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Anti-Capitalist Sentiment (with some morality)

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  1. #826
    MadMojoMonkey's Avatar
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    *yawn*
    theft

    Can we be finished with the sensational language? I can't speak to the persuasive advantage it may provide with a different audience, but it's shaving away credulity with me.

    ***
    The $5k story is not comparable because it gives the $5k to everyone. This would, presumably, drive a wave of inflation as supply/demand balances with the changing buying power of the $.

    Welfare, food stamps, and unemployment insurance are designed to be temporary programs which are offered to a small percentage of the society.

    The impact on the greater economy is not comparable.
  2. #827
    Quote Originally Posted by MadMojoMonkey View Post
    *yawn*
    theft

    Can we be finished with the sensational language? I can't speak to the persuasive advantage it may provide with a different audience, but it's shaving away credulity with me.

    ***
    The $5k story is not comparable because it gives the $5k to everyone. This would, presumably, drive a wave of inflation as supply/demand balances with the changing buying power of the $.

    Welfare, food stamps, and unemployment insurance are designed to be temporary programs which are offered to a small percentage of the society.

    The impact on the greater economy is not comparable.
    Read things before you comment on them. Have some self-respect.
  3. #828
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    Actually welfare, food stamps, and unemployment make up a pretty small part of the budget. Medicare is what we should really be talking about, it's something like 2/3 of the federal budget and growing.
  4. #829
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    Why would you assume I didn't read it?

    I read the links you posted, as well.
    Obviously, I'm against stealing. If a person steals from their employer by giving away free goods, then that's a person who is stealing, too. If that was your whole point, then I agree that it's bad.

    Where you lose me is that you're making a direct comparison between actual, quantifiable theft by individuals and a bureaucratic program funded by taxation. These are very different things.

    My point is that your story is an anecdote which explains why you feel the way to do (right now).
    It's not evidence.
    It is not convincing or persuasive.

    ***
    self respect? I'm baffled as to what this has to do with anything. It seems like a personal attack.
    I am disappoint.


    You couldn't have a more patient student. Yet, many of the questions I ask are met with a stark lack of data and emotionally loaded assumptions. Words and ideas have been attributed to me which I have not said and do not espouse. These things make the learning process slower and more difficult.
  5. #830
    Quote Originally Posted by rong View Post
    Or they could just stop abusing the system and actually look for a job.
    I'll get a job when they legalise weed.

    The fuck am I going to work in a shitty factory and being miserable for the rest of my life, just because it's illegal to smoke a fucking plant. I'd sooner be poor and happy. I don't consider that I'm abusing the system. I consider that I'm stopping the system from abusing me. The system doesn't allow me to go and live in the woods and kill deer to survive. The system deprives me of a natural life. The least it can do is provide me with the bare minimum required to survive, ie food and rent.

    Here's what they should be doing...

    Two tiers of unemployment benefits. Those who can't be arsed, who can't satisfy the job search requirements, give them less money. I wouldn't argue at getting less money if it meant I didn't have to go through the fortnightly stress of telling some patronising cunt how I've spent 30 hours a week looking for a job, when really I've been playing poker, watching nature documentaries, and sunbathing.

    But no, they want to make the unemployed look like cunts for not wanting to be part of their corrupt system. And people like you dan lap it up. Here you are saying get a fucking job.

    No. My life does not belong to the system. Yours might, but mine doesn't. If you're happy, then good for you. I'm happy, so good for me.
    Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
    ongies gonna ong
  6. #831
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    MMM I'm pretty sure the point of wuf's post wasn't to compare theft to welfare in the sense of them both being morally wrong. It was to suggest that someone receiving free shit from the system can actually be worse off for it. He wasn't even talking about theft for direct personal gain. Most of the employee theft in that story was giving free shit to customers to make them happier and inflate the tip.

    That part of it is is quite analogous to the welfare state. Politicians stand to gain a lot by offering handouts to anyone who wants them. They get campaign contributions from big corporations so the corporations will have a favor in their pocket to cash in once their guy gets elected. They get votes from working class people if they promise to throw them something. The money has to come from somewhere. We can toil at this all day as to whether that constitutes theft, but the analogy to employee theft is clear.
  7. #832
    Quote Originally Posted by MadMojoMonkey View Post
    @Ong: If you are giving false information to acquire a gain, then that's fraud.
    Plain and simple.
    That mental gymnastics whereby you pretend that you're entitled to the money while not preforming their requirements is absolute BS.
    You're only entitled to the benefits of the program to the extent that you follow the program.

    I would not be at all surprised to find some fine print on something you've signed which says exactly as much.

    If you even remotely believe that you are correct, then I suggest you have a meeting with your favorite legal representatives and have a chat with them about it.
    Let me know the results, please.
    Ok, so you're saying that claiming 15 minutes of wages when you don't actually do any work is fraud? Because that is "giving false information to acquire a gain", assuming you claim to have worked during this time, perhaps by means of clocking out at 5.00 instead of 4.45. Right?

    Sure there's fine print that tells me I need to do this and that. Sure they can sanction me if they can prove I'm not meeting these conditions. Does that make it fair? No it doesn't. What choice do I have? Get a job? See my last post.

    What people seem to ignore is that a lot of people who are long term unemployed are actually unemployable. You wouldn't employ them if you were running a business, because most of them are stupid and lazy. Why should I have to work just because I'm smart and potentially productive? Why should I suffer a life of misery while stupid people laze around watching Jeremy Kyle? Why should I submit half my waking life to the elite for them to make billions?

    I don't like the system. So, do you think the system should provide for people like me? Or should I just be left to die so the working class can pay less tax?
    Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
    ongies gonna ong
  8. #833
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    Quote Originally Posted by Renton View Post
    Actually welfare, food stamps, and unemployment make up a pretty small part of the budget. Medicare is what we should really be talking about, it's something like 2/3 of the federal budget and growing.
    What fraction of the budget is your goal?
    deja vu, amirit?

    What is up with Medicaire?
    Anything besides our general agreement that excess is bad?

    I can see an argument that excess is incentivized by any bureaucracy. Budget allocation is scandalous at best in almost any large organization. It becomes advantageous to always overstate your budget needs in order to grow your microcosm of the larger network.
    Do you get what I'm saying? Is it spurious?

    ***
    IMO, state-level societies are immeasurably complex*. I think some form of social safety net is a good thing. I think it doesn't much matter which combination of programs suits a particular society, so long as there is some workable combination.


    *Something like 3.2 {wows / (minute * person)}, IIRC. Just for perspective, that means if someone is telling you how complex society is, you are likely to say, "wow" about once every 18.75 seconds.
  9. #834
    Quote Originally Posted by MadMojoMonkey View Post
    Why would you assume I didn't read it?

    I read the links you posted, as well.
    Obviously, I'm against stealing.
    You had me fooled. You blew my point off as if I was using sensational language to say what you now say is theft.

    If a person steals from their employer by giving away free goods, then that's a person who is stealing, too. If that was your whole point, then I agree that it's bad.
    No, that's not my point. Tell me what my point is.

    Where you lose me is that you're making a direct comparison between actual, quantifiable theft by individuals and a bureaucratic program funded by taxation. These are very different things.
    Different topic.

    My point is that your story is an anecdote which explains why you feel the way to do (right now).
    It's not evidence.
    It is not convincing or persuasive.
    I link you to a economics professor who has been teaching for a few decades. He used an anecdote merely as an illustration for a broader issue that has been established before that anecdote existed. I then use that to explore our specific topic, and like you have with the last several issues, you just seem to brush it off without considering it more deeply.

    self respect? I'm baffled as to what this has to do with anything. It seems like a personal attack.
    I am disappoint.

