"go part time at work and volunteer at the local EFF"
Fire up the stake! We all know that there is no such thing as an income effect and that lower taxes will mean that you'll work MORE, not less! How dare you challenge libertarian orthodoxy!
Disclaimer: I'm a classical liberal myself. I just couldn't resist pointing this out though;-)
1) This is the low-hanging fruit. It has been picked already. Most of the things that we could just "stumble upon" or discover/isolate rather easily are long gone, simply because many people have looked very hard for a very long time. It's just diminishing returns and it also explains why we've been making slower progress in many fields: what was easy to discover has been discovered already. There's the hard(er) stuff left and it takes more money and more effort.
2) Nowadays, Pasteur would get prosecuted. Testing a vaccine on a few dogs before administering it to a child just doesn't cut it anymore. You need a multi-million dollar clinical trial before the FDA will even consider approving your new drug. And it's not enough that it's safe; it also has to be effective enough.
I don' t know the specifics of this operation. Maybe it is the one exception that proves the rule and it is a great idea. However, I should point out (if not for your colleague's sake at least for that of others who might be contemplating to do the same thing) that the consensus among aid scholars/professionals is that gifts-in-kind shipped from abroad are generally a bad idea. Why? Many different reasons:
1) Shipping is expensive. Not so much the actual journey across the seas (although it is still a factor, especially with bulky equipment such as computers), but just the logistics involved. It takes time to ship things overseas and this has an opportunity cost. Overall, it is usually estimated to be much cheaper to just source everything locally. Including labor whenever possible, which is most of the time since a project that relies crucially on foreign expertise to continue is likely to be a bad idea in the first place. If you actually go there, you'll end up doing unqualified/semi-qualified work that locals could do just as well, if not actually better. Are there no IT people in Ghana who can set up a computer lab? I'm pretty sure there are.
2) It might not be what people need. Would you be happy if you had to maintain a computer lab made up of second-hand computers that might have been refurbished but are still more prone to hardware failures than new equipment and that additionally has two dozen different kinds of hardware and software because different donors all gave whatever they had at their disposal? This would be a nightmare for any organization (there is a reason why many universities/companies standardize on 1 brand/basic configuration and stick with it as much as possible). It's the same in the developing world.
3) It promotes false ideas about developing countries. In most cases, the problem is NOT that whatever people want or need is not available locally. The problem is that people are poor and don't have enough money to purchase these goods. Electronics, including PC and parts, are available in Africa. Especially in a country like Ghana. For the matter, there are Dell distributors in Ghana and virtually all African countries. There are also wholesalers that carry all the parts that you might want to buy, that will sell you computers that are suited to your needs, etc.
Overall, you're much better staying at home and donating the money that you'd have spent on a plane ticket to a reputable NGO or to your local partners (e.g. the school). It's even better since it allows *them* to prioritize their spending. Maybe they have a roof that needs fixing and that might be more important than setting up a computer lab.
It doesn't have to be a bubble. It's only catch-up growth. The same phenomenon is at work in India for instance. If you move people from very unproductive sectors like traditional agriculture to foreign-built factories with (almost) first-world level of productivity, you get a lot of growth. Until you actually hit the technological frontier and you can't just adopt the latest and greatest technologies that are already out there but have to figure out things on your own. Most developped countries had that same period of catch-up growth after WW2, then it ground to a halt in the 1970s and we have seen much lower growth rates since then.
We can expect China's growth to slow down once it's institutions become the limiting factor. Then it will be adapt or stagnate.
Will China be the largest economy? Maybe. But the USSR used to be the second largest economy. That didn't make it a good example of shining economic policy.
Comparing the US and China and their growth rate makes about as much sense as comparing a newborn baby and a 15-year-old. Yes, the baby growth faster, but it won't last forever!
inner lanes DON'T have right of way, which makes no sense...
It actually makes a lot of sense. The basic principle is that the car who changes lane has to yield. This is why you look before changing lanes and you don't expect the other driver to hit the brakes.
In fact, I'd say that it would make no sense for inner lanes to have right of way. If you're driving in the outer lane and getting ready to exit the roundabout, you wouldn't expect to have to look *left* to make sure that nobody is trying to merge onto the outer lane. Very counterintuitive for traffic coming from the left AND changing lanes to have right of way.
I don't have a dog in this fight (not a US citizen), but let me guess, you're a Democrat? I think reactions like yours are one of the main reasons why compromise has become impossible in the US. How can you make a deal when you think that the other party is a bunch of morons and "neo-fascists" (yeah, right, don't you feel a little ridiculous?). If they're so bad then they can't possibly have a point, their voters are morons and we shouldn't pay any attention to them regardless of the fact that they control half of Congress.
