• 0 Posts
  • 563 Comments
Joined 2 years ago
cake
Cake day: October 4th, 2023

help-circle


  • No, but allow me to ask you in the same spirit: do planes require tens of billions of euro of subsidies each year for train tracks? No. Obviously these two forms of transport are quite different. The EU subsidises air travel (including said avgas tax exemption) to the tune of around €30–40 billion annually depending on what you include and what you consider to be a “subsidy.” Using similar criteria, rail is subsidised to the tune of €40–75 billion per year. So rail gets a lot more investment despite it serving 16% fewer travel kilometers per year in the EU than air travel.


  • Remote viewing in Jellyfin requires significantly more work from me as the server admin, but it is just as easy for the remote viewing clients. I don’t have to do any first-time setup for them. I recommend an app or two for the media type they’re using, and all they need is URL, login, password.

    Thanks for your suggestion. I spent some time investigating this to see how feasible it would be. I have my own domain and static IP, so setup on my end would be pretty straight forward. Users would need to enter my domain:port on first login, but I could walk them through that. I’m going to give it a shot and see how practical it is. If the performance is better, as you say, then it probably trumps those features you mention. With the exception of subtitles for me and the family. We use subs most of the time and need on-demand selection. Automated subs are very hit or miss.

    It’s also disappointing to hear the Jellyfin app doesn’t support downloads but I guess if Streamyfin is available on all the platforms then I could just use that.

    I tried Finamp and the UI is very not good on iOS. It also lacks a lot of features compared to Plexamp.




  • The reason that governments don’t seize assets is because it makes the country (or state) uninvestable. See what happened to Zimbabwe. Seizing assets always leads to very bad social outcomes across the board. It’s much less destructive to tax things we want to happen less. A high tax on land ownership would reduce land ownership (and demand, and therefore price).

    Some countries use some combination of only permitting residents to purchase certain types of property. Denmark, for example, requires non-EU non-citizens ask for permission to purchase property. Of course this then requires very strict immigration controls. If those aren’t in place, then anyone can walk into the country and buy whatever they like, and the policy is meaningless.


  • Trains are more fuel efficient, but there is a lot more which goes into the cost of these transport modes than fuel.

    I’m comparing these modes of transport because they both receive subsidies, including tax exemptions for avgas. The EU subsidises air travel (in many ways) to the tune of around €30–40 billion annually depending on what you include and what you consider to be a “subsidy.” Using similar criteria, rail is subsidised to the tune of €40–75 billion per year. So rail gets a lot more investment despite it serving 16% fewer travel kilometers per year in the EU than air travel.


  • If such a law came into effect, you would remove all rental properties from the market overnight. Don’t you think that would lead to catastrophic homelessness? There must be a mechanism for people and companies to buy and offer rental accommodation. A LOT of people can’t afford to buy a house.

    I think the solution is clear: the business case for rental property should be made worse. A comprehensive land value tax without exemption has been championed by notable economists for more than a century. It’s as close to a perfect tax as it gets. It aligns public and private interests, which are currently opposed. Owners are encouraged to use the space efficiently, so they build up and lobby for laws which make it easier for them to build. With less demand for land, prices drop, and land prices are tightly correlated with rental rates.








  • Here in the US, we only have downward class mobility, unless you are very, very clever, and continuously lucky, continuously reinvesting those gains from your cleverness into social and financial capital without making any ‘bad investments’, or ever having any sudden medical or financial disaster happen to you.

    The studies you cite in your second comment don’t support this. They show less class mobility in both directions.


  • That is a political decision and can be changed at will.

    How do you propose taxing profits from other countries would work? Send the military in and take it by force? Ban the company from selling products in Germany unless they pay some arbitrary amount like North Korea? Do you pro-rata their global profits? How do you reconcile when some regions are more or less profitable than others? You imply something that is frankly crazy. Not even Zimbabwe tried anything like that, and they stole huge swathes of land and ended up with a starving population.

    If it were that simple, Trump would not have had to threaten the G7 for an exception for his companies, he could just have withdrawn from the treaty.

    That is exactly what he did. It’s in the article. Please read it.