|
On February 04 2012 13:19 SoLaR[i.C] wrote:Show nested quote +On February 04 2012 12:31 red_b wrote:
well I cant fault your for identification of causes, but your understanding of the effects is deeply flawed and based on ideology as opposed to actual statistical inference.
your claim; that imposing a scandanavian system on the US would automatically result in disaster, is CLEARLY conjecture.
unwillingness to test models that work is not surprising coming from someone who buys into the hilarious argument that the models do not scale without any historical basis for it. several empires throughout history scaled up mercantalism which was demonstrated to be flawed and did not fall apart. please provide a historical example of where the scandanavian model was scaled up and failed. Perhaps I was a bit unclear. The scandinavian countries are successful not because of their current bias towards socialistic systems, but rather they have hit some fortunate timings that have disguised their free market successes. Such a scenario has never played out quite so well in the US. Nevertheless, the main issue involves the origins upon which the scandinavians have built their current system and the wrongful assumptions that government involvement had anything to do with it. Sweden for example was considerably poor until the 1860's when the industrial revolution swept through and led to huge strides in economic growth. Until the 1950's they were largely free of government intervention and had successfully avoided involvement in WW2, leaving their industries intact. Following this boom was the dramatic increase in welfare legislature and government spending in the 50's-70's that lead to considerable distress and the first ever instance of the Social Democratic Party losing in the general elections. Astrid Lindgren, author of the Pippi Longstocking children's series, even wrote a very well-received satirical piece involving a character named Pomperipossa who wondered why the government took increasingly more as her workload increased. What did happen during that time was the North Sea oil boom which offset the stagnation of it's economy during the 70's and kickstarted several petroleum-based industries throughout Europe. The success they're witnessing now is directly related to that oil boom of the late 60's combined with a transparent government that spends wisely on a demographic that is largely homogeneous in it's desires and needs. These are factors that have not been afforded to the US.
It's kind of annoying when you keep mixing up the different countries in scandinavia in your argument which pretty much invalidates it... Did you just wikipedia scanidanavia or something? You throw in a few accurate facts with completely inaccurate facts and conclusions. Great way to make an argument.
|
Where did I mix up countries?
Did any of those not happen in Sweden?
|
Excellent, the thread is back to comparing small population, specialized corporatist economies with centralized economic focuses to a massive and diverse economy where the distributive effect of laws, GDP and resources is fundamentally different.
|
On February 04 2012 13:31 SoLaR[i.C] wrote:
@santimonious: I've never insulted Scandinavian countries. In many ways they have more freedom than the US. This is something quite admirable. Do I think that there are parts of their systems steeped in hive-mind collectivism that could use improvement? Absolutely. Look a few posts above for the origins of success within Sweden.
I would argue that the vast majority of their success have resulted from North Sea hydrocarbon production. Naturally, people don't like to admit that private companies working for profit have a diffusive dynamic with regard to their wealth and the economic success of nearby countries. Instead, most choose to attribute success with the ideals they know best, in this case, morality based on Christian ideology that stresses the importance of providing for your neighbor.
Ironic as Republicans are usually religious zealots.
|
On February 04 2012 18:16 SoLaR[i.C] wrote:
Where did I mix up countries?
Did any of those not happen in Sweden?
Uh yes... At least in the context you put it.
But whatever, believe what you want to believe, I have little interest to discussed the history of Sweden in a republican nomination thread. If you create a seperate thread for this I might pitch in.
Btw, I'm not saying the Swedish system would work for the US, if you think I'm arguing that point.
|
On February 04 2012 18:16 SoLaR[i.C] wrote:
Where did I mix up countries?
Did any of those not happen in Sweden?
You need to have credible sources when your telling natives something about their own country that they themslves are not aware of. 
|
Hmm why is it that the scandinavian countries did so well during the crisis in the twenties? Long before the vast natural resources kicked in. Also you shouldn't forget that the money and resources are definately there in your wonderful and free US, but few persons own alot. Wouldnt it be better the other way around SoLaR[i.C]?
