That’s fucking depressing. Though the question I have is - from the looks of it, he works remotely, so why even bother living in such a high cost area? I’m pretty sure this kind of money can rent a much nicer place, possibly even in the same state.
As someone that lives in SoCal, you are correct. You can rent a room for cheaper than what he’s paying. It just won’t be in Hollywood. Still, I really don’t understand why most people would want to live there, as that area is pretty much trash.
Sounds like homelesness but taxed and with extra steps.
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Sounds a bit close to a p*rnhub channel… 😬
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be an adult take 5 mins to diagnose the problem and order the $10 part and do the 20min labor yourself for a change
Yeah I tried to do that. I figured out the gaskets on the toilet had worn out and were leaking. Turned into about $200 in parts and consumables as I had to dremel off the bolts due to bad corrosion and replaced other parts that were in bad shape while I was at it. I’d done my research, quadruple checked the manuals and resources. Guess what happened? I had some leaks on the new gaskets and a new leak on the water intake hose.
I also took the trap out of the sink to clear a clog because it was full of gunk. I put it back in wrong and didn’t realize it until months later so now the problem has grown significantly and the floor is damaged
I’m just paying a plumber to fix it because every time I’ve tried to fix plumbing I’ve made it significantly worse and at greater cost than just calling a plumber, no matter how much I try to make sure I’ve got the right tools, supplies and process.
Not everyone is handy, so not everyone can fix it themselves. This is why humans specialized, not so much because not everyone could do it, but because some people are so much better at certain things that its better to let people do more of what they’re good at and let them get better at that then to have everyone be moderately okay at everything.
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I feel like plumbing and electrical work are things you should just pay professionals to do. The risk of things going very sideways is just too high for me.
if only you knew how easy it was to learn plumbing and electric. i can teach it to you in a day, and have you mastered in a week on site. And I’m one of the contractors who fleece you idiots. Nothing is gate kept. Nothing. only your desire to Learn and Try and Practice is what’s keeping you back. if you want to accept the limits you set for yourself, sure. But I’ll keep improving and trying to reach my next plateau.
And no one’s keeping you from growing your own crop, baking your own bread, making your own clothes, programming your own software, building your own website, etc.
But nobody’s got time to learn and do everything by themselves. The greatest benefit of living in a society is division of labor so that everyone can specialize in any field. Without that, progress would not be possible and we’d still be cavepeople each doing their own shit.
Please don’t judge people on what stuff they want to do themselves and what they want to pay others to do.
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I am 100% with you on plumbing. Doesn’t matter how well prepared I am or how simple the job. It always goes sideways on me. I can build a datacenter from the ground up as long as there’s no plumbing involved.
If you can dodge a data center you can dodge plumbing. Check this Out, first Lesson Shit goes down hill. elevation is not your friend and for christ sakes use the proper pvc glue. It’s not rocket science and even that is simple; it’s a one way explosion. cmon now. i presume with your skill set you have a computer science degree…So do i, i started the same as all of you, whining about it, then i took my big internet brain and put it to good use. computer science is harder than Plumbing, Electric and Construction Combined. if you can conceptualize code, it should be retard level easy for you to see something mechanically and solve it. i believe in you, even if you don’t.
I agree with learning or joining an apprenticeship but totally disagree with the sentiment “be an adult, take 5 mins to diagnose and 20 mins labour.” Even the tenner for parts is presumptuous.
Just to be clear as well, Im not one of those stupid cucks you mentioned, I just know DIY repairs might not be as straight forward as you make it out. Of course internet access would make it easier, some people don’t have the capacity to learn things that way. Aside from that some repairs require wildly expensive equipment to complete it.
You basically just generalised putting up a shelf or something for making any repair you want at home instead of asking for help which is kinda crazy because the average person is a lot more dangerous than we give them credit for.
All it takes is for someone to decide that an electrical problem doesn’t need a professional, do it wrong, and burn their house down, and their neighbours or maybe a block of flats.
Very true about repairs. There is so much truth in this video
you have access to a library of knowledge and thousands of forums with experts to ask directly. Lemmy and reddit are more than just people disagreeing. You must have some interest or hobby. i promise you if you look for those Threads on Lemmy you’ll find a welcoming group. The Smart Phone is only as Smart as its user. Look It Up. Do Due Diligence. Do not try risky repairs. I never had a father but damn you guys, do i need to start a boys and girls club? you seem awfully ready to fight ‘doing the work’ because of, excuses.
