Why bankruptcy? Are people on HN in debt?
Ofc they would have to change their lifestyle if they had a 20x decrease in salary though.
Ofc they would have to change their lifestyle if they had a 20x decrease in salary though.
Every essential requires debt to buy. An education, a house, a car (some would argue anyway).
> Ofc they would have to change their lifestyle if they had a 20x decrease in salary though.
Are you honestly this indifferent about humans receiving a 20x decrease in their salary in pursuit of corporate productivity gains?
It really isn't as impossible as it sounds to go debt-free, especially with a high paying tech job many here likely have. The main blockers (a) cost of living in Silicon Valley and (b) our economy is designed to incentivise spending and investing, not saving.
(a) is easier to solve with more companies supporting remote and more tech jobs in other, more affordable areas. (b) is largely a matter of ignoring investment best practices. That sounds crazy, but if you want to go debt free spend those 15 years foregoing investments that you likely will never cash in to pay for a house.
I don't disagree, but it's something you would need to be proactive about, and as you say there has been little incentive to do it, both from a cultural perspective and from the perspective of monetary policy.
I guess what I'm getting at is that it seems unfair to expect people to be debt free in a society which so often requires and incentives debt. I struggle to blame a 20 year old tech worker for going to college and taking on debt, or buying a home with debt while interest rates were low. When the majority of the population are in debt perhaps it's not the fault of the people, but the incentives of the system.
As a society if we don't want people taking on debt we shouldn't encourage it, and if we do encourage it then we should probably be compassionate for those in debt where they were acting reasonably.
As you described, we've been handed this system dependent on consistent growth of GDP as measured by a debt-based currency. Going debt free, effictively breaking out of that economic model entirely, takes plenty of planning and commitment - it's not easy by design.
The societal question is so interesting to me because, at least as far as I'm aware, we were never offered the chance to pick this model or way of life. A few key individuals in our history made a few seemingly reasonable decisions that happened to build to a model where everyone is expected and encouraged to live primarily on debt.
I'm under 40 and not in dept.
Sounds like you're coming from an expensive place.
Education and rent are quite cheap where I'm from and I don't need a car, but I could buy one from my savings right now if I wanted.
I'm from the UK, so my student debt was under 30k and I paid it off within a few years of graduating.
> a house
I make a decent tech salary
>a car
I live in London, cars aren't all that useful here
To be clear, I wasn't expressing surprise that the average person would be assumed to be in debt, only that the average HN user would be.
>Are you honestly this indifferent about humans receiving a 20x decrease in their salary in pursuit of corporate productivity gains?
No. Just expressing surprise that HN users of all people would have to declare bankruptcy if they lost their jobs. Isn't everyone here aiming to retire at 30?