171–180 of 275 posts
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Do any of those people post on HN?
Or exist, for that matter?
My aunt for example really doesn't understand that the government has any limits on their funds at all. She proposed to me that shopaholics should be given money by the government to found their addiction.
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Because social programs get their money from coercion. GitHub doesn't. (To the extent that you think you can find a private company that can and does use coercion, I object to that too.) Even as a liberatarian, I'm happy to say some things are well worth the coercion. But it should never be forgotten , because otherwise people do start thinking it's just free money that has no other concerns whatsoever, and start spe…
I don't think any of the people who think taxes are free money post to HN. Constantly reminding HN posters that "free" government programs actually cost money, like every single other thing in life, just derails the conversation. It serves no useful purpose, because we already know. It's just political grandstanding. Imagine if every single post on HN about the success of some company included comments like, "it's no…
Errr... I don't really have to imagine. That happens pretty frequently. I sort of agree that it's a grandstanding distraction either way.
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This is a great idea, until you remember Finland has a population of about 5 million. LA itself has a population of almost 4 million. While I think this a great idea, it's pretty easy to do with such a small population. Once you start talking about a scale the size of the US, it gets rather spendy in a hurry.
Why don't they chop up the US in 60 Finland sized bits, if it's so much easier to have success in a small country?
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More likely, you prefer not to pay because it costs way more than it should. I am not familiar with analysis of e.g. Day care costs, but Americans pay significantly more for healthcare than Europeans, and get significantly worse results; also, they pay significantly more for education and get significantly less. The party line is that it is a preference - but anecdotally, I've only heard that preference from people w…
More likely, you prefer not to pay because it costs way more than it should. Americans earn 30% more than Finlanders adjusting for PPP . I.e., taking into account higher cost of health care, lower cost of most other things, we still have 30% more on average. Americans do pay more for education than Europeans, but our results are quite good compared to most of Europe. The only reason it appears our educational system…
Yeah, lots of people forget how great we really are once you compare our best to everybody else's average! It's pure bias. Individually (booyah!) almost every one of us is well above average. It's just that there are too many of the others who don't deserve to count.
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This is a great idea, until you remember Finland has a population of about 5 million. LA itself has a population of almost 4 million. While I think this a great idea, it's pretty easy to do with such a small population. Once you start talking about a scale the size of the US, it gets rather spendy in a hurry.
Why don't they chop up the US in 60 Finland sized bits, if it's so much easier to have success in a small country?
A baby box is the kind of thing California would do, if we weren't broke like everyone else. Though, California alone exceeds the population of all Nordic countries combined.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is a great idea, until you remember Finland has a population of about 5 million. LA itself has a population of almost 4 million. While I think this a great idea, it's pretty easy to do with such a small population. Once you start talking about a scale the size of the US, it gets rather spendy in a hurry.
Why don't they chop up the US in 60 Finland sized bits, if it's so much easier to have success in a small country?
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One question I find interesting is to what extent governments should be in the business of building solidarity and shared values. Personally, I'm all for it - but that's a product of my age (40s), location (Scotland) and where I grew up (a small village in the North of Scotland). NB Having a father who served in the RAF during WW2 probably influenced me far more than I realised at the time - my political views around…
I think building solidarity and values is tremendously important, and here's why: what is the government really responsible for? Even as you go down the political spectrum to libertarians (short of anarcho-libertarians), you have consensus that government should at least provide security, from domestic crime and international threats, the enforcement of contracts, etc. Most people would go on to say that it's the gov…
If the majority of voters do not want the government to build solidarity, or to build it against the status quo, then the only way the government can legitimately pursue such an agenda is to label it a constitutional or human right. And that is indeed the language we see used by some to promote universal health care or a living wage.
My pet theory is that homogeneity of culture makes it easier to share wealth.
I think the article is interesting, but they make the claim that the box may have helped lower infant mortality. Is that supported by any data? Would love to see a study, maybe pair Finland with a close neighbor country that does not provide the box etc.
The first thing that I noticed about the box is that all the baby clothes are sex-neutral. Here in North America it's almost impossible to find baby clothes that don't immediately scream "I'm a boy" or "I'm a girl".