    You couldn't have a more patient student. Yet, many of the questions I ask are met with a stark lack of data and emotionally loaded assumptions. Words and ideas have been attributed to me which I have not said and do not espouse. These things make the learning process slower and more difficult.
    Then stop portraying such belying behavior. There is virtually no direct evidence of anything in macro. Data-mining is virtually worthless in macro. You say I'm not bringing you worthwhile things, yet when I do it seems you hop to disagreement regardless. Maybe I'm the asshole here, but the types of things you're saying suggest you're not putting much effort into considering the arguments.
  10. #835
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    Sorry I badly misquoted the medicare budget, counting it with other mandatory spending to make up about 2/3. This includes Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, welfare, student loans, and interest on the debt. Medicare is the biggest chunk of that and is about 24% of the total budget.



    (video is from 2012, but it applies today to an even greater extent)

    I don't know what the correct percentage medicare should be. I do know that seniors in the U.S. are rapidly becoming the most affluent age bracket and it makes me question the necessity of spending 24% of a multi-trillion budget on their healthcare when most of them do not need the money.
  11. #836
    More about "abusing the system".

    If I were that way inclined, I'd be pretending to be too ill to work. If I could convince a doctor that I suffer from something like, hmm I dunno, cannabis psychosis, then I'd get more money. Furthermore, there was a time I was growing weed. During this time, my income was untaxed, and therefore off the books, so I could have claimed benefits. But I didn't. Because that is actually wrong, in my opinion. Growing weed isn't wrong. Pretending to look for a job in order to ensure I can eat and pay my rent, that isn't wrong. I have no intention of getting a job. Why should I waste my time and that of employers by applying for jobs I have no intention of holding down?

    Those who work assume those who don't want to work are lazy. That isn't true. I'd love to be doing something more productive with my life. But I'm happy enough being unproductive, and yes I believe the system owes me survival at the very least.
    Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
    ongies gonna ong
  12. #837
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    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    Ok, so you're saying that claiming 15 minutes of wages when you don't actually do any work is fraud? Because that is "giving false information to acquire a gain", assuming you claim to have worked during this time, perhaps by means of clocking out at 5.00 instead of 4.45. Right?
    Yes. This is fraud. We can imagine certain jobs or circumstances where this may be moot. However, claiming you fulfilled your part of a contract while not having truly done so to the best of your knowledge and interpretation of the contract is fraud. Sure, I can see the difference between fraud of $5 and fraud of $5M. I do not equate them in severity.

    If you are under a voluntary contract, then your signature is your uncoerced promise to fulfill that contract.
    If you do not uphold your promise to the full extent of your good faith, then you've made yourself a liar.

    If you don't see this as fraud, then I'd love to hear your explanation of the situation when the roles are reversed and someone is demanding that you uphold your half of a contract when they have obviously and intentionally not upheld their half.

    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    [...]I don't like the system. So, do you think the system should provide for people like me? Or should I just be left to die so the working class can pay less tax?
    I think if you're not working to help yourself, then you have no right to ask for anyone to pay your way. However, if you're actively trying to help yourself, but have personal struggles of whatever kind, then my opinion changes.

    Honestly, I would bet a lot of money that if you were cut off from your "provisions" that you would not, in fact, die. I bet you would find a way to not die for many, many years.

    You can go anywhere in the world and live there if you only sacrifice a couple of years to your hated system.
    I doubt you could get a permanent visa in many countries, given your current unemployment and its length. With a bit of effort, though, I am confident that you could change this. You just need a vision of your future that you love and the will to fight for that future.
  13. #838
    You seem to think lying under contract is fraud. It's not. Lying under contract is in the vast majority of cases a civil issue at worst. Maybe the jobcentre could sue me for not meeting my contractual obligations. But it's not fraud. You seem to have a very broad idea of what fraud is. Fraud is criminal. Breach of contract is not.

    If you are under a voluntary contract
    This is also arguable. I am not under a voluntary contract. If I don't sign, I either have to beg my friends and family to provde my food or shelter, or go without. To say I choose to be subject to their conditions is wide of the mark. I am subject to their conditions because my options are limited. This isn't voluntary.
    Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
    ongies gonna ong
  14. #839
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    Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
    You had me fooled. You blew my point off as if I was using sensational language to say what you now say is theft.

    No, that's not my point. Tell me what my point is.

    Different topic.
    The language of theft is off topic. We're talking about whether or not unemployment insurance is, on the whole, helpful or hurtful to the society as a whole. Furthermore, we're exploring whether the net -EV for the society as a whole dominates the net +EV for the few who use the program (or if it is a + at all).

    Since what I guessed you meant was wrong, I don't know what link you're making between employee theft and anything else.

    Help me with the context, then. I don't understand your metaphor.

    Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
    I link you to a economics professor who has been teaching for a few decades. He used an anecdote merely as an illustration for a broader issue that has been established before that anecdote existed. I then use that to explore our specific topic, and like you have with the last several issues, you just seem to brush it off without considering it more deeply.
    His anecdote expresses why he feels the way he feels (right now), and is not a compelling argument for why I should feel anything. Furthermore, even if I had the same feeling, it gives no notion of whether this feeling is in line with a helpful model of reality.

    Yes, I brushed it off. I will brush off any attempt to elucidate which relies on emotionally charged language as its foundation.

    If you can only discuss your field in these terms, then I guess I understand why you think I'm being flippant with you.

    Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
    Then stop portraying such belying behavior. There is virtually no direct evidence of anything in macro. Data-mining is virtually worthless in macro. You say I'm not bringing you worthwhile things, yet when I do it seems you hop to disagreement regardless. Maybe I'm the asshole here, but the types of things you're saying suggest you're not putting much effort into considering the arguments.
    I dont know what I'm belying. I just want a conversation with the emotions stripped out of it so that we can learn what all economists would agree on, without dispute. If there is no subset of the field for which this occurs, then I am bored of the field and it can exist w/o my input, like so many things in this world.

    My competitive advantage is in focusing on logic-based systems. I am flummoxed by emotion-based systems. I have nothing to offer that someone else couldn't do better.

    If the field of macroeconomics is truly this untested, then I'm absolutely bored with the conversation and I'm sorry if you feel I wasted your time.
  15. #840
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    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    You seem to think lying under contract is fraud. It's not. Lying under contract is in the vast majority of cases a civil issue at worst. Maybe the jobcentre could sue me for not meeting my contractual obligations. But it's not fraud. You seem to have a very broad idea of what fraud is. Fraud is criminal. Breach of contract is not.
    Nits picked. What you're doing is indecent and unethical by my standards.

    Quibbling over which law you're breaking is of marginal interest. Still, I may be confusing different laws, and that's a fair point.

    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    This is also arguable. I am not under a voluntary contract. If I don't sign, I either have to beg my friends and family to provde my food or shelter, or go without. To say I choose to be subject to their conditions is wide of the mark. I am subject to their conditions because my options are limited. This isn't voluntary.
    You are making a whole slew of choices which perpetuate your circumstances.

    What if the shoe was on the other foot? What if you had some friend crashing on your couch who keeps assuring you that he's looking for a job, while you pay for his food and rent. What if you found out he was lying to you?

    ***
    In what way are you prevented from living where weed is legal?
    Is there anything beside a few years of sacrifice that prevent you from living there?

