From: [email protected]
[mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Jason Resch
Sent: Wednesday, December 17, 2014 12:25 AM
To: Everything List
Subject: Re: real A.I.
On Tue, Dec 16, 2014 at 6:07 PM, meekerdb <[email protected]> wrote:
On 12/16/2014 10:15 AM, Telmo Menezes wrote:
Hi Liz,
On Mon, Dec 15, 2014 at 7:51 PM, LizR <[email protected]> wrote:
What is funny - as well as sad and frightening - is the number of people here
who apparently don't believe in democracy, even in principle. Democracy is the
idea that we can elect people to do things for everyone else (the NHS,
conservation, social security, infrastructure, regulations, police, army
science etc etc).
All of the things you mention are run by unelected bureaucrats with long
careers, who see politicians come and go.
I highly recommend the British show "Yes, Prime Minister!" to learn about this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qmXzGI0XP7M
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yeF_o1Ss1NQ
Yet all I can see here is people saying that it doesn't work. I think the truth
is that it can be hijacked and THEN it doesn't work. The NHS (despite
everything) was one of the greatest achievements of the 20th century, after
all. And it was introduced by a government because of its beliefs and
principles.
The NHS is the sort of thing that should worry an Ecologist, because it's based
on infinite growth. Both the European system (based on infinite demographic
growth) and the Anglo (based on infinite economic growth). I also feel that it
serves mostly to fix a problem created by the government itself in a previous
regulatory wave. The barriers to competition in the practice of healthcare are
so high that it becomes unaffordable without insurance or subsidy.
Health care isn't well regulated by competition because the consumer is ill
equipped to judge the necessity or the quality of service and the most
expensive service tends to a one-time event for the consumer.
Worse, the healthcare industry has gotten the US government to pass laws making
it exempt from monopolistic practices, price fixing, charging people different
amounts for the same service, forbidding reimportation of medicine, restricting
the number of MRI machines in a given area. It's what leads to people being
charged $60,000 for two bottles of anti-venom that cost $200, or be charged
$9,000 for a few stiches in a finger. (these are real life examples
<http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=229605> and not exaggerations).
Experimental clinics like The Surgery Center of Oklahoma, which cut out
insurance companies, and publishes their prices are 5-10X cheaper
<http://reason.com/reasontv/2012/11/15/the-obamacare-revolt-oklahoma-doctors-fi>
than what other hospitals charge (and about equivalent to prices charged in
Japan and India). If medical costs were this cheap, many people wouldn't need
insurance to pay for all but the most catastrophic of illnesses.
If hospitals were required to adhere to the same anti-trust rules as any other
business, to publish their prices and charge the same amount to everyone, we
would see about 80% of the cost of healthcare evaporate overnight. It's a sad
state of affairs when for every doctor in the country there are two people
working in the medical insurance industry.
I agree with that statement. It is not just hospitals but the monopolies that
have also been established on the practice of medicine and dentistry. Why do
the American Medical Association (AMA), and American Dental Association (ADA) –
both private (government sanctioned and enforced) guilds or trade organizations
have such power and control over who can practice medicine; over how medicine
can be practiced? MDs in the US make on average twice as much money as MDs in
other OECD countries – such as Germany -- for example.
-Chris
Jason
It's one of the several resource confiscation traps that have been emerging
under crony capitalism.
What does that mean?
I know, I know. You're going to say that lots of deaths have been prevented by
these regulations. This is true. But how many deaths have been caused by poor
or inexistent access to healthcare?
In the U.S. it's been estimated as at least 40,000/yr.
How many have been caused by the glaciar pace of innovation imposed by such
regulations?
What innovation has been delayed by regulation? thalidomide? abortion pills?
By patents? People refuse to recognise that this trade-off exists.
I dream of flat guaranteed income based on a real currency (not the current
pyramid schemes that we call Dollars or Euros). Possibly a cryptocurrency with
a smart algorithm that hopefully cannot fall under the control of the bandits.
Isn't there already an effective guaranteed "income" in terms of food, shelter,
health care. I doubt people are allowed to starve or freeze or go without
medical treatment. Of course I would agree that there should also be a
guarantee of as much education as a person wishes to absorb.
Brent
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