want an oversupply of talented people. And the people who make the laws are all lawyers. So short of a revolution, where is the plausible impetus for change going to manifest? I really don't think the market will take care of this, except in some small ways on the margins.
*Wherever workers strike and fight, it's there you'll find Joe Hill!
People often say "I dont care what the cost is! It is the principle of it!"
The Court system and the people involved in it cost money. The amount of time that your case takes impacts how far off someone else's case gets heard. So courts have to prioritize. That is why they get so pissy when people wait until the last minute to settle cases.
Thus, in my area, they have forced settlement conferences well in advance.
Court appointed special advocates and mediators are often not lawyers. It shows. They often mess up or dont think of pitfalls, thus causing the parties difficulty.
Mediation can be fantastic. Parties who resolve their cases out of court are far more likely to work together better in the future. But, when lawyers are not involved, it can be a mess.
Sure, the parties involved would pretty much always be better off agreeing on a consensual division of the property. But where they can't or don't agree, there's not much that simplifying procedure is going to do (although the stuff you've mentioned -- mediation conferences, pressure from the courts to settle -- is as helpful as anything could be).
In other perky fun news, my pay just got cut -- in theory, they'll pay back the withheld amount starting in April 2015. Feh.
I like the charming pre-holiday timing of it all -- they couldn't cut our pay in January instead of right after Thanksgiving.
21:
My point is that poor people usually do not have enough property to spend much court time on. It simply doesnt make financial sense to let them spend all day in court fighting over the dog.
in theory, they'll pay back the withheld amount starting in April 2015. Feh.
Whoa. Man, I'd rather have furloughs.
Oh, it's not all that much -- a few percent of my salary. Irritating as all get out. And they're giving us additional vacation days as compensation, which would be great if I could figure out how to schedule the amount of vacation I get already around my workload.
28: vacation nights and weekends!
Heh. Worked all day Friday and Saturday Thanksgiving weekend, although I did it at home.
This would all be much more amusing if Buck's newsletter business wasn't in the process of taking it's final nosedive. I mean, we're fine, we have savings, but things are certainly going to be a little tighter.
That 'it's' should be an 'its'. I blame the governor.
Suddenly, I feel like Tweety. Making a sudden break for total hegemony over the Recent Comments sidebar!
Is Buck going to support the family with his artisanal brewing, now that he has the time? That'd be cool.
He'd love to, but licensing issues are brutal. And he's really nowhere near an industrial brewer: he makes lovely beer, but on a home scale like I make good cake -- I'd have a serious ways to go before I had the skills to run a commercial bakery, and the same for him.
If the newsletter business shuts down completely, he's still employed at the British publication he works for; it's just a serious pay cut, not unemployment.
Luckily, since Sally went vegetarian, we're spending much less money on meat.
Could he parlay the newsletter business into some other kind of consulting-y analyzing-y work in a similar sort of realm?
We look forward to receiving your resume, LB.
16: Does it help if I clarify that I don't say that to people directly? It's a population-level statement, and I'm making it in the context of a discussion about macro-level economic issues.
If I have a person who just lost her admin job sitting in front of me, I might say, "Well, you're fortunate to have some transferable skills," as I helped her think about where to apply, but I'm not so crass or unkind as to say "Well, at least you can read!"
37: Lunches have already been purchased for connections with the intent of exploring that possibility.
38: Damn you, BigLaw! I tried to quit you, but you just keep waiting.
Yikes, LB, that stinks. And never mind the pre-holiday timing of it all, a few percent is a few percent. I'm fretting over the upcoming reversion to pre-recession-level payroll deductions for transit ($125/mo limit rather than $230) which is going to cost me less than that.
Regarding 14, I was definitely unclear. I meant people need an experienced, capable advocate to get them through the existing system. I don't actually fantasize about restructuring our entire family law system.
This is an interesting illustration of the downward stickiness of wages. I took a huge pay cut to come here, and didn't mind it much -- I knew that was the deal. And if the salary I'd come here at had been a couple of thousand lower, I wouldn't have noticed it particularly in the context of the size of the pay cut I was taking anyway. Having my salary drop at the same job, though, even though it's not very much, feels like doom.
42: the key is to lock in an extremely low salary for an extended time period. Then you won't have any unpleasant downside surprises.