    I'm getting at the fact that it's not like you are living in North Korea and can't leave. If there is any impediment to your emigrating to a nation which is more in line with your beliefs, I'd wager it's something you could overcome if you worked for it.
  16. #841
    What if the shoe was on the other foot? What if you had some friend crashing on your couch who keeps assuring you that he's looking for a job, while you pay for his food and rent. What if you found out he was lying to you?
    No. This isn't a fair comparison. Am I on your couch? No I'm not.

    Let's put the shoe on the other foot properly. When I was working, was I happy for my tax to be spent on unemployed people? Yes I was. It keeps crime lower and keeps unemployable people from the workplaces.
    Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
    ongies gonna ong
  17. #842
    MadMojoMonkey's Avatar
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    What is to be discerned by your selective answering of questions?
  18. #843
    In what way are you prevented from living where weed is legal?
    Money, friends, family, culture, language...

    Is there anything beside a few years of sacrifice that prevent you from living there?
    Money, ok I can make money if push comes to shove. Friends, I can make friends, learn a language, adapt to new cultures. But family...

    Also, do you know of any countries with a shortage of weed growers? Most nations want their immigrants to be useful to them.
    Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
    ongies gonna ong
  19. #844
    Quote Originally Posted by MadMojoMonkey View Post
    What is to be discerned by your selective answering of questions?
    Patience...
    Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
    ongies gonna ong
  20. #845
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    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    Patience...
    touche'
  21. #846
    I do have friends in Portugal who are growing. The whole family upped and moved.

    I'd like to leave England, but I do not believe that any other nation on the planet owes me a thing, whether that's a job, or benefits. I didn't choose the UK, this is my home. For me to leave here, I'd need a stable well paid job to go to.
    Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
    ongies gonna ong
  22. #847
    MadMojoMonkey's Avatar
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    Family is compelling.

    I am frequently overwhelmed by my lady's choice to stay with me in St. Louis over returning to her family in Hawai'i. That said, they still visit each other a couple of times a year.

    Even still. Living under oppression is a greater daily concern than even family. It's not as if you'd be out of contact, anyway. Skype is a thing. It's no substitute for a hug, but it's much better than complete absence.

    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    Also, do you know of any countries with a shortage of weed growers? Most nations want their immigrants to be useful to them.
    I'm certain you have other skills. If you can grow one plant, I'm sure you can grow others. As I understand it, they do most of the work themselves.

    This is exactly what I meant by a few years' work. You'll need to sacrifice yourself to the long term goal and maintain enough employment to be considered a craftsman in some field. I'm sure botany would suffice.
  23. #848
    I'd like to study, either environmental science, or natural science. That's my most likely path to productiveness. But I'm woefully underqualified for university, so it's a long road. I am looking into it though to see if it's realistic, and in what time frame.

    I don't really want to be doing nothing with my life, I'd just rather this than a dead end job.
    Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
    ongies gonna ong
  24. #849
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    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    I do have friends in Portugal who are growing. The whole family upped and moved.

    I'd like to leave England, but I do not believe that any other nation on the planet owes me a thing, whether that's a job, or benefits. I didn't choose the UK, this is my home. For me to leave here, I'd need a stable well paid job to go to.
    From the sound of it, even the UK has paid up anything they might have owed you.

    No one chooses their childhood, but we all choose our adulthood. You can't blame the outside for your circumstances beyond a certain point. You have the social mobility to put yourself wherever you see yourself.

    In a way, it's kind of messed up that some people would sacrifice everything they know to have a shot at what you have, yet, you see it as oppression. I'm not saying anything with that other than the world is a messed up place and perspective matters.
  25. #850
    I see being told I can't smoke a plant as oppression. I don't see anyone telling me I can't smoke cabbage, even though it's likely to be equally as dangerous. I could be earning a decent income.

    They owe me a living.
    Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
    ongies gonna ong
  26. #851
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    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    I'd like to study, either environmental science, or natural science. That's my most likely path to productiveness. But I'm woefully underqualified for university, so it's a long road. I am looking into it though to see if it's realistic, and in what time frame.

    I don't really want to be doing nothing with my life, I'd just rather this than a dead end job.
    Ultimately, university is just paying a bunch of people to motivate you to do things you already want to do.

    I'm saying that all you need is the textbooks and a schedule that you adhere to. Read the textbook. Do the homework.
    The professor is mostly a companion who tells you to work harder.

    Time frame is irrelevant. Or at the very least, it will work itself out. Just keep moving forward.
  27. #852
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    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    I see being told I can't smoke a plant as oppression. I don't see anyone telling me I can't smoke cabbage, even though it's likely to be equally as dangerous. I could be earning a decent income.
    I get that. This is why is masochistic of you to be resigned to remain in that culture.

    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    They owe me a living.
    lol.
    entitlement.
  28. #853
    Quote Originally Posted by MadMojoMonkey View Post
    The language of theft is off topic. We're talking about whether or not unemployment insurance is, on the whole, helpful or hurtful to the society as a whole. Furthermore, we're exploring whether the net -EV for the society as a whole dominates the net +EV for the few who use the program (or if it is a + at all).
    This isn't what we're exploring. We're exploring why something that is +EV in a vacuum is no longer +EV when other factors are applied. If it was correct that UI benefits are +EV outside of their vacuum, it would also mean that welfare benefits would produce prosperity and the more of them we have the more prosperity we would have; therefore, if only we could give everybody $5k every month, we would all be super well off and the economy would be gangbusters.

    Since what I guessed you meant was wrong, I don't know what link you're making between employee theft and anything else.

    Help me with the context, then. I don't understand your metaphor.
    Go back to my post on that. In just one paragraph I outlined how employee theft is +EV in a vacuum but -EV when outside the vacuum.


    His anecdote expresses why he feels the way he feels (right now), and is not a compelling argument for why I should feel anything. Furthermore, even if I had the same feeling, it gives no notion of whether this feeling is in line with a helpful model of reality.
    The link is just about employee theft. The way economists use blogs is to provide small tidbits from credible perspectives.

    Yes, I brushed it off. I will brush off any attempt to elucidate which relies on emotionally charged language as its foundation.
    Except this never happened. Are you high? No, seriously, are you like really high right now? You initially said theft is not theft then you quickly said theft is theft and now you're saying theft is not theft. You don't realize you're saying this because you're not paying attention. You tell yourself you're paying attention, but your posts say otherwise.


    I dont know what I'm belying. I just want a conversation with the emotions stripped out of it so that we can learn what all economists would agree on, without dispute. If there is no subset of the field for which this occurs, then I am bored of the field and it can exist w/o my input, like so many things in this world.
    Economists agree on most areas of the field with as little dispute as is possible. You haven't yet shown that you seem to care what that is though. Granted, the stuff that most economists talk about is not the undisputed. Here's a neat intro to the concept:



    Take some time and go through several videos on that channel. It's mostly short and simple material from a whole host of different econ PhDs.

    My competitive advantage is in focusing on logic-based systems. I am flummoxed by emotion-based systems. I have nothing to offer that someone else couldn't do better.

    If the field of macroeconomics is truly this untested, then I'm absolutely bored with the conversation and I'm sorry if you feel I wasted your time.
    It's as if you think these comments aren't total crap. Protip: they're total crap.
  29. #854
    Quote Originally Posted by MadMojoMonkey View Post
    lol.
    entitlement.
    They have taken away viable options for me to be happy and productive. This isn't about entitlement. It's about compensation.
    Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
    ongies gonna ong
  30. #855
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    I can't keep up in the thread either, but someone said something about the scientific peer review process and it being good.

