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Cake day: July 13th, 2023

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  • hydrospanner@lemmy.worldtoMemes@lemmy.mlthe debt
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    25 days ago

    Ignoring, for a moment, the inherent and fundamental differences between an individual and a state…

    …in my late 20s and early 30s I bought a new car.

    At the time, that car cost more than I had in my accounts plus my other possessions at the time. In fairness, my annual income was more than the total cost of the car, buuuut I also was carrying tens of thousands of dollars of student loan debt as well, meaning my overall total debt was significantly higher than my annual income, or my “personal GDP” if you will.

    Yet when I applied for my car loan, it came through with easy approval and I even qualified for the best possible interest rate.

    Why? Because I’ve always paid on my debts adequately and promptly.

    Nobody bats an eye when a couple buys a house that costs more than what they can cover with their combined income in one year. Why? Because that’s an arbitrary and unrealistic yard stick of comparison and nobody expects them to pay off a house in a year. They’re able to buy their house and live in it immediately, and pay for it incrementally, over time, as they earn over the coming years because of debt. And the bank is willing to lend the money because they’ll make money in the long run through interest.

    Similarly, it’s unreasonable to imply that the US shouldn’t carry more debt than it’s GDP because the two metrics aren’t directly linked in any way. And since the US has excellent credit worthiness, that debt is far safer than the bank’s loan to the homebuyers. And the US gains access to borrowed funds by setting it’s own interest rates through the Fed, which tells lenders exactly how much they’ll make in interest if they let the US government borrow some of their money.

    And since the US is a safer bet than homebuyers, that’s why home interest rates are higher than the rate at the Fed: if they were equal, banks would never lend to homebuyers since they could get the same return by lending to the government. So instead, they set their own, higher rates for homebuyers, to account for the higher risk of lending to a party who has a much higher likelihood of default.



  • Honestly I’m not on the spectrum at all (that I know of) and your SO’s half of those exchanges sounds utterly exhausting.

    Like, in their shoes, I’d probably just start sharing less and less about how I feel, especially when I’m not feeling well, specifically because I wouldn’t want to have to play 20 questions every time until you finally gave up on the analysis.

    Like, I totally get that you’re just trying to help because you love them…but maybe you could simplify the process (and cut to the chase and give them some more agency) simply by saying something like “Ugh, I’m sorry you’re not feeling well. Is there anything I can do for you?”

    That lets them express their own thoughts/feelings/desires without having to pass a gauntlet of questions.

    Again, I totally get that you mean well (I end up on your side of this exchange whenever my own SO isn’t feeling well…you just want to fix it for them), but I’ve also learned by time and experience that often my best move is to offer help, and if the answer is just needing some time and quiet, I just tell my SO what I’ll be doing nearby (but not up in their business) and if they need anything at all, just let me know and I’m happy to help.






  • The Autodesk forums are 40% this, 20% “just learn to program, spend a few years getting good at it, then write yourself a custom script to do what you are struggling with”, 20% “you are wrong for wanting that in the first place” or “you are wrong for having this issue”, 15% “this has been brought up once at some point in the past two decades, try searching”, 4% “OMG yes I have this issue too!”…

    …and 1% split between actual helpful answers, and confirmation that it’s a known issue.