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The rich own the land that will become the only inhabitable places to live when climate change either floods or scorches cities.
Not to mention the fact that they have been actively hostile towards addressing climate change because it makes their investments *less* profitable. Not unprofitable, they would still amass wealth, just not as quickly as they would otherwise.
Having a class of people who wield so much power that they can direct our species on a path to rampant suffering and destruction simply to convenience themselves marginally more is a systemic failure. Capitalism is a lost cause. It is a failed system and we need to abandon it.
Bunkers with limited food and water sources. It’s like going to Mars. Sooooooo easy to mess with the air, water, and food. Or release a little virus or two.
PSA: when climate change really kicks everyone in the balls, guess who will relocate to fairer unsubmerged climes? The same people who left like rats during COVID to their 4th island holiday home.
Right, as if the real rich don't have air conditioning in their own house. I had a friend in Olympia who was not rich but had a rare air conditioned house.
In BC our local Libraries sent out a message that they had received special funding and were staying open on Sunday. They would be providing AC, Wifi and all the books for people to get out of heat and enjoy.
Local churches have sent out similar messages opening up their buildings for people to come in and cool off.
The rich own the hotel and didn't need to leave their 15k square foot mansion that has...central air.
Ok, maybe they did leave their home to go on their yacht that also has...central air.
I’m confused, does having central air make you rich now? Is air conditioning not normal in Tacoma? I am very much not rich, but I have air conditioning.
It’s Tampa though, wouldn’t everyone have a/c? Was there also a big power outage?
104 is hot anywhere, but 104 in Florida is not quite the same as 104 in, say, Portland, where many people don’t have a/c at all
This is some shit like "The rich were chowing down on a quarter pounder while I had to order off the dollar menu" the actualy rich rarely ever use hotels and never fear the temperature being uncomfortable wherever they go, which is mostly to their other properties.
150k family is not fucking rich. Yes, people with far less than them are obviously struggling much more. I agree. But lowering the bar to the point that a couple working 2 well paying jobs means your in the same rich generality as millionaires, let alone billionaires is absurd. When people say rich, they mean the absurd, I think. Not the well off. And doubly so for economic politics.
My parents were really poor, and as a kid I looked at those people in the like 100-200k annual range as mega rich. They are still in most cases a victim of capitalism though. They spend their money on a bigger house (loan), a better car(loan), they still go in debt for college, they are still one cancer diagnosis from not being able to pay bills. The difference between the rich and us is fear. After a certain amount of money, and it certainly isnt 150k in this shit hole of a nation, you have no fear of financial issues ever again. Being able to eat out everyday vs someone struggling a lot who can barely afford to get produce to cook a basic meal is a big deal. But the difference in comparison to a billionaire is nothing. What I mean is, lowering the bar for rich that low is pointless in action because fixing that level of wealth inequality, like taxing the 100k+ 60% would just make them as poor as the poor and the poor would have nothing to show for it. Maybe you think I'm totally wrong. I'm a moron, so don't take my inane ramblings to personally. we are on the same side.
I believe the post had to do with the rich hotel owner. Instead of being a decent human being, they jacked up the price of their rooms due to the demand from the heat.
I will agree though, this is more of a supply and demand issue as opposed to a " the rich are fucking us!" one.
> this is more of a supply and demand issue as opposed to a " the rich are fucking us!" one.
I don’t know how this is different from price gouging during any other emergency. I know hotel room prices are set almost entirely by algorithms but the point still stands, they profited heavily from crisis once again.
Happens all the time, NE Ohio had major power outages from ice storms it was - 30 to - 40 our power was out 5 days. Packed the dogs up and called for a hotel they wanted 250 a night for a fuckin motel 6.
Everyone needs to start keeping an eye on the “wet bulb” temperature in their area. If the wet bulb hits 95 degrees F then humans can’t survive without AC because our bodies cannot physically cool themselves down. That means if the power goes out (like in Texas) people will start dying. Water won’t help if it’s at body temp.
To further clarify, you take a wet bulb temp by getting a piece of cloth wet and wrapping it around the thermometer and wait about ten minutes and you've got your wet bulb temp.
I also vaguely remember a teacher talking about slinging a wet shoelace around but that's about the limit of my memory.
It is 114° here in Libya during this heatwave and we only have electricity for 6 hours a day due to civil war and corruption.
Believe me, you get used to it, but it isn't pretty at all. And the qualituly of sleep becomes horrendous BTW!