    It's not, it's complete shit. http://www.vocativ.com/culture/scien...ic-publishing/

    With the exception of physics, most sciences are trapped by a few businesses, with reform anticipated...but far away.
  31. #856
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    I see something about fraud. Fraud is, generally, lying for pecuniary gain.

    But it's much more complicated. That's more of a test to see if you should be thinking "hrm, better make sure I'm not doing fraud".

    It's jurisdictional based, but I've seen it have as many as 9 different elements, that each need to be met.

    Also, not fulfilling a contract is likely just a breach of contract. But falsely claiming to have fulfilled it is a completely different story.
  32. #857
    I assume that claiming to have fullfilled the contract would be signing a statement to the effect of "I hereby state that to the best of my knowledge the information I have provided is true and complete", rather than showing a man a list of jobs "applied" for which he nods at then asks if I've had any replies?

    I'm very cautious about what I actually claim by signature, I read the statements carefully.
    Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
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  33. #858
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    Signatures or whatever only matter in an evidentiary sense. If you're accused of fraud, you say "not uh", and they have no proof...then you win. In 'murica (using English common law), they have to show you lied, knew you were lying, intended on them relying on your lie, and more. But if all they got is "well, I think he lied", then everyone has a good laugh and you go your merry way.

    But a signed writing isn't an element of fraud, so it's not necessary to prove guilt. It could be any lie for pecuniary gain, so long as it met the other elements are met.
  34. #859
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    It should be noted that signed writings matter a great deal in contract and property law generally, just not so much for criminal fraud.
  35. #860
    Quote Originally Posted by JKDS View Post
    I can't keep up in the thread either, but someone said something about the scientific peer review process and it being good.

    It's not, it's complete shit. http://www.vocativ.com/culture/scien...ic-publishing/

    With the exception of physics, most sciences are trapped by a few businesses, with reform anticipated...but far away.
    Dude, this article doesn't show a dysfunctional peer review process. The best case it could would be tangential in that government subsidies to universities are indirectly making participation in review more exclusionary than it otherwise would be. But of course it wouldn't do that since it seems the author wants government to take it over and make it "free".

    Paywalls for publications are not bad. If we didn't have paywalls, we'd still be watching just variety shows on three fucking channels on small tube screens.

    The peer review process is extremely robust. If it wasn't, we'd be seeing a collapse of scientific institutions themselves.

    BTW this is an example why data alone illuminates nothing. You can find any graph to tell you any story you want.
  36. #861
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    I'll retract part of my statement, but the point that peer review is still in need of vast improvement still stands.
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    When there are no regulations in place regarding a certain activity, that activity operates in a free market. The timeline regarding pretty much all market activities has been

    1. no regulations, people do as they please
    2. things go to shit, because people do as they please
    3. regulations are put in place
    4. things are still pretty much shit
    5. free market advocates come about and say everything would be sweet, if only there were no regulations

    The burden of proof to show that other regulations are indirectly affecting said activity, is on the proponents of free markets.

    Case in point: whaling and shark fishing

    When there have been no regulations in place, whales and most species of shark have been or are fished to extinction. When there are (or have been) no regulations in place to limit excess fishing, why didn't the market adjust to protect the environment?
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  38. #863
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    Quote Originally Posted by CoccoBill View Post
    When there are no regulations in place regarding a certain activity, that activity operates in a free market. The timeline regarding pretty much all market activities has been

    1. no regulations, people do as they please
    2. things go to shit, because people do as they please
    3. regulations are put in place
    4. things are still pretty much shit
    5. free market advocates come about and say everything would be sweet, if only there were no regulations

    The burden of proof to show that other regulations are indirectly affecting said activity, is on the proponents of free markets.

    Case in point: whaling and shark fishing

    When there have been no regulations in place, whales and most species of shark have been or are fished to extinction. When there are (or have been) no regulations in place to limit excess fishing, why didn't the market adjust to protect the environment?
    Overfishing is solely caused by the ocean being a common good. They aren't owned by anyone so it's a gigantic tragedy of the commons. The only ways to mitigate that problem are a) allow private individuals/companies to own and trade the exclusive fishing rights to parcels of the ocean, or b) remove the concept of international waters and divide the responsibility for taking care of the oceans evenly among the states. B is the weaker option but would be a lot better than the way things currently are.

    Please give more perceived examples of number 2 in your post. I will try to shoot them down if I can. I believe there are many fewer market failures than you think there are.
  39. #864
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    I think of it this way: regulations were invented to serve a purpose. Most civilizations have thought it prudent to make things like killing and stealing illegal, and I think there's a reason for that. Similarly, before employers were mandated to provide their employees a minimum wage, they were not. Something brought up the need for defining and regulating them.
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  40. #865
    Quote Originally Posted by CoccoBill View Post
    When there are no regulations in place regarding a certain activity, that activity operates in a free market. The timeline regarding pretty much all market activities has been

    1. no regulations, people do as they please
    2. things go to shit, because people do as they please
    3. regulations are put in place
    4. things are still pretty much shit
    5. free market advocates come about and say everything would be sweet, if only there were no regulations

    The burden of proof to show that other regulations are indirectly affecting said activity, is on the proponents of free markets.

    Case in point: whaling and shark fishing

    When there have been no regulations in place, whales and most species of shark have been or are fished to extinction. When there are (or have been) no regulations in place to limit excess fishing, why didn't the market adjust to protect the environment?
    It isn't that when there are no regulations, there is a free market. It's that when there are no regulations from a monopoly (government), there is a free market. It appears you're operating under the impression that government is the only avenue to set standards and without government things are a free-for-all. Like Renton pointed out, a key component of freedom is private ownership. We don't recommend things like making resources open to all without any rules regarding them. When something is supposedly "public", it needs government intervention to keep tragedy of the commons away. But the better solution is to allow prices to work and allow individuals or organizations to own and operate what they can.*

    Private property has a far greater record of conservation than government. Whales and sharks are victims of not having this conservation avenue.

    I think of it this way: regulations were invented to serve a purpose. Most civilizations have thought it prudent to make things like killing and stealing illegal, and I think there's a reason for that. Similarly, before employers were mandated to provide their employees a minimum wage, they were not. Something brought up the need for defining and regulating them.
    If we're talking about people and communities operating by rules, sure. If we're talking about a violence monopoly, it's a little different. The state has always been foremost about self-protection. Take the laws and norms affecting roads for example. Their most important, highest priority function is to provide state-owned vehicles swift access. State agents are mostly allowed to subvert state laws as long as they're acting in its interest. This is not true only where there are constitutional restrictions against the state.

    You are correct that "something brought up the 'need' for minimum wage". But that doesn't mean the need was real or the prescription healing. Minimum wage is a great example of what every economist learns in academia being subverted by the desires of the populace. It is understandable that people don't understand economics (it's as complex as any other science), but we have always lived in a world where being uninformed on economics is not a barrier to voting on it. My guess for why this is is that macroeconomics is too disassociated from daily life. People think mandating higher wages is better because they see their wages rise and these things are often indeed better for them in a vacuum. But the vacuum is just a fraction of the effects, and they ultimately result in worse results for everybody.

    The same principle exists in poker. Shoving KK is pretty much always +EV unless it's against somebody so tight that they only have AA. How we vote on economics only gets so far as the "shoving KK is mostly +EV..." part.

