It Needed To Get Done

You can spend all your time making money
You can spend all your love making time*

I am a believer in comparative advantage.

That's where, despite knowing how to do something and doing it yourself is cheaper than hiring someone, the opportunity cost of doing it is higher than hiring someone to do it.

In other words, you make more while someone else does it than it costs to pay them.

The AC project really did save money, even if you count buying some of the parts twice.

I bought the parts to rebuild the HVAC box for $170.

I bought a new HVAC box for $815.

I bought another $150 in sundries.  I don't count buying tools because they're reusable.

$1,145 is still less than $3,000.

I spent almost 50 hours doing the job.

To make spending $3,000 on the job with the parts I bought worth it, I need to make more than $37.10 an hour, or $77,168 a year.  I do not make, and have never made, that much a year.

So it's worth my time to do this job because it doesn't cost me more than my time is worth. 

*"I hate the Eagles man!" J. Lebowski

Savage And Wesson?

Looks like S&W just bought Savage Arms.

I happen to like my Savage rifles, I sure hope this doesn't fuck up their secret sauce.

 There's a very vocal cadre out there wanting the Model 99 back.  I wonder if this is their moment!

Different Words Is A Clue

I don't think many politicians understand what "affordable" means.

It means that I have enough money to afford it.

It can mean that it costs less or that I have more money.

Too often, having more money has come with the cost climbing to meet the raise, or surpassing it.

Affordable doesn't mean that I want someone else to pay for it.

Affordable doesn't mean that I don't want the person selling it to not make a profit.

But I keep seeing a strong correlation between how tightly something is regulated and how expensive it is, along with a strong correlation between whether most people pay for it out of pocket or if an insurance company typically pays.  There is also a strong relationship between government supplying the money for a good and the prices spiraling out of control.

Combine any or all of these things and it's logarithmic and/or exponentially more expensive.

Sprinkle in some union influence for the maximum price increases for minimum increase in value.

Just as macroeconomics can be summed up as, "Supply and demand, that's it!":  Eliminating the middle man is one of the surest ways to make the price of something go down. 

Ruger Is Discontinuing A Bunch Of Models

The American Rifleman reports that Ruger is discontinuing the following:

Revolvers: LCR, SP101, GP100, Redhawk, Super Redhawk, Blackhawk, Super Blackhawk, Single-Series, Vaquero and Bearcat.

Semi-Auto Pistols: SR1911, PC Charger, LC Charger

Rifles: LC Carbine, PC Carbine, No. 1, 77-series, Hawkeye and Ruger Precision.

Apparently

Because I have been paying the same mortgage for 24 years, I am, apparently, "bad with money."

To be good with money I was supposed to refinance every time I could and chase an ever lower interest rate.

I do know that because I was ACTUALLY very bad with my money 24 years ago that I couldn't have gotten a better rate than the 7.375% I've been paying until just about a year ago.

I prolly ain't really great with my money, but I'm not over extended.

We're paying what we owe to whom we owe as agreed.

We're not sweating maximizing at the margins.

Of course, we regard our house as a box we keep ourselves in rather than an investment vehicle, which is also "bad with your money."

On the whole, I'd rather be happy. 

Bribing Me With My Own Money?

President Trump has offered the American people a bribe to vote for Republicans for Congress.

They take both houses, he vows to give all of us $5,000.

Yippie?

That's like $1.2 trillion bucks.

No way this massive cash distribution will, in any way, be inflationary...

Printer go brrrrrrrrrr, I guess because I'm pretty sure the gubmint ain't got no extra $1.2 trillion laying around while they deficit spend normally.

I generally like Trump, but shit like this ticks me off.

I'd much rather he vowed to get the government to spend $5,000 less for every adult.

That'd be some positive change that'd be a real benefit to everyone. 

For Future Reference

 

A Modest Proposal

First, since the Department of War gets substantial exemptions from the evironmental bullshit laws...

Let's build some nuclear power plants!

Call them training centers for the Navy and use standardized designs they are already using in subs and carriers.

Yes, they are teeny reactors compared to the "real thing," but we can compensate by building lots and lots of them.

Electricity production is a byproduct and we can sell it to the local electrical monopoly or direct to customers at cost.  Or at the local rate.  Doesn't matter.

Any protesters get stroppy and they're threatening a military base not a Department of Energy facility.

