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The Hidden Cost of Privatization

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Re: The Hidden Cost of Privatization

#131

Post by dragonwriter »

subverter wrote: post #124
frgtpsswrdlame wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you ever considered that your beliefs are utopian in nature? That if we give over everything to the market things won't just solve themselves? Besides healthcare costs are lower in countries where the government intervenes more than ours does disproving the point.

I try to keep an open mind. I don't believe things will just solve themselves, nor do I think the market is the perfect solution. I do believe, however, that it's a better solution than government intervention, and we haven't found a superior solution. Also, source for your second assertion?

The US has the highest healthcare costs in the OECD on an aggregate basis, on a per capita basis, and on a share of GDP basis.

The OECD publishes copious statistics on healthcare expenditures, access, quality, and outcomes: http://www.oecd.org/health/health-data.htm

Re: The Hidden Cost of Privatization

#132

Post by xapata »

rayiner wrote: post #80
subverter wrote: post #46

The problem in Keynes thinking on "social services" is that it's impossible to gather all of the knowledge necessary to ascertain what those would be. That knowledge is dispersed among ~320m citizens (in the U.S.) who each have particular wants and needs. And even if you could somehow attain that knowledge in one place, the likelihood of finding consensus on how a particular "social service" should be offered is next…

> Why do so many oppose such a solution where everyone can much more easily find a place where they agree with the "social services" offered (or not)? Because it creates collective action problems. Countries can exercise their sovereign powers to control commerce and the flow of people so as to reinforce their chosen social welfare systems. If they offer universal healthcare, for example, they can control immigration…

> cross the border as soon as they get sick

One solution is to put a delay on eligibility. In your example, Maryland would provide free healthcare to anyone who has lived in Maryland as a permanent resident for 5+ years. Much like state universities. There's two different costs and in-state tuition is much cheaper. No more freeloading. Or less, anyway.

Whenever someone tells me, "It's too complicated!" I just think they're lazy. I usually don't say it though, to be polite. Instead I try to walk them through algorithmic thinking in a way that doesn't terrify them that I'll automate their jobs.

Re: The Hidden Cost of Privatization

#133

Post by subverter »

bjl wrote: post #125
subverter wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are already solutions available when there's no counter-party or the counter-party is unfit. i.e., uninsured motorist insurance, life insurance, etc. And who's to say the extended family or community wouldn't step up to cover their expenses?

Or, instead of depending on utopic ideals and discredited economic theories, we can just make people buy liability insurance if they want to drive a car.

We obviously have different ideas about what's utopian and what's not. I think it's utopian to believe a centralized, federal government has all of the necessary knowledge and best intentions to make blanket decisions for hundreds of millions of people.

This really goes to prove my initial point in all of this: Why can't we get to a place where you can live somewhere more aligned with your utopian vision, and I can likewise live somewhere more aligned with mine? Why must either of us force our vision on the other?

Re: The Hidden Cost of Privatization

#134

Post by pdeuchler »

Consultant32452 wrote: post #45
yequalsx wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Getting rid of unions will increase income inequality. Just compare for profit higher education with public higher education. The wages/benefits for workers former very much lag those of the latter. Private prisons pay way less too. But the people at the top get outsized pay. The cost savings to taxpayers are not sufficient to justify this inequity.

It's important to apply context to this. A minimum wage, among other things, forces businesses to prejudice against lower skilled workers. If the minimum wage is negotiated by the union to $18/hr but you only produce $10/hr due to lack of experience, disability, below average IQ, or you went to a failing public school then you're simply unemployed. If we remove this contractual minimum wage, you're right, it would li…

The incorrect assumption here is that people earn what value they produce. People actually earn (value_produced - profit + bargaining power). The reason for upping the minimum wage is all minimum wage worker unions have disappeared and an increase in the low skill labor market supply (mostly due to the loss of manufacturing in the US) have decimated bargaining power across the board. Plus, due to automation, a single say, McDonalds worker, "produces" much more value than his counterpart 20 years ago without commiserate increase in salary even accounting for a loss in bargaining power (i.e. the profit variable has shot up, meaning an unequal share in the benefits of the labor).

