That's the beauty of large numbers - they average out. And a small insurance pool has to have larger premiums because of the possibility of multiple insurance events.
As I've said, I had a personal example with mandatory insurance. Russia had absolutely no mandatory liability car insurance prior to 2000 and the optional insurance was pretty expensive. As a result lots of people were losing their savings and even houses to pay for damage. A libertarian paradise, in other words.
In 2003 a law mandating car insurance had been enacted. During the first two years, insurance premiums were regulated and only a little bit lower than the optional insurance rates that had been paying before. Then in 2005-2006 premiums fell through the floor - lots of competition and large risk pools.
Incorrect. And I had a personal experience with that - Russia introduced mandatory accident liability insurance in 2001. Prices for car insurance spiraled down in a couple of years after that.
Yes, it has. Prices has gone down in those states that had non-discriminatory mandate before. Prices went up in states where companies had to cover a lot of previously uninsurable people.
Actually, this kind of stuff is NOT possible under Obamacare. Health insurance companies can't discriminate based on your medical history, the premium only depends on your location, age and smoking/non-smoking status.
Mandating insurance forces premiums _down_ because the pool of insured people becomes much bigger. By now most car insurances are near the lowest possible values - most car insurance companies are barely profitable. It's not yet true for health insurance, but it's already happening there.
Google is big and it's stable, it won't go away in a year - and that matters for a lot of people, especially senior developers with family and kids. We also can't offer a campus with A-class offices and free food.
We tried a less premium location (San Diego) but we had even worse luck finding good developers for our startup. Talent pool is much less and it's much harder to persuade them to leave their jobs for a small company.
Companies getting H1b-s generally fall into two categories:
1) Companies with crappy jobs designed to allow people to move to the US. These companies are sometimes called 'bodyshops'. Their employees usually work for 6-12 months and then transfer the hell out of them.
2) Good software companies. They generally pay a market rate and often offer relocation assistance.
And even the first kind of companies is restricted by the prevailing wage law, so they pay quite a good wage as a result. Here is the data by state: http://www.myvisajobs.com/Repo... . If you look at California then you can clearly see the divide: http://www.myvisajobs.com/Cali... and you can also see that most of visas go to 'good' companies.
We're paying a general market rate here (Palo Alto) plus ~20% and it's STILL hard to find good developers because of the competition with companies like Google. And if you're willing to work with people remotely then why not just do it overseas?
Employers are not slaveowners. While it's not a trivial thing, an H1B visa owner can transfer to another job. And most probably will, if an employer refuses to start Green Card processing. And contrary to Slashdot's opinion, lots of employers in IT are not bottom-feeding scum and they actually want to help people to relocate to the US without fear of being forced to move in case of visa expiration.
Heat storage doesn't scale well. Even phase transition storage (with its problems) can't realistically store enough heat for more than several hours of operation.
We are building new coal plants to replace old ones. And bottom line we phase coal power out. 2013 was an all time low for brown coal btw.
Wow! Is attending brainwashing sessions a required activity in Germany? The reality is opposite: coal power in Germany is rising and 2013 was the highest coal year since 1990 ( http://commons.wikimedia.org/w... ). Meanwhile, more coal power plants are being built. Goals to reduce CO2 emissions by 2020 won't be met.
One of the other goals is to make sure that no long-living radioactive waste remains after the decommissioning. Unlike fission reactors where most of the waste are natural fission products and you can't do anything about it, in fusion reactors it's possible to use materials that produce mostly short-living isotopes as a result of neutron activation.
Really. US road design is stupid and traffic lights are cretinous. Sudden changes from green to yellow force drivers to make a split-second decisions and quite often drivers simply respond by pressing the pedal to the metal. And it makes sense - you save decision time by being consistent!
About 5 years ago Belarus switched to LED traffic lights with clearly visible countdown timers for drivers. I.e. traffic light shows the number of seconds remaining for the green and red signals. Number of accidents went sharply _down_ exactly because drivers could anticipate the light switch.
I'm a socialist. I think that some government regulation and redistributive taxes are generally a good idea. However, taxis are an example where this approach fails spectacularly, in theory taxi regulation should protect consumers and provide a decent living wage for drivers. In practice, taxi companies pay cities (in form of taxi licenses) to bar competing companies.
Gas core nuclear rockets also don't exist, even as prototypes, and have serious theoretical problems. While Orion spacecrafts are actually pretty straightforward.
No, seriously. It's much easier to use methane to produce hydrogen. Nitrogen fixation is amongst the most energy-consuming processes, because conditions required for it are hellish. And then you want to use hard-won ammonia just to get hydrogen???
And I don't even want to think about ammonia leaks. It won't simply stink a lot, but it'll easily kill a lot of people.
Slashdot Mirror
That's the beauty of large numbers - they average out. And a small insurance pool has to have larger premiums because of the possibility of multiple insurance events.
As I've said, I had a personal example with mandatory insurance. Russia had absolutely no mandatory liability car insurance prior to 2000 and the optional insurance was pretty expensive. As a result lots of people were losing their savings and even houses to pay for damage. A libertarian paradise, in other words.