I’ve got plenty of experience in trades and can do all jobs myself. It’s very presumptuous of you, to think I was talking about myself but so far you’ve made presumptions about people in general.
Maybe you need the due diligence to realise just because you can, even with a bullshit cocky attitude, not everyone can. Some people have disabilities or learning difficulties (or both) that prevent them from “being an adult” as you so nicely put it. So instead of recognising people with these difficulties you just decide to belittle them as useless children that need us to carry them.
Here’s an idea, look it up, maybe you’ll learn something. What’s more likely is that you’ll fight doing the research because of excuses.
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That’s a shame.
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I love the fact that you think you know anything about my technical abilities or self image. The ignorance is palpable.
I never noticed you offer any help either, in fact, I’d say your initial comment lacked decency by belittling people who aren’t independent. I just brought it up that people who need assistance are still adults as much as you and infantilising them isn’t the decent thing to do but your ego didn’t like that.
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The price someone would pay a repairperson to fix things is already factored into rent. If a homeowner didn’t have the time/energy to fix the thing, the homeowner could just hire their own repairperson and be in the same situation, except not me renting.
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I’ll take the bait! I definitely wouldn’t say renting is BETTER, but your comment definitely exposes some privileged views. Not everyone has the skills, competency, time, or cash on hand to manage their own repairs. There’s also other advantages to renting. Most obviously is the fact that it’s a lot easier to move - signing a new lease is so much less of a hassle than dealing with all of the things involved with selling and buying a home. This was somewhat mitigated by having equity, but right now it can take 5-10 years to have positive equity in a home.
Don’t get me wrong, the article is absolutely dystopian, dude’s paying 1400 a month for a shoebox. There is a lot that’s ridiculous about his situation, but to throw out all of the actual advantages renting can have is as disingenuous of a take as if I were to say buying is a gamble. Call it copium, or say I’m a cuck, whatever but it’s definitely not a clear-cut victory on either side
Edit: motivated -> mitigated. Thanks autocorrect.
what im stabbing at, that this article points out. is that everyone is so willing to give up control and ownership and now are like “wtf why is everything so expensive” because you go and pay that ~$2000 rent instead of living in your car and the gym for a year or two. The world owes us nothing, and the world stops for no one. if you are paying money and are happy with the result, good. but i bet you all have a story where you paid and didn’t get what you wanted or something else entirely. People say Privileged. I was born to an Orphanage with no parents. the fuq??? If i wanted something in life I learned it and Got it…stop being so dependent. im 35, im not a boomer. im an adult living in this retarded shakespearean joke trying to make it to tomorrow and you are all busy slapping at the tree leaves hoping to kill its root.
I have no desire to own real estate even though I can totally afford it, AMA
Same. The restrictions on mobility freedom aren’t worth it for me, especially when things like local amenities and crime are so variable.
As an example, been living here for half a decade - buses have gone from every 8min to every 20-30min (and every hour on weekends) and crime has gone through the roof - law enforcement regularly drops by for my external security footage for everything from theft, assault, and homicide. Bus stop that was just a 30 second walk from my door was moved 3 mins away. There are many, many more reasons too, but those are the only ones really worth mentioning.
If I “owned” the house I’d be stuck, who would want to buy it for possibly less than the bank loan for me to move on? Not to mention the complicated process of getting that sorted
Also the idea of working at the same company for 30 years is ludicrous these days. Hell even staying in the same city is tough. Why in the world would I buy a house with a 30 year mortgage and nice short commute to work when its extremely likely that two years from now I’ll be at another company an hour and a half on the other side of town?
What a world huh.
there should be an option for both
renting is preferable for a lot of folks, exclusively having the option to rent being bad doesnt automatically make purchasing a house better in every scenario
The bank says I’m too poor for a mortgage so I pay more than a mortgage to rent a studio.
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My library-card costs 8€ a year and I can work there all day long in a nice quite environment. Internet is free, so are beverages. It also has a streaming-service and I can rent consoles and such there as well. I dont understand why someone would pay 600€ a month just for a desk to work at
One library an hour away across town by Uber cuz dude has no car or we work right down the block probably.
It’s €pe, not the land of “free”(as in being dead). For me municipal library is 0₽, city library 0₽ and State Library that has every single book published in country also 0₽, but you have to be in right city.
Internet is free
And in Europe libraries are homes of knowledge, not warehouses of books. What is legal in Europe will get Internet Archive in trouble in the USA.
it’s like paying for a gun to shoot yourself with
it’s like *renting a gun to shoot yourself with
Smart move, what are they gonna do, charge late fees?
