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European Commission To Raise Camera Costs in Europe
An anonymous reader writes "According to a recent CNET article, digital camera costs could increase in Europe as result of trade inequalities. 'At the moment, all digital cameras are manufactured outside Europe. They're all imported. All of them. Currently, there's a European Commission-imposed 4.9 per cent import tariff on camcorders, but not on cameras, whatever their video-recording abilities. The EC's Nomenclature Committee has cottoned on to this and wants to slap a tax on cameras that can record at least 30 minutes of video in one go, with a resolution of 800x600 pixels or higher at 23 frames per second or higher. The Nomenclature Committee has recommended the proposal but has not, as yet, garnered the required majority vote.'" Update: 07/23 02:18 GMT by Z : Took out a bit of hyperbole.
So does this affect phones? Slapping arbitrary technical specs on something might later on bleed over into emerging technologies. Hell, I think my phone is almost capable of that... It's not, but it can't be long before your average phone is... So, what's the plans for that?
TLF
I do not respond to cowards. Especially anonymous ones.
Cause if there are people in China who are willing to work for cheaper than people in your country then you best make sure business and consumers can't benefit from that.
How we know is more important than what we know.
The less tax the better, because at it's core government is horribly inefficent, so the less money going to them the better. Sure, they are required to pay for things we couldn't be trusted to pay for ourselfs like police and the military, but taxation to protect local manufacturers who can't compete is crappy economics.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
I foresee special "EU edition" cameras with the video recording function switched off in firmware so it won't qualify for the tariff. Of course manufacturers will "forget" certain cheat codes in the firmware that will permanently enable said functionality. These codes will of course be mysteriously "leaked" to the internet.
Yay. Another tax. If a product is invented, you can be rest assured that the people whos' salaries are paid for by taxes will apply a tax to it!! Let's see, we'll tax your commerce, your income, your morality, your charity... is there anything left???
So why camcorders... and not all the other millions of goods that come from china/elsewhere in general.
To put this in perspective for anyone who's not doing the math, this means the cost of a $500 camera has now increased by *gasp* 25 dollars. You pay far more tax than that when you buy a new car.
with a resolution of 800x600 pixels or higher at
How many cameras can record at a resolution higher than 640x480? I wasn't aware that many non-camcorder cameras were able to do that.
5% is signficant, but it's not going crazy. Also, the vast majority of digital cameras at the moment wouldn't fit in with this definition anyway--800x600 at 23 fps?
It's because of people like you that the US has no universal health care and most students spend half their lives paying of their loans.
It seems to me that with the constant growth & change of the high-tech marketplace the stuffed shirts responsible for levying taxes are going to have to significantly overhaul how taxes are levied in the not-too-distant future. The way this tax appears to be defined it could apply to devices that are not primarily cameras. Mobile phones are close to fitting into this definition. You can also buy binoculars capable of recording to digital media. A similar problem thats already rearing its ugly head is the recent decision by Canada to levy an "ipod tax" on mp3 players. They're already collecting taxes on the sale of music, so this in effect is taxing the end user twice. I'd be willing to bet that somebody in Canada will sue over that soon. Imagine if Canada implemented this digital camera tax and then in a few years ipods started showing up with built-in cameras... You'll end up with devices that are heavily taxed under a slew of "digital rights" taxes.
Someone is losing money somewhere and goes crying to the govt because of poor business decisions.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
It's because of people like you that the US has no universal health care and most students spend half their lives paying of their loans.
Taxation in general is an inefficient allocation of resources with significant deadweight losses.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
How would eBay and other online stores fit into this little plan? I know that most online purchases here in the US aren't taxed, but how about the good old EU?
..there is no domestic European camera industry to protect? As they say in the article, all the cameras are manufactured outside Europe. The purpose of tariff barriers is to protect domestic industry (or so I thought).
This would be really stupid. Slapping extra tax on devices that can create creative content is plain fakin stupid.
It will take the manufacturers all of a blink of an eye to create Euro only models by changing the firmware to limit video capabilities.
Then buyers can change the firmware after they get the cameras.
So that's why we kept the free market during WWII.
Inventions have long since reached their limit, and I see no hope for further development.-- Frontinus, 1st cent. AD
Try, "with no choice but" instead of "willing" in your statement and you're closer to the truth.
If a country had actual slave labour, would you argue against tariffs on products from that country too?
Things are cheap in China for a lot of reasons:
- no labour standards
- no environmental standards
- no intellectual property standards
- no rights generally
- poverty and desperation amongst the poor
Allowing unfettered access to domestic markets only rewards China for doing nothing to change those things.
Read Pynchon.
The street, your seat, the heat, your feet. Oh, and the pennies on your eyes, if you should die.
Rampant carbon sequestration destroyed the Dinosaurs' tropical paradise. I'm here to help repair the damage.
Problem solved. God, politicians are some dumb fuckers. That, or businesses are paying them off to write really dumb laws...hmm... :(
I wouldn't say that government is the solution for everything, but especially in the case of students trying to enter the work force, paying for school can be a nightmare. The government could at the very least be providing interest free loans for students if not actually INVESTING in them in the form of free rides through school. The students will be entering into the workforce and paying taxes soon enough.
Everybody wins - except the loan sharks.
Most of the arguments against government involvement in our day to day lives are an admixture of reactionary opinions of corrupt and ineffective government mixed in with corporatist "free market" propaganda.
Corollary: There should be a law that punished with death penalty any attempts to raise prices.
It find it funny how all these etatists talk about the growing "gap" between rich and poor, while at the same time preventing low-cost goods from entering a country or the European Union. The logical consequence of this etatist argument is that trade barriers should be erected everwhere, between countries, states, provinces, counties, cities, towns, burroughs, and last but not least people. The gap between rich and poor might be gone then, but so will civilization.
EU policy is to use tarrifs to induce industries to locate facilities within the Single European Market. That's what the EU is all about. They're trying not to make the mistake the US did, of losing manufacturing to low-wage countries.
