Phligm Phlagm 2

[philmophlegm]

You don't need this laptop.

Trying to understand the EU's actions against Apple and the Republic of Ireland.

It's not shocking that professional employers judge applicants for client-facing roles partly on their appearance and their dress. What is shocking is that not only do state schools not teach this stuff, they sometimes don’t like it when

Comments

[ford_prefect42]

I have always been a little shocked at how *bad* smart-phones are at being PHONES. Near as I can tell, the pinnacle of "phone" was the convoy flip-phone. it was rugged, had a good long battery life, and would consistently allow you to speak to another person. It's been downhill ever since on that point.

[philmophlegm]

I had a flip Motorola Razr v3, and that was a good phone. And you could open it in precisely the same way that Captain Kirk opens a communicator. I miss that.

[topum]

I have heard auditors refer to what you call a logic check as analytical review a couple of times.

[philmophlegm]

Yes, that term is also used. Although when I worked at a certain four letter Big 4 firm in Audit Support, we discouraged people from calling it that because of the potential confusion with "substantive analytical procedures". At my previous "Top 11" firm, we used "analytical review" to describe both, which was a bit sloppy to be honest.

[topum]

I like the "Top11" ). The firm probably felt that it is too close to the top 10 to be a "Top 20" firm ). I wonder if there is a "Top 46" firm too.

Ah, I remember meetings at the International Headquarters office of that four letter Big 4 firm in Amstelveen related to a trade for their client. They have free milk for everyone there.

[philmophlegm]

I've worked in the Amstelveen office for a couple of days. Enormous office given that it's only two (or maybe three?) floors high. I seem to remember that facilities staff used bikes to get around.

I've also worked at the firm's other international headquarters in Zug in Switzerland rather more often. That was a relatively small office, but it was the office where my boss was based and where the Cooperative of partnerships was registered.

[topum]

I think I would buy a 21 inch retina macbook pro.

[philmophlegm]

Not as good for gaming...

[beckyc]

How much disposable income is poverty?!?

That's... Wow.

(Though good luck to anyone trying to find rent that low for a family house around here)

[philmophlegm]

To be fair, you live in one of the most expensive places on the planet. But yes, if anti-poverty campaigners want to be taken seriously, they need to avoid defining poverty as "richer than I am".

[andrewducker]

The JSRF thing is fascinating. Because what it seems to tell us is that the "Minimum Income Standards" that people, on average, think that everyone should have are actually unattainable for large chunks of the population, and therefore (presumably) a lot of middle-income/class people have no idea what many people's lives are like.

(Either that or they're answering with "_my_ minimum standard is x" and ignoring that many people will never get to that point.)

[philmophlegm]

It's reminiscent of those newspaper stories you occasionally see (because they tend to go viral) where a couple with a six figure combined salary complain that they are poor and don't have enough money to pay for [INSERT LUXURY ITEM*].

* Where LUXURY ITEM is anything from school fees for their four children (or for that matter, just feeding four children), fancy holidays, new BMW, fancy clothes, gym membership, large house in the nice part of town, yadda yadda yadda.