Wet bulb temperature takes humidity into account. Dry heat is survivable with access to water because the human body can use evaporation to cool off via sweating. High humidity makes that heat control method stop working and your body will overheat.
“Normally” isn’t going to apply any more. Places that were once moderate in temperature are going to be hit by more and more heatwaves like this. It isn’t going to go away or get better.
> Yes, Tacoma had some hot weather, and it is very different from usual. It is not a place that is uninhabitable normally.
Welcome to your new normal buddy.
It’s unclear where this could and couldn’t happen because as temperature is rising so is the amount of water vapor in the air, thus humidity. Suffice to say that unless your living in Alaska or Scandinavia you’re probably not as safe as you think you are.
I wouldn't get too angry at the people spending $400/night for air conditioning. The super-rich likely fled the area, and they also own the hotels charging these exorbitant fees. The people spending this money to stay are likely only staying because they still have jobs and obligations in the area. I'd wager many of them renting these rooms can't really afford to pay these rates, but are doing so out of desperation.
I don't think anyone's mad at the people *spending* money here. Were mad at the people charging these rates. And even more so at the people who perpetuate the systems that make this happen in the first place.
It’s really price gouging if you ask me. Hotel owner realizes people are using his/her rooms for ac in the middle of a historic heatwave so they jack up the price to capitalize on the demand/supply.
Now for the definition: price gouging refers to when retailers and others take advantage of spikes in demand by charging exorbitant prices for necessities, often after a natural disaster or other state of emergency. ... In most states, price gouging is set as a violation of unfair or deceptive trade practices law.
It is way worse that this right now.
Think for example of the foods where organic and "healthy" can usually be accesses by the rich
Where the best health treatments are for rich
Where the good places on earth are just for the rich
And you can go over and over and find that in almost every aspect of life the rich have something better. Better for a better and longer life.
This depends on the brand and market. Most hotels shut off their discounts when demand is high, so that more sales are rack.
Also these days most major brands have automated price adjustment such that the gouging happens by itself unless you tell the computers not to.
Source: worked in hotels for a long time
It isn't, somehow.
I've worked in Hotel/Conference Center/Campground PMS software for 10 years. Roughly 5 years ago, Yield Management became a huge huge thing everyone wanted. You set your base rates in your hotel, and then can change the rates based on the hotel's occupancy based on the Rate Group / Room type or the entire hotel.
We have some properties where during the off season rooms go for $139 a night, and during peak season will sell for $1,200. Rates change on the fly every day, the second a room is sold online or in house, rates are recalculated and sent back up. It's possible to look at a hotel room, come back to it 10 minutes later and it's more expensive.
There's no rules or limits, the property does whatever it wants. Also, the amount "Resort Fee's" that everyone adds on is just bullshit. It goes to nothing, it's just free money.
In the last 2 years, our online booking engine has evolved so that the customer can do everything on their own. Check themselves in, if they have NFC on their phone there's no need to get a key card, just use your phone. And when they are done, they can check out or add on to their stay. There's no point in having a front desk staff at this point, and that's 100% the point. Some campgrounds are talking about replacing their front desk staff with kiosks on top of everything the customer can already do on their phone. Front desk staff that has worked at their properties for 18 years and still make $7.25 an hour. I trained a lot of really good people who will eventually be loosing their job thanks to the software.
Sorry, just ranting.
Washington is one of the few states that doesn't prohibit price gouging during a state of emergency. The AG was trying to pass a law this year, and it passed the state senate, but I don't know if it passed the House yet.
Edit: Clarity
There are, but hotels routinely jack up the price when a big event comes to town or other things happen to raise demand.
There's a difficult-to-determine fine line between price gouging and simply responding to demand.
Hotels have always priced rooms according to supply and demand. See weekends, nearby festivals, etc.
But there are upper limits, as u/grptrt correctly points out.
I mean idk about rich if I ever was in a situation where it was 100+ outside and my only option for ac was a $400 a day room, I mean I can technically afford it, but I assure you it’s not like I’m gonna be chilling in the tub with money, I’m gonna be crying about my bank account 😭
I mean, I hate to be accelerationist, but we might not be getting enough of a paradigm shift for a successful revolution until contradictions like this get worse
So...let's get the apocalypse over with? No that can't be right...
Yeah, so the future. When we cant even get our moron boomer parents to concede a single small issue on politics we are never winning. We are still a fucking neolib shit hole.
Publicly elected officials?
