People are cheapskates with poor people but spendthrift with billionaires.
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If the driver needs to leave the cab in NYC you need to lock it or someone will get in and drive the truck away... not to steal it but just because when you have this many people some of them are... well they just do things. Anything a person might do WILL happen. Anything.
If you made a little box with a big red button on it (and nothing to indicate what it might do) and set it up on a NYC street it would be just a few seconds before someone would push it.
Ask them why? You'd get a blank stare. People just push every button turn every nob, wiggle into every crack.
The other reason you need two people on the garbage truck is so you don't have some kid trying to ride the thing while it's lifting. "that wouldn't happen"
No it will.
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@Illuminatus @futurebird @baishen But we collectively seem to have forgotten all of that now.
@jjLitke @Illuminatus @futurebird Society doesn't like facing uncomfortable truths.
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If the driver needs to leave the cab in NYC you need to lock it or someone will get in and drive the truck away... not to steal it but just because when you have this many people some of them are... well they just do things. Anything a person might do WILL happen. Anything.
@futurebird @Nerts I like to say that if a thing has a one in a million chance of happening, it happens eight times a day in NYC.
(This was borne out when I volunteered for the local American Red Cross chapter, which averaged eight emergency responses each day.)
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If you made a little box with a big red button on it (and nothing to indicate what it might do) and set it up on a NYC street it would be just a few seconds before someone would push it.
Ask them why? You'd get a blank stare. People just push every button turn every nob, wiggle into every crack.
The other reason you need two people on the garbage truck is so you don't have some kid trying to ride the thing while it's lifting. "that wouldn't happen"
No it will.
@futurebird @Nerts Try standing somewhere, anywhere, looking up with binoculars.
Even better than a red button.
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I'm struggling to even getting myself into the headspace where two people working a truck is upsetting to me.
Maybe this person works for UPS or some delivery company where drivers work alone and it is often *very dangerous*. (but just workable I guess? They still block traffic all the time) and they want everyone to suffer?
How do you look at a $7,000,000 patriot missile and get mad about more people being employed in the very honorable and *life-saving* work of collecting garbage?
@futurebird just two is upsetting - there are usually three in our part of Scotland (driver and two walking large parts of the route moving the wheelie bins from the curb to the truck and back). And less staff and it would take far longer and cause traffic flow issues - that alone wouldn’t be popular.
How on earth would anyone think this could work with just one person
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@futurebird Reminds me of the joke about the guy who will do anything to protect his family but he just means killing someone. Not anything actually useful like making sure the kids are clean, well fed, getting with housework, etc.
@baishen @futurebird Similarly, "I'd die for you"-- "You realize you just said I'd be better off if you were dead, right?"
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@futurebird @Nerts Try standing somewhere, anywhere, looking up with binoculars.
Even better than a red button.
This is how I have created many new ant fans just by standing with my camera with its huge lens intensely focused on a sidewalk crack. Someone will just join me staring at the crack then after a bit ask "what are we looking at?"
"ants!"
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@baishen @futurebird Similarly, "I'd die for you"-- "You realize you just said I'd be better off if you were dead, right?"
A failure to process the concept of "you" as another entire person and not a "precious object."

It's bad.
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This is how I have created many new ant fans just by standing with my camera with its huge lens intensely focused on a sidewalk crack. Someone will just join me staring at the crack then after a bit ask "what are we looking at?"
"ants!"
I guess they maybe thought there was a broadway show in there or something. LMAO.
(but, in a way, there is a broadway show in the sidewalk crack. Ant drama is high drama.)
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People are cheapskates with poor people but spendthrift with billionaires.
I just listened to someone complaining about how "the garbage union" has schemed so that there are always two people operating NYC garbage trucks to "waste my tax dollars" and I guess making too many wealthy sanitation workers... oh no the horror.
I like that there are two people on each truck. It's more efficient and safer. But, even if it was somehow a waste I promise you that's not who is wasting your money bud.
@futurebird Garbage collector is a job with lots of hazards, and they deal with angry idiots all the time. They absolutely earn those wages
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People are cheapskates with poor people but spendthrift with billionaires.
I just listened to someone complaining about how "the garbage union" has schemed so that there are always two people operating NYC garbage trucks to "waste my tax dollars" and I guess making too many wealthy sanitation workers... oh no the horror.
I like that there are two people on each truck. It's more efficient and safer. But, even if it was somehow a waste I promise you that's not who is wasting your money bud.
@futurebird hi I was in an adjacent industry for some years
TRASH IS FUCKING DANGEROUS. It's not just that there could be sharps, there definitely ARE sharps. There are pressurized cannisters and car batteries and gas cans improperly disposed of. There are live animals with diseases. There's heavy shit and gross shit and actual shit shit. Illegal shit and shit packed so it moves unexpectedly and could collapse. Falling shit and flying shit. The second guy is there to save the first guy's life.
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People are cheapskates with poor people but spendthrift with billionaires.
I just listened to someone complaining about how "the garbage union" has schemed so that there are always two people operating NYC garbage trucks to "waste my tax dollars" and I guess making too many wealthy sanitation workers... oh no the horror.
I like that there are two people on each truck. It's more efficient and safer. But, even if it was somehow a waste I promise you that's not who is wasting your money bud.
@futurebird Hmm. The person who complained has: 1. Never emptied other people's garbage 2. Has never driven a commercial truck in narrow alleys or city traffic.
