I've tried to watch an old Seinfeld episode during this event. It was freezing every few minutes even at downgraded bitrate. A video that should be on my local CDN node.
This whole post is about dentists recommending unnecessary treatment. And that has been our experience.
She never had all these issues when she was seeing her dentist in her own country. But a few years in the US and her teeth are practically falling apart. Is it possible her previous dentist with no financial incentive found nothing wrong with her, yet the new one who is trying to make next quarters profit has every incentive to upsell?
This feels like a particularly derogatory take on the OP's wife's home country, which is ironic given that TFA is about "horrendous dentistry" in the US. Literal comment from the article
"Dentists are not required to learn how to place implants in dental school, nor are they required to complete implant training before performing the surgery in nearly all states."
"I was frankly stunned at how bad some of these dentists were practicing,” Prisby said. “It was horrendous dentistry."
The whole article is about whether a “dentist” is qualified to place implants by performing oral surgery. [1] The coloquial term “dentist” does not actually carry information about what procedures an individual is qualified to perform. Trying to compare “dentists” from different countries with different training and regulatory regimes without getting into the specifics of what those trainings and regulations are is going to mislead you to false equivalence.
[1] In the U.S. the basic DMD/DDS is referred to as a “dentist” but does not perform implant surgery. At minimum that would require extra training. The article is extremely sloppy about clarifying what qualifications the individuals who performed the procedures on Becky Carroll have. We don’t know if those individuals were unqualified or qualified and practicing poorly.
Because contracts that people sign when they buy a subsidized phone are not really enforceable. Folks will get a "free" phone and stop paying. There is not much that provider can do. The cars are valuable enough and when you stop paying your loan you will lose it pretty fast.
It is not about stress. You are asking to pick between a) do same job at a different company for 2-3x income, or b) learn to do something different for a chance of smaller/same/or bigger income than in the previous case. First option requires passing somewhat stressful interviews and then it is all familiar territory. Second option has more unknowns.
> First option requires passing somewhat stressful interviews and then it is all familiar territory. Second option has more unknowns.
The most you'll ever make at a job is based on one conversation you had months or even years ago. Your income will only ever increase at steps every 6 - 12 months and, in the best case, linearly and in the worst case never increasing beyond inflation.
With a business, yes your income may be stagnant or slower, but your income isn't capped, can change rapidly, and can change on a dime rather than waiting on the next review cycle or whatever.
If you have the stomach for it, a business will long-term always give better returns for your work than a job.
Interesting. Europe has stricter regulations that cap interchange. As a result not a lot of rewards cards and less competition in that space. In US no caps, but much more players in the rewards cards space. I've checked recent foreign transactions and it looks like both of popular travel cards make some money on exchange rates, but not as much as in France.
Amex Plat did not charge foreign fee, but exchange rate is 1% less favorable according xe.com
Chase Sapphire Reserve also no fees, exchange rate is 0.3% different from xe.com
> I've checked recent foreign transactions and it looks like both of popular travel cards make some money on exchange rates, but not as much as in France
Don't get me wrong, there are tons of options for cheap or downright free foreign exchange transactions (such as Revolut, N26, Fortuneo, BoursoBank just in France). It's Amex in particular that are borderline scamming their French customers on foreign transactions.
Never heard about others but Revolut is not a great example. 1% exchange fee plus another 0.3% on exchange rate. I agree that Amex is scamming their european customers. But my point was that they don't do it in US despite the lack of regulations. Same Amex is nicer to their american customers than Revolut to europeans. And one of Revolut's main selling points is their great exchange rates.
Is $60K cash split between these 6 people? Then it is not that impressive.
If you want higher ROI on spreadsheet hobby start using it for your own financial/retirement planning. Playing with numbers in that field can change outcomes by hundreds of thousands dollars.
> ends up costing 2-3% more than it would otherwise
This is a very simplified view. Cash handling is not free. Fraud levels with cash are different. Overall attractiveness of a small but cash-only business is different.
if the credit card merchant was able to extract 2-3% for using their network, what makes you think that a free debit card with low/zero cost wouldn't also be owned by the same credit card merchants and force the same fees to maintain their monopoly?
Europe has similar laws capping the fees on both credit cards and debit cards. We could do the same and it would work better for everyone except the credit card companies.
Because right now debit card purchases don’t have a transaction fee while credit cards do. I just had two recent purchases where the vendor charged a 3% surcharge for credit cards but would do the transaction by debit card free.
It is an example that greed is everywhere. Not only among card issuers but also among merchants. The moment merchant find a socially accepted way to extract extra they will do it. Similar to tip screens on square terminals in all takeout places. Costs nothing to ask, generates some additional revenue.
There is a reason every concert and sports venue near me has gone cashless. It's not because they enjoy giving away 2-3% of their revenues but rather those places aren't active every evening and tend to turn over employees quickly. Handling cash is expensive and risky in that environment.
In a concert and sports venue concessions environment you're also prioritizing throughput much more than most businesses. Being cashless helps with throughput a lot - the employees don't have to wait for people to count their money, then recount it, and spend time making change.
CEOs get all kinds of compensation. Business jet travel, security, etc. This line item could be just tax optimization for this guy.
I am not trying to defend him, he is getting paid a lot:
"On May 5, 2023, the Board granted Mr. Aquila an award of 6,884,682 RSUs. These awards vest on May 5, 2024, subject to continuous service." [1]
At current stock price it is ~$20M. Getting outraged about additional $1.7M that was negotiated several years ago is strange. It does make a great headline, but would it change anything if he is paid $22M and pays for the jet out of pocket?
Totally agree. I'm not usually in the habit of defending millionaires. But I thought there used to be a justification for private jet travel of maximizing the CEO's time. The company is investing $20M per year in this asset and he's probably flying for meetings all the time and if a private jet cuts a couple hours of airport transit / wait time off of each flight it's probably worth it for the increased amount of meetings he can attend.
Maybe that can be achieved for less than $1.7M, I'm not informed enough. This source https://simpleflying.com/gulftream-g700-cost-to-own-operate-.... says it's a little more than $2M per year to operate a Gulfstream G700, I don't know what kind of jets CEOs are using these days.