    If you take anything away from this, take this: the anti-statist argues against a monopolist regulator, not rules and regulations that are privately endorsed and enforced. If people want people to stop using pot, I want them to have to pay for it instead of getting a monopoly to support them. The reason is that when people have to pay for things with their own efforts, the costs hit them. This changes both the amount of power they wield and their opinions about these things. But when they can just vote for a politician, a policy, or provide a sentiment, and it goes through a convoluted mess where once mandates are set they are virtually impossible to unset, we end up with dogshit.



    *I really want to go into greater philosophical depth with this, but I'm not sure how well that would go over. The short of it is that this principle of freedom of choice is what we use for most aspects of our lives where we would be abhorred to consider allowing government to intervene. None of these things are inherently any different to other things. Economics is at play when dating the same way it is with education, and neither are "special" in a way that they need a monopoly to set standards (there has yet to arrive a theory for why monopolies could be good in the first place). How livid would you be if the government regulated your personal relationships? Imagine I defended the government's intervention in personal relationships, and you had to formulate your arguments against me in the most meaningful way you could. For a while you would say "get the fuck out!", which is what anti-government people say, yet that's blown off as non-serious. So let's say I blow you off and say that isn't a good enough explanation. Then you argue against government intervention using logic and academic theory and data. Wouldn't you sound like Renton and I do now? You'd be saying all about how personal relationships work better without government intervention, how leading field experts agree, how the history and data are obfuscated, and how we're using a type of rationale to defend government that we wouldn't dream of doing elsewhere.
  41. #866
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    Quote Originally Posted by CoccoBill View Post
    I think of it this way: regulations were invented to serve a purpose. Most civilizations have thought it prudent to make things like killing and stealing illegal, and I think there's a reason for that. Similarly, before employers were mandated to provide their employees a minimum wage, they were not. Something brought up the need for defining and regulating them.
    You're kind of appealing to tradition though. It's certainly a reasonable assumption that things are the way things are because they needed to be that way at one point in time, but it's also quite true that human beings of previous generations did a lot of really dumb things and didn't have as much collective knowledge to act on as we have today.

    I'm pretty dismayed that you see an apt comparison between the minimum wage and laws against theft/murder. We can split hairs here all day on what government's role ought to be, but it is clear that protecting people from bodily harm is a much higher priority for the state than meddling labor market. The minimum wage is one of the most easily debunked government policies. Basically any economist who isn't a Marxian or a Keynesian agrees that it is counterproductive.
  42. #867
    Quote Originally Posted by Renton View Post
    Basically any economist who isn't a Marxian or a Keynesian agrees that it is counterproductive.
    I think that's more a subset of neo-Keynesians. A handful of economists did not learn that minimum wage is a good thing in academia. They all learned it increases unemployment and the several reasons why and the unintended consequences, but a handful of the pundit class of Keynesians changed their tune circa 2007.

    If I had to guess, I think the reasons behind it are the polarization of politics and the revenue sources of economists who moved towards media. The media adores cherry picked data-mining and consumers of media like pro-labor appearances, so we get a perpetuating cycle where a handful of economists have started saying things like "well, you never know..." Then half the country sees this and thinks minimum wage is probably okay. Bad economists, even when they make up just <5% of all economists, do a ton of damage.

    It's like the EU experiment. Lots of economists said it was a bad idea and shouldn't be done, but the political will was huge and a handful of economists within that political agenda did what they could to make it look like it would work. Now the EU is hot garbage for the exact reasons economists who stuck with their education said it would be.
  43. #868
    Killer line

    Socialism and welfare-statism, like nationalism and racism, are based on appeals to solidarity — solidarity that is enforced at gunpoint, if necessary. That appeal is more than a decent-hearted concern for the downtrodden or the broad public good. It is, rather, an exclusionary solidarity, a superstitious notion that understands “body politic” not as a mere figure of speech but as a substantive description of the state and the people as a unitary organism, the health of which is of such paramount importance that individual rights — property, freedom of movement, freedom of speech, freedom of association — must be curtailed or eliminated when they are perceived to be insalubrious.
    From here http://www.nationalreview.com/articl...ism-left-white
  44. #869
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    I don't equate killing and minimum wages, just bringing up two different examples. Theory may show that min wages are a bad thing, empirical evidence shows otherwise. Standard of living is better in countries with higher minimum wages. Now, is this an unrelated consequence or are there some externalities the theories have left out, I don't know. Either way, I don't think it's a slam dunk for free markets as you claim, mainly because of the main point of my comment, which I feel you both evaded. Not having minimum wages has been tried, everywhere, in every society. In pretty much each of them it didn't work, and minimum wages were enforced.

    The point about private ownership though is intriguing, I'll need to digest that a bit.

    BTW EU is in trouble mainly because countries with weak economies were let in. For 15-20 years prior to that it was doing pretty good. But apart from that, in theory, what's bad about opening borders and allowing free moving of resources between countries? It's not unlike the US but with more autonomy for the member states.
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  45. #870
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    Countries with high minimum wages tend to be rich countries. Those countries are rich for a complicated lot of reasons that have little to do with minimum wage laws. In a way, they have the "privilege" of being able to have their high minimum wage laws because they can afford to. That doesn't mean its the best way to do things. If you have any empirical evidence in support of the minimum wage that is more than circumstantial, I'm happy to see it.
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    I wouldn't get stuck in this issue especially when I'm not necessarily for minimum wages, there are better methods. For example where I live we don't have a minimum wage, we have collective bargaining. Personally I'm probably in favor of a basic income, but I think all of these options are better than no guarantees at all.
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  47. #872
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    A universal basic income no strings attached is actually a hell of a lot better than a conventional welfare state in a lot of ways. Of course, only if it supplants the welfare state, and doesn't add to it. The problem is, any government that tries the UBI is going to also give free healthcare, huge restrictions to the way businesses operate, so it will end up just bankrupting the country. But if you got rid of all of that shit and just took money from rich people and gave it directly to poor people, and let the free market be as free as it could be under those conditions, I would consider the situation to be much-improved.
  48. #873
    Quote Originally Posted by CoccoBill View Post
    I don't equate killing and minimum wages, just bringing up two different examples. Theory may show that min wages are a bad thing, empirical evidence shows otherwise.
    Empirical evidence doesn't show otherwise. If it did, the theory would change.

    The results of studies are mixed. But the problem with all of them is they're poorly designed. I can't say to what degree of difficulty it would be to study what minimum wage does to the economy, but it's at least a few magnitudes more than what any of the studies to date have done. Most economists believe that most of the least indirect effects of minimum wage hikes are of less hiring of marginal workers. Zero studies on minimum wage have come close to being able to analyze this. What we do have to work with is extremely sound theory related to supply and demand and an overarching view of the natural rate of employment. The theory is that the higher above market rate minimum wage is the higher the natural rate of unemployment will be. When we look at various economies, we see this. But even then, nobody has been able to isolate that it's the minimum wage specifically that does this, but more broadly welfare, regulations, and taxes and how they influence incentives.

    Standard of living is better in countries with higher minimum wages. Now, is this an unrelated consequence or are there some externalities the theories have left out, I don't know. Either way, I don't think it's a slam dunk for free markets as you claim, mainly because of the main point of my comment, which I feel you both evaded. Not having minimum wages has been tried, everywhere, in every society. In pretty much each of them it didn't work, and minimum wages were enforced.
    Every known instance of rapid economic growth and social mobility has not involved minimum wages. They have all included massive deregulation and zero welfare. It hasn't happened just once, but many times, and there are no known exceptions. Welfare-statism arises in societies that have already become economic powerhouses and their growth rates greatly reduce after the welfare state is enacted.

