Comparing Python to Perl ( assuming equal experience with both ):
If you are a good programmer, you will write good Perl and Python code. If you are a bad programmer, you will likely write terribly horrendous Perl code and slightly less horrible Python code.
If you are an excellent programmer, you will write excellent Perl and good Python code. The Python language limits your ability to write excellent code, which also limits your ability to write horrendous code.
For those looking to make a good investment to “create a desirable urban space”, there are many ways to donate to non-profit (museums, theaters, local schools, libraries, co-ops, etc) to achieve that. A coffee shop, or even funeral home, could set itself up as a non-profit, with the employees and managers making market salaries but relying on community donations, in addition to community business, to keep the place going if needed.
For businesses who set themselves up as for-profit, or those who wish to invest in for-profit businesses, a return on capital is required for those systems to work. Investors may accept a lower return on their money in a local business compared to one they will never see, but there is absolutely nothing wrong with making sure there is a investment return. Otherwise, how do you suppose the next business gets funded?
Was expecting more info on how repayment works thru the revenue sharing notes - not clear what percentage of revenue a business is agreeing to pay or how much teeth these notes actually have. I would expect most of these “investments” to end in a almost complete write downs. Could be a great funding alternative if the details / investor protections were fleshed out. I personally would not touch any of these until then.
Agreed! Once we automate one task, we move onto the next. Some of the automation requires tending over time, but order of magnitude less than the manual intervention than before.
There is always more to do, even if it might not be in your immediate job description. If you work at a company that rewards productivity, then you will do well. If you don't work at a company, or for a boss, who rewards productivity, regardless of automation, why would you stay?
The only thing I can think that is worse than doing an automate-able task over and over is lying fallow while a program does it for me.
Buybacks are effectively taxed at the same rate as dividends, at least qualified dividends, just timing differs:
Simple case with a corporation worth $200 with two equal shareholders, who each paid $100 for their half of the company and are in 20% capital gains tax bracket, ignoring net investment tax of 3.8%:
Dividends:
Corporation pays $100 in qualified dividends, $50 to each shareholder. Each shareholder pays their capital gains tax rate on the $50. If that rate is 20% for each, then a total of $20 is collected by the US Treasury. Each shareholder then reinvests or spends the remaining $80 in the economy, while the government puts the $20 to work.
Buy Back Case:
Corporation buys back $100 of shares from 1 shareholder. No taxes were due there as there were no capital gains for shareholder 1. Shareholder 2 now owns 100% of the corporation, so their investment is now, all other thing equal, worth $200. When shareholder 2 sells, a bill for $20 is due ( $100 in capital gains x capital gains rate ). Shareholder 1 reinvests/spends $100 in economy, government gets no additional cash now, but will eventually when Shareholder 2 sells.
In the end, government gets the same $20 in tax. Benefits of the buy back are that investors are able to choose whether or not they want to cash out, whereas a dividend forces it on all investors. Downside is that government has to wait for the $20 in capital gains taxes. However, if shareholder 1 owed capital gains on the buy back ( perhaps they bought their share for $50, so would owe $10 in the $50 it made on the sale ), the government would get $10 from that sale + $20 down the road when shareholder 2 sold.
Option three would be to not distribute cash through dividends or buy backs and reinvest directly in the business. In that case the net result and tax treatment is about the same as buying back shares. Trying to treat buy backs as a special case would just result in a defacto incentivization of conglomerates.
I’d rather invest in just that company, one that can continue reinvesting profits in itself at attractive returns year in and out. I can sit back and let compounding work it’s magic ( although at some point in my life I will switch from a net producer to a net consumer and opt for cash ). In cases where a company does not need all the cash it generates to continue its growth or does not have growth prospects ( not necessarily a bad thing), then I’d rather have cash to invest more productively elsewhere.