I hardly consider an additonal 4.9% tax, passed along to the consumer as "Yet another wonderful move by your socialist overlords" to be "Going Crazy." It's more of a reason to go out and vote differently next election cycle. After all, you've brought this down on yourselves.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Leica claims to make the M8 digital rangefinder in Germany, so not ALL digicams are imported to the EU.
Regardless, it seems you are stuck on the assertion that taxes are a generally inefficient way to allocate resources.
Let's assume that's true. Two questions arise:
- What about the situations where it *isn't* inefficient?
- Is the inefficiency in the more common cases worse than the alternative?
Interestingly enough, on the topic you replied to, public healthcare in the US is actually *more* efficient than private healthcare. And, even if it weren't, even inefficient healthcare is *infinitely* more desirable than no healthcare at all.
Taxation in general is an inefficient allocation of resources with significant deadweight losses.
That's a load of Republican propaganda (i.e. bullshit). Taxes build the infrastructure (roads, schools, firehouses) that allow the markets to exist.
It's simple: I demand prosecution for torture.
Not that I can tell.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
The "canon" is not a tax. Tax are handled by the state, to pay roads, health care and other things. This one, which is based in size of CD or DVD but normally ends meaning around double price (example 700MB CD has a surcharge of 24 cents, while media price is 19-70 with VAT already included, varies with brand, total quantity in pack or case provided, so it means ~33-125% overprice), is handled by a private organization, SGAE, which for now seems to run without any check like you could ask for official agencies. The "reason" they provide is this compensates for the "private copy" right. Funny you have to pay for rights, and no matter what use you do.
The USA equivalent of SGAE is ASCAP, but the methods are more like MAFIAA ones, asking bars to pay money for music (and then losing in courts after proving the music is CC licensed, or even just not from SGAE members). So please, stop saying it is a tax, it is not, and it is hurting local shops, people that use optical media as backup or transfer media, and making some "musicians" some extra money.
*NM*
To posts that go this way:
It will take the manufacturers all of a blink of an eye to create Euro only models by changing the firmware to limit video capabilities.
Then buyers can change the firmware after they get the cameras.
If that tax accounts for hardware capability down to anything that can record video that is capable of/over 800x600/23fps, in any way (including firmware modification?), pay up.
Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
Let's look at what you said more closely:
Claim: "The less tax the better"
Evidence: "because at it's core government is horribly inefficent"
Conclusion: "so the less money going to them the better."
Even if, "at its core", government is horribly inefficient, that does not mean it's not useful, or even necessary. Of course, sometimes government is exceptionally *efficient*. Your evidence does not support your conclusion, which is just a rewording of your claim.
Then you continue: "Sure, they are required to pay for things we couldn't be trusted to pay for ourselfs like police and the military,"
This completely contradicts your conclusion above. If "the less money, the better", then you can't get better than zero. However, zero and the above are contradictory.
Finally: "but taxation to protect local manufacturers who can't compete is crappy economics."
And funneling your wealth out of the country is *good* economics? Extreme anti-protectionism protects only two classes: the multinational corporations and the extremely wealthy. If you are not in either of those two classes, you are arguing against your own best interests. Congratulations.
Agreed. Globalization as originally envisioned (and argued by supporters) is dead! Cheapness as a metric of success is flawed.
BTW ALL countries practice protectionism to various degrees. From taxes and fees to rules and regulations that need to be met. Either pretend it's all bad and should be eliminated, or realize that it serves a useful purpose, and quit with the dancing around.
Leica makes the M8, a digital rangefinder. It's manufactured in Germany and Portugal. Admittedly, its sales are a drop in the digital camera sales bucket.
"Cause if there are people in China who are willing to work for cheaper than people in your country then you best make sure business and consumers can't benefit from that."
Yes, because hollowing out your locally-controlled manufacturing infrastructure and outsourcing their tasks to a foreign country not necessarily aligned with your ethics or interests, where work is carried out in social and environmental conditions your own nation's citizens consider unethical, is always beneficial to all concerned. And there'll always and forever be an extremely cheap oil-fuelled transport grid on a global scale, and never any possible spike in insurgency, piracy or other kinds of tensions that might make shipping more costly. Importing goods from distant places that could be manufactured locally incurs no energy efficiency costs, and the countries from which we import them will always wish to trade with us and never impose any kind of embargo for military or political reasons. We can fully trust every external organisation with which we deal, corporate or national, even if they are in outright competition with us, the only criterion being that they supply us right now with the absolute rock bottom prices available on the short-term market. Really, it's just common sense - when it all comes down to it, the only evaluation factor we ever need, as thinking humans, for trustworthiness, environmental sustainability or long-term future planning is one single figure: the end-user cash sale price.
Besides, employees are always just a cost factor, after all. It's not like they ever invest anything back in their local economy through purchases. Unlike hard-working executives, for whom every cent in income is a chance to sponsor yet another risky, farsighted, and rational venture that ennobles the human condition.
You are not a brain: http://books.google.com/books?id=2oV61CeDx-YC
Just build cameras that record in 720x576. Or 799x599.
"What exactly is wrong with promoting a regional economy instead of depending on a complex web of corrupt globalist ties?"
Actually I just remembered one downside of globalization. Remember the pet food scare? How about the tainted human food? Those drugs? Medical data for sale? Would the US really have had these kind of problems under our umbrella?
or Americans, for that matter, be forced to bring down our livelihood to help others?
Free trade with places like China amounts to absolutely nothing else but the total undermining of our Western democracies and our respect for human rights. Trade with China says one and only one thing: Western Democracies and Values are not profitable, and the way to be competitive is to be a hell hole like China.
As an American, I say we quarantine the sweatshop block - all nations that are undemocratic and which routinely allow sweatshops, pollution, and worker abuse - and end all trade with them now. Destroy all trade barriers with Western nations NOW. Establish a Western trade block where we renew and strengthen our pledge to cut pollution, enforce human rights, and preserve our Western democracies from being overwhelmed by a handful of wealthy corporate interests.
If necessary, America can build the cameras and ship 'em to Europe, Europe can make the steel and ship it to us.
Yes, this will cost more money for the consumer, but the end result is we will not continue to thoroughly discredit our way of life and reduce the Western world to the horrible nations that we currently are exporting jobs and debt to.