    If you have time, I'd watch these



    Every modern country once did what half the world is today doing. The example of China should be enough to discard the concept of welfare altogether, since it has outperformed what anybody thought possible just a couple decades ago, and it has done so by way of its government deregulating the market. The government still has a long way to go and the journey will still be quite tumultuous, but China has no welfare, a fully open street vendor market, and pretty much zero zoning regulations. I don't think you could find an economist on the planet who would say those aren't easily the most significant factors in the China miracle. It's not the only example. Some SE Asian countries have been taking business from China because wages have grown so rapidly there that the cheaper labor in SE Asia has a hand in the game. If Cambodia had a minimum wage where it could not do this, its people would not be rising out of poverty like they are today. Hong Kong is a good contrast to China since it is culturally the same but more free.

    BTW EU is in trouble mainly because countries with weak economies were let in. For 15-20 years prior to that it was doing pretty good. But apart from that, in theory, what's bad about opening borders and allowing free moving of resources between countries? It's not unlike the US but with more autonomy for the member states.
    I agree with open borders and free trade. My comment on the EU was specifically about the common currency. The EUR is basically the Deutsche Mark and the ECB treats it as such. Its monetary policy revolves around what's good for Germany, not what's good for the EU. Most economists saw this problem coming a mile away, including some of the most "liberal" ones.

    You are also right that weak economies being let in are a problem too. Greece lied and the Mediterranean countries are not culturally industrious yet maintain heavy welfare states

    Here's a pretty great post and discussion I read yesterday tangentially related to the subject. Some points conflicting, but most very insightful.

    http://www.themoneyillusion.com/?p=29868
  49. #874
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    Two things.

    1. Not sure where this fits into th e debate but I thought it was quite interesting
    http://www.vox.com/2015/7/21/8974435...k-life-balance

    2. Min wage for food service industry in new York just went up to $15ph so according to what we've discussed we should see a bunch of people laid off and mechanisation of the service? Or will the price of a big Mac go up?
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  50. #875
    Quote Originally Posted by rong View Post

    1. Not sure where this fits into th e debate but I thought it was quite interesting
    http://www.vox.com/2015/7/21/8974435/switzerland-work-life-balance
    Switzerland has arguably the most well-run government on the planet. It also indubitably has the best mix of geography and culture of any state. It isn't really a nation-state. It exists for the reason of common ground between all the various European countries that realize that even through war, they all need an unaffiliated entity that can protect their assets. IIRC Switzerland's government has the lowest amount of counterproductive business regulations in the world, and its culture attracts almost exclusively productive and/or wealthy people. Additionally, it's a state with competent monetary policy smack dab in the middle of a confederation of states with abysmal monetary policy. Monetary policy isn't sexy and it doesn't get much attention, but it's the red blood cells of the economy. It's not a miracle creator, but it is deterministic of how good or bad an economy can be.

    Without making this any longer, the short of it is that complexities of societies are so great that you can't say a specific policy will have a specific result. For example, even though a certain policy may reduce productivity and overall prosperity in the American south, the same policy will likely go unnoticed in a country several times richer and less diverse. That doesn't mean the policy isn't bad, but effects are relative.

    FWIW I think the true capacity civilization has for annual growth is >10%. Given that growth is currently around 2-3% and people tend to think that's a natural rate unaffected by policy, my speculation seems ridiculous. Regardless, there are about a billion different ways to increase or decrease growth, and countries can do all sorts of bad stuff if they do enough good stuff. The ratio matters too. An example is in countries like Denmark and Sweden. The left likes to prop them up as success stories of high tax and high welfare systems (while ignoring a much larger percentage of those countries that have shitty economies), yet what's really going on is that Denmark and Sweden have some of the most sensible regulatory policies in the world. They're vastly more market oriented than the US's regulatory system, and the effect is so powerful that the countries can afford to throw money away in some programs that the US can't.

    2. Min wage for food service industry in new York just went up to $15ph so according to what we've discussed we should see a bunch of people laid off and mechanisation of the service? Or will the price of a big Mac go up?
    I don't know. Probably all of the above. Given that it's statewide, it could have some seriously awful effects in the rural areas. I don't know how bad, but in many places outside NYC, $15/hr is really close to the median wage, which means every entry level and/or shitty employee will make about the same amount of money as those who have been working and moving up for a decade or so. This is a recipe for disaster.

    Mostly what I think this will do is make it so that prices in the rural areas are so high that the restaurants lose business. It should reduce immigration to the rural areas and possibly increase it to the cities, but overall it should be lower than it otherwise would be. The ultimate result will probably be harm for the regions with the least amount of economic activity and some tangential benefit for entrenched special interests in the city. Which is the way the left likes it. "Fuck the hillbillies, they're not even real people. We want to live elite lifestyles on our liberal arts diplomas and perpetual table-waiting jobs".
  51. #876
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    I remember ITT there was a video about the merits of price gouging.

    I would be interested to hear views on the recent news about the pharmaceutical CEO who raised the price of a drug used to protect AIDs and cancer patients by 5,000%. Each pill costs about a dollar to produce. The guy claims he needs to make a profit, but it seems there is a lot of scope to reduce the price for moral reasons given the large margin he seems to be making and the barriers to entry for competitors?

    Seems in this instance price gouging is a bad thing since the product is not scarce and therefore the argument about allocation according to greatest need does not apply.
  52. #877
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    Quote Originally Posted by pantherhound View Post
    I remember ITT there was a video about the merits of price gouging.

    I would be interested to hear views on the recent news about the pharmaceutical CEO who raised the price of a drug used to protect AIDs and cancer patients by 5,000%. Each pill costs about a dollar to produce. The guy claims he needs to make a profit, but it seems there is a lot of scope to reduce the price for moral reasons given the large margin he seems to be making and the barriers to entry for competitors?

    Seems in this instance price gouging is a bad thing since the product is not scarce and therefore the argument about allocation according to greatest need does not apply.
    Government adds a couple of important wrinkles to this situation:

    1) Intellectual property laws make it far too easily to monopolize. It's an open debate among free-marketeers of how IP should be handled, but its pretty universally agreed that the current set up is pretty fucked up.

    2) FDA. It costs millions of dollars and years of time and taxpayer dollars to approve any new drug. There is a lot of evidence to suggest that the FDA has resulted in far more deaths of patients waiting for drugs than lives saved by bad drugs prevented from market distribution. There used to be set limits for how long the FDA could take to approve a drug (i.e. less than 2 years) but they've thrown that shit out the window. The result is that drugs do not come in a diverse array of slightly different flavors in fierce competition like candy bars, but instead each specific type of drug only comes in one or two flavors which are often owned by the same huge pharma corporation. The FDA is an enormous barrier for entry by competing suppliers.

    Yeah, by all accounts this guy seems like a dick, but he's exploiting a situation that could never exist in a free market. This is one of the many situations in which a government takes a huge shit on the people by default, and the expected response is for the people to embrace government to clean it up. So then when government steps in and stops this guy from gouging the price, dozens of other drugs will be scrapped for fear that the government will prevent them from selling at market prices. Remember, new drugs costs millions to research and develop, submit for FDA approval, and ultimately produce on a large scale, and the investors expect a return on all of these costs. Often, a big return, since this is the type of business model that has high volatility: even if the drug makes it through the FDA gauntlet, it may bomb when it hits market. A price control (or the spectre of one) would make taking such a risk unfeasible.
    Last edited by Renton; 09-23-2015 at 07:31 AM.
  53. #878
    Is this not a prime reason medicine should be 100% state controlled? This case pretty much sums up my problem with capitalism. Profit is the motivation here, not public health.
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  54. #879
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    Cliff notes of what Renton is about to post: the private sector is far better equipped to innovate better drugs and the public sector's approach to medicine would result in resources wasted on a huge scale?
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    Without profit the incentive to dedicate years to education and millions to research is removed. I mean, who's going to pay for it?
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  56. #881
    Quote Originally Posted by rong View Post
    Without profit the incentive to dedicate years to education and millions to research is removed. I mean, who's going to pay for it?
    I find it hard to believe that people don't see the problem here.

