Oh no, the government is not doing something… so someone can turn it into a business or start a nonprofit or academia can do something useful.
And government resources can help other more critical projects.
1. The trust of the public. (This is essential for certifications.)
2. The ability to borrow at the lowest interest rate. (This is mainly due to the above.)
That makes spending to organize or coordinate the industry and the public a natural government activity.
Even the empire had Imperial Bureau of Standards.
Poor analogy.
Not sure why a long running and effective program needs government to borrow money, especially if industry finds the program valuable (enough to fund).
I’m fine with government starting programs like this, but think they should eventually be divested and run as self sufficient organizations and not constantly be a drain on the taxpayer.
If anything, distrust of government is nearly a core value inherent to being an American, again - regardless of which side you're on. Stonewall, George Floyd Protests, and Jan 6 were all protests against government, and they're all progress compared to the past, when these tensions would have instead started armed conflicts, like the anti-government sentiment that started both the revolutionary war and the civil war.
Instead of their being one central neutral auditor.
Three things that can all be true:
1. Industry has no incentive to improve per-unit efficiency if it impacts price
2. Government is largely beholden to industry, especially in oligarch America.
3. A government efficiency mandate can be better than nothing.
You are exactly right. Industry can create their own certification scheme with some independent entity, which sets the certification standards. Energy star is not safety relevant, which is the one thing which government arguably should have oversight over.
Because the additional cost is worth it when lives are at stake.
Cost doesn't mean just mean money. Government oversight creates significant friction and there needs to be a very good reason to accept that friction into an industry. Risk to human lives is one of the few things where it is sensible to introduce that friction.
Government are there to prevent friction for its citizens, not for faceless entities.
>Government are there to prevent friction for its citizens, not for faceless entities.
Have you ever tried to get a safety critical system certified by a government authority?
Public safety is an externality. The air and water are externalities.
Private industry can't effectively compete to optimize a cost which is not "priced in". That's the whole point. If you can pollute, damage public safety, et al, it amounts to a free subsidy, you are externalizing costs which should show up in your balance sheet.
It's like people read Ayn Rand, or some cliff notes version of free market capitalism, but don't read any of the deep philosophical economic arguments in the literature, and then parrot slogans around.
Hopefully, like the toilets, a new standard rises that is based around how effective something is at it's primary job _first_, with efficiency in other areas then measured after completing the intended task.
I have one of those "low-flush" toilets. I have to flush it twice, so I end up using more water than a regular toilet.
Also to prevent price-matching.
Deleting it is not a solution.
The fact that "Industry groups" like a regulation is an indication that they have managed to turn it into a means to reduce competition.
There’s some issues with the current regulations. So instead of doing the work to fix the issues, they just abruptly cancel the entire program.
Baby. Bath water.
During the what?
There's bad stuff happening, but it's also being vigorously legally challenged -- and will sure as hell be challenged by Congress if House and/or Senate changes hands in 2026.
Disregarding SCOTUS decisions also.
Or are you thinking about an example that isn't?
That’s a relief. It’s a good thing that he follows court orders against him, otherwise this situation where he doesn’t follow court orders against him would be a problem.
If you're specifically talking about Garcia, that case is still active: https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/05/08/trump-administrati...
Let’s look at it a different way—if he were seeking another term, would it look any different than what we are currently seeing him do?
In the same way that people think low-flow toilets are why their sh1t doesn't flush, instead of the proliferation of multi-ply super-thick toilet paper that are almost as bad as paper towels. It doesn't matter how much flow you have, if you flush a wad of cellulose that won't instantly dissolve like single-ply or thin-two-ply, you'll need to break out the augur.
And really, if you don't have a Toto Washlet or Japanese toilet, you're missing out. You barely need any toilet paper at all, and don't walk around with fecal particles wiped against your skin all day.
Edit: Probably this one: https://www.reddit.com/r/laundry/comments/1jco8a1/recommenda... . Speed Queen, Whirlpool, LG, and other brands are recommended. Reading the reviews after you’ve purchased something is always painful! Have you heard of Consumer Reports? They at least used to be pretty reliable.
I don't doubt their integrity, but I no longer use them.
If a machine is working for the vast majority of people then it isn't usually the machine.
Washing machines fall under the same umbrella as dishwashers for me. They work amazingly well but there will always be a decent chunk of people who claim they just never get dishes clean.
It has nothing to do with the dishwasher. It has to do with how people use them incorrectly.
It sounds more like "i'm picky about a washing machine" has become a personality trait, or a sunk cost, so there's no abandoning it at this point.
Probably gonna find a decent washing machine, then 2 months later another issue crops up. "It doesn't tumble quite right, ugh my clothes aren't clean". It reminds me of old people who say "They don't make x like they used to. Can't buy a good one anymore!"
Again, if the vast majority of people are finding the machine to be adequate, then it's probably not the machine. It's probably the people who are struggling with it have unreasonable expectations.
Domestic chores are also rife with people who do things for no reason other than "i was taught this way". This means their expectations are, often, unreasonable. I'm not saying that's applicable here, but it's definitely something to consider in these areas. Lots of people do wild stuff with their clothes/dishes/cleaning and don't realize it until someone points it out to them.
Manufacturers make energy-efficient appliances because consumers prefer them over less efficient appliances, not because the government is forcing them.
I'm highly dubious of the $500b this program has claimed to save consumers. Almost without fail, efficiency improvements in home appliances has greatly increased complexity (less reliable), reduced common components across brands (higher cost to fix), increase purchase price, and compromised actual performance.
Free market evangelist people are out of touch with reality.