$2000/mo in the midwest would rent a house, if you’re just going to work remote anyway.
$800 mortgage for a house in the Midwest here. Nice house too.
What apr is that% no chance its the 6-7% that’s the norm now. But good for you for locking it it when it was low!
Idk what APR our mortgage is, because it’s actually our father in law who got it, but ours is $550/month in the Midwest.
Property taxes keep going up each year though. We’re paying a few thousand a year now.
There are small towns with reasonable internet providers that still have houses for under $100k, sometimes well under, so yes, that’s possible. Not necessarily towns in the middle of nowhere, either.
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The only thing that might be prohibitive is meetings or calls. But lots of libraries have little meeting rooms for you to be a bit louder in.
It’s just where he lives. All the things he pays for is more than what I pay for a 4 bedroom 2 living room house, fuel for my vehicles and water bill, that allows me to wash clothes whenever needed. You’ll hear how expensive shit is mostly from city dwellers. They live packed in with millions, competing for the same housing and jobs, and think you’re ignorant or a dullard for not wanting the same things they do.
I don’t think that’s fair
If I could go live out in the woods by myself with my dog I’d love to do it. As it is I’ve moved out to a pretty rural area of my state because I hate living in the city.
However, prices are still pretty damn high out here, I just get a bit more space. On the other hand I have to go into work once every two weeks, and starting in a few months, I’ll have to go in 3 days a week. Driving in with traffic takes anywhere between 2 and 3 hours. But finding a job in my field closer to me is next to.impossible. so a lot of people live in the city, and chose to live in small hutches with 3 or 4 roommates. A lot of them would leave if they could too.
think you’re ignorant or a dullard for not wanting the same things they do.
I encourage this because the more people who think this way the fewer people will want to live out in the boonies which means less light and noise pollution and no NIMBYs whining about the way my pigs smell.
I’d kill to live out in the boonies. But it’s hard to find a job out there if you’re in certain fields, or a rental. Unless you can afford to buy, you can’t live in the country. I live in the suburbs and my rent is still insane. I’m trying to pivot to a better paying career where I can work remotely, but I can’t do that overnight. Trust me, I hate living where I can hear people. All I want is to someday be able to walk outside into my own damned yard and not stare someone else in the face, but I have neither a yard nor privacy.
wow, if my library had free beverages i would go there too. that’s top notch.
Right? This guy is really not smart if he’s paying $600 a month for a desk. He could go to a Starbucks everyday and spend $10 in food each day, and it would still be half the price to sit at a table and use wifi.
Hell, I’m pretty sure he could buy a desk and have it delivered to him for less than $600.
Last time i used library internet was a couple years ago, €4,50 for 15 minutes and on their outdated computers that do everything is slow as possible.
It took 14 minutes to print a single sided page from a government website.
This is a living hell
Remember, socialism is evil because in socialism you won’t own anything.
Meanwhile, capitalism creates this…
I’ve recently seen a random Youtube video (about the Unity pricing changes) that was talking about capitalism and what it was meant to be, and one key point that has stuck with me is that capitalism should absolutely hate rent, and the early capitalism was against it.
IIRC the reasoning was that rent was mainly a feudalism thing, and also because it doesn’t really provide much value, since you aren’t necessarily using it to invest and offer a better service to the one who’s paying it, you’re just extorting money from them.
The video was also mentioning a term, which may be totally made-up but I really like, which was technofeudalism - which describes the recent trend of every company trying to switch to subscription models, so they can also extort rent from you for using the internet, without providing a better service. Paying monthly for seat warmers in a car? Paying monthly for a guitar tuner app? Paying monthly for X? That’s not capitalism, that’s just plain feudalism - there’s no added value or improved service, they are just slapping on unreasonable costs because they can.
I just woke up, and seen the video a few weeks back, so my summary of the main ideas of the video may be totally wrong. I also have no idea what sources, if any, was the video based on, so it may be total bullshit. But I like the term, technofeudalism sounds cool, and the idea is pretty intuitive to quickly share, while sounding like something that makes sense. But that one video is my only source I have about it, II don’t even know whether that term exists or is made up. I’ll try to find the video later.
EDIT: It was this one.
Socialism is frequently evil because the people pushing for it tend to murder a lot of people for no other reason than opposing socialist dogma.
When we find socialist societies not built on murdering everyone who disagrees with the leader/party/state then we can talk about it being better.
Capitalism is rapidly making this planet less habitable.
