Five hours later, still with no response, I called up the Developer Telephone Support line to check on the status. Now, Apple has amazing phone support: no menu of options, no waiting on hold. You call and are immediately connected to a real live human being who seems to genuinely care about your problem. But their spectacular responsiveness is matched only by their complete inability to actually solve your problem. I’ve called them once before and had the same experience: they’re truly, terribly sorry (and I believe them!), but they just don’t have the authority to do anything about it. Not only couldn’t they get a technical support person on the line, they couldn’t even contact them. They couldn’t even check on the status of our ticket!
How come different attempts to measure wealth inequality come up with different answers?
That’s a question raised by the Financial Times’ analysis of Thomas Piketty’s work on inequality, which compared his data set to others and identified discrepancies, particularly when using one experimental survey in the United Kingdom.
But one place where Piketty’s argument that inequality is rising seems to hold up is in the United States. Besides his own analysis, economists Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman have worked backward from US income tax data to create a measurement that also compares well with the Federal Reserve’s Survey of Consumer Finances:
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You’ll notice it doesn’t match up as well with inequality tracked through estate tax data. And the reasons for that offer an important explanation of why measuring inequality is so hard: Wealth that evades the tax man also evades statisticians. According to Zucman, tax avoidance efforts, including those that shift wealth out of the US to countries with lower tax rates, have played played a larger and larger role in the dynamics of wealth since the 1980s. You can note above that the 1980s is when the estate tax survey starts to diverge from the two other attempts to measure US wealth inequality.
Of course, US estate tax data is sparse because so few people pay estate tax, and attempts to derive the wealth of the living from the wealth of the dead are necessarily roundabout. But perhaps the most important discrepancy is that the people who would pay the most estate tax do the most to avoid it: Witness the mystery tech billionaire who bought the world’s largest life insurance policy—worth $201 million—to more easily pass wealth to his heirs.
In another paper (pdf) that seeks to estimate the amount of wealth held in tax havens, Zucman argues that 8% of the world’s household wealth is held in tax havens and reinvested elsewhere—and most of that is from wealthy economies like the United States, Europe and Japan. Indeed, if Zucman is right, the difference is enough to reverse the capital position of the rich world, turning it from a net debtor to a net creditor:
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Zucman’s estimate of tax haven wealth compared to current statistics.
That’s a shocking twist. Essentially, citizens of wealthy countries have shifted enough wealth offshore that it appears as thoughtheir economies are owned by foreigners. This analysis helps explain some other weird facts about the world economy: More dividends and interest are reported as paid across borders than are reported as received, and more securities are reported as sold than are reported as purchased—with the difference likely winding up in a tax haven, and not in measures of national wealth.
You can call it "tomboy" or "gender-bending" or "men's style clothing for women," but I'm just surprised it's taken this long to show signs of proliferation. When Portland-based Wildfang opened just over a year ago, its hook was that it literally poached its inventory from male-designated designs, albeit while selecting cuts that worked best on female shapes, and mixing them in with lines that were designed for women but exude the same "tomboy" aesthetic. I wouldn't call it—or similarly minded clothing ventures, like the local Dapper D, which is currently crowd-sourcing funds for its launch—lesbian fashion per se. Especially with a line as marketing savvy as Wildfang, the appeal isn't that narrow. But it is being designed and branded in a way that's finally inclusive of lesbian/queer style, a belatedly smart (and lucrative) market to tap. It increasingly feels antiquated to refer to "menswear" and "womenswear," not because masculine or feminine aesthetics are irrelevant, but because the identity of those who might want to wear them is evolving into greater fluidity. As Dapper D's founder Vanna Pecoraro expresses it:
Since having my first job at 16 and buying my own clothes, I only shopped in the men's department. I never felt comfortable in dresses or feminine blouses etc. I always felt awkward and my confidence was lacking to say the least. Wearing men's style clothes gave me the confidence I needed to be myself and walk with my head held high... I want to empower other women to be themselves and wear what makes THEM comfortable... Being a fashionista doesn't just mean wearing high heels, skirts and the latest trend.
Check out Dapper D's Kickstarter if you want to help foster an increase in this type of clothing design on the local level, and also this photo of former police officer Pecoraro (who says "Wearing a uniform taught me to take pride in looking 'sharp.' My uniform had to be dry cleaned and pressed, boots cleaned and the leather shined.") looking rather amazing is worth a gander:
A group at Brigham Young University has turned Google Glass into a device that helps deaf students enjoy a planetarium. The conundrum facing the deaf in the dark is that they can't see an ASL interpreter, and captioning is difficult on a round display and would interrupt the experience for hearing people. To solve this problem, it's wearable computers to the rescue, as they can allow deaf students to view the interpreter without disturbing other viewers.