Energy Star is handy because it's a known quality with set standards. If there was no standard companies could start doing all sorts of marketing BS with meaningless numbers. With ES you know what you're getting and it's a apples-apples comparison.
Same with dishwasher: Energy Star means some specific, and if a unit has a sticker than it's at (at least) the same level as another unit with the sticker. An OEM has now go above and beyond that in features.
Contrast that with the MaP Test, which is voluntary in the toilet industry, which most manufacturers use if those it is voluntary:
If there was an ES-equivalent standard for laundry then perhaps Energy Star itself would not be needed at that point.
Maybe the tree huggers at Reddit are spending a lot of time hugging pine trees. Pine sap is hard to get out.
(It's probably not your clothes, either).
And it cost under £400
That said, your complaints about HE side loaders are not misplaced, they aren't very good.
The main reasons for going with a commercial Speed Queen for people other than the few who can't manage to get consumer washers to clean their clothes are:
• They last a lot longer and are usually easier and/or cheaper to repair if they do break.
• They have more models without internet and apps. A basic commercial model will often be like the washer you might remember your parents had: something with a simple interface that just had a few basic cycles and washed your clothes well for decades. (Their fancier commercial models aimed to bigger laundromats might have internet and cloud based management, which can be very useful commercially for managing a fleet of machines).
the amount of doublespeak in this administration is unreal. Destruction of public institutions is announced as an improvement. The agency's "core mission" remains unstated so they don't need to square the circle on how destroying consumer info helps improve the environment.
EPA Plans to Shut Down the Energy Star Program
whatshisface•9mo ago
What the administration is preparing for that requires raising defense spending to one trillion is beyond me. Actually it's not.
tomrod•9mo ago
squigz•9mo ago
Why do you think America is suddenly 'preparing' for something? Hasn't defence spending steadily increased for quite a long time now?
tomrod•9mo ago
Ignores Congress (impoundment), ignores SCOTUS (Abrego Garcia), corruptly enriches himself from his position (Meme coin), cuts social programs (numerous), encourages stochastic terrorism (numerous), and expresses sentiments fully divorced from reality or otherwise distracting from heinous and corrupt actions.
blooalien•9mo ago
Hey, give the guy a break. This could very well be his last chance to enrich himself on the "Trump brand" before it all burns down around him. :P
whatshisface•9mo ago
Not as a percentage of GDP. https://www.macrotrends.net/global-metrics/countries/usa/uni...
The administration has expressed a desire to destroy several other countries over the last year. Iran, Denmark's autonomous territory Greenland and Canada stand out for being explicitly named, and China for being a career target of important advisors. Iran out of all these is singled out by congressional support and a history of military action in the region. In conclusion, the administration most likely wants to invade Iran.
https://www.reuters.com/world/trump-says-there-will-be-bombi...
zahlman•9mo ago
A bit of banter about Canada being economically or political subordinate to the US is not even remotely in the same ballpark as expressing a desire to destroy Canada. Even the literal meaning of what was obviously a joke is not remotely in the same ballpark. This is the same kind of thing I've been hearing my entire life; it means no more than the old adage "when America sneezes, Canada catches a cold".
I say this as a left-wing Canadian, btw.
Regarding Iran, the headline of your source already contradicts you, as does the article. Bombing is not invasion, and a threat made to get what you actually want (a "nuclear deal") is not expressing desire to execute the threat (it is in fact explicitly saying that you want something else).
Is this bad? Sure. Is it an unusual level of saber rattling (especially from someone who didn't come across as much of a military interventionist in his first term)? I suppose so. But it is not anything like "an expressed desire to destroy other countries". It is not warmongering.
All the recent headlines about "not ruling out" various military actions are just decades-old MAD policy applied to conventional warfare.
> Not as a percentage of GDP.
Right, so by your own source:
* Spending as a percentage of GDP recently peaked in 2010 (in the middle of Obama's first term);
* Spending as a percentage of GDP recently bottomed out in 2017-2018 (in the middle of Trump's first term);
* If we apply the 2010 percentage to 2022, the US would have already been at 1.25T in spending - while this thread is expressing concern because of approaching the 1T mark. Notwithstanding the import shock, US GDP has been recently growing rather impressively, too - see e.g. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/GDP/ .)
Also, the implication of your phrasing is that an increase as a percentage of GDP is happening or will happen soon, but you left out any evidence for that.
I very much don't like that the US spends this much on the military (about 3x as much as China, next on the leaderboard); but it's not historically out of line, nor does it look like an indication of trouble afoot.
whatshisface•9mo ago
mcphage•9mo ago
He has stated repeatedly that it is not a joke. I’m not sure what it’ll take to get you to believe him.
> This is the same kind of thing I've been hearing my entire life
Previous Presidents have not repeatedly expressed the desire to make Canada a state.
singleshot_•9mo ago
graemep•9mo ago
A cold war with China. Everything they are doing is based around that expectation.
whatshisface•9mo ago
bryanrasmussen•9mo ago
graemep•9mo ago
Leaving that aside, the US is hugely more powerful than Denmark, Panama and Canada combined. If could walk over all three right now - no need for increased military expenditure.
Iran has been preparing to fight the US, and will probably have fanatics who will fight on after defeat of the military creating an Iraq like situation - but AFAIK the direction of expenditure is wrong for that as preparing for that would require spending on counter insurgency and boots on the ground. There would also be lots of support from other countries in the region for that.
The ONLY country that is a peer rival to the US is China.
Other nuclear powers are probably able to deter the US, but only China can actually fight it in a conventional war.
concinds•9mo ago
They’re cutting the NSF because they’re high on their own supply and misunderstand the causes of US dominance, it’s a poor indicator of their intentions.