|
On February 04 2012 10:21 aksfjh wrote:Show nested quote +On February 04 2012 09:40 Hider wrote:On February 04 2012 08:40 mcc wrote:On February 04 2012 07:30 Hider wrote:On February 04 2012 07:19 mcc wrote:On February 04 2012 06:46 Hider wrote:On February 04 2012 05:47 mcc wrote:On February 04 2012 05:35 Kiarip wrote:On February 03 2012 10:37 aksfjh wrote:
With the exception of housing, which is widely under debate at this moment, the programs you list do things cheaper than the private sector. Education tuitions rose because state budgets have refused to increase funding based on demand for nearly a decade. Military costs went through the roof because we turned to the private sector to help fight the war, instead of sticking to tradition and conscripting. My argument is that when private sector is forced to the compete with the government the prices go up disproportionately to the quality. So all my examples basically on point. I'm talking about costs both private and public. Government drove up the price of education with easy credit, housing with easy credit, medicine with guarantees and subsidies, and military with contracts. These types of economies don't work, you either need to have the whole thing nationalized or privatized without government incentives, and when you're dealing with a situation of individual customers private sector tends to be better, while for something like the military, you obviously want that fully nationalized, but the point is that when you have the two compete you get basically the worst possible situation. I might agree with you on this partially. But I would add that private sector tends to do better only if the customer has at least some ability to actually judge the service at least somewhat objectively. Healthcare is one of those where that is not true and consequences of error are often fatal. Education also but for somewhat different reasons. The first part is definitely true. However you underestimate the effiency of the free market. When its difficult for the consumer to understand how the industry works, they have a need. The market can satisfy that need, and new companies will (probably) specialize in explaining how the health care industry works, and how they minizimze their costs in relation to their needs. However when government is in involved in the market, consumers tend to feel "safe". Like believing that government will fix their problems, and hence their isn't a strong enough demand for private companies to deliever a product that makes it easy to judge the services of the health care sector. Operation of healthcare industry is the easier part to explain. The medicine is the hard part. Those meta-companies will be as useless to the consumers as the original ones. And as all private companies in a market where consumer is not able to judge the product even after he used it, they will just be ripping everyone and most successful will be the ones with best PR department that provide least service, but make it look good. It is easily seen in the privatized parts of the healthcare sector all over the world. Of course you can take a hardcore libertarian stance, that the consumers get what they wanted, no matter if they got totally ripped off compared to the "forced choice" of public system. But if you think that displayed preference is always equal to the real preference I do not think we have any common basis to continue without getting into an even bigger tangent. People complain all the time about healthcare system, so no, people are not complacent, but their complaints are mostly totally wrong and just highlighting my point. If those meta-companies doesn't work they go bankrupt. Why wouldn't they work? They will do everything in their power to make the market easy to understand and analyze for their consumers, because that is their product. And if they are to make money some people have to buy their product. Oh they will make money, and people will buy their products, but not because those companies will offer anything worthwhile, but because people are gullible and have extremely limited ability to judge those products. How do you know if you need CT, you ask the company and they will tell you exactly that what will maximize their profit, which is rarely linked to what is necessary to maximize your health benefit. Why can they do so ? Because in areas where products if they are faulty do not leave much space for punishing bad providers by changing preference (you cannot move to another provider if you are dead) and where quality of the product cannot actually be reasonably judged at all by the customer, because even unsuccessful treatment might be the best possible product, how do you leave market forces any leverage to work. Market forces will work as they always do to maximize "market efficiency", but unlike in many other areas that goal is not at all aligned with the goal of providing good medical care, because the feedback loop from customers to providers is highly unstable and unreliable. That was what I was saying that if you consider displayed preference as real preference that is the only way you can make the claim that the system works. Which in this case means that when scared patient buys snake oil from a dealer his displayed preference was to buy a snake oil. You can say since he showed preference for snake oil, market works, as it delivered him exactly what he wanted. Of course I would say that his actual preference was to get healthy, but was too stupid, uneducated, desperate, poor and that transformed his actual preference into buying snake oil instead of buying 1 dollar cheaper antibiotics in the store 10m away. Of course not all people are terminally stupid so the system would not be completely hellish nightmare, but most people are not equipped to make rational decision about most of the medical field, not only because of lack of knowledge but also because of lack of criteria to judge the product in the first place. In the end system would somewhat work, but would be completely inferior to the standard public system in use today. Other things to consider are that moral hazard is much less than in other areas, because of the nature of the offered service. People prefer not to undertake most of the offered services unless they really need to, especially not the most expensive ones. So what happens when a company displays bad behaviour to their customers to maximise short-term profits? Do you think thats a viable long-term strategy? And btw these "meta-companies" do not make money if the consumer buys more (unless they are being paid by the health care companies and thats obv. not a viable long term business model). And why can't the services be judged? Patients can tell about their experiences (how they were treated). Maybe they do not know if they are getting the correct medicin. But that just creates a demand for the health care instituions to have someone (independed private company) to control that what they are doing is correct. Will that cost them a bit of money. Sure it might, but its probably nessacary. Why? Imagine this: You are going to have an operation. You have to options: 1) Get an operation at hospital A for 10.000$. You have no information of this hospital. 2) Get an operation at Hospital B for 11.000$. Hospital has great reviews from customers and the independent companies that has reviewed them give them great grades. What will you choose? This obv. depends on your subjective preferences (obv. the example isn't realistic, as you most likely would have paid by insurance, but the point is still there). So you might argue, what if he company that is supposed to review them get paid by the Hospital. Obivously they have to hide this for the public. Corruption is a threat in any kind of society. But is the likehood of this happening in the free market higher than in the world controlled by government? Most likely not. Because on such an important area there could very well be another company that "regulated these "control-companies", and they would use ressources to investigate if this was happening. And if it indeed was happening, the control"-company would lose all its customers pretty quickly. Hence this would be a extremely risky for the control-company. So you need to remember that the market is aware of all these concerns and they have a solution for them . Maybe the solutions that I represented above aren't the ones the market will choose. I don't know, but the market regulations is much more efficient than the government regulation. Instead of $10,000 vs $11,000, it's has been something like $10,000 vs $50,000. The seller offering it cheaper often has some competitive advantage, so they can lower their prices well below the "standard." Just go look at WalMart.