BTW there is nothing in what I said that says Chinese people are bad - those who want to come to the West and participate in Western values, come on over. But by all means leave the "baby girls are a burden - kill them" attitude behind. Is it racist to want to leave the baby killing behind? Fine. It's racist. Bite me. I don't ever, as long as I live, apologize for not ever wanting to buy a single thing from a country whose citizens murder their daughters en masse.
--- Grow a pair, liberals... stop letting the Republicans bully you!
The question is not why still cameras are now considered to be the same as video cameras, the real question is why they are taxing video cameras to begin with!
And the best solution to this "horrible" inconsistency is to abolish the tax on video cameras, not to arbitrarily extend it to other devices.
Hyperbole is to slashdot what Viagra is to an old man.
It's probably because they've got all that extra space in them (where the cassette goes) that a digital camera just doesn't have . It doesn't take a large explosive to do a whole lot of damage on an airplane.
Well since the GP said "my camera is not" and doesn't say what it is the camera could very well be enough space for explosives. I could take my film camera as well as the lenses for it and pack enough C4, semtex, or another plastique to bring down an airplane. My biggest lenses, which isn't big, is large enough to hold half a pound of C4 hollowed out. With a ultra wide or super telephoto lenses I could pack a lot more in the lense. And that's lenses just for a 35mm slr.
FalconShould there be a Law?
Here is an interesting point. Who is this kind of market manipulation unfair to? People in Europe and the US buy goods from China at "below market" prices. That means that the Chinese are getting shafted because they are exchanging goods of greater value for goods of lesser value. Sure, they are building up treasury bills that they can exchange with us for goods and services later, but those will be worth even less when they do get around to spending them than they would be if they spent them today (and today they are worth less than the goods they originally exchanged for them).
What is going on here? The Chinese government is selling labour at below market cost to increase its global influence and finance a rapid build up of industrial infrastructure. In the mean time, Chinese citizens are getting shafted by being forced to work more to gain less personal benefit than other people in the industrialized world. In other words, the government is accumulating power on the backs of Chinese citizens.
Of course, it is impossible for us to reform this situation, since only the Chinese may put a stop to it by telling their government they won't stand for it any longer. Refusing to trade with China will only slow their industrial progress and make the Chinese less willing and able to stand up to these blatant governmental abuses.
In the case of tariffs, the EU is attempting to encourage local manufacturing and reduce trade imbalances
If the EU rally wanted to correct for a trade imbalance then what they need to do is get rid of the 100s of billions of euros in subsidies given to European farmers. Because of these subsidies food grown in Europe can be exported to third world nations and sold there retail for less than farmers there can grow food. That's a big reason the WTO meeting in Geneva fell apart in the summer of 2006. India walked out because first world nations, the EU, Japan, and the US wouldn't cut farm subsidies. India has literally thousands of farmers committing suicide because they can't compeat with farmers who collect hugh subsidies. Slashing US farm subsidies to $13 billion a year is "unacceptable," a Bush administration official said on Wednesday. All these tariffs are is protectionism.
whereas airline "security" is not about making flying safer, but about social engineering, making people more accepting of micro-management from a nanny state, and introducing the perception of safety even though everyone knows that it won't do a lick of good.
Yeap, our overseer lords want us all to believe the only way to keep safe is by having a nanny state. What they're really doing is a power grab, they want to tell people how to live, and if the people won't then force them to live the way they say.
FalconShould there be a Law?
"but it's also the case that there are plenty of instances where the opposite is true."
Can you tell us one time this has been true? I mean, if there are plenty, it should not be a big deal to give us one.
"mposing import tariffs in order to penalize countries that oppress their laborers, that deny them basic human rights, that deny them democratic participation and representation in their government, in my opinion are exactly the sort of cases when countries should impose tariffs."
The sounds pretty noble, and maybe an interesting way to promote life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. The trouble is, they aren't doing this on general principles, they're doing it to promote and protect specific local industries, otherwise, they would raise the tariffs on all Chinese goods. Instead, they're just raising the tariffs on cameras with very specific capabilities. In the end, I don't see how this really helps anyone, save a handful of wealthy shareholders that this tax protects against Asian competition.
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
It's because of people like you that the US has no universal health care and most students spend half their lives paying of their loans.
Yey! I prefer to avoid government-run health care, and like the ability of poor people to be able to borrow to get a good private education at the best colleges in the world.
Yes, I know, it's protectionism, it's nationalism. But until you're willing to declare that we should all be a one world Government, protecting your own country and its people from being sucked dry economically, is a virtue. And if you believe we should be a one world Government, you're asking for much bigger horrors than protectionism and nationalism.
I both believe in international trade and in supporting the local economy. I buy imported stuff as well as local produce, actually as a member of two local coops I support local farmers as much as I can buy buying as much food produced locally, which the coops buy from themselves. As for "world government" I believe in as little government as possible, national or world. Most politics should be local, except when it interfers with liberty.
FalconShould there be a Law?
That's a load of Republican propaganda (i.e. bullshit). Taxes build the infrastructure (roads, schools, firehouses) that allow the markets to exist.
Actually the market has been around a lot longer than socialist schools and firehouses.
Roads, well, you got me there. There really are too many transaction costs for roads to be generally private (with the only a few notable exceptions, and those are usually short highways). Even the Roman government built roads.
Of course most US tax dollars go to Social Security outlays (a Ponzi scheme that funnels money from the poor to the rich), the military (as if we needed another war), and the existing socialized medicine of Medicare (often for rich retirees) and Medicaid (medicine for actually poor people who may actually need some help).
Schools, firehouses, and roads are WAY down the list.
public healthcare in the US is actually *more* efficient than private healthcare.
US private healthcare is over-regulated. Every state has different regulations (imagine if your computer had to have 512MB of RAM in Maryland and 256MB of RAM in New York). There are too many state requirements for what health insurance covers to provide affordable coverage for most people. These regulations can add as much as $2000 to health care premiums.
