[extropy-chat] Extinctions

[Lee Corbin]

Bill K writes

> [Lee wrote]
> > I'd be willing to bet that 70% or more of health costs can be
> > traced to the failure to have a free market in health care,
> > and to regulation.

> Luckily, I don't bet. :)  This claim is wild speculation based
> on your economic beliefs.

Sorry for using a specific number. A Chinese colleague tells me
he means "most" when he says 70%, so it's really his fault.

> Even with the present regulations and the FBI and the DOJ, health care
> fraud is estimated to be around 10% of all health expenditure.

I was speaking of free market *efficiencies*, not fraud. But fraud,
now that you mention it, is often worse when the government gets
involved. Yes, it's complex: there is less fraud in supermarkets
than in auto repair.

> If you took away the regulation and gave the crooked entrepreneurs a
> free run you would be lucky to get *any* treatment that did not have
> some element of fraud and rip-off attached.

If you say so. Funny how markets work for everything else but
wouldn't work here.


Damien S. writes

> > More and more these figures are almost meaningless unless broken
> > down by ethnic group at least, and perhaps SES too.
> 
> Other countries have poor people and immigrants as well...Looking
> at ethnic group and SES may matter for evaluating one's own personal
> risks; not so much in evaluating a system as a whole, unless you
> think some people don't count.

Of course I didn't mean that!  I mean that you cannot compare
Luxembourg and Brazil, nor, really the U.S. and Europe. Too 
much lumping!  The "U.S." and "Europe" are each just too
diverse internally.

> Even in the US, black women live longer than white men.  It's
> black men who really suffer.

Yes. But a big part of that is that their medical needs are
somewhat different. Despite the taboos, every day you (now)
read about the differences. Yesterday there was an article
on how black women have better hearing than anyone. For
reasons just having to do with race, blacks don't live as
long as whites even after you correct (as you must!) for
SES and other environmental differences. It is not God-given
that all subgroups are exactly equal in all parameters.

> > Not just areas!  :-)  Unless you want to include districts
> > within the large cities.
> 
> ?  I mean, what's the point here?

What I said above.

> > I'd be willing to bet that 70% or more of health costs can be
> > traced to the failure to have a free market in health care,
> > and to regulation.
> 
> But we have more of a free market than other countries...

Oh yeah?   Well, basic medical care is free for everyone in the U.S.
who can't afford it. (I'll write a new post.) But even so, it would
be worse to socialize it, as I'll argue.

Lee