    Without profit there is no incentive.

    That demonstrates everything wrong with the world we live in.
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  57. #882
    Who pays for it here Dan? In the UK, there is a profit cap to stop this very thing from happening. Meanwhile poor people can get the drugs they need on the NHS. It's not a problem here. Yet.
    Quote Originally Posted by wufwugy View Post
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  58. #883
    When we say that profit is the only incentive, we're basically saying that it's only worth our while doing something if it personally benefits us. This is what I mean by "everything that is wrong with the world". Capitalism breeds selfishness, even when it comes to medicine.

    Why isn't public health an incentive? Why does it take a private company with profit in mind to develop drugs? Why can't a government with public health in mind develop drugs?
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    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    Who pays for it here Dan? In the UK, there is a profit cap to stop this very thing from happening. Meanwhile poor people can get the drugs they need on the NHS. It's not a problem here. Yet.
    There's plenty of drugs and medical procedures we don't have access to that people go abroad for and pay privately to access.
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    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    When we say that profit is the only incentive, we're basically saying that it's only worth our while doing something if it personally benefits us. This is what I mean by "everything that is wrong with the world". Capitalism breeds selfishness, even when it comes to medicine.

    Why isn't public health an incentive? Why does it take a private company with profit in mind to develop drugs? Why can't a government with public health in mind develop drugs?
    It often takes people to dedicate their lives to understanding these things. How will they live? Feed themselves? Pay for equipment and materials and trials and lab space etc if they can't earn money from it. It all takes resources. Where are the resources coming from? Someone has to pay for it.
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    Also if the government took it all on themselves they'd be crap at most of it and wouldn't have enough resources or skills that a company who specialises in one area would achieve through economies of scale. It would be a case of Jack of all medical areas and master of none.
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  62. #887
    There's a difference between profit and costs, dan. Things like wages and R&D are costs, not profit. Drugs can be sold at a price that covers the costs without the need for shareholders to be paid dividends. When it's in private hands, subject to market conditions, the drugs will be sold at whatever people are willing to pay for it, and when we're talking about life, people will pay whatever they can borrow. The excess isn't helping R&D, this isn't paying doctors' salaries, it's making shareholders rich.

    If medicine is in public hands, then drugs will be sold at the lowest price possible to cover costs. It's in a nation's interests to ensure public health is as optimal as can be. There is no need for any other incentive other than public health.
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  63. #888
    Quote Originally Posted by rong View Post
    Also if the government took it all on themselves they'd be crap at most of it and wouldn't have enough resources or skills that a company who specialises in one area would achieve through economies of scale. It would be a case of Jack of all medical areas and master of none.
    And why is this? Because the top doctors can get paid more privately than by the state, and that is because essential drugs are allowed to be sold privately at profit.
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  64. #889
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    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    There's a difference between profit and costs, dan. Things like wages and R&D are costs, not profit. Drugs can be sold at a price that covers the costs without the need for shareholders to be paid dividends. When it's in private hands, subject to market conditions, the drugs will be sold at whatever people are willing to pay for it, and when we're talking about life, people will pay whatever they can borrow. The excess isn't helping R&D, this isn't paying doctors' salaries, it's making shareholders rich.
    it's the reason shareholders invested their money. Without it they would have invested it elsewhere. It seems you think it's OK for the provider of evert resource to make a profit, so the provider of labour gets paid, the provider of all of the things you have called costs gets paid, but the providers of capital for some reason shouldn't.
    If medicine is in public hands, then drugs will be sold at the lowest price possible to cover costs. It's in a nation's interests to ensure public health is as optimal as can be. There is no need for any other incentive other than public health.

    if it's in public hands, who is going to provide the capital?
    .
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  65. #890
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    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    And why is this? Because the top doctors can get paid more privately than by the state, and that is because essential drugs are allowed to be sold privately at profit.
    Well not really, no. The market were talking about is huge. R&D budgets for pharmaceutical companies are huge. If the government tried to do it all it would be smaller budgets for each area. Smaller budgets means less resources which equates to less success.
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  66. #891
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    http://www.forbes.com/sites/matthewh...ing-new-drugs/

    Average cost per new successful drug: $12bn
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  67. #892
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    FYI didn't read article, just Google lent to first source.
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  68. #893
    if it's in public hands, who is going to provide the capital?
    Umm... the government, obviously. They can still sell the drug at a reasonable price to cover costs. So the net cost, in a perfect world, would be exactly zero. Give or take a billion and we're in business.
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  69. #894
    I'm basically talking about removing the profit incentive by having the government invest in all these things, who then recoup their losses through fair pricing. Their incentive is public health. When it's a private investor, he prices the drug to cover costs, and to make profit. His incentive is profit. The latter results in higher pricing of drugs, and the end result is that seriously ill people are at the mercy of hedge fund managers.

    How can anyone think this is right?
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  70. #895
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    I find it hard to believe people wouldn't be ok with taxes going towards drug r&d.

    I also agree that for many people, profit is not a priority.
  71. #896
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    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    There's a difference between profit and costs, dan. Things like wages and R&D are costs, not profit. Drugs can be sold at a price that covers the costs without the need for shareholders to be paid dividends. When it's in private hands, subject to market conditions, the drugs will be sold at whatever people are willing to pay for it, and when we're talking about life, people will pay whatever they can borrow. The excess isn't helping R&D, this isn't paying doctors' salaries, it's making shareholders rich.

    If medicine is in public hands, then drugs will be sold at the lowest price possible to cover costs. It's in a nation's interests to ensure public health is as optimal as can be. There is no need for any other incentive other than public health.
    The part you're missing is that the price is not a objective quantity. The same product can be made by different means and for different costs. You don't seem to have a problem with the free market when it results in toothbrushes that cost $0.30*, a price that could never have existed if not for a massive economy of scale and fierce competition. You only hate the market when the result is something that only the rich can afford.

    *I verified this at a 7/11 in thailand, it was Colgate brand.

    Yes, you may be right that a state-based healthcare system will charge only as much as is necessary to cover the costs. But the problem is that it is hard to know how much the cost truly should be without market feedback. With no market pressure, there is much less incentive to economize and innovate. When Samsung and HTC are competing over Android market share, the trend is for either phones to improve in quality or decrease in price. It doesn't matter that they are doing it for profit, the product is still ultimately cheaper and better than it would be if it were produced by a state-based smartphone monopoly.