I think we could do the same thing with refineries in places like California.  Fuel production is a vital national defense necessity.

Run it like Lake City and let them sell overruns to the public. 

Piece Rate

One of the most corrosive effects of unions is the need of the business they've extorted to make a profit now that the wages are higher and the sale price of the good is inelastic.

That means you can't just raise prices for you SEIU members.

You can't lower wages, the union has seen to that.

But what if you can get the union worker to make more units in the same time frame?

So you engineer things to be easier to assemble and automate the assembly of as many parts as you can.

I got laughed at for pointing this out, but a bot can make a circuit board with embedded relays on it for lot less than paying a UAW worker to install relays in a fuse box.

Thus, we end up with a $500 part we need to replace because a relay failed rather than a $5 relay.

It's why we have to buy assemblies and cannot buy parts. 

Hit The Ballpark

I decided that artillery rounds would get a base cost calculated from 1/1000 of the starting wealth for the TL times the weight in pounds.

Then you multiply that by the cost factors in Gun Stats.

The TL7 M107 round is $15 times 116.3 lb. (Shell, PD fuse and powder bags) to get a base of $1,744.50 and x2 for HE rounds...  $3,490.

An actual M107 runs $2,860.  I'm acceptably close.

Especially since my price is in $GURPS not USD. 

This Is Very Familiar!

A modest proposal for the student loan crisis.  With a workable solution.

Of course that means we'll never try it. 

Amazing

Revenues doubled in the past five years, but a 15% cut will eliminate everything they, successfully, funded with half the money previously?

I think we're in, "pull the other one, it has bells on it," territory. 

The maths of the people crying about this tax cut aren't adding up.

BTW:  If tripling the exemption on property taxes results in a 15% drop in revenue, then you should be fine.

What these governments are going to have to do is separate the "must have" from the "nice to have."

Two things they keep bringing up to scare the normies is schools, fire and police.

Schools are already lavishly funded from the portion of property taxes that are unaffected by the homestead exemption.

In too many cases the city fire and police services are a duplication of effort and the county, with it's more diverse funding, could take over the task.

But the giant, huge, thing they're missing is the voters have been demanding relief from the taxation of their property and, by extension, they are saying they want the cities and counties of Florida to figure out how to live more cheaply. 

The voters are painfully aware that these same governments managed to provide all the services they threaten with half the money when there was just 45% inflation while the revenue increased 100%.

That means that the previous level of funding could survive a 28% cut in revenue.

The problem is the funding levels went up as the revenue did.

The voters get another chance to remind them in November by endorsing or rejecting the tax cut. 

Rephrasing The Problem Sometimes Helps

Wind and solar are what you put up with for energy production when you don't have gas, oil and nuclear power.

It's not an alternative until it's a replacement, and it will never be able to replace them. 

Poof It Was Gone

 

I was out at the rumored $2,600 price point.

I don't think it's really an unreasonable price for a gun with so many unique and bespoke parts.

$3,300 is more than I want to spend on one.

BUT!

The entire production run sold out in less than an hour.

That speaks to an unsatisfied demand.

All of those expensive, bespoke parts get cheaper if you make a lot more of them and get the price down.

I am not sure what the number of people who want such a rifle are, but I was tempted at $2,600 and out at $3,300.  It'd have been a done deal at $2,200!

I am, also, not sure of what kind of margins are built into the production of this rifle.

Economies of scale can make a lower margin pay more than a higher margin in increased sales. 

Mods ≠ Value

Over and over I see someone who's heavily modified their car and think that just because they spent $15k on the mods, that means they've added $15k to the value of the car.

If the car is normally $10k, they want $25k for it.

That only works if the prospective buyer wanted that model car with those exact mods and the seller is the only one with this combination.

By this logic, I should add the price of every oil change to the value of the car.  I spent the money, right?

The $15k in equals $15k out also forgets something important, depreciation.  Everything loses value when you break the seal on the box.

If that really bugs you, I suggest a different hobby from hot rodding.

Hot Rods are a money sink.  You just don't break even unless you got lucky and your make and model becomes the hot collectible.

If you are lucky and owned the thing before it became the new hotness, you stand to make money, or at least not have lost money due to inflation; and what you've done to the car won't matter.

Wait, I'm making my point again...  Your mods don't affect the value.

The condition, year, make and model determine the value; in many cases the mods reduce the value.