And there is the WWII era Federal Tax laws that make employer-provided health care tax deductible, while non-employer-provided health care is not. This leads to onlyh 3.6% of Americans having non-employer provided health insurance.
Of course there is no real definition of "health care efficiency." There has been some examination of administrative costs of Medicare versus private insurance, for example. Medicare describes administrative costs as a ratio of processing costs divided by claims.
The claim is that "Medicare administrative costs are about 2 percent of claims costs, while private insurance companies' administrative costs are in the 20 to 25 percent range." The problem is that the average medical cost for a Medicare beneficiary per year is $6,600, while the average medical cost for someone with employer-sponsored health insurance was $2,700. Thus the "administrative cost ratio" is comparing apples to oranges. It also is unclear if the full cost of Medicare fraud investigations and prosecutions is worked into the ratio (private insurance is usually more pro-active in avoiding fraud, which may raise administrative costs, but probably saves overall costs by not paying out fraudulent claims.)
Anyway, I suggest that before we create a fully-socialist healthcare system (as opposed to one that is just ~50% socialized in temrs of health care dollars from Medicare and Medicaid) that we actually de-regulate private healthcare on a nationwide basis.
Taxes build the infrastructure (roads, schools, firehouses) that allow the markets to exist.
Taxes should not pay for all infrastructure, user fees should pay for some. Those roads for instance, they should be built and maintained with a user fee or tax on fuel, which we already pay when we get fuel. As for schools, firehouses, and some other things, property tax should pay for those.
FalconShould there be a Law?
America's wealth and living standards did not come from selling their wares as cheap as possible to other countries. Instead, they stem from America being a natural resource rich country and efficiently turning those resources into products that people like. Getting ever more efficient at this cycle is called "economic growth". (i.e.: when you only need half the amount of people to make the same amount of stuff, the other half can move on to making other stuff)
That is how you are supposed to sustainably industrialize. Buying manufacturing knowledge and equipment on credit from more advanced nations and then operating them by virtual slaves who will do anything just to stay alive, is not.
China, as vast as it is, has those resources too; it doesn't need anyone else. In isolation, they too can become as prosperous as any "western" country if they put their minds to it and are patient.
Imposing import tariffs in order to penalize countries that oppress their laborers, that deny them basic human rights, that deny them democratic participation and representation in their government, in my opinion are exactly the sort of cases when countries should impose tariffs.
Not all tariffs and other trade barriers are to penalise countries. Some are simply to protect inefficient national businesses. For instance the US has barriers on Brazilian sugarcane to protect US sugarcane and sugar beet farmers.
I have been a strong supporter of Ron Paul; he's my candidate. That's my general philosophy toward government
Same here, I voted for Ron Paul in 1988 and if he's on the ballot in 2008 I'll vote for him again.
FalconShould there be a Law?
I'm afraid you do, though I think it's a matter of not expressing yourself clearly.
Sometimes protectionism can benefit a country. Witness the success of MITI in Japan. Beyond that, however, you must ask the question "bad for whom"? What is it that your economics is trying to maximize? Equality? National wealth? Global wealth? Well being? Sustainability? That's a moral choice, whose answer depends on your ethical framework.
Finally, you provide a hypothetical illustration of one form of bureaucratic inefficiency. This is nothing more than anecdotal evidence... except it's not even anecdotal. It's about on the level of, "Take an American worker who watches some TV. If he's watching TV, he's not working. But the poor Chinese peasant seldom watches TV - he's always working. The Chinese also has to focus on the bottom line, because if he is inefficient he'll starve - the American will just end up on welfare."
If you want to show that goverment is "horribly inefficient" - or, more importantly, that it is less efficient than the market - then you need to compare more than just one possible form of government behavior. There are many ways of organizing economic activity, corporations, and governments. Each has its strengths and weaknesses, which vary depending on the government, th esociety in which it operates, the specific activity in question, etc. - and which must be judged relative to what ever standard you choose for efficiency (which is again an ethical question). If you want to show that government is "horribly inefficient" - or that it is more or less efficient than the market for a particular activity - you need to explain what you mean by "inefficient" and then you need to actually make a comparsion - not just cherry-pick an example, then smack your hands together with glee exclaiming: "see! they're horribly inefficient!"
It may be attractive to look for cute "laws" like "the less tax the better". But they don't exist. What you're stating there is not an objective characterization of the worth of goverment: it's a subjective ethical claim. If you really care about this kind of thing, you would be well advised to read some thoughtful arguments by people with varying perspectives, not run around calling people "dolts".
As it happens, I'm with you in this particular case: I susspect it's pernicious corporate welfare. Though frankly, it's small beans compared to many other goverment activities (software patents, copyright extension, barriers to third world agricultural products, etc.).
Zeiss and Leica among them, were decimated. Ask any seasoned photographer who made the better products, and you'll likely hear testaments to the quality of Leica and Zeiss products produced over half a century ago.
Yeap, Zeiss made some of the best optics, lenses. Hasselblad made, and continues to make, quality medium format cameras.
FalconShould there be a Law?
"At the moment, all digital cameras are manufactured outside Europe. They're all imported. All of them."
Is it none? Not one? They are all made outside the EU?
Talk about emphasising a point.
dnuof eruc rof aixelsid
I know that most online purchases here in the US aren't taxed, but how about the good old EU?
Actually taxes are supposed to be paid for online purchases, it's the buyer's responsibility to report the purchase to the state and pay the tax. These taxes go back to catalogue mail orders, however many people don't know this and even if they do not many will report it.
FalconShould there be a Law?
A tax intended to slant the playing field in such a manner that any potential EU camera producer has an immediate advantage when selling within the EU.
However any company trying to manufacture cameras in Europe has a distinct disadvantage, high taxes to support all the social welfare programs. Also there's the high cost of labor. That's why many European companies are moving thier manufacturing over seas.
FalconShould there be a Law?
greed
assignment != equality != identity
I guess that if it is happening we're gonna see on the box written clearly in cubic letters "PLEASE DONT GO TO THIS ADDRESS TO UPGRADE THE CAMERA BECAUSE IT IS ILLEGAL". You hit the point! I add another few examples that come from real life.