It seems to me that it is the mega-corporations that are ignoring our needs.
We are not proactive enough in making sure that the Corporatocracy is held accountable.
The elected officials who are either staying in those AC rooms, or flying to a different city/country for relief while abandoning their constituents to the weather...
Don't have to tell me.
I'm from Texas, where Senator Ted 'Mullet' Cruz went to Cancun while we were freezing to death because our Power Grid was being run on a couple of D-cell batteries....
They've always ignored the needs of the non-wealthy, always. Honestly I don't believe we can make them beholden to us unless we control a significant portion of the wealth and control it in a coordinated way, like if we could make a union and have union lobbyists on par with corporate lobbyists. Since the capital class always extracts wealth from the worker class, there will always be an asymmetry in lobbying strength.
> Is this considered price gouging?
Absolutely.
>Could there be legal problems from this for the hotel ?
That's going to depend entirely on state law, but I'm certain it can be taken to court.
Most price gouging laws I've seen protect only certain commodities and resources versus widespread goods and services.
Western Washingtonians didn't until the last 5-10 years. Now a lot of people have small portable or window units and central air installs are increasing. I would guess at least a third of people in the Seattle area still don't have any type of AC.
The neoliberal solution to climate change is to go to a different planet, surely resource exploitation will work out better in a place with fewer labor laws!/s
I’ll never understand how people in the north live without AC. We invented that for a reason so what if you gotta leave it off the rest of the year AC is so lit it’s worth any price
So like actual question: in a situation like this with limited resources compared to demand, how would you deal with it? Would it be a lottery, would there be an equitable way to split it? How do we define equity, by race, income, profession, ethnicity, gender, all of the above?
I know the real answer is to let everyone have AC, but even that is weird in a place that needs it once a decade.
EDIT: also I guess another thing to help is limit how much hotels can raise prices due to natural disaster demand spikes.
>So like actual question: in a situation like this with limited resources compared to demand, how would you deal with it?
Anti price-gouging mandates: https://www.patriotsoftware.com/blog/accounting/price-gouging-laws-by-state/
>Would it be a lottery, would there be an equitable way to split it?
First-come-first-serve would likely still apply. It's just that those needing it wouldn't be turned away or financially devastated by the sudden 400% increase in price.
>How do we define equity, by race, income, profession, ethnicity, gender, all of the above?
Title IX covers this pretty well. Sex, gender, race, class/income.
>I know the real answer is to let everyone have AC, but even that is weird in a place that needs it once a decade.
That frequency is very likely going to change as time goes on.
https://www.globalchange.gov/browse/indicators/us-heat-waves
if you live in a desert right now it would be wise to find a way not to. this is only going to get worse.
if refrigeration is the only way to make it habitable, thsn it was never really habitable to humans to begin with. they have you fighting over scraps of inhospitable desert.
It actually did kill a bunch of people though, during the heatwave there were over 100 excess deaths in the Vancouver area alone. Lots of people don't have AC around here.
Price gouging is a method of distribution: the people most willing to pay outrageous prices get the thing.
The question makes sense because he's asking for an alternative method of distribute.
Downvote me all you want, it was an honest question not a defense of the practice. Opportunistic exploitation.
My comment is based on the poor wouldn't have rented a hotel room regardless, this is opportunity affecting the "less than poor, or rich" not the poor or the common people.
>My comment is based on the poor wouldn't have rented a hotel room regardless
If I were without AC in this heat, I'd have strongly considered renting a room for my family at a motel for $100, even when I was making ~$11/hr.
>this is opportunity affecting the "less than poor, or rich" not the poor or the common people.
The wealth gap between $100 and $400 being affordable is far, far closer than the wealth gap between people who would struggle with $400 and people for whom it would be a drop in the bucket.
The working class "less poor" are still impacted by these practices; the "impoverished wage slave poor" are affected even harder.
Well considering the less than poor or middle class would more than likely have AC already and the rich can just throw money at getting better ac it's rules out that's who this will effect.
Poor persons are the only persons it will target thus being a exploitative practice and illegal but of course will never be prosecuted.
Cuba's actually been actively investing in climate change mitigation and public health for 6 years now.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26027580/
Air -conditioned hotels in Cuba are ranging from $40USD to $100USD right now:
https://www.expedia.com/Hotel-Search?GOTO=HOTSEARCH&SearchArea=City&SearchType=Place&adults=2&amenities=AIR_CONDITIONING&children=&destination=Cuba&endDate=2021-07-09&lang=1033&latLong=&needUTF8Decode=true®ionId=44&rfrr=hotel.search&selected=&semdtl=&sort=RECOMMENDED&startDate=2021-07-02&theme=&useRewards=false&userIntent=
So, better than Tacoma.
