Author of the post here - fwiw all the houses I've lived in have had a good gender mix, though it's true none of the men wanted to join for the hip hop dance workout. In general though the men have been the better cooks!
I wanted to note that a lot of houses I've lived in have had couples. Two of our housemates in PR were a married couple who rented out the apartment they owned to come live with us. The husband was more extroverted than the wife and loved the company - and the wife loved that we kept him entertained and she got the room to herself more often :)
All this to say I simply think it's great to live with (good) roommates, whether you're male, female, single, coupled, or anything else.
Basically: a team of researchers asked people if they'd be happier on their morning commute if they interacted with strangers or kept to themselves. Most said they'd be happier keeping to themselves. Then the researchers ran an experiment where a group were told to keep to themselves, a group was told to interact with a stranger for as long as possible, and a control group was supposed to do whatever came up. Those who were forced to interact with a stranger came away most happy, and those that kept to themselves were least happy.
We are social beings - it is how we have been able to survive as a species. And yet, given the choice, we often choose to isolate. I think people would be happier and healthier if we made more of an effort to combat that tendency.
Tbh this makes perfect sense. As someone who worked in airline revenue management for 11 years, it always seemed a little odd that the sales tactics people use everywhere else - group discounts, BOGO, etc - weren't being used by airlines (yes, group bookings could often get discounts, but usually for much larger groups).
What's remarkable here is that airlines waited this long to do it. Sad news for me as a usually solo traveler who prizes flexibility, but I understand airlines wanting to prioritize groups and more locked-in fares.
There are lots of things airlines could offer, that they don't. They are all obsessed with "loyalty", why not sell travelers multi-packs (6 flights over the next 12 months) or subscription-like plans? Why a 24-hour cancellation period even for flights booked months ahead... they could certainly extend that to allow for "low-risk" booking or even charging a small fee for the right to cancel up to, say, 3 months in advance. Auctioning off unsold seats. Selling itineraries with multi-day layovers in a 3rd city (basically adding a second destination to a vacation). Lots more with a bit of creativity.
Airlines do sell multi-packs with flexible rebooking. At least United and Delta did pre-covid, I haven’t had a use since then though.
With even moderate airline status rebooking/cancellations work more or less as described. I can’t recall the last time I haven’t been credited for a flight I ended up not taking, even I did a full on no-show.
Without status airlines sell refundable tickets with similar flexible rules, but I assume there is some adverse selection included in how they need to price those fares.
Yes most airlines have eliminated change fees, and rebooking isn't too difficult for business travelers. But that's not a refund, and people booking 6 to 12 months out tend to be families going on vacation or to a specific event. So if something changes, there isn't always something else to book, or at least not on that specific airline. Further, what you call "moderate" status - the lowest level - has been raised to require an enormous amount of spending on any one of the major airlines. And don't get me started with "you only need to spend 100k on their credit card..."
Realistically most frequent travelers go for business and they don’t care about cost that much so subscription packs wouldn’t be valuable. That’s why loyalty programs instead offer non monetary perks or those that accrue to the individual (points).
I dont really buy into the businesses don't care about cost - maybe for top execs - but companies are obsessed with expense reports and accounting for every penny, reducing per diems, limiting hotel cost ceilings, booking through a specific travel agency, etc. And of course most companies are working overtime in every other department to slash costs, why would travel be spared? Being able to buy flights in bulk and save money seems like it would be highly appealing to finance managers.
Of course, there are exceptions. Governments seem to be some of the worst violators, they really do not care about costs and in many cases they egregiously throw money around for 5 star luxury hotels, first class flights, etc.
Yes, most domestic US airlines have eliminated change fees. But as you point out, it's not possible to get your money back and it's not easy to make changes if you don't have an alternative trip in mind. Cancellability is valuable (see hotel bookings), and yet, people over-value the option - sometimes out of laziness, or they forgot, or they go with the original plan. I have difficulty believing airlines would lose very much if they offered full refundability up to about 3 or 4 months in advance, but they would probably get more bookings, most of which would likely not get cancelled.
A lot depends on your travel habits. Credit on my usual airline (United) is pretty much a no-brainer within the year--I'll use it barring circumstances where losing some airline dollars are the least of my problems. Less so than it used to be but still.
For hotels, I still tend to pay the premium. I don't expect to cancel but, especially for an extended city stay, it can be a fair amount of money and the premium usually isn't that huge.
Agreed. I participated in a points-based package that used to be offered by AirAsia. It was about $300 for 30 points. Flights between cities/countries were 1 to 3 points each, I probably got 3x my money's worth and still had about 4 or 5 points left over.
> As someone who worked in airline revenue management, it always seemed odd that the sales tactics people use everywhere else weren't being used by airlines
Remember the really old days when air miles were awarded solely by distance flown rather than by dollars paid? This made no business sense. It meant that someone who flew the cheapest tickets could rack up as many points as a last-minute first class business traveller who spent massively more ticket.
With the airlines I’m familiar with, it seems that pricing anomaly has been corrected. Air miles are much more correlated with the price of the ticket these days. Eg., you don’t even get air miles on the cheapest tickets on one airline I know.
But I still wonder why the airline industry created an air miles formula so disconnected from the value of the passenger in the early days.