I have implemented this strategy with enormous success.
I wonder if the subways are hiring. Driving the A-train was good enough for my grandfather.
36: Good Lord, how much meat did Sally eat?
the key is to lock in an extremely low salary for an extended time period. Then you won't have any unpleasant downside surprises.
It seems like a better alternative would to lock in an extremely high salary for some time period. Then if you manage things prudently you might have savings accumulated to help you weather any unpleasant downside surprises.
Oh hey, in personal finance/food budget news, we got kicked off food stamps (for good reasons) about 6 months ago.
Of course, the upshot is that, despite increased income, we don't feel much better off, since our food budget has gone from $0 to ~$550/month.
Not to mention catching up on long-deferred home maintenance/improvement and wardrobe updates. My pants situation was growing egregious.
Anyway, sorry to hear the news, LB.
we got kicked off food stamps (for good reasons) about 6 months ago.
It's heebie's fault, isn't it?
My pants situation was growing egregious.
Laydeez.
Driving the A-train was good enough for my grandfather.
Well, he must have had those sweet Duke Ellington royalties coming in, too.
OT: Today I spent four hours with a corporate speech consultant. Why didn't you people tell me that I don't make eye contact?
53: Well, I was going to, but, well, [stares at shoes]
There's not really a polite way to say that you look shifty and underhanded, is there?
And since I'm here, I'm going to vent about something that annoyed the shit out of me a few weeks ago. An IRL and FB friend of mine was going on (on FB) about how she and her friends were, as an experiment, keeping to a $35/week food budget* while seeking to eat healthy. A one week experiment, mind you.
The thing is, my annoyance/barely controlled fury wasn't so much at the condescension of it** - it reeked of "we'll show the stupid poor that it can be done" rather than "we'll gain empathy from this", even though they'd deny it all the livelong day - as from the fact that, actually, it's not that big a deal. I don't want to understate the restrictions of food stamps, or suggest that a limited food budget isn't hard, but the bottom line is that, for about 2 years, I fed my family 95% on SNAP benefits without any compromises, and it pisses me off that people treat it as some magical challenge.
Yes, I'm privileged to have a nice kitchen with appliances and shit, yes, knowing how to cook is a privilege (although, to be clear, I started out figuring out for myself how to fry an egg as a teen; privileges like Cook's Illustrated and appliances made me a better cook, but I fed myself great food with a toaster oven in my dorm room based on making shit up), but the bottom line is that, by making food a priority, I was able to feed my family to the highest standards on a strict food stamp budget. I don't think I've ever read a discussion of food stamps, whether written by someone who's been on them or not, that doesn't piss me off. Food stamps aren't an excuse for feeding your family shit, nor are food stamps an excuse to judge the food choices of others ("you shouldn't be allowed to buy soda on SNAP" - fuck you). People who buy processed crap with SNAP are exactly the same as people who buy processed crap with cash - it's cultural (that is, American), and has nothing to do with what card you're swiping.
* this is right in line with my benefits for most of my time on SNAP
** and this is really the first time I've ever experienced/understood that feeling of resentment that comes from well-intentioned condescension. Whether due to pure privilege or a certain sociopathic not giving a shit, I've never cared in the least about that sort of thing (I'm pretty sure I've detected intended condescension in the past, but it never takes, because wtf do I care what you think of my choices?).
53: I always picture you staring directly at me with unblinking red-rimmed eyes.
It's heebie's fault, isn't it?
Well, she didn't help any.
55: There's an emoticon, but of course we're not allowed to use them.
There's not really a polite way to say that you look shifty and underhanded, is there?
"You look tired and emotional"?*
* I think Adam Carolla said once that "Shifty is sketchy with a plan."
56: Actually, I keep multiplying $140 by 3, not 4. It's a bit more than my max benefits, a good 10-20% better than the benefits I had most of the time. OTOH, my kids were in the ~1,000 calorie/day range for most of the time, so let's call it even.
Worked all day Friday and Saturday Thanksgiving weekend, although I did it at home.
Serious question, why aren't more professional-level jobs hourly rather than salaried? I've always been hourly, so I don't have anything to compare it to, but I like it. At the very least it means that when you have to work more than you expect and/or want you get an immediate reward in your paycheck. Beyond that it feels like it makes it really simple to negotiate working less, when that's possible.
