Namthings

- Money, and most forms of currency, is fungible. This just means that any piece of it is interchangeable without changing value -- one dollar is one dollar, whether it is represented by a fresh new dollar bill or an old wrinkled dollar bill or a record kept in a ledger or a record in a computer. Being fungible is one of the core things necessary for a currency to work as a currency (alongside other things such as ‘being recognised as currency by others’ and ‘the value being backed by something that can ensure reasonable stability, like a stable government’). If you’re currency isn’t fungible, then it isn’t currency -- you’re not buying with it, you’re bartering. So that’s what the “fungible” part means.

- People trade with non currency stuff all the time. People trade in favours, faith, and small numbers of resources that someone else needs more. When people trade in large value items, they usually estimate a value for the item; people might trade in high value artworks, for example. This is a pretty common thing for rich people to do as you can cook books in all kinds of ways through the trade value of unique items with no obvious parallels. Who’s gonna tell you your numbers are wrong, after all?

- NFTs -- non fungible tokens -- are the latest fad by cryptobros who are a) trying to imitate the unregulated illegal trading of the rich without understanding it, or b) running scams that bank on the idea that other cryptobros don’t understand it. They’ve basically taken cryptocurrency and made it non fungible. Cryptocurrency is ‘mined’ by making computers do really, really complicated math, and the math gets more complicated the more of it is ‘mined’. It has to be like this to keep it rare and combat inflation. But, while each bitcoin will have a different ‘serial number’ the same as each US dollar note does, bitcoin are fungible -- one bitcoin has the same value as another bitcoin. (Users frequently ‘tumble’ their cryptocurrency -- swap it with each other in a complicated, automated fashion -- to launder it.) NFTs are instead URLs, and their gimmick is that each one is different! And can be worth a different amount! You can’t just swap them; they’re non-fungible!

- To convince people that the URL is worth something, they put a ‘unique’ digitally generated picture there. These are hilariously ugly. Confused cryptobros who don’t really understand NFTs tend to become convinced that what they bought is that picture, and they ‘own’ it in some way that’s deeper and more entrenched that’s just like, commissioning art. This is quite funny because you can really upset a lot of them by ‘stealing’ their NFT (copying the picture).

As of Jan 26, 2022, the Biden Administration CFPB (Consumer Financial Protection Bureau) is bringing the hammer down on junk fees. This is more than just bank fees - this is going after the junk fees on things like prepaid cards, loans, bank transfers, credit card late fees, even closing costs on a mortgage.

The CFPB needs public comments, like the opinions of real people who are affected by these fees, to build a case about telling financial organizations that THEY CAN'T CHARGE THEM ANYMORE.

The CFPB says it’s particularly interested in hearing from older and lower-income consumers, students, service members and people of color.

There's some good detail about the comments in this investopedia article. The easiest way to comment is to send an email to [email protected]. Include Docket No. CFPB-2022-0003 in the subject line of the message.

Note that these are public comments. They will be published online through the CFPB website. Don't include account numbers, social security numbers, or full names. Tell a story - tell about the time you overdrew your account by $1.23 and the bank took $35. Tell about how you signed up for a credit card and the company charged you a bunch of fees you didn't even know about. Tell about how you transferred money from your savings account to a checking account and the bank charged you $2.50.

These junk fees are a slap in the face of ordinary people who can't refuse to pay, and the CFBP is taking aim at the banks that charge them. To read what CFPB director Rohit Chopra had to say about this call to action, click here.

FUCKING YES!!!!!!

Y'all know the hole I just asked your help digging me out of like, literally last week?

THAT HOLE WOULD NOT HAVE EXISTED WITHOUT PREDATORY FEES LIKE THIS

ADDRESSES: You may submit comments, identified by Docket No. CFPB-2022-0003, by any of the following methods:

• Electronic: http://www.regulations.gov. Follow the instructions for submitting comments.

