AI Could Allow For 3-Day Workweeks And Single-Income Households, Bezos Claims
This is something I've been saying for a long time. But it's interesting that it's coming from the slavemaster general himself...
u/Singularity-42 — 5 days ago
u/Singularity-42
r/dataisbeautiful r/Luxembourg r/Infographics r/ClaudeCode r/wohnen r/portugal r/generativeAI r/LeftistsForAI r/EU_Economics r/Imobiliare r/singularity r/Slovakia
[OC] Average 2-bedroom rent vs income of two average-income adults across EU capitals, 2025
For average monthly rents, the published value for the Netherlands refers to The Hague rather than Amsterdam, so I used The Hague.
Rent values are taken exclusively from Eurostat:
https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/databrowser/view/prc_colc_rents/default/table?lang=en
For the flat and house categories used in the rent data, Eurostat covered selected neighbourhoods in each surveyed city. Methodology/source booklet:
https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/6939681/0/Booklet_2026_rents_2025_e_Final.pdf/d2cd0065-f017-16a7-dfa2-7dad9d6fa84b?t=1766065004758
This rent survey was designed for cost-of-living comparisons for expatriate staff of the EU and international organisations, with Brussels used as the reference city. Broadly speaking, it is part of a cost-of-living comparison used to adjust the remuneration of EU officials and other international civil servants depending on their place of employment.
The surveyed neighbourhoods are therefore good-quality residential areas where officials, international civil servants, and similar professionals would be expected to live. For that reason, this data should not be treated as a city-wide rental index. However, this caveat is already included in the chart.
Here is what page 4 of the booklet says about the selected neighbourhoods:
“Since the aim of the entire exercise is to compare ‘like with like’, the neighbourhoods surveyed may not necessarily be in those areas where expatriates actually live but are comparable with those actually occupied by officials in Brussels. These neighbourhoods are described as residential areas of good quality, favoured by expatriates and professional people such as international civil servants, university staff, doctors, managers, and similar professionals, who pay their rent by themselves, i.e. not paid by their employers.”
Note: In many European countries, including Sweden, Romania and Latvia, the common local practice is to count the living room as a “room”. So a 2-bedroom flat/house is often described as a 3-room property: 2 bedrooms + 1 living room.
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By “income of two average-income adults”, I mean 2 × monthly mean equivalised net income from Eurostat ilc_di03.
For mean equivalised net income, I used Eurostat ilc_di03 annual mean equivalised net income values for 2025, which refer to the 2024 income reference year, divided by 12:
https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/databrowser/view/ilc_di03/default/table?lang=en
These are country-level figures, not city-specific wages, and they refer to mean equivalised net household income, not individual salaries. It’s obvious that average wages are probably higher in capital cities, but I still found this comparison useful.
The values used here are filtered by age class 18–64, meaning the final average is calculated only for people aged 18 to 64. The income measure is still based on total household net income adjusted for household size and composition.
In the equivalence scale (modified OECD) used by Eurostat, the first adult counts as 1.0, each additional household member aged 14 or over counts as 0.5, and each child under 14 counts as 0.3. Source:
https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php?title=Glossary%3AEquivalised_disposable_income
Example: if John earns €20,000 net per year, Mary earns €20,000, and John’s grandfather, aged 67, earns €10,000, and they all live in the same household, total household net income is €50,000. With an equivalence scale of 2.0, the household’s equivalised net income is €25,000 per year. This value is then assigned to each household member.
With the 18–64 filter, John and Mary would each be counted in the final average with an equivalised net income of €25,000 per year, while the grandfather would not be counted in that final average. However, the grandfather’s income and household weight still affect the household’s equivalised income.
Source: citycostatlas.com / citycostatlas on Instagram. On the website, you can compare different metrics against each other and see how they relate, view city rankings based on various metrics, and use an interactive map that instantly displays different data about the capital selected
u/CarefullEugene — 4 months ago
▲ 153 r/ClaudeCode
Can we get a refund since Fable 5 was taken away?
I came back to Claude only because of Fable. I started on Max 5, but it wasn't enough and today I upgraded to max 20 to get it done faster.
I'm working on a crucial migration for our startup and I was using Fable for it and it was going really well. I've had bad luck with Opus 4.7, 4.8 and basically left Claude a few weeks ago, downgraded to Pro and slowly transitioned to Codex.
Fable pulled me back, it's clearly better than anything else, and now I'm rug pulled. I was already iffy paying $200 for just less than two weeks of access, but it seemed doable. But this completely killed me. I'm a laid off software engineer that's trying to make our own thing with my friends now. Yes, we have sales, but there is a ton of work still to be done. Now this sucker punch.
