Wanderthread Redux (Part 1)

Wanderfound · June 19, 2021, 12:30am

Wanderfound · June 19, 2021, 12:33am

Again, imagine the response if a mainstream American Palestinian organisation had responded to mass death in Israel with mocking memes.

Wanderfound · June 19, 2021, 1:00am

Wanderfound · June 19, 2021, 1:01am

Wanderfound · June 19, 2021, 9:01am

Wanderfound · June 19, 2021, 12:28pm

TLDR: Oz property managers are increasingly farming out their rent-collecting duties to dodgy financial-services startups that add yet another layer of rentseeking to the transaction.

In New South Wales, lessors are required to offer one reasonable fee-free way to pay the rent.

But the definition of reasonable is elastic: in some cases the free option offered by real estate agents is much less practical, such as payments by cheque or cash.

In Victoria, laws introduced in March require agents to provide at least one free way of paying rent, as well as an electronic funds transfer option.

The previous regime – which mirrored NSW – led Melbourne resident Orlando Skeete to deploy drastic measures to avoid using third-party services. In 2018 Skeete had been paying rent by direct debit for about a year when a new agency took over and told him he would need to begin paying via Rental Rewards.

Skeete and his partner read the contract and saw some of the same issues raised by Pape: a $5 membership fee, a $2 transaction fee plus 1.1% charge with credit or debit card payments, a $10 cancellation fee when the tenant ended the contract and a $15 dishonour fee. Some cards attracted a $10 transaction fee for payments of more than $500.

Unimpressed, Skeete asked to keep paying by direct debit card, but was told he could only do so if he signed up to Rental Rewards.

Eventually Skeete and his partner, a lawyer, read the Competition and Consumer Act and told the agent that what they were doing “might be illegal and constitute third line forcing” – a practice that requires renters to use a scheme with no alternative.

“To be honest it wasn’t about the money, it’s the fact that I already don’t really like rental agents to begin with, and it was just the principle, like, screw these guys,” he says.

The agent told him he could pay by cash. So for the next two months, Skeete hopped on his bike, withdrew $3,000 in cash from his bank, and rode about an hour across the city to drop the rent off.

“When I got to the agent, they were clearly not set up to take cash payments so they tried to get me to sign up to Rental Rewards again,” he says.

Eventually they agreed to accept the money, but only after insisting he pay in exact change, something he had predicted.

Wanderfound · June 19, 2021, 12:54pm

Wanderfound · June 19, 2021, 2:10pm

In 2006 the U.S. government replaced “hunger” with the term “food insecure” to describe any household where, sometime during the previous year, people didn’t have enough food to eat. By whatever name, the number of people going hungry has grown dramatically in the U.S., increasing to 48 million by 2012—a fivefold jump since the late 1960s, including an increase of 57 percent since the late 1990s. Privately run programs like food pantries and soup kitchens have mushroomed too. In 1980 there were a few hundred emergency food programs across the country; today there are 50,000. Finding food has become a central worry for millions of Americans. One in six reports running out of food at least once a year. In many European countries, by contrast, the number is closer to one in 20.

Wanderfound · June 19, 2021, 8:55pm

Clintonite “feminism”:

Wanderfound · June 19, 2021, 9:03pm

Wanderfound · June 19, 2021, 9:36pm

Thread.

Context.

Wanderfound · June 19, 2021, 9:39pm

Wanderfound · June 19, 2021, 11:39pm

Wanderfound · June 19, 2021, 11:42pm

Wanderfound · June 19, 2021, 11:56pm

Wanderfound · June 20, 2021, 12:04am

…you get the idea. Many more in thread.

Wanderfound · June 20, 2021, 2:53am

Historical trivia:

TLDW: apparently the market for selling replicas of WWII military rifles to civilians in the US was kickstarted by the “need” to arm the Bay of Pigs invasion.

Fascism is imperialism turned inwards.

Wanderfound · June 20, 2021, 3:04am

Wanderfound · June 20, 2021, 3:09am

Wanderfound · June 20, 2021, 6:53am

Zionism is a feminist issue.