My wife used to drive a tractor trailer (53 feet) in NYC to deliver pallets of food. And had to navigate between park cars, unaware foot traffic, speeding cyclists, and angry drivers trying to block her or unsafely cut her off.
Since she drove alone, she had to take chances without any help when trying to back up or turn or get into/out of driveways. The city is not for faint-hearted inexperienced drivers. Commercial drivers get a premium to deliver in NY because it's not designed for commercial traffic, and well, because of impatient aggressive New Yorkers. Boston is as bad, with tiny winding streets and lots of Massholes.
After that person's car gets smashed or sideswiped by a one-person city garbage truck with one person, tell them "you got what you wished for, and don't you dare sue the city and raise our taxes." -
@futurebird Hmm. The person who complained has: 1. Never emptied other people's garbage 2. Has never driven a commercial truck in narrow alleys or city traffic.
My wife used to drive a tractor trailer (53 feet) in NYC to deliver pallets of food. And had to navigate between park cars, unaware foot traffic, speeding cyclists, and angry drivers trying to block her or unsafely cut her off.
Since she drove alone, she had to take chances without any help when trying to back up or turn or get into/out of driveways. The city is not for faint-hearted inexperienced drivers. Commercial drivers get a premium to deliver in NY because it's not designed for commercial traffic, and well, because of impatient aggressive New Yorkers. Boston is as bad, with tiny winding streets and lots of Massholes.
After that person's car gets smashed or sideswiped by a one-person city garbage truck with one person, tell them "you got what you wished for, and don't you dare sue the city and raise our taxes.""impatient aggressive New Yorkers" I can't imagine what would give people this impression. LMAO.
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I know. It's such a difficult job and this fun time we are all having living in a dense city just would not happen without this work. I guess I wish more people took that seriously. Especially because people die and are badly injured just trying to make it all happen.
@futurebird @alda In Paris the sanitation workers strike regularly just to make sure everyone remembers.
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I guess they maybe thought there was a broadway show in there or something. LMAO.
(but, in a way, there is a broadway show in the sidewalk crack. Ant drama is high drama.)
@futurebird @Karen5Lund @Nerts
Passerby: "Why are you looking at those?"
Myrmepropagandist: "Cause I'm an ANT FAN! 𝅘𝅥𝅮 Ski-Ba-Bop-Ba-Dop-Bop... 𝅘𝅥𝅮 "
[ parody of Scatman John's work, earnestly detailing the fascinating qualities of family Formicidae, continues for 5 minutes and 11 seconds ] -
People are cheapskates with poor people but spendthrift with billionaires.
I just listened to someone complaining about how "the garbage union" has schemed so that there are always two people operating NYC garbage trucks to "waste my tax dollars" and I guess making too many wealthy sanitation workers... oh no the horror.
I like that there are two people on each truck. It's more efficient and safer. But, even if it was somehow a waste I promise you that's not who is wasting your money bud.
I happened to be out on the road when our garbage truck came by.
I said "hi" and he immediately concluded that I had gone over to complain about something.
I said "no, I was just thinking about how tough your job is now, there used to be a driver and someone on the back picking up the garbage/recycling".
They'd cut it down to one guy who had to stop the truck, climb out, go round the back, collect the stuff, get back in the cab, drive down to the next house, repeat.
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People are cheapskates with poor people but spendthrift with billionaires.
I just listened to someone complaining about how "the garbage union" has schemed so that there are always two people operating NYC garbage trucks to "waste my tax dollars" and I guess making too many wealthy sanitation workers... oh no the horror.
I like that there are two people on each truck. It's more efficient and safer. But, even if it was somehow a waste I promise you that's not who is wasting your money bud.
@futurebird i think in Germany most garbage trucks are manned by three persons. One drives the others get the trashcans and mount them on the truck for emptying. Very efficient.
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People are cheapskates with poor people but spendthrift with billionaires.
I just listened to someone complaining about how "the garbage union" has schemed so that there are always two people operating NYC garbage trucks to "waste my tax dollars" and I guess making too many wealthy sanitation workers... oh no the horror.
I like that there are two people on each truck. It's more efficient and safer. But, even if it was somehow a waste I promise you that's not who is wasting your money bud.
@futurebird
Every Christmas I get the garbage guys a card and a coffee card as thanks for their service. I couldn’t live without the garbage man! -
People are cheapskates with poor people but spendthrift with billionaires.
I just listened to someone complaining about how "the garbage union" has schemed so that there are always two people operating NYC garbage trucks to "waste my tax dollars" and I guess making too many wealthy sanitation workers... oh no the horror.
I like that there are two people on each truck. It's more efficient and safer. But, even if it was somehow a waste I promise you that's not who is wasting your money bud.
There's this thing that happens where people are riled up by perceived injustice. Then this anger blinds them.
Take benefit fraud. An absolute devil worshipper level evil according to the uk press. A frenzie of hate. Yet look at the consequences of a handful of people in your local town getting a few extra bob they "weren't supposed to"... your town has more people spending money.
Compared to the profligate fraud of billionaires where our money disappears into tax havens.
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How have so many people been trained to think like they are private equity managers who just want to cut every job, anything that makes middle class people exist?
And this comment had a bunch of likes ... none of the people getting mad about this really are private equity managers. They won't get rich. But the sight of people with "cushy" (livable, decent) jobs just makes them mad?
It's so depressing.
@futurebird I'm astonished how often I hear people complain about the laziness of people who are visibly working hard right in front of them.