:D => Most mopeds built now have a bigger engine castrated by "firmware" (Electronic injection) that consume and perform as much as the previous model BUT fall into the new standard imposed by the eurocrats. Since the engine is more capable there there always been keen people able to trick it for a price (also stands true for BMW limitators on bigger cars).
Italian Limits for 14Y/O motorbikes: A motorbike to be driven by a 14y/o boy has to obej there rules - Cubature Less than 50CC - Less than 5HP - Max speed less than 45Km/h. As we all know anyone riding a bike is hungry power and speed let alone if he's 14 y/o and likes taking unuseful risks. The moped industry adapted promptly => It is usual for those motorbikes to ship with a "diopter" that can be removed by anyone with a little knowledge and a screwdriver - thought the operation is illegal most do it. After the operation you get a screaming monster capable of 80Km/h
Euro3 limits for pollution: These are limits to the quantity of pollution that approved engines can emit. They are classified into classes cubic centimeters. What happens is that if the engine is big enought it can emit more CO2 and still fall into the limits. What was the response of the moped industry?
With broadcast resolution in Europe being less than 800x600 for standard definition, I would have thought that means nearly all cameras are excluded from this tax as most digital cameras only offer PAL or NTSC quality video at best (720x576 PAL or just 640x480 for the blur-o-vision NTSC standard). Both of those resolutions are less than the 800x600 that is mentioned as the tax trigger. Very few still cameras offer 800x600 or higher video recording capabilities so I don't really see how this tax will make any difference.
Private health insurance overhead: 15 to 30% (in other words, for each $100 paid in premiums by insurees, $15 to $30 doesn't go to health care, but instead to marketing, advertising, legal, accounting and executive's yachts)
...)
Public health insurance overhead: less than 2% (no advertising, little legal BS, no shareholders to pay dividends to, no marketing geniuses needed to figure that everyone needs health insurance
But don't take my word for it. Look at the stats.
Developed country with mostly private health insurance (the US):
- Life expectancy lower than all other developed countries
- Infant mortality highest
- Total cost more than twice
Developed countries with mostly public health insurance (all the others)
- Higher life expectancy
- Lowest infant mortality
- Cost at least half
Yay, capitalism!
US private healthcare is over-regulated.
It's less regulated than European countries. Said European countries' health care system is an order of magnitude more efficient. Connect the fucking dots.
How do you become a libertarian? Does it involve being hit on the back of the head repeatedly as a child?
had the highest import duties of all the major countries.
Weird, eh.
The key this the 800x600 resolution. Since all the SDTV and standard DV video formats fit within this resoultion.
NTSC:720x468 (It is actually 720x525, but only 468 lines carry image data, the rest are sync or are unseen. NTSC isn't used in Europe anyway.)
PAL:720x576 (again the actual resolution is 720x625, but only 576 lines are visible)
SECAM:720x576 (same as PAL)
Interestingly, SECAM was developed by the French as a political statement (rather than on technical merit) to protect local manufacturers, since it was so incompatible with everything else. It was only later that another standard was developed, MESECAM, to try to make it more compatible with PAL, but that is getting away from the original subject.
I'm not exactly sure how the EU came up with 800x600, but it seems that most home camcorders would be exempt from the tarrif on this basis. Instead it seems to be solely focussed on HD cmeras, perhaps as a means for preventing people from importing cheap HD cameras and making commercial content with them. I'd say the only people really affected by this are the budding filmmakers, where cheap HD consumer cameras are a good alternative to either film or extremely expensive betacam setups. Of course the manufacturers will feel the pinch too, since these tarrifs will help to discourage the consumer adoption of HDTV camcorders.
It's not that simple, cowboy. Read a bit about Keynesian economics and how it explains the Great Depression, among other things. Also, about the multiplier effect in economics.
It's sorta like this: everyone can produce entirely too much of everything. The laissez faire capitalism of the 19'th century (that so many nerds long for a bullshit idealized version of):
A) only worked in an economy of scarcity, and
B) it wasn't a paradise, either. It produced cycles of bankruptcies, and a drive to cut the wages and demand more work hours after each hit.
Trying to undercut each other's prices always presented the easy option of cutting the wages some more. Unfortunately that had the side effect of reducing how much those people can buy. But the thing is, the wages aren't the only component there. Reducing salaries to half, doesn't also reduce the price of the end product by half, because there are other costs in there too. So essentially it's a losing spiral.
And the culmination of this was the Great Depression, when basically aggregate supply vastly outstripped aggregate demand. If you ploted units-produced vs production costs, and units-sold vs the at which price the market would buy that many, the two curves became parallel. There was no point at which you can sell all that stuff and break even, much less make a profit.
There were some other factors too, but essentially it was inevitable. That was where that downwards spiral was leading, sooner or later.
Where I'm getting at is that since the great depression, most governments _had_ to produce some extra demand. This means essentially requisitioning some of the production capacity to make something else, and create jobs in the process. But since we're not under communism, they can't outright do that, so the way it works is taking some money in taxes or as deficit spending and:
1. directly spending it on stuff
2. giving it to some people who otherwise would have not much to spend. E.g., unemployment benefits, tax breaks for people with kids, whatever. Just as long as someone goes and buys more stuff.
Especially during recession times, deficit spending is crucial to keep it going.
The multiplier effect means that 1$ spent by the government doesn't just create 1$ in employment. If the government gives a big chunk to someone producing tanks, then that factory goes and gives some money to someone producing trucks, and its employees buy cars and food. The company producing the cars and trucks then goes and buys something else with the money. That money circulates and produces more jobs and more money spent at other companies down the line.
Of course, you don't want _too_ high taxes either, because that reduces the multiplier. But basically neither extreme is some kind of ideal paradise. No taxes means no government spending, so with any multiplier imaginable, zero times that multiplier still equals zero effect.
You can see it worked too, because:
I. Look at who got out of the Great Depression when. The countries whose government overspent (e.g., USA with the New Deal, or Germany with its military spending) got out of the crisis fast, those who stuck to "nooo, the government should stay lean and cheap" ideas (e.g., Canada) got to enjoy a jolly good depression until the 40's (when they got dragged into the war anyway.)
