Looks like trickle down works after all

[JoeWeber 2,720]

37 minutes ago, brenthutch said:

Wow!  What up with the hate?  Looks like I am living, rent free, in your brain.

Conservatives always want something for nothing. No worries, I know you'll pay the rent.

Zero hate, brother. Even though I think half of what you say is somewhat premature, I actually enjoy your style. In this situation I happen to be tickled that whereas with climate change the evidence is observable in real time and right before your eyes when it comes to trickle down economics, that is the money your pay your own people, the evidence is statistical and needs graphs, arrows, percentages and other peoples money to be fully understood. I just love that.

[gowlerk 2,191]

1 hour ago, brenthutch said:

The tight labor market is giving the worker more leverage than at anytime in the last 50 years.

I would call BS on that. Shortly before the 2008 crash things were looking pretty good for workers in the US.

[brenthutch 444]

1 hour ago, gowlerk said:

I would call BS on that. Shortly before the 2008 crash things were looking pretty good for workers in the US.

5.8% vs 3.5%.  

It might have been good then but it is better now.

[gowlerk 2,191]

6 minutes ago, brenthutch said:

5.8% vs 3.5%.  

It might have been good then but it is better now.

Wages had stronger upward pressure and were rising. As you know, the unemployment rate is strongly affected by the participation rate.

[brenthutch 444]

I'm glad you bought that up.  Only around 100k of new workers entered the workforce the rest of the 160k+ jobs were filled by those who were previously not participating in the job market.  So good news all around 

[JoeWeber 2,720]

12 minutes ago, brenthutch said:

I'm glad you bought that up.  Only around 100k of new workers entered the workforce the rest of the 160k+ jobs were filled by those who were previously not participating in the job market.  So good news all around 

Back in October you posted:

"Wow, I can not even begin to figure out how to answer that.  Please flesh out how tax cuts hurt the middle class.  As a member of the middle class I can certainly appreciate the  extra $5K+ my family has benefited from.  Please explain how I have been harmed".  

But you're a business owner. From what I grasp of your circumstance you aren't drawing a wage. So, did you redistribute any of that 5 Grand to your employees? Do you have any hourly employees or like a lot of DZ's are you exclusively benefitting from the gig economy?

[brenthutch 444]

No, I run SDHV, I don’t own it. I am just a simple worker bee.  Manager, S&TA, chief instructor, packer, tandem mule, demo guy, and manifest bitch all rolled into one lovable fuzz ball.  We don’t have any indentured servants, everyone had regular full time jobs (except for me, I’m semi retired)

 

Edited December 10, 2019 by brenthutch

[turtlespeed 220]

On 12/8/2019 at 12:37 PM, JoeWeber said:

That's outstanding news for everyone. I'm curious, how many hourly employee's at Skydive Happy Valley made $23.24 an hour on average this year? I'd argue that averaging them in with your winnings, your gig economy piece workers or other better paid workers elsewhere isn't valid. If the answer is none, that's cool, and not your problem. It'll trickle down to them sometime from somewhere, right? Simple economics and business.

That sounds like a simplistic climate change argument where if is sunny and mild in California, or cold in Michigan, its status quo - so we must not be in the middle of climate change.

[JoeWeber 2,720]

1 hour ago, brenthutch said:

No, I run SDHV, I don’t own it. I am just a simple worker bee.  Manager, S&TA, chief instructor, packer, tandem mule, demo guy, and manifest bitch all rolled into one lovable fuzz ball.  We don’t have any indentured servants, everyone had regular full time jobs (except for me, I’m semi retired)

 

So the slaves are all part time gig economy workers? Just lovers of fuzz balls, humble workers in the gardens of the Brents?

[SkyDekker 1,465]

On 12/6/2019 at 11:35 AM, brenthutch said:

Obama leveled out at five percent, Trump has it down to 3.5, defying all conventional wisdom of what constitutes full employment.  Not to mention real wage growth, during the Obama administration it was close to zero.  Under Trump? >3%.  In short, more jobs, more money, less taxes.