Industrialism and overconsumption is what is doing that. The PRC and USSR are/were also responsible for colossal environmental damage. The Aral Sea is almost entirely gone due to bad planning by the USSR.
It’s not capitalism, it’s industrialization that’s making the planet less habitable, which is completely possible under socialism or communism.
Correct, however if the workers own the means of production they would have greater motivation AND greater ability to change the methods of industrialization to ways that are a little less… pollutey or dangerous.
Instead, under capitalism, we get politicians who are actively working to eliminate as many environmental, health and safety regulations as possible because they’re
bribedlobbied to do so by their corporate masters.Instead, under capitalism, we get politicians who are actively working to eliminate as many environmental, health and safety regulations as possible
Under capitalism, we got those regulations to begin with…
Which to be fair, isn’t because of capitalism we got regulation, but because of Democracy. Democracy is capable of keeping capitalism in check, to a point. After a certain amount of wealth inequality, which we’ve already passed, capitalism goes destructively out of control.
Correct, however if the workers own the means of production
I generally agree, although if you have a “dictatorship of the proletariat” like the USSR that desides it needs to heavily industrialize to compete with capitalist counties, it could be just as bad or worse for the environment.
You don’t want a “dictatorship of the proletariat”, and neither do I, but we already have corporations trying to strip regulations and policies because they want America to be more like China or Russia. Mega corps could make a little more money if they were free to pollute and exploit as they pleased.
And, let’s be clear, aside from some Uber-comrade tankies, no one is suggesting we adopt a soviet or Maoist style communism.
Why does the Aral Sea a fraction of its size before communists were in charge of the area?
It’s industrialized societies that are the issue.
If the actual workers owned the actual means of production, I.E. if the people who’s entire livelihood depended on fishing that sea, do you believe they would have let unscrupulous people on the other side of the country exploit the sea the way they did?
I’m not really that much invested in politics and don’t really know much about any of the leading sociological/political theories aside from the common knowledge, but your point made me realize something.
if the workers own the means of production they would have greater motivation AND greater ability to change the methods
Oh, god. Give how does the political landscape looks across the world, be it the fact that there are still millions of Trump supporters, the fact that it looks like that in Slovakia, a guy who’s basically unhinged and outright evil will win elections, and Hungary has it the same, to give just a few examples I know about from the top of my head…
Imagine if people who vote or act like that had the means of production. But that’s just my general loss of faith in humanity, and I by no means want to start arguing about whether socialism is/isn’t good, since I know nothing about it. Just a random though I had when I read your comment.
That’s a very valid point. But the people you are describing are already in positions of power or authority, they’re just all concentrated near the top of the chain. When you distribute that power and authority amongst the entire work force, things suddenly have a chance change for the better.
I actually spent some time working for one of the largest employee owned corporations in America. There were plenty of MAGA minded people working there, and It’s amazing how quickly they’ll embrace traditionally liberal or socialist notions when it affects their shares of stock. Things like strict health and safety regulations, hiring diversity and strong unions.
Obviously there will still be shitty people who make shitty decisions, hopefully there just wouldn’t be as many as there seem to be today.
…boy do i have some news for you about US foreign policy since the 50’s
Is the USA killing its own people in purges?
Yes, have you not been paying attention to the rampant unchecked police problem
…boy do I have some news for you about Soviet domestic policy back when it still existed
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_massacres_in_the_Soviet_Union
You understand that communism and socialism are not the same thing? Stalinism and Communism are also not the same thing.
OOOOOOOOOH ARE WE WIKI LINKING NOW?
Haha let’s go https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_empire
Party foul. The point was ‘socialism bad because socialists kill people for opposing socialist dogma!!’
Showing the US spending 70 odd years ramming it up the arse of various countries for daring to consider /vote in a system that is not capitalism belies that position and acts as a counterpoint. Going ‘hurrbluur soviets’ adds nothing.
Are foreign invasions and acts of war the same thing as domestic purges of opposing ideologues?
No. You see, corporations murdering people for profit isn’t the same. Coke killing union leaders or Rio Tinto destroying entire towns doesn’t count because they’re not government. Q.E.D
Coke pushing foreign governments to murder union leaders is in fact quite different than the state purging people. One is a company paying off a corrupt government to murder people that government likely does not want gaining power and the other is the state murdering people who oppose their political views.
How many people were murdered in COINTELPRO? Where is the purge that is similar to say the numerous purges in Soviet or Chinese history?
Oh boy…
The fucking shit you read on the internet sometimes, wow.