This is not related to my example.
Here the 1 hospital pays an indepent company to control that they are treating patients correctly. This allows them to charge higher prices as consumers feel more safe getting treatment at that hospital.
|
On February 04 2012 12:41 Kiarip wrote:Show nested quote +On February 04 2012 12:26 SoLaR[i.C] wrote:
Please elaborate. You think our spending on the things I listed is beneficial to the economic system you're proposing?
At least attempt a cogent argument instead of using memes. he's been trolling for a while now.
He's been consistently refuting your and other libertarians' claims derived from theorycrafting by providing factual and historical evidence, but I suppose it's easier for you to put your hands on your ears and claim he's trolling than actually address the evidence he puts right in front of you.
Since you did not reply to my last post, I take it you agree you were wrong on both issues we were discussing.
|
kwizach, I appreciate your kind words but let's be fair; this is not a high school debate and people do not always have the time or desire to respond to every post. or sometimes, things just get lost.
so a non-response does not necessarily equate to a concession. especially because the people you are talking about both belong to a political school which is notorious for its intransigence as well as have in this thread demonstrated repeatedly said behavior.
on a completely different note:
look, I dont believe the Scandanavian model is perfect or even the best possible method. but what we're doing in America isn't working and what they are doing is mostly working. there are certainly aspects of their model which we could painlessly adopt; primary amongst them is adopting an understanding that we have expectations of our government to operate as a tool of society beyond the thin lines put forward by our founding fathers in a time vastly different to our own, and that we must be willing to pay for that.
you know I dont make a lot of money myself (I rely on my parent's income for the time being) and have few valued possessions but I would be happy to make the sacrifice of giving up my M2 or having my own computer, and truly I would only have to give up one of the nice things I own, to ensure that every child in this country can go to a doctor when they are sick and not worry about whether mommy and daddy have a decent enough job to have health insurance. and I am prepared to; literally the second that everyone else agrees to make the same small sacrifice to go ahead and pay for the US to convert to a single payer system. that so many people are unwilling to is baffling to me, that a few even worship the cult of selfishness is heartbreaking.
|
On February 05 2012 01:28 red_b wrote:
kwizach, I appreciate your kind words but let's be fair; this is not a high school debate and people do not always have the time or desire to respond to every post. or sometimes, things just get lost.
so a non-response does not necessarily equate to a concession. especially because the people you are talking about both belong to a political school which is notorious for its intransigence as well as have in this thread demonstrated repeatedly said behavior.
on a completely different note:
look, I dont believe the Scandanavian model is perfect or even the best possible method. but what we're doing in America isn't working and what they are doing is mostly working. there are certainly aspects of their model which we could painlessly adopt; primary amongst them is adopting an understanding that we have expectations of our government to operate as a tool of society beyond the thin lines put forward by our founding fathers in a time vastly different to our own, and that we must be willing to pay for that.
you know I dont make a lot of money myself (I rely on my parent's income for the time being) and have few valued possessions but I would be happy to make the sacrifice of giving up my M2 or having my own computer, and truly I would only have to give up one of the nice things I own, to ensure that every child in this country can go to a doctor when they are sick and not worry about whether mommy and daddy have a decent enough job to have health insurance. and I am prepared to; literally the second that everyone else agrees to make the same small sacrifice to go ahead and pay for the US to convert to a single payer system. that so many people are unwilling to is baffling to me, that a few even worship the cult of selfishness is heartbreaking.