Another interesting thing here with people trying to recoup their mod expenditures is the number of folks who have very recently completed the mod.

That's worrisome to me.

It makes me wonder about the value of the mod in the first place.

Did it make the car miserable to drive?  Did it crater the mileage?  Is it now unreliable?  Did it break something you only notice after owning for a while? 

Checking The Math

Using this inflation calculator to check the picture found here. 

 The calculator says there was 483.1% inflation, that means a 1975 dollar is $5.83 in 2024.

$39,300 house should become $239,144.57.
$14,100 income should become $82,212.17.
$0.59 gas should become $3.44.
$1,500 college tuition should become $9,057.31
$3,800 new car should become $22,156.47
$150 rent should become $874.60.
$2.10 minimum wage should become $12.24
$0.28 loaf of bread should become $1.63
$1.55 movie ticket should become $9.04

Gee, you'd think the calculator might not be calibrated correctly.  At least for those specific things.

A 23" Zenith TV was $420 in 1975.  It should cost $2,599.78 today.  They actually cost $99.
A Colt Gov't model was $175.50.  It should cost $1,086.34 today, but actually comes in at $970.99. 

Inflation is not even across all things, but calculators try to make it so. 

The invisible hand does not care if something is relatively more or less valuable compared to 50 years ago.

I remember $70 Mosin-Nagant 91/30's around 2004.  Inflation says that should only be $123.41, they're selling in the mid $400's now. 

Capitalism For The Win

Watch this:

If you're skeptical, remember that the plastics industry is the result of finding a use for the crud left over from refining oil into fuel.

If allowed to do so, Humanity is good at solving problems.

I Did Note They Are Different Words

Unintended and unexpected are not the same word.

Most, if not all, unintended consequences from socialist "planning" seem to come with the expected consequences.

Most, if not all, unintended consequences are predicted before the "planning" can be implemented.

What's amazing is how many people are still surprised when the Gods of the Copybook Headings, with terror and slaughter, return. 

California has become the latest state to notice that upping the minimum wage to a stupidly high level doesn't result in comfortable lifestyles for the people earning that wage.

The best case was inflation eating up all the gains in income, and they are not getting the best case.  When the one-time costs of automation are cheaper than the ongoing expenses of keeping an employee, the bot gets the job.

If the cost of employing people makes a business unprofitable, then it closes.

In both cases, the minimum wage worker will be getting the true minimum wage. 

I Noticed Something They Have In Common

Several youtubers and podcasters who cover entertainment have been mentioning that Hollywood is increasingly concerned that all the jobs are disappearing and that LA will start looking like Detroit soon.

Let's just look at the similarities!

Democrat run mayor's office.

Pivotal industry in an environment that's increasingly hostile to it.

Pivotal industry dominated by many unions, driving production to places where such domination is much reduced or eliminated.

Welcome to your own goal territory, Hollywood!

The automakers never really solved for the union problem, and it's following them even to right-to-work states.

Democrat run mayor's offices are much harder nuts to crack because by the time things are REALLY wrong, all the people who'd vote against them (and their businesses) are long relocated.

Worse for them is the increasing push-back from places that emigrants from self-blighted places are getting from their new homes.

"Don't California My Texas," and, "Don't New York My Florida," are popular slogans.

I think it's fair to say the model of Democrats and Unions is that of locusts.

Go Go Detailed Records!

I keep a spreadsheet of all the maintenance and modifications I do to the cars.

That includes a date and mileage for when the maintenance is done.

This has helped with insurance twice now.

First was when they totaled The Precious and "calculated" a mileage value to devalue the car.  I'd recently changed the oil, so I knew there were many fewer miles on her than what they quoted and it got me a bigger check.

The second time was today when I got Alice on the policy to replace Noxious.  Despite both being 2013 Chevy Equinoxes, Alice was $71 a year more to insure.  Dunno how they figure this shit out, but if they wanna play games, so can I.

To the spreadsheet!

Thanks to work from home and a general case of "don't go no where." we're far below the "average" person's 12,000 to 15,000 miles per year.

The Beast is actually being driven about 5,000 miles per year.  Noxious was being driven about 4,000.

So I changed the values from 10,000 and 8,500, respectively, and dropped my insurance even lower than before we started.

If they complain about the miles, I can give them a spreadsheet showing my oil changes!