Find me a socialist nation that didn’t purge its population please
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So Denmark? The nation whose PM said in 2015,
“I know that some people in the US associate the Nordic model with some sort of socialism,” he said. “Therefore, I would like to make one thing clear. Denmark is far from a socialist planned economy. Denmark is a market economy.”
In Rasmussen’s view, “The Nordic model is an expanded welfare state which provides a high level of security to its citizens, but it is also a successful market economy with much freedom to pursue your dreams and live your life as you wish.”"
https://www.vox.com/2015/10/31/9650030/denmark-prime-minister-bernie-sanders
The Scandinavian nations are not socialist. They are not promoting workers owning the means of production and frequently push for free trade.
You are outright confused as to what socialism is and you should be less certain in your statements given that obvious confusion.
If anyone goes on to do this be a dear and find me a capitalist nation that didn’t purge its population while you’re at it.
It’s a good thing capitalist countries haven’t killed millions for oil or you might sound a little foolish. oh wait…
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name 10 countries in europe with majority socialist leadership
Way to put an uncrossable bar. Most of Europe are parliamentary democracies for which the ideological alignment of the individual leadership is irrelevant. What you have to look at is at the policy and law that those leaders are mandated to enact, and most of them will include socialist policies, even if they’re not braindead propagandizing it as socialism like lemmygrad would like them to.
Name five European countries that are attempting to give the means of production to the workers.
I thought you had blocked me, why are you still here? go away, nobody wants to interact with a bad faith online troll.
Way to put an uncrossable bar.
if picking just 10 countries (out of over 40) that actually mostly vote socialist is too high a bar for a group of ‘mostly socialist’ countries to clear, the bar is not the problem
Most of Europe are parliamentary democracies for which the ideological alignment of the individual leadership is irrelevant.
personally i think that the ideological alignment of a countrys elected leaders, and by extension their voters, is pretty relevant to a discussion about the ideological alignment of a country
personally i think that judging whether something is socialist based on whether it enacts -some- socialist policies as opposed to whether it is socialist is inane
if they’re not braindead propagandizing it as socialism like lemmygrad would like them to.
- can you explain what braindead propagandizing socialist policies as socialist actually means
- can you explain why european elected officials do not propagandize socialist policies as socialist?
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You cannot be that dense
If I had a nickel…
It’s a lot more affordable in places other than Hollywood
I assume this dude is some kind of extreme minimalist or something. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
At that point, convert a van or something. It’d be a better move
For real, this guy is just terrible with money. What the fuck is he renting a desk for $600 a month for when Starbucks has free Wi-Fi?
Maybe there is, though.
As someone growing up with a hoarder, I have felt this compulsion strongly.
I have adversely nuked my files on my PC before because it’s lower stakes than actual items. I desire full oversight and to know the purpose of everything to know whether or not it is needed, and I constantly fall far short.
I made the stupid decision to use a low-capacity SSD as my boot drive along with the decision that “This is my boot drive, nothing except my OS should be installed here.”, and now, years later, I can’t update my graphics card driver because it’s full.
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Is this not just a meme lol why would you assume this is real
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Minimalist for 2k/month sounds kinda fucked up tho :D
This is more austere than when I lived in college dorms. 2 sets of clothes? That means this dude is washing them daily. It’s also a lie unless he’s working out in his street clothes. It also means 100% remote work, which is nice. But not having a nice shirt/dress means interviewing might be a problem.
Not even the most ideal state of communism advocated for shit like this. You still had personal possessions.
That means this dude is washing them daily.
Nonsense…with that kind of lifestyle, you can go 2 or maybe 3 days easily before changing to the other outfit. Especially if you workout in your underwear and then shower while still wearing the underwear.
Especially if you workout in your underwear and then shower while still wearing the underwear.
Sir, you have been banned from Planet Fitness.
It’s all pipes, Jerry.
Landlords, landlords as far as the eye can see.
I’m sure Marx would be impressed at how after his writing swept across the world, we managed to turn most of the world into someone else’s private property that we all have to pay to use lol.
Cyberpunk dystopia, here we come!
Not to be an “achschually…” guy, but we’re already in a cyberpunk dystopia.
Then where are my chrome implants and RealFood© snacks? And our cool motorcycles?? And our cute gothpunk gfs???
Nah, I getcha, but we’re still just in the boring dystopia phase. Cyberpunk implies all the crushing hypercapitalism goodness, but in a sick neon color with fancy tech. Once tech hits the point where the 99% can no longer rise up, we’ll be safely locked into the cyberpunk dystopia.