Scandinavian model seems to be working? Any sources for that? If the only reason prices are relatively low is becaus waiting lists are long and the quality mediocore, then thats not really a good argument for scandi health care.
|
On February 05 2012 01:28 red_b wrote:
kwizach, I appreciate your kind words but let's be fair; this is not a high school debate and people do not always have the time or desire to respond to every post. or sometimes, things just get lost.
so a non-response does not necessarily equate to a concession. especially because the people you are talking about both belong to a political school which is notorious for its intransigence as well as have in this thread demonstrated repeatedly said behavior.
I just want to address this real quick by providing context. The thing is, Kiarip _never_ agrees he is wrong on _any_ issue. A few dozen pages ago, I replied to him regarding a very specific claim he had made - it was a blatant fallacy that I proceeded to reveal as such (to give him the benefit of the doubt, he might have legitimately misunderstood the poster he was initially replying to, but that's something he could have easily acknowledge at any point in our discussion and never did). He tried post after post to derail our exchange and muddy the waters by tying the argument to others and bringing up issues that were different from the claim I had addressed. I refused to let him change the subject , and post after post I had to force him to come back to the original claim which he had made and which I had demonstrated to be false. His last attempt at saving face was to start arguing semantics - after initially refusing to go down that road I ended up copy/pasting the relevant Merriam-Webster definition, which supported what I had been saying and contradicted him. Instead of showing intellectual honesty and acknowledging his initial claim was invalid (as well as his claim pertaining to the semantics of the argument), he never replied. The same scenario unfolded a few pages ago when he again tried to both rewrite our exchange to change what it was about and argue semantics. It did not work better for him than the previous time, and I see he's now stopped replying to me again.
Why am I bringing this up? Because it shows how deaf to opposing arguments Kiarip is. It can be frustrating to argue with someone who does not have the intellectual honesty to put into question his own views and who refuses to acknowledge any contradicting evidence, or fallacies in his claims/reasoning. That's why when he was actually cornered and decided to stop replying to me rather than even hint that his initial claim might have been incorrect/misguided, I wrote that I was taking his silence for an acknowledgment that he was wrong. He can't always have his cake and eat it too - if one wants to start arguments, one should also be ready to not always be right.
|
On February 05 2012 01:33 Hider wrote:
Scandinavian model seems to be working? Any sources for that? If the only reason prices are relatively low is becaus waiting lists are long and the quality mediocore, then thats not really a good argument for scandi health care.
I've already posted the world health care rankings, in which every single payer system ranks above the United States.
seriously this thread is a bit like talking to a brick wall sometimes.
|
Red_b, you and I are simply never going to agree. You preach the values of selflessness, and I support the complete opposite, rational and ethical egoism. It's no surprise that we're going to disagree on the governing of people then.
Anyway I'm genuinely curious about a few things. You mentioned that you rely primarily on the support of your parents still: Do you think your views will remain the same when you are self sufficient and providing for your own family? It's easy to underestimate how much going into the "real world" might affect one's views. In my case, I completely changed when I started having to provide for my girlfriend and I during the 2009 economic downturn.
|
On February 05 2012 02:45 SoLaR[i.C] wrote:
Red_b, you and I are simply never going to agree. You preach the values of selflessness, and I support the complete opposite, rational and ethical egoism. It's no surprise that we're going to disagree on the governing of people then.
Anyway I'm genuinely curious about a few things. You mentioned that you rely primarily on the support of your parents still: Do you think your views will remain the same when you are self sufficient and providing for your own family? It's easy to underestimate how much going into the "real world" might affect one's views. In my case, I completely changed when I started having to provide for my girlfriend and I during the 2009 economic downturn.
With out a doubt people grow up a lot when they leave the cocoon of the family unit, it is no different for political and social views. I would have been the one arguing against conservatism when I was still living with my mom and dad, but life experience changes you. This helps explain Red_b's mentality.
|
On February 05 2012 02:11 red_b wrote:Show nested quote +On February 05 2012 01:33 Hider wrote:
Scandinavian model seems to be working? Any sources for that? If the only reason prices are relatively low is becaus waiting lists are long and the quality mediocore, then thats not really a good argument for scandi health care. I've already posted the world health care rankings, in which every single payer system ranks above the United States. seriously this thread is a bit like talking to a brick wall sometimes.
Can't find it. Anyway as I remember a lot of factors that isn't directly related to quality of health care system (like genereal health level of public) is included in those ranks.
Anyway Norway = 11, Sweden = 20, Denmark = 33.