Lows in unemployment are a good indicator of a coming recession.

Edited December 10, 2019 by SkyDekker

[brenthutch 444]

In no particular order our staff consists of:  medical practice consultants, Emmy award winning video editor, IT guru, multi media guy for the department of engineering at Penn State, police officer, and several Penn State students.  No slave workers making tennis shoes for a dollar a day.

[brenthutch 444]

20 minutes ago, SkyDekker said:

Lows in unemployment are a good indicator of a coming recession.

Not as much of a harbinger of economic troubles as this:

https://globalnews.ca/news/6262739/canada-biggest-job-loss-financial-crisis/

 

[JoeWeber 2,720]

11 hours ago, brenthutch said:

In no particular order our staff consists of:  medical practice consultants, Emmy award winning video editor, IT guru, multi media guy for the department of engineering at Penn State, police officer, and several Penn State students.  No slave workers making tennis shoes for a dollar a day.

No AVN award winners? That's too bad. Setting aside that everyone born after 1980 seems an IT guru to me, I have to say I've always been impressed with the quality of the people we've attracted for staff. But that's also just skydiving. Nationals, World Team, AZ Challenge, Power Play or just fun jumping down the road you're always taking grips on people who have more than one trick in the bag. Makes you wonder where all of the douchebag DZO's come from, no? But I digress.

Given that a single 182 DZ doesn't have the economic mass to offer an all encompassing salary or respectable hourly wage with guaranteed hours it would appear that both you and your college students are gig economy workers. I do not say that's a bad thing. I've tried offering year around salaries and benefits and it didn't work. People like the personal freedom of gig work. 

The problem, as observed by the Dallas Fed is: "One reason wage growth has remained unusually subdued could be that the headline unemployment rate has understated the amount of available labor, or labor slack, owing to gig employment." 

So yes, the current unemployment number may be 3.5% but that number, owing to a changed economy, is probably not relative to a previous number in an especially meaningful way. So, kind of sort of, the gig economy has made the number look better than it should.

[DJL 235]

1 hour ago, JoeWeber said:

Given that a single 182 DZ doesn't have the economic mass to offer an all encompassing salary or respectable hourly wage with guaranteed hours it would appear that both you and your college students are gig economy workers. I do not say that's a bad thing. I've tried offering year around salaries and benefits and it didn't work. People like the personal freedom of gig work. 

I think a DZ is a bit too unique for comparison in the context in which we discuss a gig economy.  We instruct for personal fulfillment and to offset the expense of the sport in addition to the extra income.  We don't really gripe that tandem pay hasn't gone up in a long time and part of that is because it's not caused by DZO's squeezing employees while their stockholders get rich.

Edited December 10, 2019 by DJL

[brenthutch 444]

1 hour ago, JoeWeber said:

Given that a single 182 DZ.....

Hey! we are a double 182 DZ :-)

[JoeWeber 2,720]

1 minute ago, brenthutch said:

Hey! we are a double 182 DZ :-)

Fantastic. On my authority go ahead and double your salary.

[gowlerk 2,191]

29 minutes ago, brenthutch said:

Hey! we are a double 182 DZ :-)

We made that move this year as well. Double the expense, double the MX headaches, double the pilot retention issues. But at least the fun jumpers can jump even while tandems are paying the bills. The DZ economy here is almost socialist in nature. We are owned by 6 jumpers, no one has even drawn a dividend on their investment. The only capitalist aspect is that the bank is making a return on their loans.

[wolfriverjoe 1,523]

1 hour ago, gowlerk said:

... The DZ economy here is almost socialist in nature. We are owned by 6 jumpers, no one has even drawn a dividend on their investment...

Well, I'll guess that you mean nobody has drawn a monetary dividend.

The real 'return on investment' of a club DZ is..

You have a DZ. A place to jump, hang out, be with like folks. 