II. Ever since we didn't have the bankruptcy cycles that plagued the previous laissez faire economy. Better yet, we've had inflation and unemployment where we want them ever since.
(That's one dirty little secret the politicians don't tell you: the Philips curve. Inflation and unemployment depend on each other, and pushing one down pushes the other up. The best you can do is pick your favourite point on that curve. So
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
haha, more costs for cameras...
Canon used to charge more for their cameras in Ireland. After a small campaign to balance the prices canon agreed that the price system they had was unfair. They raised the prices across euroland to match the Irish prices...
Won't affect SLRs, then. Ironically, cheap compact cameras could end up taxed more than expensive DSLRs.
Why is this on the front page? It's hardly newsworthy.. So, a 500 camera will now cost 525. This will surely hit consumers really bad, because we all buy cameras all the time. If you want to bring attention to protectionist measures, write about the CAP instead, which along with other protectionist measures in other rich countries is the cause of much poverty in the third world.
n/t
Said European countries' health care system is an order of magnitude more efficient.
What is your source of this information?
Well - all the digital cameras I looked at until now could capture at a maximum of 640 x 480 @ 30 fps (expect for models by Panasonic that could do 848 x 480 in widescreen mode).
Are there any models that can film in 800 x 600 @ 25 fps (or even 30 fps)? That would allow a conversation to European PAL without losing quality. Unfortunately I could not find anything like that on the market.
So if you know of a good bridge camera that allows filming in 800 x 600 please post the model name here. And don't forget: Were talking about digital cameras, not camcorders or webcams.
As I said somewhere else, overhead for private insurer = 15 to 30%; overhead for public universal healthcare: less than 2% (true of, for instance, Medicare of French Social Security).
That's an order of magnitude right there.
Cost-per-capita is the typical metric used, and there's no question the US is the least efficient, when examined from that perspective. This is particularly true when you take into account quality and length of life metrics, not to mention percentage of individuals covered.
Sorry, but it's blatantly clear to anyone paying attention that the US is *not* the best system in the world. Does it have the most cutting edge technology? Sure. Is it great for those who can afford it? Absolutely. But if you're one of the 45 million Americans who have no coverage, well, tough shit. Meanwhile, countries with "socialized" medicine have longer average life spans and greater coverage overall.
The true irony, here, is that a large percentage people without coverage are the exact folks the conservatives, aka the big pushers of privatized medicine, espouse to support: families with kids. Typically, these people are making enough money not to qualify for healthcare subsidies, but not enough to actually afford healthcare on their own. The result is parents without coverage because they can only afford to insure their children (I personally know a number of families in this position). And it only gets worse if any of the parents or children have any kind of unusual conditions, as, assuming they can get coverage at all, it's exhorbitantly expensive.
Cost per capita isn't efficiency, it is cost. But I'll agree that US costs per health results do not appear to be efficient, although the exact definition is difficult to define because of the health risk due to genetic or lifestyle differences in the populations (not that many Native Americans living in Europe, for example, and there are significant dietary differences between Americans and Japanese)
Sorry, but it's blatantly clear to anyone paying attention that the US is *not* the best system in the world.
I do agree, health care in the U.S. is too expensive. De-regulate it to allow market forces to work.
We could socialize it and allow government rationing to work, but I'd prefer not having people who oppose embryonic stem cell research and don't believe in evolution running my health care.
I do agree, health care in the U.S. is too expensive. De-regulate it to allow market forces to work.
It's a shame that, IMHO, they simply can't work. The barrier of entry, due to simple costs, basic level of government regulation to ensure public safety, etc, will ensure that only big corporations can really participate in the game. Further, because medicine is a service few can do without, there is little preventing corporations from colluding to screw the customer. See the disaster that is the insurance industry, or hell, Enron, for an example of how "free market" economics often works in such cases. The latter is a particularly excellent example, as, in the absence of regulation, a corporation in control of a necessary resource (in that case, energy) did it's best to screw the customer as efficiently as possible, all in the name of massive profits. <sarcasm>I know *I* would want those same people in charge of my health.</sarcasm>.
Honestly, I simply don't understand this blind faith in the "free market". You people are no different than communists. Complete blindness to the realities of humanity, instead favouring an idealism that is clearly at odds with reality. It's truly bizarre, IMHO.
How about cameras that can record only 29 minutes 59 seconds out of the box, with a do-it-yourself *wink wink nudge nudge* hardware mod that eliminates this restriction?
For cheaper cameras this won't be worth the trouble but for $500 and up ones, it may be worth it.
In particular, high-end still cameras that have video as an afterthought might limit themselves to 22fps or 29 minutes to avoid the tax.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
"Complete blindness to the realities of humanity, instead favouring an idealism that is clearly at odds with reality. It's truly bizarre, IMHO."
This coming from someone who trusts the government to provide efficient long term health care. What's that about power corrupts and something...
You genuinely believe that the government, once it has control of your health care, won't abuse the power? If so then it's you who is showing "Complete blindness to the realities of humanity, instead favouring an idealism that is clearly at odds with reality".
I only go to buffets for the unlimited soft serve.
You genuinely believe that the government, once it has control of your health care, won't abuse the power?
I believe that, if they abuse power, I have the ability to vote them out (trust me, people get very passionate when their healthcare program is threatened). Unfortunately, the same can't be said of a corporate oligopoly.
"I believe that, if they abuse power, I have the ability to vote them out (trust me, people get very passionate when their healthcare program is threatened)."
In other words, you still show "Complete blindness to the realities of humanity, instead favouring an idealism that is clearly at odds with reality".
If they control your health care they control you. It's very easy to say "I'll vote them out" until they make your health care contingent upon something that prevents you from voting them out, or otherwise blunting their power.
And please don't say that won't happen. That level of naivety has no place in this discussion.
I only go to buffets for the unlimited soft serve.