First, everyone should take issue with the fact that a Harvard-man and a policy wonk are *necessarily* the best suited to run a country. Do you realize how condescending that sounds? "Oh my, this Sarah Palin only has a B.S. from the University of Idaho... How awful!". Isn't the Democratic Party supposed to be the party of the underdog?
In terms of credentials, Bush/Cheney should have been great. Bush: Yale & Harvard, Cheney: M.A. and some doctoral coursework... All we need to do to see that the "best and the brightest" mentality does not lead to great achievements is look at the 60s with Kennedy & Johnson and the Vietnam War. The "best and the brightest" (read the book) got the US into an unwinnable war.
I think we also have a different definition of what actions one needs to take not to start a war. By my definition, launching 100+ missiles into a sovereign country and destroying their airforce IS making war on this country. Attacking a foreign country is a very strange way of trying to keep a nation at peace. Or maybe the Japanese were also engaging in "kinetic military action" at Pearl Harbour? Have you been reading Orwell lately?
Strangely enough, it seems to ring a bell... Didn't the previous administration also use euphemisms to hide the dirty reality of what they were doing? They didn't torture people, they used "enhanced interrogation". Likewise, the present administration is not waging war on Libya, they are engaging in "kinetic military action".
Didn't you hear about the hawks in the Obama administration advocating military action in Libya? Do you believe that only the GOP has that kind of people?
Anyway, you seem to focus solely on the rhethoric. I say that actions speak louder than words. There seems to be a lot of continuity between Bush & Obama. When the GOP is in power, all they do is talk about deregulation, etc. while voting for NCLB. Talk about small government while voting for the PATRIOT Act. Talk about cutting the deficit while making sure that Medicare and all the popular programs don't get cut, etc.
Same thing for the Dems. They badmouth deregulation a lot but, you know what, they supported most of it. Airline deregulation (mind you, this was a good thing)? Carter era, sponsored by a Dem. Repeal of Glass-Steagall? Clinton era, bipartisan vote. And who promised to "end welfare as we know it" in his 1992 campaign?
Are the two parties the same? Of course not. But the policies they implement are reasonably similar. I'm not convinced that the US would be a very different place if the GOP had won the 2008 elections. Now with Libya, you can't even say that Obama will not engage in military action without the approval of Congress...
At the risk of sounding like a philistine, I wonder to what extent this loss is "painful". What exactly would have changed for 99.999999% of people if Ovid's Medea had not been lost? If you lose historical works, it does actually have an impact as it limits our understanding of the past and can distort our view of history. But is it such a big deal to lose a work of fiction?
How many people today have read Ovid's works that are still extant of their own volition? How many people go to a bookshop and say "I so want to read the Metamorphoses!"?
There are already much more works of fiction than could ever be read in a lifetime. I'm not convinced that one more ancient book gathering dust on a shelf would be such a great improvement. Not to say that *some* people would not be happy to read it, but it's really a marginal phenomenon. To me, the loss of Medea is on par with, say, losing an episode of a popular TV show. Maybe the world would be a marginally better place with it, but it's really no big deal.
Wonderful! Now Markey can show that he cares by spending other people's money and imposing time-consuming, expensive regulations on all of us. What's the point of requiring *all* VoIP phones to be hearing-aid compatible? It'll just make all phones more expensive for everyone, including those of us who don't need have hearing aids! It's not insensitive, it's just common sense; we don't mandate that all books be written in 20pt, we just allow publishers to sell both regular-print and large-print books! There are currently cheap VoIP phones that are not compatible with hearing aids and slightly more expensive VoIP phones that are. And it works just fine this way, the deaf can just use some of the $10 million that Markey wants to give them to purchase fancier phones!
The same applies to screen readers for mobile devices. Some are already available, what about the radical notion that those who benefit from them should purchase them with their own money? Not everyone who is blind is poor and helpless and so destitute as to not be able to afford the spend $300 on software that, according to Markey, is indispensable to live a fulfilling life. And if these politicians feel generous, they should just donate a portion of their income to organizations that help the blind. They're wealthy enough that don't have to stick taxpayers with the bill when they're feeling generous.
That's right, our biggest addiction rates came from the men in "clean white coats".... but it was all legal.
[...]
The biggest aid in bringing down both the addiction rate, and cleaning up the quality of drugs? A government law. The Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906, which prohibited the consumption of opiates without a prescription.
Presumably, obtaining a prescription would not have been very hard if, as you argue, doctors were so keen on giving morphine to their patients. I think your post is quite self-contradictory. If the large addiction rates came from men in clean white coats, then the Food and Drug Act would not have made any difference. Might it not be like OHSA, i.e. the law came into force as other factors were influencing drug use/workplace safety and did not directly cause any change? Could it not indicate that, by 1906, people, including the government, had realized the risks associated with the use of morphine and were becoming less willing to use it? This would make a lot of sense since the Act was only passed *after* journalists wrote scathing articles about the patent medicine industry. Another element that bears this out is that Coca Cola stopped including cocaine in its beverage in 1903.