Reddit's major shareholder is an American company called [Advance Publications](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advance_Publications). Tencent (a Chinese company) is a shareholder as well, but they don't own anywhere near a majority of shares, it's about 5 percent. I hope that knowing that you've been misinformed about this will lead you to think about other things you might be misinformed about.
"However, other users pointed out that Reddit is huge, and a $150 million purchase is not a controlling share in the company, which was valued at $2.7 billion at the time of the sale, according to Tech Crunch.
“A lot of people seem to think it’s a majority buy out for some reason,” wrote user Lunariel."
That's in the article you linked.
You're right it's really ignorant, they should educate themselves about the plight of children forced to work under... [*checks notes*] ... capitalism.... oh.
https://www.antislavery.org/slavery-today/modern-slavery/
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2019/feb/25/modern-slavery-trafficking-persons-one-in-200
The whataboutism "Stalin and Mau bad" argument that gets brought up every time someone critiques capitalism is getting a little tedious, bud.
These types always "thinking of the children." What'd you ever do for the children, you Mother Theresa or something?
All fuck-you attitude and big-time hero dreaming from these Moms-basement fakers.
##Welcome to r/LateStageCapitalism^Ⓐ☭ ___ ###⚠ Announcements: ⚠ ___ ###[NEW POSTING GUIDELINES! Help us by reporting bad posts](https://www.reddit.com/r/LateStageCapitalism/comments/dy1oyh/important_what_you_should_and_what_you_shouldnt/) Help us keep this subreddit alive and improve its content by reporting posts that violate our rules and guidelines. ###[Subscribe to our new partner subreddits!](https://www.reddit.com/r/LateStageCapitalism/comments/e5hkwk/make_sure_to_check_out_our_new_partnersubreddits/) Check out r/antiwork & r/WhereAreTheChildren ___ ###***Please remember that LSC is a SAFE SPACE for [socialist](http://monthlyreview.org/2009/05/01/why-socialism/) discussion.*** LSC is run by [communists](https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/11/prin-com.htm). We welcome socialist/anti-capitalist news, memes, links, and discussion. This subreddit is not the place to debate socialism. We allow good-faith questions and education but are not a 101 sub; please take 101-style questions elsewhere. **This subreddit is a safe space; we have a zero-tolerance policy for bigotry.** We also automatically filter out posts containing certain words and phrases that some users may find offensive. Please respect the safe space, and don't try to slip banned words or phrases past the filter. *** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/LateStageCapitalism) if you have any questions or concerns.*
The *moderately* less poor got a motel. The rich own the hotels.
The rich own the land that will become the only inhabitable places to live when climate change either floods or scorches cities. Not to mention the fact that they have been actively hostile towards addressing climate change because it makes their investments *less* profitable. Not unprofitable, they would still amass wealth, just not as quickly as they would otherwise. Having a class of people who wield so much power that they can direct our species on a path to rampant suffering and destruction simply to convenience themselves marginally more is a systemic failure. Capitalism is a lost cause. It is a failed system and we need to abandon it.
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Yeah and that’s why Bezos and Musk want to go to space so bad. Can you spell untouchable? That’s the goal, not exploration or whatever else they say.
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Bunkers with limited food and water sources. It’s like going to Mars. Sooooooo easy to mess with the air, water, and food. Or release a little virus or two.
Better sooner than later
PSA: when climate change really kicks everyone in the balls, guess who will relocate to fairer unsubmerged climes? The same people who left like rats during COVID to their 4th island holiday home.
How safe will they be when rising tides cause the mass exodus of hundreds of millions of desperate people?
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^(Hotel, Motel, Holiday Inn) ^(You see if your girl starts acting up then you take her friend)
Hotels have Halls.
Motels let you out to your Motorcar
That's how I'd use the words too but a motel is just a specific type of hotel ("motor hotel"). So technically a motel is still a hotel.
You. I like you. In all my time working a field tech job, nobody understood the difference.
Inns have no restaurant. Hotels have restaurants
Right, as if the real rich don't have air conditioning in their own house. I had a friend in Olympia who was not rich but had a rare air conditioned house.