• Email: [email protected]. Include Docket No. CFPB-2022-0003 in the subject line of the message.

• Mail/Hand Delivery/Courier: Comment Intake —Fee Assessment, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, 1700 G Street NW, Washington, DC 20552. Please note that due to circumstances associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, the CFPB discourages the submission of comments by hand delivery, mail, or courier.

Unlike Congress, where sometimes your call or email about a policy goes into the void, every single comment about a regulation is individually read and tallied.

When a regulation is written it will say something like "The CFPB adopted X because it received 5,284 comments telling us to do that."

Write your comments.

It can be short. It can be long. It can go into detail about your experiences or your background. It can simply be an email saying "overdraft fees suck and should be illegal."

And it will affect policy.

Note, however, that comments are generally public record, so even though you're encouraged to give your name, don't give personally identifiable information.

Federal register comments are one of the least known yet most powerful ways to influence public policy.

The Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drugs Company (MCCPDC) is a registered pharmaceutical wholesaler and purchases drugs directly from manufacturers, bypassing middlemen to lower the price of more than 100 medications, it said in a statement.

For example, the leukemia drug imatinib is priced at $47 a month on MCCPDC compared to the $9,657 retail price.

MCCPDC CEO Alex Oshmyansky reached out to Cuban with an idea for a low-cost generic drug company in a cold email. It was launched in January last year. They were motivated in part by “Pharma Bro” Martin Shrkeli’s outrage-producing price hike of the lifesaving drug Daraprim from $13.50 to $750 per tablet while Shrkeli was CEO of Turing Pharmaceuticals. Cuban told Forbes last year the pricing for generic drugs was “ridiculous.” He said he decided to put his name on the company to “show capitalism can be compassionate and to send the message I am all in.” It’s not clear how much he had invested in the company.

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please note that prices are location dependent on goodrx—it shows you the options at pharmacies near your location. i’m in pittsburgh, pa; if you’re in a different part of the country and you try this, you may get slightly (or wildly) different numbers. 

fluoxetine is generic prozac. thirty 20mg capsules costs $12.80 at my cheapest local pharmacy. costplus has it for $3.90.

atorvastatin is generic lipitor. thirty 40mg tablets is $10.95 at my cheapest local pharmacy. costplus has it for $4.20.

omeprazole is generic prilosec. thirty 20mg capsules is $13.90 at the cheapest local pharmacy; $4.20 at costplus.

aripiprazole is generic abilify. thirty 10mg tablets is $17.73 at the cheapest local pharmacy (and $260.60 at the most expensive—and that’s with a discount, still, yikes); $6.00 at costplus. 

lamotrigine xr is generic lamictal xr. thirty 25mg tablets is $36.59 at the cheapest local pharmacy; $8.40 at costplus. 

maybe that doesn’t seem like a huge discount, but the goodrx prices change *all the time*—last time i used it to buy fluoxetine, which was in the last couple of years, it was $31. also, many people are on multiple medications, or have multiple people in a household taking multiple medications, and $5 off every prescription adds up real fast. 

THE CHEAPEST I CAN GET IT IN PERSON ANYWHERE IS $13 AND THE STANDARD PRICE FOR THE GENERIC IS $82.

TAMIFLU IS ON HERE FOR UNDER $4. IT’S AN ANTIVIRAL USED TO TREAT SEVERE CASES OF INFLUENZA AND REGULARLY COSTS OVER $100.

There is a medicine on here called Valcyte, it’s an HIV medication, he’s offering it for $100.20 which sounds outrageous (and I mean still kind of is but wait for it, wait for it) UNTIL YOU REALIZE ON GOODRX IT’S LISTED FOR $179 AS THE ABSOLUTE CHEAPEST PRICE I CAN FIND AND MY LOCAL WALGREENS SELLS IT FOR $1,009 FOR A MONTH’S SUPPLY.

What Do You Think You’re Doing? by Kaiser Caimo

Part 4 of 4.

(Part 1 here)