After 11-hour cross-pacific from Vancouver to Seoul,then 5-hour to connect, 3-hour to fly, landing around 1150am,home around 0230pm finally, the trip of 19 hours (or 26 hours) was finally done. The worst beer experience, sweating and catching a cold in the on-off sleep during flight.

After a simple late lunch or early dinner around 3pm, then a shower, sleep at 6pm and wake up around 0930pm. Jet-lagging is obvious. How the city is so noisy and everyone seems OK with it? From my window, almost every house has their window open. At night the noise seems the same as day. Or there is no day or night, people is always busy. My brother has to work to 10pm because of my interruption.

The subway is well-connected and slightly hot, at least the cooling is not strong. From route 14 to route 10, then route 8 that is a circle. The subway is not very fast and not very often (not in the peak hours). In the subway, it was not that crowded but almost every adult has a mobile phone in his or her hand. Two phones are quite often. Most are captured by the screens. Exit C.

So mobile phones and the noise are the first impression. Capturing your face and fingerprints are mandate at the customs without negotiattion. So many stores along the streets. So many cars and vehicles along the street and around the high-rising buildings. It is hot under the sun to walk. Welcome to home.

  • 1030pm July 3

Jet lagging is still there. Yesterday fell to sleep around 6pm and woke up arond 9pm. Then it’s very hard to fall asleep. Today 730pm and 1130pm. A little better. After a few hour break, fell asleep around 3am and woke up around 7am.

Think to get a local sim card so that a phone number at least.

How to transfer money easily? How to get the kids out? How to avoid normalization? It’s very hard. Think about Fang. What he is talking about is all people need here. But he was pushed out. We have one same earth. But there are too many different worlds isolated and connected. Each world has its own set of normalizers.

  • 09am Jul 6 (local time)

昨天下午从2点睡到5点，算是补了前晚的觉。晚上从11点睡到凌晨3点，然后再睡。前天晚上从10点睡到凌晨一点，然后再从4点睡到早上，半睡半醒睡得不深。

晚上吃牛排，80多一份。回来路上看到一个眼镜店还开着，就进去修好了眼镜的鼻托，5元。进到一家药房，买了一盒药38元，统筹付20多，个人医保付剩余。早餐煎饼果子6元一个。

电动单车那个多，住宅楼下面停得满满，路边道旁也一样满满的。就连中学生很多也是骑着电动单车去补习。

晚上回来走在路上，忽然发现摄像头是出奇得多。不仅是监控交通的路口，每个门口不管是医院还是住宅区，满是摄像头。停车场门口有，就连电梯里也有。

  • 0630am Jul 7 (local time)

中午吃过后找到了一个游泳馆，办了一个月卡299，和人锁定。泳池刷脸拿手环，然后刷脸用手环进。手环还可以用来开储物箱，这样就不用自己带锁。就是开关反应比较慢。

泳池标准池，50x21m，12个泳道，6个可游，另外6个是玩水用的。要求戴泳帽。主要是泳池和换衣间灯光太暗，还没有通风扇，比较闷。

这是隔了一个星期第一回游，没戴泳镜，比较慢，但是感觉体力还行。来回都是步行，走回来稍微吃点晚饭。5点多睡，1130醒，然后就是迷迷糊糊到早上5点起床。

  • Jul 7 0800am (local time)

Yesterday swam in the morning. Twenty minutes to walk from home to the pool. Less than two hours in total. This time everything is OK.

On the way home, there were two polices looking for people riding the e-bikes without helmets. It’s supper easy to just scan the faces. Then every piece of info about the driver was up on the screen.

Had a lunch for another two hours. Again, smoking is quite common. It seems that you could smell it all the way.

After a shower, started to sleep around 0530pm. Woke up in 0930pm. Continue on and off till 6am.

corporate tax rates and personal income tax rates over the years in the USA

corporate tax rates

  • 1913-1940s: The corporate tax rate started at 1% in 1913, gradually increasing to 40% during World War II to fund military efforts.

  • 1950s-1960s: The post-war economic boom saw rates stabilize around 52% in the 1950s, reflecting a strong commitment to social programs and infrastructure.

  • 1980s: The Tax Reform Act of 1986 significantly reduced the corporate tax rate to 34% from 46%, aiming to stimulate economic growth and investment.

  • 2000s: The rate remained at 35% following the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001, which aimed to provide tax relief to individuals and corporations.

  • 2017: The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) marked a historic reduction, slashing the corporate tax rate from 35% to 21%, a move designed to enhance US competitiveness globally.

personal income tax rates

  • 1986 Tax Reform Act was signed into law by Presiden Reagan. For personal income, before the reform, the tax code had fifteen brackets, with the highest marginal rate at 50%. The new law condensed these into two primary rates: 15% and 28%.

questions

  • How does a market economy generate rising inequality?

  • What causes changes in income and wealth distributions?

  • If current technology has the commanding market power, will it slow down the rate of innovation? Further, will it slow down economic growth too? Or its market power is just the nextwork effect of current technology such as telecomm network, internet, and social media?

  • the IT revolution was supported by the passive and laissez-faire policy set by Reagan admin in the 1980s. the end of golden age of Bell labs means the end of great fundamental innovations? Is current AI a real innovation or just the mix of technological advancement in a new clothes?

  • the IT itself may be a service. However IT could be used by other products or services? It is like that the computer itself is a product. Telecomm network based on computers is another new service.

spectrum of ideas and their forms

Every person is an agent of his ideas and values. Every person’s action is chaning the world. However, even we are speaking the same language, the meaning of one word could vary greatly. If we could collect the spectrum of some popular ideas such as property, freedom, and rights in different historical periods, then comparing these with each other to check the evolution of accepted norms from period to another, it may show us the drive of changes for human society.

Another point of people living in different worlds. Your ideas and norms define your world. You are a prisoner of your own ideas. The ideas have to include two parts. One part of the ideas is real and true pertaining to material world around us. The part of the ideas is something fantasy and imagined by our wild mind. Think about ghosts, vampires, gods and many stories like myths. They are not real. But they are still affecting our behaviors and actions. Though these ideas are not true in themselves, they affect our real lives in the real world.