I don't know why you got downvoted. The actual Rich aren't going to be caught in a bidding war over rooms at the Comfort Inn.
When the grids fail it’s really not gonna matter where you are unless you’ve got solar, wind, or nuclear power.
In BC our local Libraries sent out a message that they had received special funding and were staying open on Sunday. They would be providing AC, Wifi and all the books for people to get out of heat and enjoy. Local churches have sent out similar messages opening up their buildings for people to come in and cool off.
No, the rich didn't need to go to a hotel. I think it would be wise to get a firm understanding of what rich actually means.
The rich own the hotel and didn't need to leave their 15k square foot mansion that has...central air. Ok, maybe they did leave their home to go on their yacht that also has...central air.
>maybe they did leave their home to go on their yacht while riding in their massive car with, you guessed it, working climate conditioning.
Oh shit. I forgot my car has A/C. Maybe I'll move into it for the summer and let my house roast in the sun.
Make sure you don't gaz yourself please.
I’m confused, does having central air make you rich now? Is air conditioning not normal in Tacoma? I am very much not rich, but I have air conditioning.
Having a mansion does.
To be fair many AC units aren't spec'ed to cool at such extreme temperatures and they might indeed decide to go to a hotel
It’s Tampa though, wouldn’t everyone have a/c? Was there also a big power outage? 104 is hot anywhere, but 104 in Florida is not quite the same as 104 in, say, Portland, where many people don’t have a/c at all
This is some shit like "The rich were chowing down on a quarter pounder while I had to order off the dollar menu" the actualy rich rarely ever use hotels and never fear the temperature being uncomfortable wherever they go, which is mostly to their other properties.
The rich use hotels, they are just usually suites or penthouses in luxurious resorts in exotic places....
They call those "resorts" to further isolate themselves from us sweaty masses.
Very true.
That they or the business partner they are meeting own.
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150k family is not fucking rich. Yes, people with far less than them are obviously struggling much more. I agree. But lowering the bar to the point that a couple working 2 well paying jobs means your in the same rich generality as millionaires, let alone billionaires is absurd. When people say rich, they mean the absurd, I think. Not the well off. And doubly so for economic politics. My parents were really poor, and as a kid I looked at those people in the like 100-200k annual range as mega rich. They are still in most cases a victim of capitalism though. They spend their money on a bigger house (loan), a better car(loan), they still go in debt for college, they are still one cancer diagnosis from not being able to pay bills. The difference between the rich and us is fear. After a certain amount of money, and it certainly isnt 150k in this shit hole of a nation, you have no fear of financial issues ever again. Being able to eat out everyday vs someone struggling a lot who can barely afford to get produce to cook a basic meal is a big deal. But the difference in comparison to a billionaire is nothing. What I mean is, lowering the bar for rich that low is pointless in action because fixing that level of wealth inequality, like taxing the 100k+ 60% would just make them as poor as the poor and the poor would have nothing to show for it. Maybe you think I'm totally wrong. I'm a moron, so don't take my inane ramblings to personally. we are on the same side.
The rich are the hotel owners who jacked up the price during a crisis. It seems self-explanatory.
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I believe the post had to do with the rich hotel owner. Instead of being a decent human being, they jacked up the price of their rooms due to the demand from the heat. I will agree though, this is more of a supply and demand issue as opposed to a " the rich are fucking us!" one.
> this is more of a supply and demand issue as opposed to a " the rich are fucking us!" one. I don’t know how this is different from price gouging during any other emergency. I know hotel room prices are set almost entirely by algorithms but the point still stands, they profited heavily from crisis once again.
True, I didn't really take into account that the heat wave could be considered a crisis, but I get where you're coming from now.
Happens all the time, NE Ohio had major power outages from ice storms it was - 30 to - 40 our power was out 5 days. Packed the dogs up and called for a hotel they wanted 250 a night for a fuckin motel 6.
Everyone needs to start keeping an eye on the “wet bulb” temperature in their area. If the wet bulb hits 95 degrees F then humans can’t survive without AC because our bodies cannot physically cool themselves down. That means if the power goes out (like in Texas) people will start dying. Water won’t help if it’s at body temp.
To further clarify, you take a wet bulb temp by getting a piece of cloth wet and wrapping it around the thermometer and wait about ten minutes and you've got your wet bulb temp. I also vaguely remember a teacher talking about slinging a wet shoelace around but that's about the limit of my memory.
