Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Workers who cut countertops are dying of silicosis

news.yahoo.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 469 posts

Re: Workers who cut countertops are dying of silicosis

#111

Post by spanktheuser »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #104
mitthrowaway2 wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Canada doesn't have a border with Mexico, but it does have its share of undocumented and under-protected workers. > While there are no accurate figures representing the number or composition of undocumented migrant population in Canada, estimates range between 20,000 and 500,000 persons > Research suggests most undocumented individuals live in large urban centres and typically work in seasonal and informal sectors, s…

A quick search suggests there are 10.5 million in the US. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2021/04/13/key-facts...

A quick search suggests there are 335 million Americans but only 37 million Canadians.

https://www.indexmundi.com/factbook/compare/canada.united-st...

Re: Workers who cut countertops are dying of silicosis

#112

Post by DoughnutHole »

Anon1096 wrote: post #106
mabbo wrote: post #39

What I find interesting when comparing the US the Canada on topics like these is that in Canada, there is self-interest in demanding workers be protected. Like beyond the fact that it's a good thing you do. Because we have a public health care system, funded by taxes, having a large number of young men out of the work force (not paying taxes) and using the health care system effectively means my taxes, everyone's tax…

Perhaps unexpectedly, people dying are usually _cheaper_ for a healthcare system than healthy people. This has been studied a lot with smokers, basically people in old age cost far more than young people and thus a true cost-minimizing system would not be how you expect. Of course, we aren't trying to minimize cost so the premise is flawed.

This is very dependent on the illness.

From a cost perspective it’s best that people die suddenly. If I live a fairly healthy life into my 80s and die of a heart attack, I might not necessarily have cost my insurer that much, as opposed to if I suffer from a chronic illness for 10, 20, 30 years.

Cancer is now usually not a sudden death sentence - treatment is good enough now that most cancers caught early can be treated and patients often go through multiple remissions before it or a complication from treatment finally gets them.

Insurers very much do not want their customers getting cancer, because it is invariable an extraordinarily expensive condition to treat and treatment can go on for years.

Re: Workers who cut countertops are dying of silicosis

#113

Post by lazide »

mabbo wrote: post #39

What I find interesting when comparing the US the Canada on topics like these is that in Canada, there is self-interest in demanding workers be protected. Like beyond the fact that it's a good thing you do. Because we have a public health care system, funded by taxes, having a large number of young men out of the work force (not paying taxes) and using the health care system effectively means my taxes, everyone's tax…

How do you explain the massive push to ban/stop Smoking?

The US is pretty much the only country to successfully reduce it, near as I can tell (perhaps Canada has had success too?).

Re: Workers who cut countertops are dying of silicosis

#114

Post by lazide »

Anon1096 wrote: post #106
mabbo wrote: post #39

What I find interesting when comparing the US the Canada on topics like these is that in Canada, there is self-interest in demanding workers be protected. Like beyond the fact that it's a good thing you do. Because we have a public health care system, funded by taxes, having a large number of young men out of the work force (not paying taxes) and using the health care system effectively means my taxes, everyone's tax…

Perhaps unexpectedly, people dying are usually _cheaper_ for a healthcare system than healthy people. This has been studied a lot with smokers, basically people in old age cost far more than young people and thus a true cost-minimizing system would not be how you expect. Of course, we aren't trying to minimize cost so the premise is flawed.

Eh, depends. COPD, or like the article is about, Silicosis, is a long slow drawn out illness.

Re: Workers who cut countertops are dying of silicosis

#115

Post by [deleted] »

mitthrowaway2 wrote: post #110
DoreenMichele wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A quick search suggests there are 10.5 million in the US. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2021/04/13/key-facts...

On a per-capita basis that's not hugely different, but one of the reasons may be that Canada provides a somewhat easier path, relative to the United States, to becoming a legal immigrant rather than remaining undocumented.

[deleted]

Re: Workers who cut countertops are dying of silicosis

#116

Post by lazide »

mitthrowaway2 wrote: post #110
DoreenMichele wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A quick search suggests there are 10.5 million in the US. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2021/04/13/key-facts...

On a per-capita basis that's not hugely different, but one of the reasons may be that Canada provides a somewhat easier path, relative to the United States, to becoming a legal immigrant rather than remaining undocumented.

Really? I’ve had relatives try to immigrate to Canada (from the US), and it was quite a horror story. Any specifics?

Re: Workers who cut countertops are dying of silicosis

#117

Post by jader201 »

trobertson wrote: post #78
jader201 wrote: post #26

Not long ago, we had our countertop replaced (from quartz to granite). They ended up having to make a cut in it while it was sitting in our kitchen. Our home was in a cloud of dust for several hours, and when the dust finally settled a day later, every surface imaginable was covered in dust. I’m pretty sure none of them wore masks when doing this. I honestly didn’t think to wear a mask either (since they weren’t and…

> Fortunately it was a granite countertop and not quartz. Granites are primarily composed of feldspar and quartz, which are both primarily composed of silica. Silica is the thing that causes silicosis, and when that granite was cut it was clouds of silica dust that covered your home. You were no more safe in that granite dust than you would have been in quartz dust.

Do you have a source? Everything I’m reading [1] says that granite contains 10-45% silica, compared to quartz containing 90%+.

[1] https://www.osha.gov/sites/default/files/publications/OSHA37...

Re: Workers who cut countertops are dying of silicosis

#118

Post by AnthonyMouse »

jmvoodoo wrote: post #94
echelon wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I guess you could tax their victims instead though... they don't have a lobby so theyre probably easier to take advantage of. Nobody is the victim of choosing to eat a cake.

We aren't talking about cake though. We are talking about inexpensive highly processed foods made predominantly from ingredients that are subsidized specifically because of their caloric density. I.e. corn. High caloric density is what you want if you need to be able to feed your country in war, so we subsidize these foods. No one wants to eat just plain corn though, so companies process it into other foods that are…

> Knowing all of this, it makes perfect sense to tax the living crap out of highly processed foods that are made from subsidized ingredients.

The consequence of this would be that the subsidized food gets exported to a country that doesn't tax it, at which point you're subsidizing some other country's food.

The US is also a large net exporter of food, implying there is more than enough domestic production for wartime needs. Also, the US hasn't been in that kind of a war in almost a hundred years and MAD makes it unlikely that it ever would be again. The obvious conclusion is to eliminate the subsidies.

Re: Workers who cut countertops are dying of silicosis

#119

Post by lazide »

duped wrote: post #92
lm28469 wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like giving people an incentive to illegally come to your country ? If there are no difference between coming legally or illegally the choice is easy. Like I could just book a one way flight to LA and become a US citizen because reasons ?

Like how most of our ancestors got here, you mean?

Well, not since ~1882.

https://www.uscis.gov/about-us/our-history/overview-of-ins-h...

That said, overstaying tourist visas (aka just hopping on a plane and then not going back) is a very popular form of illegal immigration into the US.

Re: Workers who cut countertops are dying of silicosis

#120

Post by AnthonyMouse »

duped wrote: post #92
lm28469 wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like giving people an incentive to illegally come to your country ? If there are no difference between coming legally or illegally the choice is easy. Like I could just book a one way flight to LA and become a US citizen because reasons ?

Like how most of our ancestors got here, you mean?

You can either provide social benefits to your country's poor or you can have open borders. If you try to do both at once, you're providing social benefits to the world's poor, and the amount of benefits you can provide from a given tax base falls through the floor.
Post reply on HN