> Corporation buys back $100 of shares from 1 shareholder. No taxes were due there as there were no capital gains for shareholder 1. Shareholder 2 now owns 100% of the corporation, so their investment is now, all other thing equal, worth $200.
Maybe I don't understand how stock works, but wouldn't shareholder 2 still own only 50%, with the corporation still owning 50% of itself?
There is a disconnect here that needs to be clarified but you are actually part correct. The 'corporation' owns the shares, but shareholder 1 owns the corporation and thus it is his now. Shareholder 1 now owns 100% of the company but the company is worth 50% less because it spent half it's money on buybacks. So shareholder 1's value of ownership did not increase at all, only shareholder 1's % of ownership. Stock buybacks do not add value to a company and are not like a dividend at all. All they are is an indicator that the board thinks the shares are undervalued.
So...I know realistically, this isn't possible, but what if a corporation bought back every share except for one. Would that one lucky shareholder who probably bought his one share for $20 now own the entire corporation?
A stock buyback is not like the company is buying its own stock and holding it in a brokerage account.
Think about it like ... the opposite of an IPO. Instead of dividing up the firm into n shares and selling them to investors for cash; it's buying back n/m shares and effectively canceling them.
After the buy back, there are fewer shares of the company which are proportionately more valuable assuming the market capitalization has remained the same.
I looked up if a company can do the opposite - basically poof additional shares into existence and sell them - and found out they basically can and it's called stock dilution.
How is that legal? It doesn't make sense to me that if a share is worth x% of a company that said company can just decide "Nah, you actually now only own half of that" and sell more shares.
Fake edit: I googled "how is stock dilution legal" and found this [0] which explained it well and now it makes sense to me. The diluted stock might be a smaller % ownership, but since the company gained value because of money coming in, the dollar value of the shares stays the same.
No, the corporation retires the shares after the buyback. Total outstanding shares decrease. All remaining shareholders get a larger percent ownership of the corporation
- Walker School ( walkercares.org ) - special education and behavioral care for children and their families. Why Support? This is a local organization that serves a population of young children that often, but not always, have endured tremendous trauma and/or abuse, and typically have no where else to go. The Walker School helps them recover and rehabilitate and find them a permanent, safe home to re-enter mainstream society and become productive happy kids and eventually adults. A $1 to help get a kid back on track early saves a $100+ supporting someone through adulthood.
- Museum of Science ( mos.org/ ) - if you are ever in Boston, please make a trip halfway across the river and check it out. It is one of the best science/engineering museums in the country. Why Support? Not everyone is going to be a scientist, engineer, mathematician, etc, but the Museum offers vital community outreach to show what these disciplines can offer society. We can't all play for the Patriots/Celtics/Bruins/etc, but a lot of people can enjoy watching them and enthusiastically support them. I see the museum as the "Local Sports Team" for STEM.
Big difference is that a surgeon cannot fiddle around with a liver, jam it back in the body, wake the patient up, test how the change works, and address (or revert if really messed up) any unexpected and unwanted behavior.
I agree "Web dev" has a very long learning curve, but there is opportunity to be productive and helpful at many, many different points along that curve.
You're right, as software developers we have the advantage of being able to create an offline replica of the software we're working on, which we can experiment with without doing any harm. We've learned, through experience, to do that instead of poking around and testing things on our production website. That's one of the many things we had to learn (and which isn't an acronymed technology), which differentiates "career" software developers from hobbyists.
Like I said in my post, I don't really have advice to give. I don't know any short cuts to get from "I don't know anything but I'm willing to learn" to "I can convince a company to hire me full-time so I have a career". Companies have internships where they hire people who are just starting the learning curve, but that's generally unpaid (or very low-paid) and for very young future developers.
I consider myself very lucky to have taken the career path I've taken. It wasn't planned at all, and I don't know how I would have planned it.
If you are a good programmer, you will write good Perl and Python code. If you are a bad programmer, you will likely write terribly horrendous Perl code and slightly less horrible Python code.