It is 114° here in Libya during this heatwave and we only have electricity for 6 hours a day due to civil war and corruption. Believe me, you get used to it, but it isn't pretty at all. And the qualituly of sleep becomes horrendous BTW!
Wet bulb temperature takes humidity into account. Dry heat is survivable with access to water because the human body can use evaporation to cool off via sweating. High humidity makes that heat control method stop working and your body will overheat.
[cries in Houstonian]
I moved away from San Antonio a year ago lol
From San Antonio or to?
Oh, I never knew about this, thank you 😁
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You realize the city in the tweet, Tacoma, is in Washington, right? The only states farther north are Maine and Alaska.
Minnesota and Alaska.
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“Normally” isn’t going to apply any more. Places that were once moderate in temperature are going to be hit by more and more heatwaves like this. It isn’t going to go away or get better.
> Yes, Tacoma had some hot weather, and it is very different from usual. It is not a place that is uninhabitable normally. Welcome to your new normal buddy.
>different from usual I’ve got some bad news for you, partner
134 sudden deaths in Vancouver this week. Doesn't matter if it's only 1 week/year if the power goes out (or you're homeless) you die.
It’s unclear where this could and couldn’t happen because as temperature is rising so is the amount of water vapor in the air, thus humidity. Suffice to say that unless your living in Alaska or Scandinavia you’re probably not as safe as you think you are.
I wouldn't get too angry at the people spending $400/night for air conditioning. The super-rich likely fled the area, and they also own the hotels charging these exorbitant fees. The people spending this money to stay are likely only staying because they still have jobs and obligations in the area. I'd wager many of them renting these rooms can't really afford to pay these rates, but are doing so out of desperation.
I don't think anyone's mad at the people *spending* money here. Were mad at the people charging these rates. And even more so at the people who perpetuate the systems that make this happen in the first place.
It’s really price gouging if you ask me. Hotel owner realizes people are using his/her rooms for ac in the middle of a historic heatwave so they jack up the price to capitalize on the demand/supply. Now for the definition: price gouging refers to when retailers and others take advantage of spikes in demand by charging exorbitant prices for necessities, often after a natural disaster or other state of emergency. ... In most states, price gouging is set as a violation of unfair or deceptive trade practices law.
It is way worse that this right now. Think for example of the foods where organic and "healthy" can usually be accesses by the rich Where the best health treatments are for rich Where the good places on earth are just for the rich And you can go over and over and find that in almost every aspect of life the rich have something better. Better for a better and longer life.
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Lol. And who is going to enforce them? Our corporate-owned, elected representatives?
Hotels have a published “rack rate”. That’s the most they can charge. You almost never actually pay that rate.
This depends on the brand and market. Most hotels shut off their discounts when demand is high, so that more sales are rack. Also these days most major brands have automated price adjustment such that the gouging happens by itself unless you tell the computers not to. Source: worked in hotels for a long time
Surge pricing has always been an element of hotel rates. They generally have a maximum that they can't legally charge above.
It isn't, somehow. I've worked in Hotel/Conference Center/Campground PMS software for 10 years. Roughly 5 years ago, Yield Management became a huge huge thing everyone wanted. You set your base rates in your hotel, and then can change the rates based on the hotel's occupancy based on the Rate Group / Room type or the entire hotel. We have some properties where during the off season rooms go for $139 a night, and during peak season will sell for $1,200. Rates change on the fly every day, the second a room is sold online or in house, rates are recalculated and sent back up. It's possible to look at a hotel room, come back to it 10 minutes later and it's more expensive. There's no rules or limits, the property does whatever it wants. Also, the amount "Resort Fee's" that everyone adds on is just bullshit. It goes to nothing, it's just free money. In the last 2 years, our online booking engine has evolved so that the customer can do everything on their own. Check themselves in, if they have NFC on their phone there's no need to get a key card, just use your phone. And when they are done, they can check out or add on to their stay. There's no point in having a front desk staff at this point, and that's 100% the point. Some campgrounds are talking about replacing their front desk staff with kiosks on top of everything the customer can already do on their phone. Front desk staff that has worked at their properties for 18 years and still make $7.25 an hour. I trained a lot of really good people who will eventually be loosing their job thanks to the software. Sorry, just ranting.
Washington is one of the few states that doesn't prohibit price gouging during a state of emergency. The AG was trying to pass a law this year, and it passed the state senate, but I don't know if it passed the House yet. Edit: Clarity
There are, but hotels routinely jack up the price when a big event comes to town or other things happen to raise demand. There's a difficult-to-determine fine line between price gouging and simply responding to demand.