Why should the government subsidize partying? Aside from a few professions (doctors, lawyers, etc), college is mostly a waste. Don't get me wrong, I loved it. I love learning for learning's sake. But the vast majority come out with nothing that will help them do their jobs, outside of a piece of paper. For the costs, it simply isn't worth it for most people. Especially the large percentage that end up dropping out cause it was never for them in the first place.
Connect the fucking dots.
I have, Europe and America are different when it comes to spending. After WWII, America assumed the defense role for the Western world. Half of our money in America goes to war or interest/obligations due on past wars. Now, I for one am anti-war and I think that most of the cold war was easily avoidable. And you can argue that nobody asked America to assume that role (although, I'd say the British did at the very least), but if we hadn't filled that vacuum, European governments would have spent a lot more on defense and a lot less on the social welfare. And with people like Sarkozy rising in France, it would seem that the strain on government programs is rising to a breaking point, despite the military mantle that the US is still assuming.
Actually the market has been around a lot longer than socialist schools and firehouses.
OK, you got me there. How's that bartering for seashells working out for ya ?
It's simple: I demand prosecution for torture.
No. The European public health care system does cost less per person than the American private+public system, but there is no real comparison between the private systems in Europe (which I understand to be minimal) and the U.S.
Regulations and the public health care systems probably do drive U.S. private health care costs up. That said, there is no realistic way to not have many of those regulations/public systems. It is just not feasible to leave it as a completely free market, because while it may be less expensive, it is still not guaranteed.
Stupidity is like nuclear power, it can be used for good or evil. And you don't want to get any on you.
we need to keep our food production locally. Dependence for food on other nations is a big no-no.
For food staples I totally agree. I can't think of a single place that shouldn't be food self sufficient. Now this doens't mean all food just food that's culturally appropriate, like casava, corn, potatos, rice, wheat, and whatever should be grown locally on farm owned and opperated by people living in the area. Some things that won't grow locally, as least not without a lot of inputs like energy and labor, should be traded. For instance a study I read about in the Economist magazine concluded it takes more energy and emits more CO2 by raising sheep in England than it takes in raising sheep in New Zealand then shipping them to England.
That said, I don't agree that they export the heavily subsidized stuff.
Wrong, corn is heavily subsidized yet it exported all around the world. Because US agribusinesses can grow corn then export it to Mexico where it's sold for less than Mexican farmers can grow corn, Mexican farmers are being driven off thier farms. This is one reason there are so many "illegal immigrants" or aliens in and trying to get in the US. Allow Mexican farmers to make a living on their farms and they will stay there.
They should just produce less, and that's often what happens: farmers are paid not to plant stuff.
Yeap, paying farmers not to plant some fields is another subsidy. While I don't agree with many subsidies, I approve of paying farmers to not plant, or ranch, in some places, such as along the banks of lakes and rivers. Instead pay farmers to use them as buffer zones to prevent these bodies of water from being polluted. That's what New York City does, NYC pays farmers in the Catskill Mountains, Catskills, to prevent farm runoffs from polluting rivers that run through the mountains where NYC gets most of it's freshwater. This isn't really a subsidy, the only other way to get the farmers to use buffers is to have a law mandating buffer zones, however such laws are a form of taking without compensating the owners.
FalconShould there be a Law?
those African countries have expressed all sorts of eagerness to supply the EU with inexpensive produce in exchange for lots of shiny, new euros.
Yes, but it would mean outsourcing our food production entirely to other nations
No it doesn't. Not all food stuff grows in Europe, at least not without massive energy requirements and or subsidies. For instance bananas aren't traditionally grown in Europe.
This is about balances of power. You might think that foreign trade with African countries will work, but it has to go both ways: if we are dependent on their food, they need to be dependent on something we produce... Otherwise the "peace producing foreign trade" doesn't work.
Where do you think a lot of diamonds, gold, and oil come from? How about coltan? Coltan is used in electronic equipment, especially cellphones. A lot of coltan comes from Congo, and the mining of coltan fuels war there as warlords fight one another as well as civilians for control of mining areas. Then there are the blood diamonds. Botswana evicts Bushmen from their ancesteral land so diamonds can be mined. Fact is is a lot of natural resources come from Africa, and not all of it helps those who live there.
FalconShould there be a Law?
Think about prices falling and farmers closing up shop and then there is only a few large commercial farms working.
First, the size of farms and agribusiness. Don't you think the US already has large commercial farms? What is ADM, Archr Daniels Midland, if not a large agribusiness? Cargill is another one. Actually Cargill is the largest privately held corporation in the US.
Next, dropping prices and farmers closing shop. As is the case with supply and demand and prices, if farmers close shop reducing supply but demand remains the same prices will rise not fall. While many young people are being driven off farms many urban professionals, especially older ones, are leaving the city life and starting small farms of their own, mostly organic and or specialty craft farms. As it is government gives farmers hugh subsidies, which usually go to big agribusinesses like ADM and Cargill, which distort the market. It's one thing to give small farmers money it's totally different to give money to hugh businesses. I'd rather not have the governemnt give either any taxpayer money. If taxes weren't as high as they are I could show my support for small local farmers by buy more from them.
India should be doing the exact same things. Especially with Pakistan and the border problems they have off an on. The India government could also buy all the imported food, determine the in country fare market value or price and then sell the imports for that price in order to pay for it. Dumping rules should allow this.
India walked out of the WTO meetings in Geneva during the summer of 2006 because they couldn't prevent the importation of cheap European food into India. Because of the distorted market subsidized European food has in India many farmers there are committing suicide. Indian farmer simply can't compeat with subsidized European farmers.
FalconShould there be a Law?
Don't forget using the poor peoples food for ethanol instead of feeding them ;-)
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
I think more taxes should be like this: on your honor. For instance, instead of taking money out of my paycheck, the IRS should just trust me to send in my income tax, without checking for correctness (audits).
I'd get rid of federal personal income tax AND the IRS period. States may have an income tax but not the feds. The federal government can instead tax corporations as well as shrink in size.
FalconShould there be a Law?
