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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 3rd, 2023

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  • senoro@lemmy.mltoMemes@lemmy.ml~~Wall~~ Sesame street
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    10 months ago

    Except the banks payed it back. The US government profited about $15bn from the bailouts. Potentially a loss if considering inflation. Also banks were forced to take the bailouts to prevent a bank run. You would almost certainly have taken your money out of CITI bank if they were the only ones receiving a bailout from the government. Which would have cost the government more in the long term.

    Large banks like JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs had already paid back the government bailout by July 2009.





  • senoro@lemmy.mltoData Is Beautiful@lemmy.ml*Permanently Deleted*
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    10 months ago

    This is true, in reality it’s what has to be done, and it will be against the will of the people, it would be undemocratic and would require agreement on both sides of the political spectrum. When one side makes unpopular but necessary change to regulation to reduce our environmental impact, you have to pray that come next election, your hard work isn’t immediately undone after almost certainly being voted out.

    People generally aren’t unreasonable, adding additional regulation on say oil producers is fine for people in rich nations, people who can afford (begrudgingly) to pay more money for their petrol. But the only way to make such a change fair is to increase the amount of aid sent to lower income countries. When the price per litre of petrol in Kenya is about €1.2 and the average income is €2000 it becomes unfair to give them higher prices for necessities without also loading these developing nations with significant amounts of financial aid. Oil and gas is the ladder which developed nations climbed to become who they are to day, and it is the same ladder which we need to kick down behind us to prevent or limit climate change. We can not leave those behind us ladderless however. We must use money to help them reach our levels.

    And money comes from taxes, and taxes come from people, and when people in these developed nations look at the state of their country, large expenses, large mortgage payments or rent, increased price of fuel increased price of meat and dairy. Most will not understand why it is necessary to also start sending hundreds of billions of dollars to poorer countries. You either need to educate the general population to a level where they can understand what must be done to save ourselves. Or you must do it against the will of the people, undemocratically.

    I understand that this comment may be slightly irrelevant but it came to my mind and I thought it had to be voiced. If you can see any way in which the logic is not sound in my comment here please let me know and correct me. Thank you in advance.


  • You can get high quality clothing for much much less than these prices you have said. Solovair boots are about €200, and they’re still pretty expensive for high quality stuff. €80 for a high quality charles tyrwhitt shirt. It doesn’t even need to be specifically branded as high quality, but when you are browsing in whatever store, check the thickness of the teeshirt or shirt, check the strength of the trousers, think about how easy it would be to repair if it broke. Last year I bought a thick plain teeshirt from H&M for €8, I have worn it a lot and it shows no signs of wear. You just have to be conscious about what it is you are buying.


  • This is true, but when 2000 people find out that the price of milk and cheese they love so dearly is going to have to go up, a perhaps decently sized portion of those 2000 would protest and fight to stop the regulation that causes them to have to change their diet. It’s incredibly difficult to change the way people think in a democracy. The only democratic way to make the change we need is to already have more than 50% of the people on board with the proposed regulation.


  • senoro@lemmy.mltoData Is Beautiful@lemmy.ml*Permanently Deleted*
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    10 months ago

    I wonder how many of the large meat and dairy companies will still be such huge polluters if everyone ate a vegetarian or even vegan diet? I wonder how much less pollution fast fashion producers create if everyone prioritised high quality clothing that lasts a long time over cheap clothing that doesn’t even last a year? I wonder how much pollution oil and gas producers would make if everyone decided to stop using gas boilers and petrol cars and taking long polluting flights?

    To argue that we can’t affect the amount of pollution going in to the world makes someone else less likely to try. If we all do our part the companies are forced to change, not via laws and regulations, but by the fact that they will lose money if they don’t. The fact of the matter is, most people say they care about climate change and the environment, but when you ask them to give up their highly polluting luxuries, they suddenly don’t care as much. And obviously there are exceptions to this, you and I for example probably care about the environment and actually act in a way as to reduce our own footprints. But the average person does not care enough.