Can I get a refund?
EDIT: I got reply from Anthropic:
Hi ******,
Thank you for reaching out about your refund request for your Max plan (*********'s Organization).
I understand your frustration regarding the Claude Fable 5 access situation. However, after reviewing your account, your Max plan is not eligible for a refund as it falls outside of our refund policy due to multiple plan changes on your account.
Our refund terms are not flexible in this case. I apologize that I'm unable to assist further with this request.
When Fable came out, I upgraded from Pro to Max 5 and just today I upgraded to Max 20 as Max 5 was not cutting it. I guess I'm fucked.
u/Singularity-42 — 4 months ago
▲ 57 r/Slovakia
Prečo "byty, byty, byty"?
Úprimne sa pýtam, lebo mi tá matematika pri dnešných cenách moc nevychádza.
Keď pozerám ceny bytov a porovnám ich s nájmami, veľa slovenských bytov mi vychádza niekde okolo 250 až 350 mesačných nájmov, v horších prípadoch aj okolo 400. To znamená hrubý výnos možno 3 až 4 %, niekedy menej. A to je ešte pred daňou z nájmu, fondom opráv, opravami, zariadením, neobsadenosťou, problémovými nájomníkmi a celou tou otravou okolo toho.
Chápem argument s pákou. Keď dám povedzme 20 % vlastných peňazí a byt ide hore o 20 %, návratnosť na vlastný kapitál vyzerá super. Lenže to predpokladá, že ceny budú ďalej rásť dosť výrazne. A tam mám práve problém. Tie ceny sú už dnes podľa mňa dosť prestrelené voči nájmom aj voči príjmom. Takže otázka je, na čo presne človek pri takomto nákupe vsádza? Že budú ešte viac prestrelené?
Keby išlo o vlastné bývanie, tam to beriem. Stabilita, rodina, nechceš riešiť majiteľa, chceš si to prerobiť podľa seba. To je iná debata.
Ale ako čistá investícia? Tam mi to príde dosť slabé. Hlavne keď Slovensko má podľa mňa jednu z najlepších vecí v EÚ pre bežných investorov: pri cenných papieroch obchodovaných na regulovanom trhu je zisk po viac ako roku držania oslobodený od dane. Čiže človek môže kúpiť normálny globálny ETF, držať dlhodobo, a kapitálový zisk môže byť po roku 0 % zdanený. To je brutálne výhodné.
Jasné, ak niekto vie kúpiť byt lacno, zrekonštruovať, prenajať dobre, má lokálny edge, alebo rieši nehnuteľnosti ako biznis, tak okej. Ale kúpiť hocijaký byt za dnešné ceny len preto, že “nehnuteľnosti vždy rastú”, mi príde dosť nebezpečná logika.
Mne osobne to dnes vychádza skôr tak, že ak človek nemusí vlastniť, tak je často rozumnejšie bývať v nájme a rozdiel investovať do akciového trhu. Minimálne by mal byť ETF benchmark, ktorý musí investičný byt prekonať po všetkých nákladoch, rizikách a čase, ktorý tomu venuješ.
Možno mi niečo uniká, ale pri dnešných pomeroch cena/nájom mi slovenské investičné byty vôbec neprídu ako no-brainer. Skôr naopak.
u/Singularity-42 — 5 months ago
▲ 2 r/Slovakia
I'm a dual US-Slovak citizen planning to relocate to Slovakia in the next couple of years. I have a buy-and-hold stock portfolio (US-listed equities, held for years) and I understand that capital gains on listed shares held over 1 year are exempt from tax.
My question is about options strategies — specifically covered calls and cash-secured puts. These generate premium income on top of the underlying holdings. In some European countries (Switzerland being the clearest example), regularly writing options can get you classified as a professional trader/business, which means your gains lose their tax exemption and get taxed as self-employment income at full rates plus social contributions.
Does Slovakia have any similar concept? Specifically:
Does options premium income qualify under the 1-year exemption for listed securities, or is it taxed separately as "other income" at 19%/25%?
Is there a risk that regularly generating income from options writing (not day trading, but systematic covered calls on long-term holdings) gets reclassified as business activity (podnikanie) rather than private wealth management?
Has anyone here dealt with this practically — either personally or through a tax advisor?
I'm not talking about day trading or leveraged speculation. This would be writing covered calls on shares I already own and plan to hold long-term, and selling cash-secured puts on stocks I'd be happy to own. Maybe 5-15 transactions per month.
Any pointers to a tax advisor in Slovakia who actually understands capital markets taxation (not just standard employment/business taxes) would also be appreciated.
Dakujem!
u/Singularity-42 — 5 months ago