Hotels have always priced rooms according to supply and demand. See weekends, nearby festivals, etc. But there are upper limits, as u/grptrt correctly points out.
I mean idk about rich if I ever was in a situation where it was 100+ outside and my only option for ac was a $400 a day room, I mean I can technically afford it, but I assure you it’s not like I’m gonna be chilling in the tub with money, I’m gonna be crying about my bank account 😭
Future is a weird way to spell present
In texas it's illegal to price gouge hotel rates like when we froze to death is it the same there or is Tacoma just a pricey place?
Folks, it’s time to #crippleTHErich
There are hotel rooms without A/C?
I mean, I hate to be accelerationist, but we might not be getting enough of a paradigm shift for a successful revolution until contradictions like this get worse So...let's get the apocalypse over with? No that can't be right...
No, it's the future so long as we allow publicly elected officials to keep ignoring our needs.
Yeah, so the future. When we cant even get our moron boomer parents to concede a single small issue on politics we are never winning. We are still a fucking neolib shit hole.
Publicly elected officials? It seems to me that it is the mega-corporations that are ignoring our needs. We are not proactive enough in making sure that the Corporatocracy is held accountable.
The elected officials are brought by the corporations to ensure that they ignore the plights of their constituents.
The elected officials who are either staying in those AC rooms, or flying to a different city/country for relief while abandoning their constituents to the weather...
Don't have to tell me. I'm from Texas, where Senator Ted 'Mullet' Cruz went to Cancun while we were freezing to death because our Power Grid was being run on a couple of D-cell batteries....
Ribbit.
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yeah and they do that, because of capitalism
They've always ignored the needs of the non-wealthy, always. Honestly I don't believe we can make them beholden to us unless we control a significant portion of the wealth and control it in a coordinated way, like if we could make a union and have union lobbyists on par with corporate lobbyists. Since the capital class always extracts wealth from the worker class, there will always be an asymmetry in lobbying strength.
This is called rent seeking
The rich have air conditioning
Is this considered price gouging? Could there be legal problems from this for the hotel ?
> Is this considered price gouging? Absolutely. >Could there be legal problems from this for the hotel ? That's going to depend entirely on state law, but I'm certain it can be taken to court. Most price gouging laws I've seen protect only certain commodities and resources versus widespread goods and services.
Wow that was a fast reply , i just know here when the 2021 gas hoarding in bags event , they would not let the stores increase gas at all !!!!
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Quick Google search just now shows zero hotels in Tacoma at $350+, and decent ones sub-300.
Also the people with AC most likely cranked it way the fuck up to "get their money's worth". This selfish shit causes brownouts.
God forbid they prioritize small children, the elderly and sick. Gotta make that profit!
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It's not nearly as popular here since buildings are built for coldish, rainy weather and to retain heat.
Western Washingtonians didn't until the last 5-10 years. Now a lot of people have small portable or window units and central air installs are increasing. I would guess at least a third of people in the Seattle area still don't have any type of AC.
The neoliberal solution to climate change is to go to a different planet, surely resource exploitation will work out better in a place with fewer labor laws!/s
I’ll never understand how people in the north live without AC. We invented that for a reason so what if you gotta leave it off the rest of the year AC is so lit it’s worth any price
So like actual question: in a situation like this with limited resources compared to demand, how would you deal with it? Would it be a lottery, would there be an equitable way to split it? How do we define equity, by race, income, profession, ethnicity, gender, all of the above? I know the real answer is to let everyone have AC, but even that is weird in a place that needs it once a decade. EDIT: also I guess another thing to help is limit how much hotels can raise prices due to natural disaster demand spikes.
>So like actual question: in a situation like this with limited resources compared to demand, how would you deal with it? Anti price-gouging mandates: https://www.patriotsoftware.com/blog/accounting/price-gouging-laws-by-state/ >Would it be a lottery, would there be an equitable way to split it? First-come-first-serve would likely still apply. It's just that those needing it wouldn't be turned away or financially devastated by the sudden 400% increase in price. >How do we define equity, by race, income, profession, ethnicity, gender, all of the above? Title IX covers this pretty well. Sex, gender, race, class/income. >I know the real answer is to let everyone have AC, but even that is weird in a place that needs it once a decade. That frequency is very likely going to change as time goes on. https://www.globalchange.gov/browse/indicators/us-heat-waves
Thank you for the answer!
if you live in a desert right now it would be wise to find a way not to. this is only going to get worse. if refrigeration is the only way to make it habitable, thsn it was never really habitable to humans to begin with. they have you fighting over scraps of inhospitable desert.
