quiddities and agonies of the ruling class - a rolling new york times thread

lol at the punchline. "N. GREGORY MANKIW is a professor of economics at Harvard."

"That is indeed lamentable."

In 2009, while the economy was suffering through the Great Recession, Mr. Leno, a car enthusiast, generously performed two free “Comedy Stimulus” shows for unemployed workers near Detroit.

Yet zero is not, as economists put it, the equilibrium price to see a live performance by Jay Leno. Some of the unemployed who received free tickets tried to turn around and sell them on eBay for about $800. When Mr. Leno learned about this, he objected, and eBay agreed to take down offers to resell the tickets.

well this doesn't seem like Leno at all

paying $800 to see Jay Leno makes me think some people are from the alternate universe where that seems like a good idea

there are many punchlines in that article

His entire career is based on saying "The price is the right price because it's the price someone paid which is good" over and over again.

"It sucks that you can't afford these tickets. Yet there is another way to view the situation, which is that I can afford them!"

He has previously written a paper called "Defending the One Percent" and was an adviser to Romney and to Dubya.

yeah he's a big name in apologetics for the wealthy

That article points out the astonishing fact that when there's a limited supply of something that lots of people find desirable, then the wealthiest people hog it all for themselves. Which is an extremely fair system, because some people having lots of money when other people have very little money is just the way it is, so like it or lump it.

his big solution is for them to just raise the base prices of tickets. but that would mean the secondhand tickets he bought would be way more expensive as well.

his theory that demand would decrease bc it's expensive is undercut by the fact that he is personally demonstrating people will pay extra for these luxury items and in fact take pleasure in out-wealthing other richies.

luv the contrast to this editorial: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/24/opinion/struggling-to-serve-at-the-nations-richest-university.html

when i did econ 101 we were taught from this mankiw book. it was very well written and easy to understand. one of the only university textbooks i had that i felt did a good job of explaining the basic concepts of a field of study to the novice. the thing was though, iirc, it had various little bits about how corporate taxes, rent controls, minimum wages, etc. are bad. it was the only general introductory textbook i had in school that had an explicit political agenda, and we studied it as if it were just "the truth" and not just one take.

All Karen Hendrickson wanted was the latest pocketbook from Gucci, the Sylvie, with a glittering gold chain down the front.

But she had to explain herself over and over to police officers who stopped and questioned her, and searched her shopping bags as she sought to cross Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. She was trying to reach the Gucci flagship store on the corner of 56th Street, but her shopping trip had an unusual impediment: Gucci is inside Trump Tower. Fifty-eight stories above is the penthouse of President-elect Donald J. Trump, who was engaged in the rocky business of selecting his administration.

Well, if this doesn't turn them against him, I don't know what will.

via deadspin: this is from a toronto star article but w/e i didn't know where else to put it.

https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/ujonl99cvplfh7gneaso.png

septum piercing really makes that for me

Is he going to raise that kale in place of a son?

that is his large green son

His son's name is Kyle.

I had a vasectomy, but it was for sensible and practical reasons. I 'celebrated' by wearing an ice bag on my scrotum for hours afterward.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/04/business/media/jolly-green-giant-comeback.html

“We’re going to make him more relevant, more socially active with the consumer, and bring him into today’s world” = two tickets to a better reality than this one, please.

Jolly Green died on his way back to his home planet, etc

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/19/your-money/talking-to-children-about-inheritance.html

it's like they know about this thread

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/26/realestate/where-to-live-when-the-l-train-shuts-down.html

Mr. Gannon’s new one-bedroom on Orchard will be more expensive, at $3,200 a month, than the $2,200 he paid in Williamsburg. But “the fact that there is a lot going on” in his new neighborhood, he said, “compares favorably.”

$1000 worth of free goings-on hopeefully

Mr. Gannon's time is money.

Spayd out: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/new-york-times-public-editor_us_592ec472e4b0e95ac1956706?4r9

our long national nightmare is over

lol wait they're eliminating the role entirely?!

not content to wreck accountability during her tenure, she now wrecks it indefinitely into the future

"We're replacing the public editor with more comments sections" is the worst idea for accountability that I've ever heard pic.twitter.com/aS4AcW2W6J

— Kelsey D. Atherton (@AthertonKD) May 31, 2017

otoh it does sound like the thesis of a Liz Spayd column

Can we just have a "rolling NYT into the shitbin" to combine this and the "death of newspapers" thread and the Brooks and Douthat and Friedman and every other thread where this rag gets linked in a "does it get worse? Yes it does!" context

no. this thread must remain pure(-ish)

they will never be pure until they return to paper only a nd stop thjis i n t e r n e t thing

http://torontolife.com/real-estate/parkdale-reno-hell/

"we bought impulsively"

that particular clusterfuck made the rounds on twitter

there are so many weird-ass things going on that the gentrification/treatment of the people who were technically squatting is just the iceberg tip

jesus christ

We considered cutting the electricity, changing the locks or just starting the demolition with the tenants inside, but it didn’t feel right.

Dude you are right the whole article is just mega

article wasnt really a quid/ag but this quote in the real estate section abt salisbury, ct & y this dude bought a second home there is a gem

“There’s a softball game on Sundays open to anyone,” he said, adding that he had struggled to get into games in Central Park.

that Toronto piece, wow

a spreadsheet of 40 contractors and they choose some random sketchy dude who rides up on a bicycle because he suggested "skylights in the attic" holy fuck

as a born and bred torontonian, some things: 1) toronto life exists for this type of hate journalism (the whole magazine is real estate); 2) this has to be their finest moment; and 3) my favorite moment walking through parkdale was in the snow clutching some king cans eight years ago after the first destination bistro had opened. this couple was summing up their meal quietly outside, until booming down a blanketed queen street someone yelled 'i'll stab you motherfucker.' and then it was all silent again.

like christmas.

oh my god these people

i just got to the part where the sketchy bicycle dude tears down their porch on a whim - We didn’t like his rogue decision making, but if it meant we’d be saving money, we could live with it = wtttttttttfffffffffffffffffffffffffffff is wronnnnnnnnnnnng with you

right? real canadians would have apologized for disliking his rogue decision making

also noteworthy that the entire prologue establishing how run-down and filthy and inhuman the house was (none of which matches the photos put alongside btw) actually has nothing crucially to do with the main 'plot,' in terms of real estate and finances and the renovation. it's just there to heighten the sense of SCARY POOR PEOPLE AND DRUGGIES AND HIPSTERS from whence this "grande dame" was wrested. like it's leftover from a draft begun before everything went south, in those halcyon days when they looked forward to writing an uplifting "before and after" story with a bunch of matched-up photos of the "bathtub full of black liquid" (not pictured) and then the glistening new clawfoot bathtub etc. etc.

i also love how credulously they buy into what seems to be the sellers' assertion that everyone calls it the "grande dame" when there is no clear reason to think anyone would. nice house and all but judging by the one next door it doesn't seem like it would stand out on the block. my god the husband is just an incredible moron.

I know, right? I have been in houses with really slobby people who had money that looked worse because they were in between cleaning services!

also how the fuck do you go from a spreadsheet of 40 possible contractors to hiring a dude who came by on a bicycle