I can see how it creates more opportunities for bad managers to pressure employees either by giving them fewer hours than they want or by trying to get them to falsify timesheets, but I would hope that professional employees would have the ability to push back.
I'm sure there are good reasons why it's much more common for jobs like LB's to be salaried, but I just think there are real advantages to being hourly.
it's much more common for jobs like LB's to be salaried
I don't think this is right. It's much more common for relatively junior professionals to be salaried rather than hourly employees, and the reason is that a significant percentage of the time that junior professionals spend on the job is supposed to be training and apprenticeship--learning how to do their jobs as competent, skilled professionals.
For more senior professionals, who're done with the apprenticeship phase of their careers, salaries are much less common. Doctors, lawyers, accountants, architects, etc. all bill their clients by the hour (or the task or whatever else)--they're not on salaries. Salaried positions are the exception, at least traditionally--in house or government lawyers (hello LB), doctors who work on staff at hospitals, etc.
Law firms bill by the hour, but even partners in law firms are rarely paid in any simple sense by the hour -- what they take is a function of the firm's profits, which may relate to their hourly billing but is going to depend on a whole lot of other factors. Being an hourly employee, which is what NickS is talking about, rather than a salaried employee or a business owner, is pretty rare.
56: People who buy processed crap with SNAP are exactly the same as people who buy processed crap with cash - it's cultural (that is, American)
Minor point: it's also often a function of living in a food desert. That circumstance could be a function of what card you're swiping, but that may be descending into the weeds on this topic.
57: I swear this was completely unplanned--a week or two ago I, uh, borrowed a bunch of the Ella Fitzgerald sings the American Songbook albums from the internet, and as I was coming back from Rikers I thought "well let's try out this Duke Ellington the young people kick up such a fuss about" because, truly, I am ignorant of jazz. So there I am pulling out of 59th Street and, bang, everything gets all meta.
Yes, being an hourly employee is pretty rare, and you're right that was specifically what Nick was asking about. I was trying to explain why it's relatively rare. My wife, who works as a psychologist in a private practice, is a counterexample--she's paid hourly rather than a salary by the guy running the practice. But he only pays her for the hours he feels he can bill for (and the number of hours that can be billed is generally determined by insurance companies), which is a fraction usually hovering around half the hours she actually spends working for him. So, yes, there's the advantage that when she gets unusually busy and finds herself working nights and weekends, her pay is higher than if she is less busy, but unpredictably so--sometimes unclear if it will be 10% higher or 70%. Overall I think she'd vastly prefer a salary. When she bothers to calculate her "real" hourly wage, it's fairly depressing.
And, at least for lawyers, there are actually lots of hourly positions (more often as contractors rather than employees, but available in either form). They're non-partner track "staff" attorney positions, or contract attorney positions. Here again, you're able to be paid an hourly wage (be paid for all the hours you spend working) because in those positions, there's little to no time spend on the professional training/apprenticeship aspects of the job. All the time you spend is for the firm's benefit, not yours.
Doctors, lawyers, accountants, architects, etc.
Those are all professions in which there's a long tradition of private practice. I would assume that most engineers are salaried, most in-house accountants are salaried and, of course, most management positions are salaried (sometimes with performance bonuses, but that's a separate issue).
In my case I really am more interested in making it simple to work fewer hours when work is slow than I am in making more money when work is busy and I realize that isn't most people's concern.
70: Those exist, but so do senior salaried positions. Anyone in-house is salaried, as are of counsel in law firms, and there are salaried staff attorney positions as well. I'd guess that there are easily more salaried employee lawyer jobs than hourly employee lawyer jobs -- not sure where self-employed/partner jobs would fit in there.
I don't think 72 contradicts anything I said. Maybe we're not disagreeing.
Working for hourly wages gives the employer greater control over how you spend your time, IME. Whereas working for a salary, you can at least pretend to yourself that you're being paid to do some set of tasks, not directly renting out your body and mind. Of course, that's just pretend, especially if your salaried job doesn't really take a full-time amount of hours to complete but you're required to be there for the full time anyway. (In which case, Hello, internet!) I think this illusion of autonomy is an essential part of what it means to be a professional.