Of course, that's just the high level theory... using just common sense those same workers are going to be automated away entirely, if the wage is 20 cents or 20 dollars it doesn't matter. So we might as well force companies to compensate them in the short term for their impending unemployment.

Re: The Hidden Cost of Privatization

#135

Post by subverter »

harryh wrote: post #126
subverter wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They can't? How do they force everyone to pay state/local taxes? I doubt states would find it difficult to enforce participation. On "unbridled state to state migration", I already covered that. Maryland would have to face the real cost of providing universal healthcare, and residents would have to decide whether it's still worth it to live there. Many sick people would decide that it's not, and choose to stay put in…

Maryland would have to face the real cost of providing universal healthcare The point is that they would have to face much more than the real costs of providing universal health care because they would have to provide care to a lot of people that never paid into the system due to migration.

There's a good suggestion for dealing with this above: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14556688

Re: The Hidden Cost of Privatization

#136

Post by rayiner »

xapata wrote: post #132
rayiner wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why do so many oppose such a solution where everyone can much more easily find a place where they agree with the "social services" offered (or not)? Because it creates collective action problems. Countries can exercise their sovereign powers to control commerce and the flow of people so as to reinforce their chosen social welfare systems. If they offer universal healthcare, for example, they can control immigration…

> cross the border as soon as they get sick One solution is to put a delay on eligibility. In your example, Maryland would provide free healthcare to anyone who has lived in Maryland as a permanent resident for 5+ years. Much like state universities. There's two different costs and in-state tuition is much cheaper. No more freeloading. Or less, anyway. Whenever someone tells me, "It's too complicated!" I just think t…

See the case I linked. Such laws are unconstitutional because they discriminate against new residents from other states. State universities are a weird special case in constitutional law.

Re: The Hidden Cost of Privatization

#137

Post by harryh »

subverter wrote: post #135
harryh wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maryland would have to face the real cost of providing universal healthcare The point is that they would have to face much more than the real costs of providing universal health care because they would have to provide care to a lot of people that never paid into the system due to migration.

There's a good suggestion for dealing with this above: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14556688

The unconstitutional suggestion? Neat.

Re: The Hidden Cost of Privatization

#138

Post by EGreg »

crdoconnor wrote: post #40
EGreg wrote: post #24

Look, I actually argue for social safety nets. I believe government's role can be defined simply as "ensure that the minimum expectations of society are met", with the full understanding that these expectations (running potable water, medical advances, etc.) increase over time and vary from place to place. I am totally fine with decentralizing government functions to the point of neighborhoods – many of you know that…

>Because when providers compete, quality goes up and costs go down. Public Private Partnerships are not creating competition and that was never their intention. The legal set up of such agreements is set up, in fact, in order to purposely exclude competition. In the NHS it tends to both drive up costs and filter out money to companies run by the friends of politicians. It's simple parasitism. In general, if there isn…

And Keynes made the assumptions that there are no individual factors, cronies, and boosting aggregate demand won't have bad side fx.

Re: The Hidden Cost of Privatization

#139

Post by thingification »

subverter wrote: post #72
bjl wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How do you justify the healthy paying for the unhealthy? Because we live in a society, and in a society people help one another.

I absolutely agree that people should help one another. In fact, it's inherently built in to a lot of people. I'm not arguing against that. I'm arguing against being forced to help others who I have no relationship with, live in far off places, hold different health standards than me, etc. Believe me, if a family member of close friend needed help with medical expenses, I'd be the first to volunteer.

This idea, which lies behind a lot of American libertarianism, says that theft (as taxation is construed here) outranks most or all other moral values, but does not explain why.

Instead, it hopes dogmatically that other moral values will be met as a side effect of following this one.

Re: The Hidden Cost of Privatization

#140

Post by maxxxxx »

TheCoelacanth wrote: post #68
maxxxxx wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Employees of the big agencies in DC make very good money from what I know.

The absolute highest paid government workers make on par with what is typically claimed on HN to be average for an entry-level developer in SV. A typical mid-level government employee makes much, much less.

SV is an outlier. For everybody else the goverment salary with defined pension, health care and job security is a very good deal.
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