Don't forget using the poor peoples food for ethanol instead of feeding them ;-)
Food crops aren't needed to produce ethanol. Instead Switchgrass can b used. Using Switchgrass instead of corn will produce more ethanol than corn will also. Or hemp can be used to make biofuels, it can also be eaten though. Hemp seed oil can be used either for food, there's a salad dressing made with the oil, Hempola, or it can be useds to make diesel fuel. Small farmers can grow either, switchgrass for ethanol production and hemp for food or ethanol. This will create an income for these farmers, so it's not either food or fuel.
FalconShould there be a Law?
Yep, and they could start by downsizing the bloated military, and stopping getting involved in foreign wars of aggression.
I'd shrink the military in some ways, but I'd do more than just that. What I'd do see have a small core of military professionals then a large citizen's army, well military, like in Switzerland. Have almost all heads of household, both male and female, own and keep a rifle in the home and have them practice a few tymes a year as a unit with others. Civilian airline and helicopter pilots can fly military aircraft. And so on.
I'm sorry, but I don't see how we need to start wars in order to keep our economy in good shape; if it is true, then our civilization deserves to collapse.
What many don't consider is that bad economies actually increase the chance of war. Countries start fighting to get what other's have, but with a strong economy and trade nations won't want to upset the applecart.
FalconShould there be a Law?
Sounds good to me. I think Switzerland has the best model for running a nation: make the citizens the defense force, stay neutral in conflicts, and concentrate on having a strong economy and trade.
Yeap, about the only thing I don't like about Switzerland is that it's landlocked. Now if it were Corsica it'd be excellent.
FalconShould there be a Law?
Yep. But at least they have high mountains separating them from outside countries. If they're in danger of a siege, they just have to blow the tunnels and prepare the anti-aircraft guns.
And Corsica also has mountains, as well as the Med surrounding it. However Switzerland hasn't invaded whereas the French invaded and now controls Corsica as part of France. Corsicans are more closely related to Genoans.
FalconShould there be a Law?
The EU imagining that more government interference is going to get them anywhere except the stagnant direction of France and Italy. Do politicians willfully ignore 200 years of economic data or is a better life for EU citizens just not on the agenda? Open markets have been shown, and are shown as the only way for improving everyones lot in the long term, not this intervention and protectionism.
Taxation in general is an inefficient allocation of resources with significant deadweight losses.
That's a load of Republican propaganda (i.e. bullshit). Taxes build the infrastructure (roads, schools, firehouses) that allow the markets to exist.
Actually, it's simple economics. There are things that the government provides that represent the collective desires of the people; however tehre are many thing sthat are simply transfers of money with the attendent deadweight loss.
For example, politicians like to proclaim that they've created jobs when they open a new government facility in a town when all they're doing is transferring someone else's tax money to another location to pay for those wages and the building plus the cost of government administration of the funds; in othe rcases they simply use tax money to subsidize companies - at the expense of other, non-subsidized firms.
In economics, you need to ask "Who else is impacted" to assess the results of policy. To use an old example, if someone throws a rock through your window the money you spent helps the glazer but hurts whoever else you would have bought a product from with the money.
While there certainly are things a government does (and need to be funded with taxes) that are necessary (and teh reason people form governments)the notion that government can efficiently provide many services and fund them through taxes is simply wrong.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
It's funny. You wrote that as though it's a meaningful response.
Regardless, it seems you are stuck on the assertion that taxes are a generally inefficient way to allocate resources.
In general, it is; especially since it represents a simple transfer of money form one area to another - look at all teh earmarks in Congress - do we really need bridges to nowhere; subsidies to keep sugar farmers in business (and competitors out), etc - all paid for with tax money? Do you believe taht is efficient.
Let's assume that's true. Two questions arise:
- What about the situations where it *isn't* inefficient?
There are cases where government is needed - which is why we form governments.
- Is the inefficiency in the more common cases worse than the alternative?
Interestingly enough, on the topic you replied to, public healthcare in the US is actually *more* efficient than private healthcare. And, even if it weren't, even inefficient healthcare is *infinitely* more desirable than no healthcare at all.
I've seen government run US healthcare up close and personal and it ain't pretty. I would not want to have to depend on it for care after my experiences with it. I doubt once people realize that what some are proposing is inefficnet healthcare for everyone that it will get ongoing support; mor elikely we'll wind up with a two tier system - low end government care with long waits and poor facilities for those that can't afford it and our current sytem for those that can. We already see some of that with some doctors offering higher level of service (hhouse calls, for exmaple) for those who will pay more tahn what an insurance company pays.
As a sid enote, why does the UK, a country with fine schools and smart people, have to import doctors? What happens to the ones they train locally?
Personally, I like the Swiss model - individuals buy health insurance and stay with a company long term - even if they switch employers since they are the policy holder not the comapny. Universal care is not a simple let the government do it solution - issues such as cost control, allocation of servcies, etc. are often glossed over in the debate.
Take prescription drugs, for example. The US government could create a national drug program - and set price limits on what they will pay - say no more than the lowest selling price to any foreign healthcare system. Now it becomes a question of whta is more profitable - stop selling drugs to the lowest foreign payers so we can get more for US drugs (at lower overall volumes) or make less profit. It's simple mat and economics - and guess where the burden will fall?
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
"Food crops aren't needed to produce ethanol."
They are being used though.
"Small farmers can grow either, switchgrass for ethanol production and hemp for food or ethanol. This will create an income for these farmers, so it's not either food or fuel"
For a few seconds perhaps, before they are put out of business by the big producers in the west.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
Except that SECAM was developed before PAL... even Wikipedia gets this one right.
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"Small farmers can grow either, switchgrass for ethanol production and hemp for food or ethanol. This will create an income for these farmers, so it's not either food or fuel"
For a few seconds perhaps, before they are put out of business by the big producers in the west.
Without subsidies big western producers couldn't produce ethanol then ship it for sale to third world countries cheaper than local farmers and producers could. However this wouldn't prevent wealthy landowners there from dominating the industry. And in some cases western companies pay military or paramilitaries groups. For instance Coca Cola has paid paramilitary leaders in Colombia to keep workers from starting unions. Stuff like this though happens because government allows it, and may even encourage it.
FalconShould there be a Law?