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thomblake comments on Optimal Employment - Less Wrong
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Short explanation:
This is not me being misleading in how I present data. I'm presenting what happens by default in both options, not one optimized and one non-optimized option. What you discovered here is that, the plan to save money in the outback is robust and succeeds by default, while the plan to save money in the US is fragile and fails by default.
The longer explanation:
The Australian outback option isn't optimized. It's an off-the-shelf option that is heavily subsidized and in a bizarrely awesome economic climate... something I don't think many people here knew existed.
I think it's fair to compare a typical US job to a typical outback job because this is what you get when you don't put much effort into optimizing your budget in both cases.
The difference is that the outback is already incredible without you having to do anything.
It's actually pretty unfair to compare an outback working budget to the best-case US scenario where you spend tons of time in the US managing your money well to get the cheapest rent, best car prices, lowest food costs, and execute convoluted tax dodging strategies that most people couldn't figure out. It's a very tricky plan that requires lots of things to all go right, lots of time, lots of effort, lots of will-power, lots of knowledge, and lots of discipline.
On the other hand, my option only requires you to get whatever job you want in a remote area of Australia and get all your costs of living heavily subsidized and all your major cost centers nearly erased with no willpower, no planning, and no discipline required.
What you uncovered is not my "misleading" people, but the difference in robustness between the two plans. The Australian outback plan lets you save money by default with almost nowhere to go wrong while the plan that lets you save money in the US is a life-engulfing minefield of time-consuming bargin-hunting, self-denial, and tax evasion.
But as you noted above, there is a lot of resistance by default to exercising the Australia option. So the Australia plan fails by default too.
Once you've opened the door to considering those rare Americans who might decide to uproot and move to unfamiliar lands across the globe, you might also consider those rare Americans who can manage their money and don't consistently make irrational decisions. In the context of here, I wouldn't doubt they're the same people.
Every plan has the problem that if you don't execute it, it fails. In this respect, the two are exactly equal. (And in degree, they may not be too far apart - given all one would have to do to carry out the American plan.)
Here's a more abstract analogy:
Imagine a hypothetical world. Every night, when you fall asleep, you experience the same horrible nightmare. As you sleep, you're approached by different sets of con-men and con-women who do whatever they can to rob you and steal everything you have. This happens every single night. The twist is, the money you're carrying on your semi-conscious, disoriented dream-projected self is actually your real money from your real bank account in your real waking life! Different people carry different amounts on them but most have somewhere between 1/300 to 1/400 of their yearly income on them.
To cope with these nightly robberies, most people in nightmare-land ignore their situation. With the small part of their mind that allows them to acknowledge what's happening, they mostly hope that one day they can earn enough money to stop the constant robberies from taking everything they have... not realizing that because they're ignoring the problem completely, the money is actually a fraction of their income and the solution of earning more money will never help them.
But the more adept people in this world learn advanced lucid nightmaring techniques. They spend large chunks of their day preparing themselves for their nightmares so they'll remember how not to get robbed. It takes constant vigilance and is incredibly stressful, but it works more and more often over time. These people are still robbed occasionally, but mostly get by with only partial robberies instead of losing everything like their peers.
But one day after a couple dozen years, you're offered a chance to leave nightmare land and live in "dreamland" where there are no nightmares. The only catch is that in dreamland, people earn 50% lower nominal salaries.
Hmm... if you think you're especially good at navigating nightmares, perhaps you could continue using your nightmaring skills rather than leave?
But why would you? Dreamland sounds so much better. Having these nightmares sucks even when you don't get robbed every night. In dreamland, you can just avoid the problem entirely and win by default without wasting all your time preparing for and experiencing nightmares. The nightmares feel less and less bad over the years as you get used to them, but they're still awful -- you've just forgot.
I don't think I need to explain this analogy.
I just find it weird that I'm over here in dreamland shouting back to people in nightmare-land that dreamland is so great but people in nightmare-land are shouting back "Screw you! I've already developed excellent nightmare-having skills. How dare you accuse me of not being good enough at navigating my nightmares. You think I'm not smart enough to handle subjecting myself to an unending series of them!"
"Huh? What? No! But dreamland is predictably good and it allows you to succeed constantly without having to keep your guard up and have nightmares all the time."
"Whatever... Fxxx you dreamland hippie! I'm only robbed of 1/250 of my income most nights. You can't even do math right! Dreamland would probably only be 2.5x better for me than nightmare-land... not 4x like you thought. Looks like I've exposed you for the liar you are! You won't trick me into improving my life!"
"But why not at least consider trying it since you know it's still better?"
"Dreamland? It's impossible. Look, I pretended to consider it for 10 minutes already while I sat around making up clever reasons to reject it. Isn't that enough? Only hard working nightmare navigators like me would even be capable of leaving nightmare-land... which I will prove to you by telling you how I won't leave! Ha! QED, Booyah!"
Don't burn out, Louie. This is Less Wrong, of course there's going to be some pretty intense criticism. It's only worth getting angry if you think you're right but your posts/comments are negative on net.
It seems to me more like folks are pointing out that things aren't all that nightmarish in actuality, and your analysis to show otherwise is flawed. If you would rather make fun than improve your analysis, there are other places on the Internet where that sort of thing is more welcome.
I might even agree with your conclusion, but would point out serious issues with quality of your arguments regardless. Off-the-shelf property, for example, is a good argument for taking it (if no downsides are present for your case) instead of trying to devise a more complicated or less apparent-at-the-moment plan, but not for the absence of alternative off-the-shelf solutions. Instrumental vs. epistemic rationality.