Not sure where hourly billing fits here. I had a salaried job where we billed hourly to various projects (not a legal job), but the billing was something of an afterthought: if we had work to do, we figured out later how to bill it, and if we didn't have work, there was a sort of slush project that we could bill to. I've also taken some small freelance jobs that I billed hourly, where I knew the person who was paying me, and I was very scrupulous to only bill them for time I was actually working. This didn't feel bad, since I'd given an estimate and I was working for individuals or small organizations, not big companies.
I can't even imagine how to keep track of hours worked and not-worked. I remember when I was an undergrad and had to fill out a time card, I would invent elaborate justifications for myself ("yes, I spent half of that hour on the web, but on the other hand, I spent fifteen minutes thinking about how to make that code work over lunch, so it kind of evens out...")
for what it's worth my experience is generally similar to what you describe in 74.2 -- I have projects, I'm responsible for allocating my hours worked among those projects in a responsible way, and nobody is particularly looking over my shoulder about it. How I decide which project to assign my time to depends partially on my relationship with the various clients and it is always nice when I have the equivalent of a slush project available to me (usually some form of "internal projects" ) which I do most but not all of the time.
||
A F/B friend just posted a photo of him and his wife, his arms around his wife's midsection, but with Brad Pitt's face photoshopped over his face. "Ha ha! I had plastic surgery!" A comment: "Do all women glow like that with Brad around?" A follow-up comment by F/B friend: "Now I just need to get a mask made for myself! We'll go out in public! Ha ha."
This is a kink I don't need to see being enacted.
|>
that feeling of resentment that comes from well-intentioned condescension.
Oh lord, have I been there. Food stamps never made sense for me, as a single person without children making an ostensible scrape-by living; still, with transportation costs and rent being what they were, "food insecurity" described my life fairly well. Still, as a single person without children, cooking was insanely problematic (especially since I usually didn't get home from work until 9 or 10 and shared a kitchen). There was pretty much no well-intentioned policy, white paper, or whatever that would help someone in my demographic. Daniel Davies had a one-point plan I liked: the poor want money.
Hm, when I last worked a salaried position, by which I mean I had a contract to earn x amount per year in exchange for roughly 40 hours/week, the place made liberal use of what we called "comp time".
There was no overtime, but if you put in additional hours over 8 in a given day, you kept track of these, and eventually you'd show your sheet revealing that you'd now racked up 40 or 80 hours of comp time, or what have you. You'd then be able to arrange for compensatory time off as needed and viable, whether it be taking an extra hour for lunch each day to take a class (as I did for a semester, in order to take a German for reading course preparatory to applying to grad school!), or for whatever other reason.
This made an extraordinary amount of sense to me, and actually made for a fairly happy workplace. Again, no overtime pay, and you were of course expected to put in however much time was needed in evenings and the weekend if there was a tight schedule or project in the works. You'd get comp time for that.
65: Food deserts are an issue no doubt, but at the margins. Most SNAP doesn't get spent at corner stores miles away from a grocery.
But this is what rankles. Insofar as there are legit reasons to buy crap food, they're unrelated to SNAP. Being a two job parent, or a single parent, or whatever, may be understandable reasons for buying unhealthy convenience foods, but food stamps don't enter into it.
80: You left out crap food tastes better.
Not all crap food, of course, but french fries about the perfect food ever.
My last hourly position was at a sales-driven workplace where they tried hard to keep workers below the 35 hrs/week level at which employers are liable for paid vacations. When an employee didn't meet performance standards two weeks running, that employee's hours were cut. When an employee exceeded performance standards, every once in a while, there was a cash reward--maybe the equivalent of two or three hours' work--but the main reward was more a little job security, for a while. So many people were hustling for second (or third) jobs to fill the gaps that we mostly accepted the crappy under 35 hours/week deal. Overtime had to be approved in advance, and effectively stuck your head out on the chopping block.
80: I'll push back on this just a bit, JRoth, mostly for the record. The idea isn't that food deserts involve just corner stores, but also grocery stores that, frankly, seriously suck in the quality and range of their produce, bread (whole grains, what's that?) and so on.
