Earlier quoted context omitted.
What if you go to war or the other country chooses to impose economic sanctions?
As long as it goes both way, that seems like a good way to prevent wars.
One of the main ideas when they founded the EU.
Doctors Say Shortage of Protective Gear Is Dire
101–110 of 145 posts
Re: Doctors Say Shortage of Protective Gear Is Dire
#102Earlier quoted context omitted.
How do I learn more about this regulation?
No idea. They told me by email. And it makes sense for normal times. It's probably in a procurement regulation or guideline.
Sure, but why do all of the smaller firms absolutely need cash right now? If they sell to a government or large entity, payment is all but assured. Even if they have a high discount rate, they can factor that into the price. There's no way they all need the money now to remain in operation.
Re: Doctors Say Shortage of Protective Gear Is Dire
#103Earlier quoted context omitted.
What I'm getting at is that if you're talking tens of thousands of dollars for an order there's a far greater number of people who can put an advance towards that than if you're talking hundreds of thousands or millions per order. Hospitals (public and private) in the Bay Area are publicly talking about sourcing PPE from non-medical vendors (e.g. construction companies) and nurses are protesting in front of hospitals…
> If you can ballpark it I'll ask around. About $0.5 to 0.6 for surgical masks ex factory. My email is in the profile if you got a hospital or similar. Not selling to consumers for now.
Tried to reach you but @vix.cc bounced the email
Can you contact me? (Email in my profile)
Re: Doctors Say Shortage of Protective Gear Is Dire
#104Earlier quoted context omitted.
That seems like a complete non sequitur, but it reminds me of an old joke. 1. Elect people who don’t believe in government 2. Get shocked when they do a poor job. 3. ??? 4. Profit More seriously, I don’t think this is the kind of situation where people are ever going to be happy with how it’s handled. But, governments can do a better or worse job.
It doesn't matter if the people running the government believe in it or not. Central economic control doesn't work.
Then why is USA so afraid of China?
Re: Doctors Say Shortage of Protective Gear Is Dire
#105Earlier quoted context omitted.
Let's go to the source of this problem - Corn/Wheat lobbyist paying off lawmakers in DC. This is the root cause of American sell out. It is an awful system that needs to be completely dismantled, criminilized and banned. Please don't tell me about how each special group has the right to lobby... this is an asymmetrical game. As the corn/wheat lobbyists lobby, who is opposing them? No one. And, as their interests are…
'... democracy is the worst form of Government, except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time...' What's your proposal for how to ban lobbying?
https://berniesanders.com/issues/money-out-of-politics/
You could vote for him if you're in the US.
Re: Doctors Say Shortage of Protective Gear Is Dire
#106Earlier quoted context omitted.
Look at farming subsidies as an example. The government funds some percent of our food production by putting in place limited price and production controls for American-produced goods. The hand of the market is not completely removed: producers still want to be as efficient as possible. The cost of food has gone down over time. And inefficient producers still go bankrupt. Is this a good model? I have no idea. It cert…
My grandmother born around 1900 said what happens when you don't have some government market coordination is damaging boom bust cycles in agriculture. Farmers chasing last years profits tend to over produce, prices crash and farmers go bankrupt. And if you don't keep your poor urban workers fed really bad things happen politically. I think there can be a lot of debate about the mix of subsidies and price controls. Bu…
While corporate farming gets trotted out as the Boogeyman anytime subsidies are discussed, and is indeed an issue, there's still a lot of non-corporate farming.
And it's a hard life.
You go into debt to buy machinery and raw materials (seed, fertilizer, pesticide) you need to generate competitive yields...
Then it doesn't rain. Or it rains too much. Or the weather is too good in Asia, depressing the global price.
And all it takes is a few years of the above, and the bank is foreclosing on property that may have been handed down to you through generations of family,
How does that make you feel as a person? And even if everything goes right, what does worrying about that constantly do to you?
Farm subsidies are a messy business, fraught with peril, but farmers can't just up and move like most of us. So I'm not unsympathetic to the underlying compassionate goal (even if the realization may be perverted).
I guess the closest analogy for many would be being a web dev, if browsers decided to randomize their compatibility with all standards every year. And you needed to take out a loan for a laptop and tooling.
Re: Doctors Say Shortage of Protective Gear Is Dire
#107Again severe failure on the govt’s part. Their inaction in when it was needed the most led to all these circumstances that makes it ripe for situations like these. As the number of infections spread and economic situation get worse these kind of things will get really really bad. Once the second and third order effects kick in it’s going to be a catastrophe. And our leaders answer to all of this is to give $1200 chec…
> Again severe failure on the govt’s part. Just imagine how bad it would be if we turned industry over to the government to run, too.
Would private industry have won WW2 on its own, or put humans on the moon? That’s the level of commitment and organization that is now required. Private industry is great at many things, but sacrificing profit for a shared goal is not one of them.
Re: Doctors Say Shortage of Protective Gear Is Dire
#108Earlier quoted context omitted.
Look at farming subsidies as an example. The government funds some percent of our food production by putting in place limited price and production controls for American-produced goods. The hand of the market is not completely removed: producers still want to be as efficient as possible. The cost of food has gone down over time. And inefficient producers still go bankrupt. Is this a good model? I have no idea. It cert…
> It certainly has drawbacks. (Ex: we subsidize too much corn and wheat.) Huge drawback right here, corn (high fructose corn syrup, corn itself) and wheat are both at the center of the obesity epidemic and health crisis. It's a point that's often brought up and isn't controversial at this point, but inertia makes it hard to correct, especially with said subsidies.
Corn and wheat are damn healthy when consumed raw. Individual trends and desires are the problem, not wheat or corn. Shredded wheat is one of the healthiest foods to eat. So is whole corn.
Re: Doctors Say Shortage of Protective Gear Is Dire
#109Again severe failure on the govt’s part. Their inaction in when it was needed the most led to all these circumstances that makes it ripe for situations like these. As the number of infections spread and economic situation get worse these kind of things will get really really bad. Once the second and third order effects kick in it’s going to be a catastrophe. And our leaders answer to all of this is to give $1200 chec…
> Again severe failure on the govt’s part. If you live in a democracy, then you are part of the government. You can't just blame other people for this.
This is flippant pablum. The majority of voters did not choose the current administration.
Re: Doctors Say Shortage of Protective Gear Is Dire
#110Earlier quoted context omitted.
> If you can ballpark it I'll ask around. About $0.5 to 0.6 for surgical masks ex factory. My email is in the profile if you got a hospital or similar. Not selling to consumers for now.
Tried to reach you but @vix.cc bounced the email Can you contact me? (Email in my profile)
Done. You put an `I` instead of `L`.