I didn’t spend any money yesterday, but I did shop. And I got very close to spending a lot. So I probably don’t deserve that “counter-cultural-minimalist icon” statue the art world commissioned on my behalf.
Truth be told, I went so far as to put an expensive carbon frame bike in my Colorado Cyclist shopping cart. But I couldn’t pull the trigger. Sometimes when I put something in an online cart and don’t complete the purchase, the next day the vendor sends me a message that includes a deeper discount to help me decide. Alas, nothing from Colorado Cyclist yet.
Shifting gears, pun-intended, despite being cynical about most fads, I find myself on the precipice of embracing one of the biggest trends in cycling—gravel riding. I concede, sometimes the crowd is right. What’s not to like about riding in nature free of heavy metal objects hurtling by at high speeds? Not to mention all the adventures the cool bikepacking kids are having. I wanna be a cool kid.
But I can’t decide if I should get a Santa Cruz Stigmata or a Santa Cruz Highball. What say you gravel riding reader? I deserve at least partial credit for narrowing it down to one California city, don’t cha’ think? Juliet has me leaning Highball.
Back to my mea culpa. This morning, before I got out of bed at 6am, I spent $47 on this. Yes indeedy, I am taking it on myself to brighten your winter.
How much of our consumption is the result of social contagion? More than we care to admit.
My day was wonderfully counter-cultural. $0 spent out-of-pocket.
Lest I not kid myself about my minimalist street cred, the digital cash register was continuously updating in the background. The YMCA membership, property taxes, utilities, groceries, coffee beans, auto/house/health insurance, gasoline, internet and streaming services, digital and print subscriptions, the family’s cell-phones. And I’m sure I’m not accounting for some other recurring expenses.
Still, don’t I deserve some credit for saying “no thank you” to the legions of marketers and their super sales?
Manjoo turns to Chuck Collins, a scholar of inequality at the Institute for Policy Studies, to tell the sordid story.
“In previous recessions. . . billionaires were hit along with the rest of us; it took almost three years for Forbes’s 400 richest people to recover losses incurred in 2008’s Great Recession.
But in the coronavirus recession of 2020, most billionaires have not lost their shirts. Instead, they’ve put on bejeweled overcoats and gloves made of spun gold — that is, they’ve gotten richer than ever before.
On Tuesday, as the stock market soared to a record, Collins was watching the billionaires cross a depressing threshold: $1 trillion.
That is the amount of new wealth American billionaires have amassed since March, at the start of the devastating lockdowns that state and local governments imposed to curb the pandemic.
On March 18, according to a report Collins and his colleagues published last week, America’s 614 billionaires were worth a combined $2.95 trillion. When the markets closed on Tuesday, there were 650 billionaires and their combined wealth was now close to $4 trillion. In the worst economic crisis since the 1930s, American billionaires’ wealth grew by a third.”
Meanwhile, as the rise in homelessness and strained food banks illustrate, ordinary people are losing.
Is going to be okay. Because Bam is getting paid. From ESPN News Services.
“The Miami Heat and Bam Adebayo have agreed to a five-year max extension, Adebayo’s agent, Alex Saratsis, told ESPN’s Zach Lowe. The deal includes escalator clauses that can take its total to $195 million over five years.”
Let’s not forget, social mobility is extremely low in the (dis)United States these days. And if one wants to improve their lot in life, education is still a much safer bet than professional sports. Neither of those two facts mean we can’t celebrate Bam’s and his mother’s changed fortunes.
“Adebayo had told The Associated Press during the NBA’s restart earlier this summer at Walt Disney World that his lone financial goal was to take care of his mother, Marilyn Blount. She raised him by herself in North Carolina, making about $15,000 a year from her multiple jobs and with the family calling a single-wide trailer their home.
‘That competitive nature comes out when I feel like I’m playing bad and when things aren’t going right,’ Adebayo said in the September interview with the AP. ‘I think about how she fought through struggle. … You see that for 18 years straight, you take that load on and feel that responsibility. And my responsibility is to provide for my mom, and the best way to make sure I can do that is to help us win.'”
“. . . the stock market isn’t the economy: more than half of all stocks are owned by only 1 percent of Americans, while the bottom half of the population owns only 0.7 percent of the market.”