The first mileage program was introduced only a couple years after deregulation, so it probably made a lot more sense at the time as a rough proxy for revenue, and revenue management at the airlines wasn’t nearly as sophisticated as it is today.
Alaska still uses miles flown. It’s pretty annoying since I’m doing some short hop flights with them that cost a lot and I get basically nothing for it.
I actually prefer the miles per $ model since it seems more fair for everyone. Obviously it’s less exploitable but that’s exactly the sort of thing everyone is complaining about.
In the early days you didn't have the internet where people would share every tiny anomaly, allowing thousands of people to exploit them. Even then, you had a few people realize they could do mileage runs, but it was considered additional revenue and the perks of doing so weren't valued nearly as highly as they are today.
I usually expect to see BOGOs, group discounts, etc advertised. If airlines showed the seat price along with a group discount I don't think people would have a problem with the price difference.
When I'm in the store and I see 3 for 2 or whatever, I can think, yeah, ok, I'll be using three of 'em soon enough, fine I'll get 3.
But when I travel, it's not like I'm gonna call up my buddy and ask him if he'll join me on a flight so I can get a better ticket price. And if I'm going on vacation with my family, I'm not going to buy individual tickets, like why would I do that?
If these things aren't advertised or even made visible in any way other than the user happening to discover them, they're not sales tactics, they're just scumbag business tactics to prevent pricing transparency.
I've lived in community for 10 years in a variety of different houses/complexes (including ones where I've had my own apartment and there's been a communal kitchen). We've almost never had issues with cleanliness. It really depends on who you live with!
I'm reminded of this Atlantic article that says 'You can try to micromanage your child’s care—whether they eat sugar, whether they get screen time, whether someone insists that a child apologize after snatching another kid’s toy—or you can have reliable community help with child care. But you can’t have both.'
Personally I'm ok with flexing my standards a bit for the sake of having a great community - I'm on the cleaner side but I don't mind doing a little extra tidying as long as it feels like a balance. I've lived with my friends and their kids and while we don't have the 100% the same parenting styles we all respect what the others bring to the table.
I'm the editor of Supernuclear, not Patty who wrote the post. I don't think Patty wants her address shared but some other commenters have triangulated the general neighborhood if you feel like reading through!
I'm the co-author of Supernuclear and editor of this post. We've been writing the blog for almost five years now, you never know what will go viral!
I've spent my adult life living in Istanbul, New York, San Francisco, and San Juan, Puerto Rico. In Istanbul it sometimes felt like my neighbors knew too much about me - they would comment on who slept over (I had a lot of friends visit!) and once when I went out of town for a week my landlady said she nearly let herself into my home to make sure I hadn't died because no one had seen me in a few days. That being said, it was also comforting to know, 5000 miles from my home and my family, that people around me cared about my wellbeing and my whereabouts.
And this is the thing those of us who live in the US sometimes forget: knowing your neighbors isn't just about being able to borrow cup of sugar when you're out. It's about knowing someone will share their generator when a hurricane has knocked your power out. It's about someone noticing when something looks off and coming over to knock and make sure you're ok. We aren't just happier when we get to know our neighbors better, we're safer.
Greetings from Istanbul. Unfortunately what you describe in your blog post sounds impossible to me in (at least many districts of) Istanbul. The only place to "socialize" in a neighborhood is to sit at coffee shops.
I lived on a street in Cihangir for three years. In the walk to and from work I'd pass several shops and cafes, and got to know all of the owners and regulars.
I’ve lived in scenarios where people saying either of these things would be a huge violation, and I’ve lived in scenarios where people saying either of these things would be natural.
Living in the latter scenario is a far better place, and nothing like, the former scenario.
100% agree! We had moved to a smaller community in New England and was eating an early dinner when we got a single knock on the door. Before we could get up, the UPS driver opened our door to place the packages inside (and out of the snow). He waved and welcomed us and then off we went. It was a bit odd, but then we realized this was a special place that we would come to love and we did.
Well, you should be able to leave for a week without having to tell your neighbors all about it. It may be different for old weak people who are unlikely to just go to vacation all of a sudden.
>isn't just about being able to borrow cup of sugar
this in particular is interesting to me because you used it to illustrate the minimum level of neighborly engagement, but I think many of us don't even reach that level. I for one would never think of asking my neighbor for cooking ingredients; in fact the idea of going over and knocking on their door for any purpose is almost inconceivable to me unless there was a medical emergency.
Not saying my mindset is right or even healthy, but that's how it is. There's a lot of work to be done.
You 100% can do stoop whiskey! Or simply hanging outside with whatever beverage. My block in Brooklyn has a lot more stoop whiskey than coffee but also has a really strong neighborhood feel (and whatsapp chat). I feel lucky to have moved into an already vibrant community but also believe anyone can create this anywhere.
This reminds me of a tool my friends made calle Escher Sketch, which allows you to create tiles https://eschersket.ch/ ... I've lost days playing with the program (and generating some pretty intricate art).
I wanted to note that a lot of houses I've lived in have had couples. Two of our housemates in PR were a married couple who rented out the apartment they owned to come live with us. The husband was more extroverted than the wife and loved the company - and the wife loved that we kept him entertained and she got the room to herself more often :)
All this to say I simply think it's great to live with (good) roommates, whether you're male, female, single, coupled, or anything else.