This young man should be an inspiration to the rest of you, an ideal tenant and employee that gives every penny he earns back to the economy. The world would be better off with a few more Steven T Johnson’s and a few less Greta Thumburgs.
Johnson decides to live like a pleeb in an area that’s costly. Johnson’s story sounds like there isn’t an alternative.
I work in the same industry and have net of 2700€ a month after taxes and rent.
Don’t get glued to geographic location that eats all your hard earned money.
In fairness to him, we don’t know what his net is. How much he makes or what he has left over after paying that $2k per month isn’t mentioned. He could be sitting on an enormous savings.
… Which I guess is okay for him, specifically, assuming that hypothetical is even true, but it’s still an outrageous amount to be paying for what he’s getting.
He’s working in advertising in Hollywood… My guess is that he’s making bank.
Social media advertising. Not bank.
Or he’s an industry pleb who says that because it sounds better than office gofer.
The pod space things are criminally overpriced and sometimes dangerous. There was this video of someone showing “futuristic” pods made of cheap plastic and electronic-only doors.
If a fire breaks out in these spaces, people will die. I don’t understand why a fire marshal would even allow these places that are filled with dozens of people and no emergency exits.
A trailer park or a tiny home sounds like a penthouse suite compared to these places. But they will build these and charge this much because people are that dumb. I get that LA housing costs are extreme, but surely there are many things you can try to do before this.
But they will build these and charge this much because people are that dumb.
It’s not so much that people are dumb, it’s just that there’s nothing else like it available without those issues.
He could probably own a car if he stopped using the ride share. He’s probably spending close to $600 a month for the rideshare service unless he’s splitting the cost with others. Average rental in Hollywood is (and this is the highest, which is twice what I found elsewhere) $5k a month. I’d rather split rent with some roommates and have a place of my own. Work from home instead of renting a desk. That’s $2k alone to put toward rent. Two or three roommates and you could actually save money.
His lifestyle is a lifestyle driven choice, not a cost driven choice. He’s paying extra for that lifestyle. Forget food costs since he can’t very well prepare much food without owning storage space, so it’s eating out all the time for him.
Owning a car is one of the worst choices you can make though, even with the expense of things like uber i’m pretty sure at worst it breaks even.
I think what’s… I guess sad, for lack of a better term, is that this dude in Anon’s story is literally the embodiment of “you’ll own nothing and you’ll be happy”, which is terrifying because who the fuck doesn’t want to own anything? The only difference between a homeless person and this guy is that the guy spends $2k a month to be practically a homeless person.
That’s the ridiculous part of this. He’s literally paying to be homeless and is happy about it. Like, buy the car and sleep in it. That would literally save him more money and he still could be “free” of possessions.
Gives a whole new meaning to freedom isn’t free.
I had more than him when I was sleeping in a car
Same. I had the car, a camping stove, and existential dread. Plus some clothes, I guess.
Image Transcription:
A photo of a young man sitting at the top of a set of wooden steps attached to a bunk bed. Between the two beds is a chalkboard with “1”, an arrow pointing up, and “Zach” written on the left side and “Mike”, an arrow pointing down, and “2” written on the right side. Under the bed is a gap with a pair of shoes and a couple of hard plastic travel bags. Tucked between the stairs on the left side of the bunk bed and the cement wall is a bicycle. A pot plant is barely in frame, and the floor appears to be bare cement, the doors and wall a temporary wood and clear plastic.
Underneath the image is a 4chan post reading:
'Steven T. Johnson, 27, works in social media advertising and lives in Hollywood. He spends most of his days using things he does not own.
'He takes a ride-share service to get to the gym; he does not own a car. At the gym, he rents a locker. He uses the gym’s laundry service because he does not own a washing machine. Johnson doesn’t even have an apartment, actually. He rents a bed in a large room with other people who rent beds, for nights, weeks or months at a time. All the residents share a kitchen and bathrooms. Johnson also rents a desk at WeWork, a coworking space. And he says the only clothes he owns are two versions of the same outfit.
‘Johnson says he owns so little that he has even been able to get rid of his backpack. “I gave that up two months ago,” he says. He says that for him, this lifestyle isn’t cumbersome or confusing. “That’s what’s great,” he says. “When you don’t own thing, you don’t have to keep track of them. You just show up.” He pays $1,400 a month to rent a bunk and an additional $600 a month to rent a desk to work at.’
[I am a human, if I’ve made a mistake please let me know. Please consider providing alt-text for ease of use. Thank you. 💜]
Good human!
