Design patents period should not exist. Trademarks exist to prevent consumer confusion that is it. There is nothing so novel in making a laptop a wedge shape or flat that deserves protecting.
Penicillin is a drug millions/billions of people need yearly. I am talking about cancer drugs that thousands of people need yearly. Some drugs exist for even rarer conditions than that.
A computer is not always programmed to be efficient. I have a lot of garbage code out there so do many other people.
Death should be an available choice, a smart human would know that. Give the choice between living with chemo for 6 weeks or without for 4. I know what I would want.
If one was really this worried about it, just don't include death in the database of treatment options.
Greece has been broke for a long long long time. They exist only through tourism, any hit to the economy ends that. Italy is the same way, I remember getting a thousand lira or more for every mark.
If everyone paid their own way most of those treatments just would not exist. The reality is some of them really do have very high costs for good reasons and they just would not be profitable in the system you propose.
Well depends on how you define government healthcare. The reality is many government healthcare programs around the world have better outcomes and lower overhead than our private insurance system.
Getting rid of government intervention is not going to magically lower prices and make healthcare free.
So because rising taxes don't stop all smokers the tax is specious?
I think your argument against it is either misguided or foolish. No one thinks it will stop all smokers. All it needs to do is pay for their treatment and it is already a huge win. If it also gets some people to quit, that is just gravy.
What if their taxes paid for their costs. Smokers tend to pay enough in tax on their habit to cover those costs and then some. How is that not them paying for their own coverage on the installment plan?
Yeah, those cancer drugs would be personally delivered by the hand of the free market if we did not have a government!
Oh wait, no most of those came from government research and have to be regulated if you want them to actually work. We tried not regulating them and we then had patent medicine.
Can't quit? I did, just don't buy them. Very easy. In fact the state will even give you help doing so.
The reality is smoking is enjoyable and they rather continue to do it. Which is a fine choice, and their taxes on those products surely pay more than the cost of their treatment. Most smokers don't really cost much end of life, compared to the average elderly. They die younger and from things that have very few treatments other than management until death.
Sounds great. When you die of cancer that costs more than you can afford to treat, can I have your stuff?
The reality is we each have a low probability of that happening but almost no one can afford to pay for it alone. This is why insurance exists. Much like flood or car insurance, you have to either enforce participation or just allow people who don't have the money to die in the gutter.
I would prefer to think we do not live in a society that lets our people die in the gutter.
The mass of comments will be those saying this is some horrible government intrusion into their lives on the level of police cameras in their bathrooms.
Instead I view this as a valid experiment that the people of this city are conducting. Had they not wanted to conduct such a trial they would have elected other representatives. The wonderful thing about different levels of government is that we can test to see if this works or not. Just like we did with cigarette taxes.
Now carry on with your rants about how the government is stealing from you every time you buy a Coke even thought this single short lived experiment will have no impact on your life.
No, but I do think they should meet with school officials at least a year before to make sure they have all the requirements. I doubt he even checked with anyone.
His eight year old can be an eight year old kicked out of school then. Complaining about reality does not change it. Either get the kid to another school or teach him to deal with the one he is in.
Slashdot Mirror
They have an HTML5 version for many things.
My phone has more RAM than that.
I suggest you spend $10 and buy more RAM.
Heck I might even mail you some if you ask nicely.
Or might give someone else the opportunity to sell it for a little more making it in a better way.
What you advocate is that using slave labor is fine and no one should ever try to "vote with their dollars".
Design patents period should not exist.
Trademarks exist to prevent consumer confusion that is it. There is nothing so novel in making a laptop a wedge shape or flat that deserves protecting.
Penicillin is a drug millions/billions of people need yearly. I am talking about cancer drugs that thousands of people need yearly. Some drugs exist for even rarer conditions than that.
I smoked for a decade, is that long enough?
A computer is not always programmed to be efficient. I have a lot of garbage code out there so do many other people.
Death should be an available choice, a smart human would know that. Give the choice between living with chemo for 6 weeks or without for 4. I know what I would want.
If one was really this worried about it, just don't include death in the database of treatment options.
The real question is what do we do when it makes 90% of jobs unneeded?
I would love to think star trek, but dystopia is far more likely than utopia.
Before and during WW2 Italy was a fascist state, not a socialist one.
Nice try though.
I know people who stopped smoking because of the cost. They mostly switched to inhaling nicotine vapor.
They only switched over because of the tax.
I agree fashion had a lot to do with it, but so does the high cost.
Greece has been broke for a long long long time. They exist only through tourism, any hit to the economy ends that. Italy is the same way, I remember getting a thousand lira or more for every mark.
The EU is not going broke as one big nation. The poor nations that were always poor nations are going broke.
It would be like making a NAU and then being surprised when Mexico ends up broke. Then blaming that on whatever your team does not like.
You do realize that in places with more of teh ebil socialisms they have more smokers right?
Only americans seem to be thinking that by paying your own tax bill you should get to say how your neighbor lives.
You don't have to smoke pot, you could eat it.
Does it have too many calories for you?
If everyone paid their own way most of those treatments just would not exist. The reality is some of them really do have very high costs for good reasons and they just would not be profitable in the system you propose.
Well depends on how you define government healthcare. The reality is many government healthcare programs around the world have better outcomes and lower overhead than our private insurance system.
Getting rid of government intervention is not going to magically lower prices and make healthcare free.
So because rising taxes don't stop all smokers the tax is specious?
I think your argument against it is either misguided or foolish. No one thinks it will stop all smokers. All it needs to do is pay for their treatment and it is already a huge win. If it also gets some people to quit, that is just gravy.
What if their taxes paid for their costs. Smokers tend to pay enough in tax on their habit to cover those costs and then some. How is that not them paying for their own coverage on the installment plan?
Yeah, those cancer drugs would be personally delivered by the hand of the free market if we did not have a government!
Oh wait, no most of those came from government research and have to be regulated if you want them to actually work. We tried not regulating them and we then had patent medicine.
Can't quit?
I did, just don't buy them. Very easy. In fact the state will even give you help doing so.
The reality is smoking is enjoyable and they rather continue to do it. Which is a fine choice, and their taxes on those products surely pay more than the cost of their treatment. Most smokers don't really cost much end of life, compared to the average elderly. They die younger and from things that have very few treatments other than management until death.
Sounds great. When you die of cancer that costs more than you can afford to treat, can I have your stuff?
The reality is we each have a low probability of that happening but almost no one can afford to pay for it alone. This is why insurance exists. Much like flood or car insurance, you have to either enforce participation or just allow people who don't have the money to die in the gutter.
I would prefer to think we do not live in a society that lets our people die in the gutter.
The mass of comments will be those saying this is some horrible government intrusion into their lives on the level of police cameras in their bathrooms.
Instead I view this as a valid experiment that the people of this city are conducting. Had they not wanted to conduct such a trial they would have elected other representatives. The wonderful thing about different levels of government is that we can test to see if this works or not. Just like we did with cigarette taxes.
Now carry on with your rants about how the government is stealing from you every time you buy a Coke even thought this single short lived experiment will have no impact on your life.
Had he not been coddled thus far he would have it.
Good. I would gladly pay more if that improved the quality of education in America.
School taxes benefit everyone. Without them we could not get educated worker, nor could we have our economy.
No, but I do think they should meet with school officials at least a year before to make sure they have all the requirements. I doubt he even checked with anyone.
His eight year old can be an eight year old kicked out of school then. Complaining about reality does not change it. Either get the kid to another school or teach him to deal with the one he is in.