In 2003 a law mandating car insurance had been enacted. During the first two years, insurance premiums were regulated and only a little bit lower than the optional insurance rates that had been paying before. Then in 2005-2006 premiums fell through the floor - lots of competition and large risk pools.
Out of $54 billions of earned premium. I.e. they are about 8% profitable - that's considered a decent margin, but not at all great.
Incorrect. And I had a personal experience with that - Russia introduced mandatory accident liability insurance in 2001. Prices for car insurance spiraled down in a couple of years after that.
Yes, it has. Prices has gone down in those states that had non-discriminatory mandate before. Prices went up in states where companies had to cover a lot of previously uninsurable people.
Actually, this kind of stuff is NOT possible under Obamacare. Health insurance companies can't discriminate based on your medical history, the premium only depends on your location, age and smoking/non-smoking status.
Mandating insurance forces premiums _down_ because the pool of insured people becomes much bigger. By now most car insurances are near the lowest possible values - most car insurance companies are barely profitable. It's not yet true for health insurance, but it's already happening there.
Just buy Sygic or something like it. It works offline as well.
We _do_ include US citizen and we can't care less about color, race, age or accent. It's still very hard to compete with big companies.
Google is big and it's stable, it won't go away in a year - and that matters for a lot of people, especially senior developers with family and kids. We also can't offer a campus with A-class offices and free food.
All the H1B data is public and is monitored by the Labor Department. Companies MUST pay the advertised salary or they'll be hit with a hefty fine.
We tried a less premium location (San Diego) but we had even worse luck finding good developers for our startup. Talent pool is much less and it's much harder to persuade them to leave their jobs for a small company.
Companies getting H1b-s generally fall into two categories:
1) Companies with crappy jobs designed to allow people to move to the US. These companies are sometimes called 'bodyshops'. Their employees usually work for 6-12 months and then transfer the hell out of them.
2) Good software companies. They generally pay a market rate and often offer relocation assistance.
And even the first kind of companies is restricted by the prevailing wage law, so they pay quite a good wage as a result. Here is the data by state: http://www.myvisajobs.com/Repo... . If you look at California then you can clearly see the divide: http://www.myvisajobs.com/Cali... and you can also see that most of visas go to 'good' companies.
We're paying a general market rate here (Palo Alto) plus ~20% and it's STILL hard to find good developers because of the competition with companies like Google. And if you're willing to work with people remotely then why not just do it overseas?
It is hard to find good developers anywhere. However, you have a much larger pool if you include overseas developers.
Employers are not slaveowners. While it's not a trivial thing, an H1B visa owner can transfer to another job. And most probably will, if an employer refuses to start Green Card processing. And contrary to Slashdot's opinion, lots of employers in IT are not bottom-feeding scum and they actually want to help people to relocate to the US without fear of being forced to move in case of visa expiration.
Heat storage doesn't scale well. Even phase transition storage (with its problems) can't realistically store enough heat for more than several hours of operation.
We are building new coal plants to replace old ones. And bottom line we phase coal power out. 2013 was an all time low for brown coal btw.
Wow! Is attending brainwashing sessions a required activity in Germany? The reality is opposite: coal power in Germany is rising and 2013 was the highest coal year since 1990 ( http://commons.wikimedia.org/w... ). Meanwhile, more coal power plants are being built. Goals to reduce CO2 emissions by 2020 won't be met.
France gets more than 95% (99% by now, I think) of electricity generated. Yet its prices are amongst the lowest in Europe.
It was not 'a' commercial power plant, but 'the' commercial THTR power plant. As in, singular - the only one in existence at that time.
One of the other goals is to make sure that no long-living radioactive waste remains after the decommissioning. Unlike fission reactors where most of the waste are natural fission products and you can't do anything about it, in fusion reactors it's possible to use materials that produce mostly short-living isotopes as a result of neutron activation.
40 tanks over the border? And where are they now?
Really. US road design is stupid and traffic lights are cretinous. Sudden changes from green to yellow force drivers to make a split-second decisions and quite often drivers simply respond by pressing the pedal to the metal. And it makes sense - you save decision time by being consistent!
About 5 years ago Belarus switched to LED traffic lights with clearly visible countdown timers for drivers. I.e. traffic light shows the number of seconds remaining for the green and red signals. Number of accidents went sharply _down_ exactly because drivers could anticipate the light switch.
Actually, yes. A 'balanced budget' amendment would be about as cretinous as possible. Ditto for 'return to gold standard' amendment.
I'm a socialist. I think that some government regulation and redistributive taxes are generally a good idea. However, taxis are an example where this approach fails spectacularly, in theory taxi regulation should protect consumers and provide a decent living wage for drivers. In practice, taxi companies pay cities (in form of taxi licenses) to bar competing companies.
Gas core nuclear rockets also don't exist, even as prototypes, and have serious theoretical problems. While Orion spacecrafts are actually pretty straightforward.
No, seriously. It's much easier to use methane to produce hydrogen. Nitrogen fixation is amongst the most energy-consuming processes, because conditions required for it are hellish. And then you want to use hard-won ammonia just to get hydrogen???
And I don't even want to think about ammonia leaks. It won't simply stink a lot, but it'll easily kill a lot of people.