Bubbadoo99 (u/Bubbadoo99)

Bubbadoo99 commented on Will US companies hire fewer engineers due to Section 174? blog.pragmaticengineer.co... · Posted by u/WillieCubed

k1t · 2 years ago

Agreed.

TFA gives an example of amortizing the cost of a $2,000 server with a 4 year life. If you did not amortize the cost, you would have a "bumpy" expense with a $2,000 charge in Year 1, then $0 for the next 3 years. It is more convenient to smooth out the cost of the server over the expected lifetime, instead treating it as a $500 cost in each of the 4 years' of its expected life. Essentially treating it more like a service or pay-over-time situation.

But employees don't work like that. Employees don't have multi-year expected lifetimes which you are required to pay for upfront. In the US at least, it is fairer to say that an employee has a 2 week expected "lifetime". If you stop paying them, they will go somewhere else.

How can you take something that you essentially lease 2 weeks at a time, and amortize it over 5 years?

Bubbadoo99 · 2 years ago

For most small and medium businesses (certainly not FANG), you wouldn't amortize the cost of said server but would take it as a Section 179 expense. This would allow the business to expense the full-cost of the server in the year it's placed into service. Section 174 just further commoditizes the software development skill. Question is: can software dev labor costs be expensed via the Section 179 rule, up to the limit (somewhere north of $1.1MM).

Bubbadoo99 commented on Americans are canceling more of their streaming services wsj.com/business/media/am... · Posted by u/PKop

k310 · 2 years ago

What happens when you need 5 subscriptions as content is divided by the streaming services? I suppose you could make the analogy to paywalled websites.

Paywalled websites are "leaky" and there's syndication, or we'd need subscriptions to get different news feeds.

It's not as if there were some electronic currency we could send per item, since companies are still really big on bundling. More money for a lot of stuff you don't want. Will that ever change? (oh, the monopoly over content factor)

The companies are market-driven, so what would drive them to a la carte pricing? And wasn't that predicted ages ago?

Bubbadoo99 · 2 years ago

I think 'cutting the cord', ie., streaming content instead of paying for cable, was supposed to be the driver behind much lower monthly fees. But even 5 years ago, when I added up monthly fees for each streaming service needed to replicate what I had on cable, it was still ridiculously expensive. And it's even worse today with much higher fees. To your point about paywalled websites, the internet isn't the tool it was 20 or even 30 years ago. As others have pointed out, it's the shittification of the web. 20 years ago, I really looked forward to watching HBO on Sunday nights. These days, it's hard to get excited about any content.

Bubbadoo99 commented on First new U.S. nuclear reactor since 2016 is now in operation eia.gov/todayinenergy/det... · Posted by u/ano-ther

dkobia · 2 years ago

As exciting as this should be, the soaring cost overruns on this project means we Georgians have been left holding the bag. There’s now a “Nuclear Construction Cost Recovery” line item on my bill, so electricity costs more rather than less.

Bubbadoo99 · 2 years ago

Unfortunately, this more the rule than the exception. Same thing happened on Long Island, NY with Lilco's Shoreham reactor that took years to build (construction was riddled with all sorts of problems, theft, etc.)and when finally finished, people realized if something went wrong, the narrow, 128 mile island would be impossible to evacuate. After completion, it was never put online and despite the mass incompetence, no one was fired. In fact, management bonuses were as big as ever. Rate payers on LI are still paying for this debacle 40 years later thanks to then Gov. Mario Cuomo. LI utilities, like many utilities, are so poorly managed.

Bubbadoo99 commented on The Era of Startups Is Over acecreamu.substack.com/p/... · Posted by u/acecreamu

Bubbadoo99 · 2 years ago

If I had a dollar for every time someone comes out with dire predictions for startups or the greater economy, I'd be proverbally rich. 1987, 1989, 1993, 1998, 2001, 2007, 2012... 202x... All years during which a 'correction' occurred. In 2001, the intertubes imploded during the internet crash. But it was anything but fatal, despite two of every three startups failing.

When GDP is so high, it creates a momentum that does help every sector. One thing that would help would be an administration that is pro-business and doesn't pick winners and losers. Maybe leadership that has an idea of what economic theory means.