I’d love to rip Jack for accruing over a quarter million in debt, and one might think he’s fair game as a hetero, white, male; but not for this hetero, white, male because of my economic privilege.
I can’t rip Jack because I haven’t even come close to walking in his worn-torn shoes. Back in the Pleistocene Era when college was affordable, my parents paid my college tuition which is just one example among many of the economic help they provided me and my family. My family and I are economically secure for lots of reasons, but “luck” is first and last on the list.
That’s why I can’t say, “What the hell Jack, step away from the loan application!” Nor can I go back in time and tell him to tell his kids in no uncertain terms that he can’t afford to send them to four year universities. Community college will have to suffice and then part-time jobs while working their way through public universities. Saying those things to Jack would be poor form.
It would even be insensitive for me to frame my criticism as questions like,”Jack, why the hell, loan on top of loan on top of loan? At what point do you just say ENOUGH debt already?” There has to be some personal agency, doesn’t there?
Other questions bubbling up in my pea brain are more benign. Why didn’t Jack’s “friends” stage an intervention? And how many Jacks are there out there? How can we help them avoid his fate? Where’s the urgency around this type of student debt? Is my university complicit, at all, in creating additional Jack and Jills?
In fairness to Jack, he hasn’t been seeking fame or fortune. Just a LITTLE job security. Previously homeless, and still on the edge of it, he deserves compassion.
So it’s a good thing I didn’t say anything too harsh to him.
I need to muster some strength before reading the whole, mind blowing story.
Addendum: Something doesn’t add up. A full-time (I assume) fifth year teacher making $30,000? Ah, private Catholic school that apparently doesn’t have any qualms with not paying a livable wage.
I just bought a new car, or more accurately, a pre-owned car. A 2017 Prius-V, the uber-sexy wagon* that Toyota doesn’t make anymore that gets 45-50mpg**. Suffice to say, my friends’ jealousy is spiking. Don’t hate me because you ain’t me.
I paid $23,100. It had 13,662 miles on it and was in near new shape. Taxes, fees, and registration brought the total to $25,700.
This damn car review of the 2020 Prius Prime makes wonder if I made a mistake that you should avoid if in the market for a new car. Start at the 12 minute mark.
For some reason I can’t explain, in my upper lefthand corner of the world, car prices are lower in Portland, especially when I add in the tax savings since I live in a county with a lower than average rate and they use my home address for the sales tax calculation. Dig this 2020 Prius Prime car listing. Note, importantly, it’s the base model recommended by the Savage Geese.
Purchase price $27,201. For me, taxes, fees, and registration are going to push that to right around $30,000. Then, crucially, subtract the $4,500 federal tax credit that comes with it for an out of pocket cost of $25,500. Two hundy less than I paid for my lived in 2017 that I can’t plug in at night for 25 miles of electric range. I could stop right here, but let’s extend the case study for potential new car buyers unaccustomed to car math.
We’re going to own it for 8 years. Since it’s a Toyota, and we’re going to take great care of it, and not use it for ride sharing, let’s assume it depreciates slowly at 7.5%/year for a cost of approximately $1,900/year. Let’s fully insure it for the first six years at an approximate cost of $1k/year and then remove comprehensive and collision for years 7 and 8 for a savings of $300-$350 in each of those last two years. So total insurance costs is approximately $7k for the 8 years or $875/year.
Because we mostly use it in and around town, and use juice to do that, let’s assume 6 trips to the gas station at $25 a pop for a total outlay of $150/year. Same with maintenance, $150/year on average. The first two years are free, then we’d probably average $200 a year because we have an independent mechanic we trust and the car is bullet proof.
The final equation $1,900+$875+$150+$150=$3,075/year or about the same TOTAL cost my nephew paid for his beater Corolla. The big differences of course are the considerable safety and technology enhancements, superior ride quality, and convenience of only having to do regular maintenance.
$3,075/month is $256/month, or if you make $25.60/hour, 10 hours of work a month. Not too bad.
I am aware I failed to factor in electricity costs, not quite sure how to calculate those. Finally, my car has one distinct advantage over the new Prime, its vo-lu-mi-nous cargo space.
*with me in it
**because the RAV-4 Hybrid has cannibalized sales.
Pressing Pause 