According to EurekAlert, the project is called "Signglasses," and it gives deaf students a tiny ASL interpreter while watching the planetarium show. The Glass display is visible in the dark and displays a video of the interpreter during the show. The group, which includes two deaf students, hopes to expand the idea beyond the planetarium. "One idea is when you're reading a book and come across a word that you don't understand, you point at it, push a button to take a picture, some software figures out what word you're pointing at and then sends the word to a dictionary and the dictionary sends a video definition back," the professor in charge of the group said. The full results of the group's research will be published in June at the Interaction Design and Children conference.
Just last year, metal’s premier band of space aliens GWAR launched its GWAR-B-Q barbecue sauce and released its own beer at its annual GWAR-B-Q event in Richmond, Virginia. With this costumed step into the world of the culinary arts proving successful, GWAR has taken another step into the world of food and drink with the announcement of a GWAR-themed restaurant and bar known as GWARbar set to open in Richmond. The band notes that the idea of a GWARbar jumped from the mind of Dave Brockie (better known as Oderus Urungus), who, with his death in March of this year, prompted the band to launch a foundation in tribute to the band’s leader.
GWAR has launched an accompanying IndieGoGo campaign that allows for its minions the world over to lend support to the project at various levels. Proving the group hasn’t lost any of its caustic bite ...
Maya Angelou, Poet, Author, Civil Rights Activist, And—Holy Cow—Tony Award–Nominated Actress, College Professor, Magazine Editor, Streetcar Conductor—Really? Streetcar Conductor? Wow—Calypso Singer, Nightclub Performer, And Foreign Journalist, Dead At 86
OKnitMe is an open-source project developed by Serpica Naro collective with the help of some friends with the aim of putting to better use punch-card knitting machines, much easier to find and cheaper to buy.
The punch cards you can create with OKnitme are designed starting from a model of Knitmaster Empisal 321. It’s 24-dot wide and 48 or 60-dot high. It fits nearly all standard gauge 24 stitch punch card knitting machines including Brother, Studio, Singer, KnitKing, White, Silver Reed, Empisal and most (but not all) Toyota’s.
Every Wednesday is Wearable Wednesday here at Adafruit! We’re bringing you the blinkiest, most fashionable, innovative, and useful wearables from around the web and in our own original projects featuring our wearable Arduino-compatible platform, FLORA. Be sure to post up your wearables projects in the forums or send us a link and you might be featured here on Wearable Wednesday!
Andrew didn’t actually hand over that much money for his 128-ounce espresso milkshake. He’s a Gold member of Starbucks’ loyalty program, which entitles him to one free drink after every twelve that he buys. The free drink coupon entitles him to any drink available. Any drink? The only limits, it seems, were his imagination and what the baristas would let him get away with. They were game to let him get away with a lot.
Here's our stance: If you self-define as an MRA, please fire yourself as an Eclipse Phase fan. We don't want you. We want our forums to be open and inclusive, and we don't see the point of debating with you anymore. You have other places on the internet where you can wallow in the awfulness of your male privilege.
That's just plain interesting, as is the rest of the post. Unsurprisingly the comments immediately under the post wind up including some of the exact problem this is meant to be responding to, in line with "How dare you be bigots against bigots TWO SIDES who is the real discriminator here" rubbish, but there we go.
I'm curious to see what kind of conversation starter this winds up being in general, or whether it'll mainly be notable for drawing a hatestorm from the sections of the internet we can rely on for that kind of thing.
Maya Angelou, the American poet and author, died at her home in Winston-Salem, North Carolina on Wednesday. She was 86.
The news was confirmed to the Guardian by an assistant to Winston-Salem mayor Allen Joines.
“White men make up approximately 36% of the population, but commit 75% of mass shootings. What would be called terrorism by any other skin tone is suddenly some mysterious unnamed disease. We as a society are perfectly happy to further stigmatize mentally ill people, who are far more likely to be victims of violence than commit violence, in the service of protecting white supremacy and male entitlement.”
Future "All-Amercian" Mike Weber can really "deilver" those titles.
Last week, Ohio State fans poked fun at Michigan fans, because the Michigan coaching staff apparently sent a fake "ESPN The Magazine" cover to a four-star Detroit running back recruit in which someone misspelled "All-American."
I'm not saying that I know this for a fact, but Michigan misspelled "All-American" on purpose.
...
Thousands of recruits saw that sweet Photoshop of Weber on their local news sites today. They're now interested in Michigan more than they were yesterday.
You can call Hoke an idiot, and I'll continue to admire his prowess as a recruiter.
Well, if Brady Hoke is a genius, then so is Ohio State coach Urban Meyer, because this week, the Buckeyes also allegedly misspelled a word on a magazine cover ... sent to THE SAME RECRUIT.
So good luck, Mike Weber, whether you choose to be an All-Amercian at Michigan or to deilver titles to the Bucks. And if any former journalists are looking for a copy editing position, it looks like Michigan and Ohio State might be hiring.
'In his defense ... there's no defense. Quarterbacks make a living on their arm and things like "arm strength" are picked over with a fine-toothed comb. Punters only need their legs and it's not like this was a kicking contest or anything.'
