>I'm not sure if you look at the curve’s derivative since, say, 1995, it’s clear we’re heading in a good direction.
Crime was near all-time highs in the US, Europe's deadliest war since WWII was raging, numerous civil wars in Africa and elsewhere were claiming millions... It's clear it's way better, and definitely got better since your arbitrary timeline.
>I don’t think there’s been a year in modern history like 2020 since 1968, and even that pales in comparison.
Of course 2020 was a weird year, but to compare that to the height of the Vietnam and Cold War, with nuclear mutually assured destruction just inches away, among the many other things boiling is just naivete. 2020 was NOTHING like 1968, not even a close comparison.
>We’re in the midst of a global pandemic with nearly 500k dead in America alone.
Indeed, but we're rounding it out, things are slowly opening back up, and vaccines are out.
>We’ve suffered two deep, major financial crises in roughly a decade.
And mostly recovered.
>The entire west coast was on fire this fall
Objectively false. Less than 50 people died. If the entire coast was on fire, that number would be several orders of magnitude larger.
>Texas completely fell apart this week.
And recovered this week.
>Living in a bubble?
Correct, you're not living in reality. You're living in a constructed delusion that doesn't match with facts, has no context for history, and is just neurotic/alarmist.
>Well the parent comment is simply arguing against nuclear, and given that no civilization before 1940 had to think about nuclear, it’s not a bad take...
No civilization had to think about electric generation at all 60 years before that.
>Its not crazy to think late era Obama administration was more competent than Trump administration.
It's not, it's a fact. Obama's administration was absolutely more competent than Trump's.
>So you completely missed his point, (s)he’s not saying “times are bad now”, they are saying “I see now that times are not good enough”
Except I didn't. Even accounting for Trump's blip, times are more than good enough for new nuclear plants now.
>And that is general global instability. E.g., things sure feel like they've come off the rails recently and things I used to take for granted: that competent people would generally be in charge, has been challenged.
There's almost never been a safer time to be alive, and there have been incompetent leaders since time immemorial.
Not even a lifetime ago incompetent leadership caused tens of millions of people to perish because they thought killing all the birds would save more of their crops, among other things.
You've been living in a bubble and/or have been ignoring history, even recent history.
>He's right when he says that your desk location (your main office, not necessarily HQ) according to HR is what matters.
Incorrect, you kind of have this backwards. If you're a resident in another state (Texas), and are conducting work in that state (Texas, home office), then HR has to make sure they're conforming to the labor laws of that state (Texas), not the state of the office where you used to work (California).
>You could maybe fight with the State of California for the refund next year, but in the meantime you'll pay taxes in the state if your paycheck says so.
That's why it's pertinent to change your residency as soon as you move, and then update HR the same day. Else you're fighting an uphill battle for no reason.
>If your desk is in NYC, but live in CT or NJ, you'll pay taxes in two states, even if you haven't set foot in your office for months.
No longer true if you no longer actually work there.
>You can try changing your residency to e.g. Texas as you say, getting assigned by HR to a new office or marked as remote, but you can bet that the original state will try everything in their book to keep some of your money.
And you can give them the middle finger because they're wrong. Spending $300 to get your taxes prepped by a CPA will stop 99% of this shenanigans.
>Although you're right in general, there is actually a history of CA going aggressively after the money of residents of other states, like the screenwriter in AZ that did a lot of work for a California customer
Even this is not entirely correct. They do not consider you a CA resident, but they consider the income you make while (more than transiently) in the state taxable.
Many states have similar clauses (NY, NJ, etc.), CA is not unique in this aspect.
This is categorically false. If you're a Texas resident, working for a California based company, but doing your work remotely in Texas, you absolutely do not owe taxes in California.
The concept of "work done for California" does not exist. If the work is done in Texas (at your house), you pay Texas taxes (no income tax).
So to say that "the entire West coast" was burning is objectively false, alarmist dribble.