    As for government's hand in healthcare in general, I'm inclined to believe in an "all in or all out" stance. I think the U.S. has the worst of both worlds. I'd rather see a total healthcare state than this hybrid shit, but total free market healthcare would be the best option BY FAR. I think you would be surprised at how cheap healthcare could be if it weren't for all of the regulations and bureaucracies.
  72. #897
    You only hate the market when the result is something that only the rich can afford.
    This isn't true at all. I hate the market when it allows hedge fund managers to hold sick people to ransom. We're talking about medicine here, not yachts. I don't see why medicine needs the competition of markets to value it. It's worth whatever the government need to charge to recover costs. JKDS, the taxpayer isn't paying for this, they are investing in it.

    idk, I mean I don't really have a problem with private companies where their profit is capped at a reasonable level. It's when sociopaths like this guy take the fucking piss, you really see the ugly side of capitalism.
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  73. #898
    I hope you'll read this Ong

    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    Is this not a prime reason medicine should be 100% state controlled? This case pretty much sums up my problem with capitalism. Profit is the motivation here, not public health.
    Renton described a situation where the government is the cause of a problem. Your response is to solve the problem of government intrusion with government intrusion.

    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    I find it hard to believe that people don't see the problem here.

    Without profit there is no incentive.

    That demonstrates everything wrong with the world we live in.
    Please think about what you just said. You have argued for the position you're against. The position you hold is supposed to say "profits don't create incentive".

    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    Who pays for it here Dan? In the UK, there is a profit cap to stop this very thing from happening. Meanwhile poor people can get the drugs they need on the NHS. It's not a problem here. Yet.
    This situation is like if you put a 2 ton dead weight in the trunk of your car and then you say "well the only way to keep the vehicle functioning is to alter its structure and engine". The price control is like making a really really really bad policy into just a really bad policy. The solution isn't to achieve the really bad policy but to avoid the really really really bad policy.

    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    When we say that profit is the only incentive, we're basically saying that it's only worth our while doing something if it personally benefits us. This is what I mean by "everything that is wrong with the world". Capitalism breeds selfishness, even when it comes to medicine.
    I've posted video of Milton Friedman answering this question several times. Adam Smith's most famous quote is about it: "It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest." This is an extremely well understood phenomenon in economics. It is covered in literally Chapter 1 in my Econ 101 textbook. A market economy creates a greater amount of good for the people precisely because both producers and consumers act in their own self-interest. The seller wants to optimize his profits and the buyer wants to minimize his costs. A market consists of multiple buyers and sellers, so only the fittest survive.

    Why isn't public health an incentive? Why does it take a private company with profit in mind to develop drugs? Why can't a government with public health in mind develop drugs?
    Because that incentive is weak. It may not fit your moral ideal, but the reality of the world does not give a fuck what anybody's morals are. History has demonstrated countless times and the academic science known as economics has total consensus that the incentive to create a good for your own purposes and pleasures far outweighs the incentive to create a good for an elusive abstract communal narrative.

    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    There's a difference between profit and costs, dan. Things like wages and R&D are costs, not profit. Drugs can be sold at a price that covers the costs without the need for shareholders to be paid dividends. When it's in private hands, subject to market conditions, the drugs will be sold at whatever people are willing to pay for it, and when we're talking about life, people will pay whatever they can borrow. The excess isn't helping R&D, this isn't paying doctors' salaries, it's making shareholders rich.

    If medicine is in public hands, then drugs will be sold at the lowest price possible to cover costs. It's in a nation's interests to ensure public health is as optimal as can be. There is no need for any other incentive other than public health.
    Intro to Microeconomics or Intro to Macroeconomics would disavow you of these false statements.

    The economic principles that govern the most trivial of pleasures (like arguing on the internet) are the exact same that govern the most serious of desires (like staying alive). There is an assessment of opportunity cost and marginal benefit for EVERY decision regardless of the fact that typically people aren't cognizant of those things. When those decisions are subsidized and displaced, there is less incentive for frugality, which in turn increases demand and thus raises costs for everybody else. Government subsidized healthcare is extremely expensive in every iteration there is (including NHS), but market ones are several times less expensive. Markets always reduce costs and increase goods relative to government intrusion and subsidization because markets are more capable of achieving efficiency.

    Your method has been tried many times and failed so badly that poor health was unfathomable compared to today. While the NHS is an example of this same method, it exists within an economy that engages market principles in enough other ways that the anchor of your healthcare system is only able to have so much negative effect.

    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    And why is this? Because the top doctors can get paid more privately than by the state, and that is because essential drugs are allowed to be sold privately at profit.
    This is false. Medical salaries are enormous precisely because of government. I have given bullet points for why like five or so times on this forum, probably twice in this thread alone. I don't have the time to do it again. Just make sure you acknowledge that governments have many laws on the books that very directly (and many more that do so indirectly) bloat medical salaries. Ever wonder why it's almost impossible to work in medicine without devoting a decade of your life and six figures to the endeavor? It has NOTHING to do with the market of medicine or the skills and desires of the population, but it does have everything to do with laws.

    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    Umm... the government, obviously. They can still sell the drug at a reasonable price to cover costs. So the net cost, in a perfect world, would be exactly zero. Give or take a billion and we're in business.
    This doesn't happen. It never happens in government, but it always happens in markets. Fun that.

    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    I'm basically talking about removing the profit incentive by having the government invest in all these things, who then recoup their losses through fair pricing. Their incentive is public health. When it's a private investor, he prices the drug to cover costs, and to make profit. His incentive is profit. The latter results in higher pricing of drugs, and the end result is that seriously ill people are at the mercy of hedge fund managers.

    How can anyone think this is right?
    I explained already some of why this isn't true. I'll add that your version has been and is constantly tried. Your belief is held by the vast majority of people. It is the majority type of policy the world uses. Yet, there is no academic backing for how it has created the goods that consist of our living standards, while there is academic consensus in economics that its functions are what have done so. This is only a debate among non-economists.

    Quote Originally Posted by OngBonga View Post
    This isn't true at all. I hate the market when it allows hedge fund managers to hold sick people to ransom. We're talking about medicine here, not yachts. I don't see why medicine needs the competition of markets to value it. It's worth whatever the government need to charge to recover costs. JKDS, the taxpayer isn't paying for this, they are investing in it.

    idk, I mean I don't really have a problem with private companies where their profit is capped at a reasonable level. It's when sociopaths like this guy take the fucking piss, you really see the ugly side of capitalism.
    What you are describing you don't like are monopolistic elements. The solution you are prescribing is an unfettered monopoly.
  74. #899
    Quote Originally Posted by JKDS View Post
    I find it hard to believe people wouldn't be ok with taxes going towards drug r&d.
    I am against it because it's pretty inefficient and wasteful, which means it decreases the total amount of R&D in the economy. I agree with the sentiment that R&D is good. People are right to have that sentiment. But the way to optimize that outcome is to do the opposite of have government tax for it.

    I also agree that for many people, profit is not a priority.
    For who? I mean, sure, for sooooooooooome people who don't need to engage it, but really, go take away the motive for somebody to profit and he's going to live on the street and not afford basics.
  75. #900
    Quote Originally Posted by pantherhound View Post
    I remember ITT there was a video about the merits of price gouging.

    I would be interested to hear views on the recent news about the pharmaceutical CEO who raised the price of a drug used to protect AIDs and cancer patients by 5,000%. Each pill costs about a dollar to produce. The guy claims he needs to make a profit, but it seems there is a lot of scope to reduce the price for moral reasons given the large margin he seems to be making and the barriers to entry for competitors?

    Seems in this instance price gouging is a bad thing since the product is not scarce and therefore the argument about allocation according to greatest need does not apply.
    The behavior is temporary in markets. The higher the price, the higher the pressure to increase quantities sold, even when the resource isn't truly scarce. What keeps the behavior from being temporary is, you guessed it, bad laws. There are millions of examples of things being horribly overpriced purely because of bad laws.

    If this situation perpetuates, it's not the fault of economics and capitalism. Economics explains why the situation doesn't perpetuate without government intrusion.

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