I am quite convinced that grocery chains provide subpar options to certain demographics, and those demographics are just those that are more likely to be on food stamps.
Your general point about your FB friends remains.
81: Some of it, no doubt. But the bulk frozen shit I see in peoples' carts... no. Easier, absolutely. In some ways satisfying, sure. OK, if it's all you're used to, of course. But better? Not in a million years.
I'm not trying to restart one of the ancient food snob vs. junk food threads here; I'm just saying that the kind of junky food bought by SNAP users is not, for the most part, objectively tastier than even the simplest fresh foods. I mean Jesus, Uncrustables.
72: What does "of counsel" in a law firm mean? The person I knew who held the title was/is (maybe slowing down at 88) a workaholic who had been managing partner at a BigLaw firm. When he retired --though he still ran a big mutual fund company-- and was no longer a partner he got to have an office and a secretary and was "of counsel."
I doubt he was drawing a regular salary. Not that it would mean much since
What does it usually mean?
JRoth, I don't want to sound condescending saying this, but thanks for sharing your experience. I haven't had to deal with anything recently beyond having no accessible money and three kids for a few weeks and dealing with WIC, which I'm avoiding asking about with these two because it's such a pain for so little useful benefit to us and the way we eat.
I'll go ahead and break my general embargo on talking about this and say that one of the kids' parents got arrested on an outstanding warrant because after the crisis that got the kids removed, they lost their apartment and moved in with one parent's family but apparently the court didn't get that message and tried to send a summons to the old address and then put out a warrant when the summons was "ignored." So now there's someone in jail and the other parent trying to find someone in the family who can cash that parent's check to be able to get that money to the jail or lawyer or whatever but no one has an account with enough money to make this feasible and on and on and on.
The family caseworker told us that poverty was the main problem in the family at the point the kids came to us(which is specifically not a reason to delay reunification or push for termination, though I think she wishes it could be and she has no interest in helping alleviate any of it because of course people who get their kids taken away are bad and deserve to suffer or something) and it's just little things that spiral. If you have to pee in a cup at a certain time 20 minutes' drive from wheer you live and have no car and yet you also have to be at work at that time and both working and having these pee tests is part of your caseplan, what the fuck do you do? It's just one Catch-22 after another all day every day. I don't know if they're paying child support on the kids in my care, but I wouldn't be surprised. I just get so fucking angry and frustrated.
87: It means a lawyer that lays eggs but nurses its young.
87 cont. since he's a billionaire from the mutual fund company he founded.
Are there maps that overlay theoretical/modeled "food deserts" onto rates of malnutrition, diabetes, obesity, etc.?
OT: Is anyone else looking forward to the new adaptation of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy? I am, but it occurred to me that one could make a fair argument that Kim Philby's cultural legacy -- peaking in T,T,S,S, I guess -- is disproportionately broader than and likely to survive the effects of his treason/defection on superpower relations or best practices in espionage and counterespionage. Odd, considering the almost apocalyptic terms in which said betrayal is treated in both historical works and the many fictional versions.
Of counsel means we can call him up and ask him to donate a few of his billions in service to remedying situations like 89.
Sorry, couldn't resist.
Are there maps that overlay theoretical/modeled "food deserts" onto rates of malnutrition, diabetes, obesity, etc.?
There must be? A lot of people are studying this. It's not hypothetical.
85: Sure, I know all about shit grocery stores. But my point is that it's not as if people shopping with SNAP at good grocery stores* are making vastly healthier choices than their SES peers in food deserts. There's probably some consistent difference when the choices are better, but I'm mostly talking about what I see being purchased with SNAP - and without - in what has become a very fancy grocery store, as well as in the quasi-wholesale groceries in the Strip District.
And it's not all about class - as knecht once pointed out, the fresh foods at Whole Foods are effectively loss leaders for the high margin prepared and frozen foods that even high SES Americans choose these days.
Which I guess is the other side of what's annoying - Americans with food budgets one hell of a lot higher than $35/person/week are buying processed, bullshit foods (although they're also buying ostensibly less artificial, higher nutrition bullshit foods). Unhealthy eating isn't primarily an economic issue: it's a persistent intersection of biology (fat = yum!), culture, and marketing, with societal factors like overwork and food deserts exacerbating it all.