If it's anything like my old DZ, you put in the work and enjoy the benefits of being able to jump (at a reduced price, in exchange for 'work credits', that sort of thing).

You know, a communal effort. Everyone puts in according to their abilities, and takes according to their needs.

 

Ya pinko commie you 

(we really need a 'sarcasm' font)

[JoeWeber 2,720]

1 hour ago, gowlerk said:

We made that move this year as well. Double the expense, double the MX headaches, double the pilot retention issues. But at least the fun jumpers can jump even while tandems are paying the bills. The DZ economy here is almost socialist in nature. We are owned by 6 jumpers, no one has even drawn a dividend on their investment. The only capitalist aspect is that the bank is making a return on their loans.

WTF, are you a retired hockey team? Out of curiosity, are the 6 of you able to do all jobs?

[gowlerk 2,191]

22 minutes ago, JoeWeber said:

WTF, are you a retired hockey team? Out of curiosity, are the 6 of you able to do all jobs?

Hell no. Two are PFF (AFF) instructors. Two, including myself, are TIs. Two are semi-regular jumpers with no instructor ratings. One is a business guy who seldom jumps anymore. None of us are pilots or aviation professionals in any way. I function as Ops manager which means I deal with TC, and hire the pilots and make sure the PRM is tracking the MX. Another one of us answers the phone and deals with the public and runs manifest and looks after the buildings. Another most experienced guy, pretty much a lifer, is an electronics wizard and looks after the video program as well as being the chief safety officer.

It is a pretty unique situation that came about because the DZ was in danger of folding and we were not going to allow that to happen to our playground. It is stronger now than it has ever been in the 26 years since I first jumped there. We are just finished out 3rd full season under this regime.

Occupationally in the real world we are:

truck driver-myself

carpenter-contractor

retired electronics designer

aircraft engine inspector (Standard Aero)

chain restaurant manager

business manager-president

We have lots of others who pitch in to help but do not have any ownership stake

 

 

Edited December 10, 2019 by gowlerk

[JoeWeber 2,720]

31 minutes ago, gowlerk said:

Hell no. Two are PFF (AFF) instructors. Two, including myself, are TIs. Two are semi-regular jumpers with no instructor ratings. One is a business guy who seldom jumps anymore. None of us are pilots or aviation professionals in any way. I function as Ops manager which means I deal with TC, and hire the pilots and make sure the PRM is tracking the MX. Another one of us answers the phone and deals with the public and runs manifest and looks after the buildings. Another most experienced guy, pretty much a lifer, is an electronics wizard and looks after the video program as well as being the chief safety officer.

It is a pretty unique situation that came about because the DZ was in danger of folding and we were not going to allow that to happen to our playground. It is stronger now than it has ever been in the 26 years since I first jumped there. We are just finished out 3rd full season under this regime.

Occupationally in the real world we are:

truck driver-myself

carpenter-contractor

retired electronics designer

aircraft engine inspector (Standard Aero)

chain restaurant manager

business manager-president

We have lots of others who pitch in to help but do not have any ownership stake

 

 

Well done. Another triumph for socialism. It's all the fine folks who pitch in for the greater good that really makes things nice. They're the reason I keep it going: I owe too much.

[turtlespeed 220]

17 hours ago, SkyDekker said:

Lows in unemployment are a good indicator of a coming recession.

Just as likely as highs in unemployment could be an indicator of the end of a recession.

[brenthutch 444]

On 12/9/2019 at 9:18 PM, SkyDekker said:

Lows in unemployment are a good indicator of a coming recession.

I thought the inverted yield curve on bonds was a good indicator.  

[JoeWeber 2,720]

49 minutes ago, brenthutch said:

I thought the inverted yield curve on bonds was a good indicator.  

Nope. It's when you see this:

[SkyDekker 1,465]

2 hours ago, brenthutch said:

I thought the inverted yield curve on bonds was a good indicator.  

Incredibly enough there can be more than one indicator.

The US has never been able to sustain a low rate of unemployment without tipping into recession.