Furthermore, the Act did not even prohibit the consumption of opiates without a prescription. Rather, it imposed mandatory labeling requirements for drugs and food containing alcohol, opiates, etc. Most of the rules laid out in the Act are common sense rules that are simply meant to prevent fraud and ensure that individuals can give informed consent before taking a drug. Seems a lot better than assuming that people can't make the right decision when they are presented with all the facts. My point of view is that drug abuse and alcoholism were rampant in the 19th and early 20th century because standards of living were much lower, many diseases that are now considered minor inconveniences could kill you, and, for many people, life was overall much less enjoyable than it is now. Given these constraints, it is understandable that these people would have different time preferences than we do and favor present enjoyment (i.e. getting high, smoking, etc.) over future benefits.
But if you are poor, God help you, because you can't afford it.
In most cases, poor people are covered under Medicaid or similar programmes. The middle class is covered by private plans. The elderly have Medicare. There are relatively few people who 1) would want to have health insurance and 2) do not qualify for Medicaid/etc. Many of the insured are either the "young invincibles" or individualswho could qualify for Medicaid but never bothered to fill in the required paperwork (or simply don't know that they qualify).
The bill was over $2000 USD for that hour and a half!
This has a lot to do with the fact that, in most cases, someone else is footing the bill.
1. Do people and companies react in a sane rational way, especially when it comes to healthcare?
No. But government officials are people too and, in theory at least, respond (albeit imperfectly) to the demands of their constituants, who are even more irrational when it comes to politics than in market settings (see Bryan Caplan' s The Myth of the Rational Voter . The issue is not whether individuals always make good decisions. The issue is whether individuals typically make better decisions about their healthcare than a central planner.
Also, it is probable that the current system encourages people to be irrational. I.e. they are rationally irrational. If you don' t have to foot the bill (because the governement/your insurance company) pays for your healthcare, why shouldn' t you ask for this very expensive treatment that only has limited benefits?
2. Are you aware that large free markets have been proven to be disconnected from what is called "the fundamentals"?
It's very hard to prove such a thing and depends on what you include in " the fundamentals". If, for instance, a housing bubble is fueled (among other things) by misguided government policies, is it disconnected from the fundamentals? Or is it that market participants were reacting to then-present incentives and then-valid assumptions? Once again, if large free markets can be wrong (investors are not prescient, market value is only a best-guess), so can large government.
Ex post, it is easy to see how market value did not reflect the fundamentals. Ex ante, how do you suggest we identify bubbles? If it were that easy, then, by definition, there would not be a bubble as investors would exploit this profit opportunity.
Is a person or company acting in what is in their best interest always acting in the interests of the whole community?
No. The same remarks however applies to governement officials. The question is whether there is more accountability in the political or economic market. I believe that feedback is more direct and more accurate in the economic arena. If a product does not sell well, it can be easily killed. If you don't like a particular political decision, what do you do? The average congressman probably votes on thousands of policies every year. Maybe, on balance, you like the incumbent more than the challenger and you' ll still vote for him even though you disagree with many of the policies that he supported.
4. Have you ever heard of game theory [http] or the prisoner's dilemma [wikipedia.org]?
Have you ever heard of Public Choice?
5. Can we expect everybody patients have access to all information, allowing them to act rationally, or will they be making decisions on incomplete information?
There are always information asymmetries. Taken to its logical extreme, your argument should lead us to disenfranchise patients. Doctors should make decisions for them and pooh-pooh their concerns which, by definition, would be illegitimate.
Do note that most people don't know much about computers, cars, clothes, etc. Yet, there are functionning markets for all these things. When you don't know much about a field, you don't purchase things at random. You rely on other people's advice (e.g. Consumer Reports, what your more-knowledgeable friends advise you to do, etc.).
If people make spectacularly bad decisions about health care, I'd rather it be with their money (which should make them think twice about making unecessary expenses) than with mine.
2. Why do the foreign quacks selling Cancer treatments and fake stem cell therapies not go out of business?
Because there will always be a minority of people who can be defrauded of their money. Which is why fraud and false advertising are illegal. Once again, the question is whether the vast majority of people can make good decisions about their health, n
I knew you were a Fleming when I read your first sentence. So am I FYI, and I fully support Flemish independance, but could you *please* get your history right?
For starters, the was a ruling class that *spoke* French. But they were not French or Walloons. I hate to break it to you but if the elite in Flanders were French-speaking Flemings! They only spoke French because it was fashionable to do so. Just like the lower-classes in Wallonia spoke... Walloon (not French).