* I live in a low-income neighborhood adjacent to high income ones, so therefore my nearest large grocer, and that of a lot of my neighbors, is the best in the city. It's part of a mass market chain that includes pretty crummy stores, so there's no price premium there for eggs or milk, and you can get off-brands there.
Sure, I know all about shit grocery stores.
I still regret that I never went to see if the Dirty Bird was as bad as everyone says. Now it's too late.
94: For a rich guy, he's decently progressive. Endowed a professorship but also raised a ton of money to found a law school clinic to serve poor people.
Gives a ton of money away.
He got a lucky break getting into Harvard from a poor familu, probably had his HLS tuition paid for by the GI bill and he knows it. So, he works the system and gives $60K per year to the Dems.
If I lived near one, I would shop at Piggly-Wiggly because it makes me think of the Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle books, which brought me great happiness as a child.
I live near a crappy grocery store. I think the owner just stopped investing it in and the people with cars started going to other stores so the owner invested even less. Whatever the reason, the carrots are always old.
89: Not condescending at all. The whole situation was/has been weird. I don't even know who IRL ever knew we were on food stamps. We didn't go to any effort to hide it, but how often do you ask friends how they pay for their groceries?
Anyway, you get at the real problem with food stamps (and all the other benefits): all the bullshit hoops. The amount is basically fine (although the calculus is kind of stupid, and seriously not equipped for the self-employed, because of course most poor people have steady jobs with consistent paychecks), but the hassle, the regular 6 month reviews, and the incompetence/hostility of some of the workers was insane. For our final 6 months, we had a different worker who got us ~$100 more per month, basically because she gave a shit (although maybe my income was down the month they tracked?); the previous guy fit every cliche about overworked, apathetic social worker. At one point I actually had to yell and curse at him on the phone (really not my MO), which was the only thing that worked. Ridiculous.
And we were hyper aware that we had far more resources and time for all this bullshit than 90% of users*. It's not exactly news that all the hoops and paperwork catch very little fraud but keep a lot of children hungry and without medical care, but we can't seem to keep it at the center of the discussion.
I'd bet that if you cut benefits by 10% in exchange for cutting out all the bullshit, most users would jump at it. It's a huge drain.
* don't like recipients, and "clients" is a joke, considering agency attitudes
101: Sq. Hill or Greenfield? I still remember when the former was the best store in town. Now it's irredeemably depressing.
JRoth, what are you complaining about? That people are overworked? yes. That many USians aren't inclined or can't find or don't know how to prepare good food?
Agreed. (And it's good to see you.) Your FB friends, in any case, sound clueless about the larger issues, and yeah, it's irritating.
87: "Of counsel" as a job title usually just means a lawyer who's affiliated with a firm and doesn't fit into any other available box ("partner," "associate," "staff attorney," &c.). Could be a retired partner, could be a former associate who wasn't offered partnership but whom the firm wanted to keep around, could be a lateral hire who wasn't brought on as a partner. Usually it also indicates that the firm has no future plans to make the counsel a partner.
In litigation it sometimes also is used to mean "lawyer who is involved in this case but who isn't counsel of record."
104 to 97, without having seen 102.
Piggly Wiggly is doing evil in Wisconsin regarding the recall.
103: Greenfield, thought I agree the Squirrel Hill one is bad.
If I lived near one, I would shop at Piggly-Wiggly because it makes me think of the Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle books, which brought me great happiness as a child.
FLIPPANTER'S COMMENT - DON'T TOUCH
74.1 is a very good summary of things I've lived, the last sentence a tiny tragedy. I know I get paid to finish some very finite tasks, and nobody would ever complain about the time I blow online, or indeed even look, but some days it just seems like this wretched bargain...I somehow want to invoke the Soviet adage "we pretend to work/they pretend to pay us" only here substitute "I pretend there's some reason for me to be here more than ten hours a week/they also pretend there's some reason for me to be here more than ten hours a week" and it's not clear why neither of us calls the bluff except it's the order of all things.
I'm not looking forward to the new T,T,S,S because I love the miniseries so much and can't imagine anything better. Seriously, Alec Guinness's melty face and liquid eyes, almost but not quite at rest?
109: FLIPPANTER -- DON'T TOUCH.
Except you, ladies....