Not really that great either. Denmark barely better than US.
|
On February 04 2012 11:55 koreasilver wrote:Show nested quote +On February 04 2012 10:55 SoLaR[i.C] wrote:
Good god your ideals scare the shit out of me red_b. I'd sooner move to Singapore than live in the scandinavian-esque country you're hoping the US becomes. Thankfully it's not possible. This is some of the most nonsensical things I've ever read. Seeing as how many of the Scandinavian nations have been living very well in comparison to the rest of the world for a rather long time, it's actually comical that you'd even throw such a comment that you'd rather live in one of the most restrictive nations of Asia when all that hangs out of your lips is a demented idea of "freedom".
I am half-joking of course, but Scandinavia is a wonderful place. Sooooo many attractive women.
I really don't understand why people keep saying liberals are anti-freedom. Every human wants to be free (except some BDSM types). Liberals are people too. We like being free. But we should also realize that to some degree, our desire to be free may infringe on other's freedoms. In that case, we must recognize that we are also flawed, or at least that there are enough of us flawed, as shown by history to necessitate rules, punishments to temper our freedoms. Yay social contract.
It's absolutely ridiculous how polarized that the political arena has become. Like, just read the comments section of any online article pertaining to politics. I read an article about how unemployment was down to 8.3%. A bunch of people complained about "OMG OBAMA FUDGING NUMBERS ELECTION YEAR, DEPORT HIM BACK TO KENYA" or "MISUSE OF STATS". Really, the BLS has been extremely trustworthy and used pretty much the same methods since... the 1960's? (At least for CPI I believe). So why is there a problem now? It actually makes me mad, which I suppose is drawing me into the partisan whirlpool.
|
On February 05 2012 02:51 Rabbet wrote:Show nested quote +On February 05 2012 02:45 SoLaR[i.C] wrote:
Red_b, you and I are simply never going to agree. You preach the values of selflessness, and I support the complete opposite, rational and ethical egoism. It's no surprise that we're going to disagree on the governing of people then.
Anyway I'm genuinely curious about a few things. You mentioned that you rely primarily on the support of your parents still: Do you think your views will remain the same when you are self sufficient and providing for your own family? It's easy to underestimate how much going into the "real world" might affect one's views. In my case, I completely changed when I started having to provide for my girlfriend and I during the 2009 economic downturn. With out a doubt people grow up a lot when they leave the cocoon of the family unit, it is no different for political and social views. I would have been the one arguing against conservatism when I was still living with my mom and dad, but life experience changes you. This helps explain Red_b's mentality.
That "growing up" goes both ways. I was a staunch (fiscal) conservative until I went out and experienced life. Then I realized how naive and foolish fiscal conservative ideals can sound. And don't even get me started on social conservatives. Social conservatism in America often just boils down to racism, homophobia, and religious brainwashing. It's absolutely sickening.
I actually find it kind of amusing that you think that more people start to "come to their senses" and think on a more conservative line when they get real world experience when I've found that the overwhelming majority of conservatives I've met are either completely sheltered students that have never had to work a day in their life or those that have been well off their entire life and have rarely (if ever) had to struggle, either fiscally or against social adversity. Of course, we know that this isn't actually true and that there are plenty from the lower classes that are both liberal and conservative, so how about you stop being such a condescending prick?
Scandinavian model seems to be working? Any sources for that? If the only reason prices are relatively low is becaus waiting lists are long and the quality mediocore, then thats not really a good argument for scandi health care.
It's already been repeatedly mentioned about how long waiting lists and crappy care are both myths with very little actual basis. Stop mentioning them.
|
With respect, the 'diagnosis' of being left-wing because of lack of life experience is a fairly condescending non sequitur. Many of us who do provide for ourselves and others still do not buy into hardcore libertarianism.
Edit: Snip, I can't read.
|
On February 05 2012 02:51 Rabbet wrote:Show nested quote +On February 05 2012 02:45 SoLaR[i.C] wrote:
Red_b, you and I are simply never going to agree. You preach the values of selflessness, and I support the complete opposite, rational and ethical egoism. It's no surprise that we're going to disagree on the governing of people then.
Anyway I'm genuinely curious about a few things. You mentioned that you rely primarily on the support of your parents still: Do you think your views will remain the same when you are self sufficient and providing for your own family? It's easy to underestimate how much going into the "real world" might affect one's views. In my case, I completely changed when I started having to provide for my girlfriend and I during the 2009 economic downturn. With out a doubt people grow up a lot when they leave the cocoon of the family unit, it is no different for political and social views. I would have been the one arguing against conservatism when I was still living with my mom and dad, but life experience changes you. This helps explain Red_b's mentality.
Please, don't even try going down that road, you're embarrassing yourself more than anything else.
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