Well, this is embarrassing.
Sometimes quarterbacks need to buy players lavish gifts or do them a service to take their number, when you're the backup for the Tennessee Titans things are a lot simpler — beat the punter in an arm wrestling competition.
Charlie Whitehurst failed at this task.
In his defense ... there's no defense. Quarterbacks make a living on their arm and things like "arm strength" are picked over with a fine-toothed comb. Punters only need their legs and it's not like this was a kicking contest or anything.
Sergey Brin had admitted that it was "probably a mistake" that he ever worked on Google+ because, in his own words, he's "not a very social person" and "kind of a weirdo."
Dates to ca. 1307–1275 B.C., northern Mesopotamia, 54.3 cm long, and made of bronze.
This curved sword bears the cuneiform inscription “Palace of Adad-nirari, king of the universe, son of Arik-den-ili, king of Assyria, son of Enlil-nirari, king of Assyria,” indicating that it was the property of the Middle Assyrian king Adad-nirari I (r. 1307–1275 B.C.).
The inscription appears in three places on the sword: on both sides of the blade and along its (noncutting) edge. Also on both sides of the blade is an engraving of an antelope reclining on some sort of platform.
'And by looking at drivers who work more than 40 hours a week, Uber is taking the juiciest sample set from which to derive its average.
So the truth still lies somewhere in the vast expanse between minimum wage and $90,000, and no doubt is as varied as the businesses being run by the drivers’ themselves. Some additional points to consider. The UberX averages don't mean much unless we also know how many UberX drivers work such long weeks. Is that half the fleet? Or five guys hustling to pay off their bookies during the NBA playoffs? It also seems likely that the numbers are inflated by surge pricing. That's an acceptable practice for now, but whether it will stay that way as cities get more involved in regulating TNCs is an open question.'
Uber
Earlier this month, a group of disgruntled UberX drivers staged a protest outside Uber headquarters in San Francisco. The drivers felt misled that Uber had jacked its cut of their fares from 5 to 20 percent (the company says the shift was seasonal); a few threatened to defect to rival transportation network companies. The main reported grievance was that the drivers were doing all the work and seeing very little of the money:
"We work for less than minimum wage!" one driver said. "The fares are so low. It doesn’t make any sense."
So it comes as a bit of a surprise to see Matt McFarland of the Washington Postreport yesterday that UberX drivers who work more than 40 hours a week make a median wage of $74,191 a year in San Francisco. Meanwhile the average cab driver in the city makes just under $40,000. (In New York, the figures are even more impressive: $90,766 for an UberX driver, compared to about $38,000 on average for a cab driver.)
A comparison of salary.com percentiles for annual income among New York and San Francisco cab drivers, and uberX drivers.
It strains credulity, given the recent protests, to think UberX drivers make twice what cabbies make in San Francisco. Indeed, Dan Kedmey at Timepoints out some important nuances to the discussion. The UberX figures don't take into account business expenses like gas, insurance, parking, and car maintenance. And by looking at drivers who work more than 40 hours a week, Uber is taking the juiciest sample set from which to derive its average.
So the truth still lies somewhere in the vast expanse between minimum wage and $90,000, and no doubt is as varied as the businesses being run by the drivers’ themselves.
Some additional points to consider. The UberX averages don't mean much unless we also know how many UberX drivers work such long weeks. Is that half the fleet? Or five guys hustling to pay off their bookies during the NBA playoffs? It also seems likely that the numbers are inflated by surge pricing. That's an acceptable practice for now, but whether it will stay that way as cities get more involved in regulating TNCs is an open question.
CityLab conducted a rigorous scientific survey of precisely one San Francisco UberX driver upon hearing the new income report. During a 1.7-mile, 8-minute trip downtown, he said it was "almost impossible" to believe UberX drivers make two or three times what cabbies make.
The driver said on a good day he made about $300 net, which dropped to maybe $220 after deducting Uber's cut and business expenses. If he were one of the super-dedicated drivers, and got out there every single day of the year, that does come out to about $80,000 in annual income. But for a standard five-day work week it's closer to $57,000. And that doesn't take into account seasonality or the fact that not every day is a "good" day.
So it's far too soon to say that UberX will fundamentally elevate cabbie pay across the board. That's not to say it's a bad deal; on the contrary, it's disrupting traditional taxi networks in a very beneficial way for city residents, and may well have the legs to succeed where previous jitney revolutions have fallen short. There's a reason that a startling number of registered taxi drivers have jumped ship to TNCs, and why Uber may be valued at $17 billion.
There's also a reason to follow some bad news with good publicity.
Every Wednesday is Wearable Wednesday here at Adafruit! We’re bringing you the blinkiest, most fashionable, innovative, and useful wearables from around the web and in our own original projects featuring our wearable Arduino-compatible platform, FLORA. Be sure to post up your wearables projects in the forums or send us a link and you might be featured here on Wearable Wednesday!
The Message — Medium:
