I like to think about how providing 4-week paid parental leave would cost $2 billion annually and actually help US families. Meanwhile we have spent over $100 billion on this war.
I got mine from a paper published by the University of Chicago: https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/735565.
also there's the fact of this having a ROI since people generate economic value in the longer run, and hence, more taxes
I do think it is a policy point that Democrats should absolutely be hammering them on. This is pro-worker and pro-family at very low cost.
Seems like money well spent.
If any event has pushed us closer to WW3 it is the US's decision to preemptively attack Iran.
> Seems like money well spent.
Based on what outcome? The regime is still intact, if not stronger. They are likely more resolute in wanting a nuclear weapon, as we almost certainly wouldn't have attacked them if they had one. They have validated their control over the Straight of Hormuz and it's impact on our economy.
The US is reacting to Iran's attacks in the region. Iran has been attacking first.
> Based on what outcome? The regime is still intact, if not stronger.
> They are likely more resolute in wanting a nuclear weapon, as we almost certainly wouldn't have attacked them if they had one.
Russia has nukes and yet Ukraine is happily able to attack deep into Russia. Russia hasn't nuked Ukraine yet. I suspect if we had to, we still would've attacked them. Countries like Iran and North Korea lose their entire country if they launch a nuke.
> They have validated their control over the Straight of Hormuz and it's impact on our economy.
What was validated is that they have limited control over the strait, and we also have validated control over the strait as well as economic impact on Iran.
The more they harass the strait, the weaker that card becomes as more investment goes into alternatives.
This also pressures Chinese oil supply chain.
What signal are you looking for with that question? It feels much more like a thought experiment with friends while having a few pints than something reasonable for a job interview.
Less than half are net income tax payers, IIRC. So if you pay income tax, you're actually on the hook for more $6, on average.
Thinking of country-scale finances in the same way you think about personal finance is wrong in many ways. Take debt for example. As an individual, it's arguably best not to have debt at all. As a country, sovereign debt is the foundation of the world's money supply and fuels continuous economic growth.
Also, though the U.S. has $31 Trillion dollars of debt, $22 Trillion of that belongs to U.S. domestic traders.
If we were to cut our debt down to zero, we'd cripple ourselves with taxes and stifle growth. We'd have zero debt but we'd be sent into a massive economic depression, and that would likely ripple out across the planet.
> I would use drones to hover over the nests to detect if the turtles hatch so people don't have to stand there.
And put brighter lights on the drones to lead them in the right direction!
But if you asked me that in an interview, I would probably question whether I wanted to work there. I don't think random, irrelevant, put-me-on-the-spot questions help anyone on either side of that coin.
The organizations that do this have mobile apps and collect tons of data. If I'm use ML, I'd start with time series forecasting to see if I can get the window done to a few hours.
So $1 billion is about equal to 4 hour hours of government spending.
$7 trillion is not operating expenses. Much goes into assets that are retained decades or more. The Interstate Highway System isn't an operating expense.
> Based on aggregate highway spending reported in 2009, the average statewide cost of maintaining a lane mile was $13,841.
source (pdf): https://www.osc.ny.gov/files/local-government/publications/p...
Has, not is. Clearly you didn’t take Intro to Object-Oriented Programming in CS.
(Your share of overall defense spending is ~1,000x higher, of course.)
I wish political leaders would express it that way. And you need to include the time factor: $10/year for 10 years differs from $20 for a one-time event. And somehow figure in capital accumulation (as opposed to e.g., consumables) and depreciation. But there are clear, effective ways to communicate it: 'I propose each American spend an average of $80/year for 50 years on this fighter jet program'. 'This moon mission will cost everyone $5/year for 2 years.'
To nitpick a little, I think your math is off: There are 350 million Americans, but we need to exclude most children, elderly, etc.
tax billionaires, then
You can do full Dekulakization (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dekulakization) on them and it won't change anything in current economic situation.
Confiscating 100% of all billionaire wealth (~$8.4T) covers - ~1.1 years of federal spending (~$7.4T) - ~4.4 years of deficits (~$1.9T) - ~23% of debt (~$36T):
and pretty much kills US ability to rely on private sector (and I dont think we have a way to rely on public sector)
The sooner we all start focusing on things that actually matter -- like improving democracy, quality of education (btw spending more may not solve it) etc -- the faster we will improve situation.
Cities like NYC pretty much can afford UBI (look at per capita spending on homelessness, public schools etc). Taxing more may not be the answer.
*it should be studied what motivates people to repeat it
I've generally come around to believe that we need to limit wealth from a purely power / control point of view.
If you get rid of wealthy people's power, what takes its place other than politicians?
Adding a wealth tax doesn't mean eliminating existing income taxes.
> Cities like NYC pretty much can afford UBI (look at per capita spending on homelessness, public schools etc).
Perhaps , but what about poor states like West Virginia or Alabama. It's not universal if they don't receive benefits also.
Absent a federal wealth redistribution, yes NYC must do its best for it's residents. I'm not disagreeing with that. A federal wealth tax, however, would tax Alabama billionaires as much as it would tax NYC billionaires.
These people do not care about you. You need to hate them more.
This is what you want though? If everyone stops "wasting even more money on boondoggles" there is no innovation, and no jobs if nobody is making more boondoggles.
So...what are you talking about?
/s
The left's hypocrisy knows no bounds.
Now compare that against a credible accusation being enough to derail a senate hopeful in a must win seat for the Democrats. Sorry, I don't see the hypocrisy. Actually, I do see it, just not on the side you insist it's on.