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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 17th, 2023

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  • Shifts power source to the grid. Grid can use different sources for energy production.

    Such an excellent point, which I hadn’t seen mentioned before. It means we can have more control over those sources. Thank you.

    with hand crank windows

    I want hand crank windows back anyway. Faster and more reliable. So frustrating when the “auto complete” aspect of modern car windows means I cannot easily get the window half way closed or only a crack open. But I must be in the minority on that.







  • What I’m curious about (as a self employed tailor, so I have no personal interest in work from home, just curiosity) is whether or not employers are paying employees for the use of their homes as offices. Who pays the extra housing costs, internet, etc. that the employee can’t claim on their taxes. And even if they could claim it, the amount claimed would not cover all the associated costs. If for instance you set aside a room in your house, and get away with deducting the rental value, claiming that value in the USA covers about 1/3 of the actual expense.





  • As you know, the current system in America is that we pay into the retirement system. In the present time those funds are used to support present day seniors, and then when you have reached the proper age the people currently paying into it are supporting you but can (supposedly) expect to be supported the same way. I started paying into it at age 16, and now at 69 I am collecting. And additionally, I need to have saved up.

    I don’t know how we would transfer out of this system and into a completely self sufficient one. I DO know that this system mitigated the deep deep poverty many elderly used to experience. Because for the working and poor classes, no one realistically makes enough to set aside for retirement.



  • Of course this is a good thing, but there are still serious negative consequences to a reducing population, which must be mitigated. Primarily, old people who are past working age are an expensive population to maintain. When there are as many or more old people as there are young, the burden is too heavy for young people to bear. And I say this as a 70 year old. Young people today CANNOT hit old age without their own substantial retirement resources.



  • I agree about a German or Polish item; such a good chance for a bit of international flair. I don’t know anything about Poland, but I spent time in Germany a long time ago. My mind went to cuckoo clocks for fun, and other fine and classy looking clocks (I brought home a chime clock that I loved). Could be towels embroidered in a traditionally Polish way. Or a set of Polish or German stemware.