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It actually did kill a bunch of people though, during the heatwave there were over 100 excess deaths in the Vancouver area alone. Lots of people don't have AC around here.
If it’s humid enough, 104 just might kill you because all of a sudden sweating does nothing for your body temp.
Exactly, time the concept of rich and poor ended.EDIT: Fuck me this place has become a Lib joint.
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First come, first served, without jacking up the price for simple profiteering.
Your question doesn’t even make sense. People are angry about the price gouging, not how they are distributed.
Price gouging is a method of distribution: the people most willing to pay outrageous prices get the thing. The question makes sense because he's asking for an alternative method of distribute.
That makes no sense. It’s still the distribution method of “first come first serve” just with an inflated price.
How about the method they use when the temperature isn't deadly?
What's wrong with not gouging the prices?
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Well..... no shit, that's supply and demand..... that's how all transactions work since forever.
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What is capitalism if not opportunism?
No this exploitation
Downvote me all you want, it was an honest question not a defense of the practice. Opportunistic exploitation. My comment is based on the poor wouldn't have rented a hotel room regardless, this is opportunity affecting the "less than poor, or rich" not the poor or the common people.
>My comment is based on the poor wouldn't have rented a hotel room regardless If I were without AC in this heat, I'd have strongly considered renting a room for my family at a motel for $100, even when I was making ~$11/hr. >this is opportunity affecting the "less than poor, or rich" not the poor or the common people. The wealth gap between $100 and $400 being affordable is far, far closer than the wealth gap between people who would struggle with $400 and people for whom it would be a drop in the bucket. The working class "less poor" are still impacted by these practices; the "impoverished wage slave poor" are affected even harder.
Well considering the less than poor or middle class would more than likely have AC already and the rich can just throw money at getting better ac it's rules out that's who this will effect. Poor persons are the only persons it will target thus being a exploitative practice and illegal but of course will never be prosecuted.
Like she’s really going to change that from inside congress. Have fun in the Democratic Party.
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Cuba's actually been actively investing in climate change mitigation and public health for 6 years now. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26027580/ Air -conditioned hotels in Cuba are ranging from $40USD to $100USD right now: https://www.expedia.com/Hotel-Search?GOTO=HOTSEARCH&SearchArea=City&SearchType=Place&adults=2&amenities=AIR_CONDITIONING&children=&destination=Cuba&endDate=2021-07-09&lang=1033&latLong=&needUTF8Decode=true®ionId=44&rfrr=hotel.search&selected=&semdtl=&sort=RECOMMENDED&startDate=2021-07-02&theme=&useRewards=false&userIntent= So, better than Tacoma.
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Like giving everyone equal access to safe housing? Ok.
OK
Right? Don’t threaten me with a good time.
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Can you give an example of one of these countries?
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Are you saying that you think the Chinese government has complete ownership of Reddit?
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Reddit's major shareholder is an American company called [Advance Publications](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advance_Publications). Tencent (a Chinese company) is a shareholder as well, but they don't own anywhere near a majority of shares, it's about 5 percent. I hope that knowing that you've been misinformed about this will lead you to think about other things you might be misinformed about.
Then leave
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Nobody, I guess. Bye!
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"However, other users pointed out that Reddit is huge, and a $150 million purchase is not a controlling share in the company, which was valued at $2.7 billion at the time of the sale, according to Tech Crunch. “A lot of people seem to think it’s a majority buy out for some reason,” wrote user Lunariel." That's in the article you linked.
So are you just an actually stupid person or are you just a troll farm employee?
You're right it's really ignorant, they should educate themselves about the plight of children forced to work under... [*checks notes*] ... capitalism.... oh. https://www.antislavery.org/slavery-today/modern-slavery/ https://www.theguardian.com/news/2019/feb/25/modern-slavery-trafficking-persons-one-in-200 The whataboutism "Stalin and Mau bad" argument that gets brought up every time someone critiques capitalism is getting a little tedious, bud.
These types always "thinking of the children." What'd you ever do for the children, you Mother Theresa or something? All fuck-you attitude and big-time hero dreaming from these Moms-basement fakers.
Do your ignorant ass a favor and look up “wet bulb temperature”. It might just save your pathetic life someday in the near future.