The Off Topic Topic

[Valmy]

So everybody who takes out a mortgage is bad at money management and blames other people for it? That seems a bit of an unlikely generalization

[HVC]

If she got sued then I guess it was someone else's fault

[celedhring]

If she was guilty of libel it was her fault 

[garbon]

So everybody who takes out a mortgage is bad at money management and blames other people for it? That seems a bit of an unlikely generalization

Given that you know that's not what she meant...

[garbon]

New York decided not to honor my request for a primary ballot but has now given me my general election ballot. Well at least, even without me, New York made the right choice and told Sex and the City to stuff it.

I did enjoy though when it was reported that Bloomberg's failed protege (Christine Quinn) referred to Nixon as an 'unqualified lesbian' and got dragged for a major gaffe though Quinn is a lesbian. Apparently, she got in hot water because Nixon identifies as a bisexual.

[Valmy]

So everybody who takes out a mortgage is bad at money management and blames other people for it? That seems a bit of an unlikely generalization

Given that you know that's not what she meant...

I thought that 'people in debt' meant 'people in debt'.

But hey it is not like I got that tweet in context, whatever that might be.

[garbon]

So everybody who takes out a mortgage is bad at money management and blames other people for it? That seems a bit of an unlikely generalization

Given that you know that's not what she meant...

I thought that 'people in debt' meant 'people in debt'.

But hey it is not like I got that tweet in context, whatever that might be.

Katie Hopkins is a troll. She was clearly talking about poor people and how they deserve their fate/don't take ownership over their poor decisions.

[Admiral Yi]

Read in the NYT Book Review that before The Second Great Awakening, 1/10 Americans were members of churches.  After, 8/10 were.

[Oexmelin]

It was the review of Jill Lepore book. It had also something to do with stringent requirements to be church members in most colonies/states.

[Josquius]

I'm sure you've all heard of toxoplasma. Its a parasite that reproduces only in cats with which it has somewhat of a symbiotic relationship- it infects other mammals and generally makes them like cats more.
By evolutionary design this is likely geared towards rodents as it means more prey for the cats thus more cats in which to reproduce.
But it also has the side effect (or is it...) of making humans like cats more.

Well.
Today I learned there is a drug that can cure this disease.
However...



I smell a conspiracy of cat people. But the dog people are fighting back?

[Eddie Teach]

I have a dream where cats, dogs and their people can join hands and sing "free at last, free at last. Thank God Almighty, I'm free at last."

[Grey Fox]

US price is not worldwide price.

[grumbler]

[Grey Fox]

Tyr does not notice the obvious.

[Zanza]

THE world is still in recovery mode fully ten years after the financial crisis of 2008-09. Inflation-adjusted wages grew by an average of 27% in the decade before the crisis in the OECD, a club of mostly rich countries. In the ten years since, real wages have increased by just 8.4%, on average. Ten OECD countries experienced real-wage growth of 30% or more in the ten years to 2007. And in the ten years since, just one OECD member, Lithuania has enjoyed such heady growth. By contrast, real wages have fallen by a fifth in Greece, a country that is still saddled with enormous government debt.

Surprisingly, Britain is one the OECD's worst performers over the past decade. At 4%, its unemployment rate is at its lowest level since 1975. A relationship first sketched out by William Phillips 60 years ago reckons that when unemployment falls, wages should rise. Yet Britain appears to be increasingly divorced from the "Phillips curve": a 4% unemployment rate in 1980s Britain would have been associated with a 5% rise in wages. Today wage growth is a weaker 2.9%. Britain is not the exception. Policymakers in America and Germany alike have noted that their low unemployment rates are not yielding significant wage rises for workers.

Interesting that poor wage growth even during favorable economic conditions seems to be a general issue in the West. I assume this is a factor that contributes to the raise of populism in the West.