OT: I never thought I could pity Eli Manning. I still don't, but now I can understand why somebody would.
108: I don't know if I've ever even been in that one; if so, it was a decade ago. I avoid even being on that block, it's so grim.
||
I just sent my brothers and their wives an out-of-character-for-me email saying that my feelings were hurt by the series of events over the weekend.
Now I'm totally on edge that I'm going to get a screamy phone call from one pair, and absolute radio silence or at most a bland platitude from the other.
I just felt very strongly like I didn't want this past weekend to go down on the books as "ok with Heebie". I don't expect them to change or respond in any satisfying way. (although I really hate being screamed at.)
|>
110 is such a painful sort of sentiment given that so many people are out of work. Apparently we could reduce the workforce still further and get the same amount of work done. Although there is all sorts of work to be done (infrastructure repair and so on) that's not being done. A conundrum.
So many people were hustling for second (or third) jobs to fill the gaps that we mostly accepted the crappy under 35 hours/week deal.
Which is, of course, common and not new.
For the boss is getting rusty and the ringer's caving in
His bandaged wrist is aching with the pain;
And the second man I fear will make it hot for him
Unless we have another fall of rain.
113: It's not that bad. They caught the person feeding the pigeons (or they stopped), so you don't feel like you're going to be pecked to death. Plus, Redbox and my bus keep me going there.
114: Good. Because other things they've done have been thoughtless/selfish, and I know a thing or two about putting up with shit like that because you're the baby and the only sister. (I am projecting! But you feel me.)
114: If you get a bland platitude, you might be my sister.
120: Did you hurt my feelings this weekend? My brother!
114: Yay, boundaries and sticking up for yourself and all that! I'm glad you're letting them know they didn't get away with it. I've been surprised to learn how often that's all people need to improve.
Whenever I upset my sisters, I send them a poem.
Roses are red.
Violets are blue.
I was born first,
so I'm older than you.
99: Serves me right for being flip!
Are there maps that overlay theoretical/modeled "food deserts" onto rates of malnutrition, diabetes, obesity, etc.?
Well, here is the feds' own mapping tool. And a press release explaining it.
But the Food Environment Atlas might be more what you're looking for. (Click the link on physical activity.) I'd guess that HHS has the kind of disease data you're talking about, but I don't know the tool off the top of my head.
Yay, boundaries and sticking up for yourself and all that!
I'd like to put in a good word for repression and passive-aggressively avoiding any sensitive or emotional matter.
The funny thing is that my anger peaked on Saturday - I was so furious that I slipped out to go running so that I'd be more mellow at the wedding - and now I'm not mad at all. I think they were selfish jerks, but so it goes. I just really did not want anyone thinking it was all ok with me.
125: I'm not saying it's what I'd do because it isn't, but heebie's braver than I am. (Lee criticized one of my brothers for lack of support on facebook, though in the comments on one of his friends' walls because she doesn't understand facebook or that I don't want her to fight my battles for me especially in ways I find tone-deaf and embarrassing.)
127: If they messed with Hokey's bday party, I will slap them.
I think it's great that you told them it wasn't okay, heebie. The trick, now, is to let yourself believe that it was okay to send the email, and to be okay with not receiving a satisfying response. I'm in a similar dynamic with my parents right now and it's hard to deal with my feeling that they must either get angry at me or apologize all over themselves and tell me I've been right all along. They'll probably do neither, but no matter what they do I did the right thing by communicating with them.
129: I updated in a different thread- both sets of siblings and their families missed it altogether. We had changed the time (another complaint) and included muffins, and neither family showed up.
The trick, now, is to let yourself believe that it was okay to send the email, and to be okay with not receiving a satisfying response.
This is exactly the excruciating part! There will be no contrite apologies or admissions of anything. I only sent the email on the condition (made with myself) that I was doing it in order to be square with myself, and nothing more.
I appreciate the value of open communication and all of that stuff people mention on TV, but whenever you see them again, you really have to have a tray of muffins near you.
Or pie tin full of whipped cream.
Aggh. Sorry Heebie. I have a somewhat similar kid's birthday party that I'm still way too sad and angry about to discuss here.
131: Jesus Christ. Imagine if you hadn't gotten your son a birthday cake in order to meet their demands?
Those frozen white castle burgers you can get at your finer supermarkets are great. I ate a ton of those for a while.
Looking at the internet at work, great too. I have no idea what I'm being paid for, now. Scholarlilessness.
If you send out holiday cards with pictures of your kids, placing a muffin discretely in the background would also work. If you have it on a plate of holiday cookies, nobody who doesn't know will think much of it. People often underestimate how much aggression you can use and still be passive-aggressive.
140: also, she should send them out at some unpredictable time.
Chanukah is at an unpredictable time.
I've started sending New Year's cards. (By "started" I mean I did it once a couple years ago, and by "cards" I mean emails.)
Night all. Thanks for the TLC and support.
131: wow! Dickwads!
My sentiments exactly. What the fuck.
131: I can imagine being so hopelessly disorganized in relation to kid-wrangling and travel-time that I couldn't get it together to get back for the party, but I can't imagine not being all super-apologetic about it afterwards. I think it's been said before but, completely ex recto, it sounds like the s-i-ls have decided that you're somehow disrespecting/oppressing them, so they're not going to go out of their way to avoid disrespecting you. People decide this sort of thing all the time, usually because they're unhappy about their lives for some other reason. Very hard to stop them from interpreting things that way once the frame is in their heads.
I got a nuclear multi-page screamy email back.
Oh my god. WONDERFUL. I'm glad your extended family is full of nice people, at least.
Is it wrong that I kind of want you to post it so we can make fun of it?
Is it okay to abuse the living hell out of redaction?
I chickened out, and sent you two emails.
Send me an email! Address under my name.
My favorite detail in the email might be the accusation that I've got some nerve, seeing as how I've never been to any of her kids collective 9 birthdays either. Context: I've been about 1500 miles away on all of their birthdays, as opposed to being upstairs in the same hotel.
Ok, I really need to go to bed now. Night all.
OT: Is anyone else looking forward to the new adaptation of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy?
I've seen it. It's not very good. It's ugly and the plot has been changed in petty irritating ways to make it make less sense. Stick to the miniseries.
159. Don't really agree with this. Yes, it's ugly, so your point is? 1970s Britain wasn't very pretty. Not as good as the miniseries, but well worth seeing. Oldman is excellent.
I thought the consensus was that the consequences of Philby's spying was surprisingly small, considering how highly placed he was in British intelligence, and that the only really important spy of the era was Klaus Fuchs.
162:I'll skip it.
Even way back when, when I was barely politically aware, I loved Bill Haydon. Loved him with all my heart, I did, and felt his contempt and despair at the end as a kind of victory. Firth could act it, but apparently they have given Bill short shrift.
What is the line? Remembered after twenty years?
"America is the institutionalization of bourgeois " ("Institutionalized oppression of the masses?" Maybe I don't remember. I just remember the despair.)
Ian Richardson could fucking snarl it, like a badger in a steeltrap.
See, heebie, you're making me feel better about just not telling my family about what bothers me so I don't have to deal with the fallout. but still yay for you!
Even way back when, when I was barely politically aware, I loved Bill Haydon.
He'd have hated you. It's hard to imagine a bunch of more egregious snobs than the Cambridge Five.
Firth does a good job. It isn't a huge part, but he has plenty of room to develop the character and does it well.
165.1: maybe not. Haydon liked a bit of rough. Maybe the young bob would have appealled.
"It was an aesthetic decision as much as a moral one..."
Very McManus, actually.
Got a second, (wildly defensive) email from the ones who I'd assume would have gone the radio silence route. So, uh, yay?
Also, I heard through the vine that the bride and groom totally loved their present! Maybe I can post it to the flickr group.
168: For a second I thought you meant you could post the emails to flickr and got all excited. I'm sure presents are great too. And some of Hokey's birthday pics so we can have a contest to photoshop in cakes.
I'm doing epic bong rips tonight, guys.
If you send out holiday cards with pictures of your kids
Ooh, Thundersnow and I are doing holiday picture-cards with her cats. I'll consider posting the photo to the Flickr group, so you can make fun of me.
holiday picture-cards with her cats
We did that, and here we are two years later, married and with a mortgage. Slippery slope!
They could rent. House prices are scary in some parts of the county.