Now, once again, I'm sorry to rain on your parade, but those who fought for independence were mostly Flemish-speaking inhabitants of Brussels. Who was *opposed* to independance? The French-speaking (Flemish) upper-classes in Antwerp and Ghent, because they derived their wealth from trade with the Dutch and Indonesia.
As for the current political situation, what business of mine is it what language my neighbors speak? For all that matters, they can speak Chinese, I don't care!
Only a very detailed statistical analysis of the numbers could tell you if it was a good or a bad thing, and even then people would still argue with the result.
We should beware of physics envy. Do we really need pseudo-complex econometric studies that probably fail to control for many variables (most of which might not even be clearly identifiable in the first place)? I'm always amazed when people argue that a statistical analysis or econometric study is what we need, when all it takes is 5 minutes of
rational thought.
The demand curve for video games is downwards sloping
Pirated video games are perfect substitutes for legit copies. The only exception would be games that derive most of their value from the multiplayer experience (e.g. UT, Quake III, etc.) AND have implemented an effective way to prevent pirated copies from accessing the multiplayer part of the game.
If the cost of pirated video games (including the opportunity cost of the time spent finding ways to bypass DRM, etc.) is lower than cost of legit copies, it is rational NOT to buy a legit copy.
The total cost of pirating video games is close to 0, since cracks are easy to find
Maybe not everyone will always act rationally. Maybe *some* people will say "I've been playing for 1-hour, I should buy a legit copy". But most people will behave rationally and not buy what they can get for free. The precise percentage of people who will still buy video games is unknown, but it is lower than if piracy did not exist (the availability of free perfect substitutes causes the demand curve to shift to the left).
I think the pro-piracy movement should learn more about economics. They seem to assume that people either would be willing to buy a game or would not. In the real world, people make decisions at the margin. Maybe you're not willing to pay $50 to play the game now but, in two years' time, when it costs $10, you'd be willing to buy it. Is it a lost sale or not? Perhaps not at current prices (thus, "I'd never have bought it anyway"), but a lost sale indeed at a lower price.
Yes, especially since laid-off construction/manufacturing workers can be turned into scientists with just a wave of the government's magic wand.
I don't think there is massive unemployment among people who are capable of conducting such a study, and therefore no need for stimulus.
And since when has Paul Krugman been an expert in Macro?
Right. That's why police officers are utterly uninterested in getting you to confess, and the Miranda warning does not say anything about anything you say "being used against you in a court of law".
"Party admission" (e.g. confession) is *not* hearsay. It is admissible in virtually every jurisdiction. Your example was poorly chosen, as it is obvious that no charges would be pressed against you for having imaginary cocaine in your trunk. Should you however confess to, say, a murder (and there are other indications that the person you allege to have murdered met an untimely death, your statements could very well be used against you.
I imagine a lot of people do when their box eventually gets hosed
It simply goes to show how little you know about the windows world. No, most people will *never* install the OS themselves. Should their machine become compromised, they will use the recovery CD, which will take care of all this dirty business for them.
And, if you weren't relying solely on second-hand knowledge and the experiences of a few people you know, you'd also know that most users will never re-install the OS period . All windows boxes are not fated to get hosed at some point. And if it does five years away, the user will most likely put it down to his aging hardware and buy a new computer. Are consumer-grade computers even built to last 5 years without experiencing some kind of trouble.
I see that you don't use any windows boxes yourself. That in itself should disqualify you from judging the merits of Vista. But most importantly, it makes me wonder if you would happen to be a linux user. If so, how do you think people would react if they had been given a shiny, new OS that, for instance, does not support Itunes? What about driver support? Can I use any scanner I want in linux? Or this no-name wireless card that works just fine in Vista? But, hey, we're talking Linux here, so it must be the manufacturer's/MS/Apple's fault if all these things don't work.
Are they? Is there any hard data on this, or should we just assume that people who build their own computers are l33t and, therefore, are bound to use Linux?
If you're just making it up as you go, I can also do it. I'd say that gamers make up a large part of those who buy parts, and that small systems integrators are also a rather important market. Linux users? Very few and, in all likelihood, most of them wouldn't be using a Foxconn motherboard anyway.
This is really a tempest in a teapot. How many people are affected by this issue? A thousand? Ten thousand? Gee, Foxconn's bottomline will *really* suffer from this. I mean, with that measly $40 billion they made in 2006, they must deeply care about a handful of angry geeks who wouldn't have been their target market anyhow.
If you've read TFA, the only conclusion you can draw is that this guy needs to get a life. How many hours did he spend working on this and sending useless e-mails to Foxconn? Something you bought doesn't work as expected, the manufacturer tells you to contact the retailer to get a refund, that's it, end of story. But, hey, we're talking linux here, so here comes the persecution complex (evil company, they must be in MS pocket) and the associated messiah complex (I have a blog, I'll sound the alarm and save the day!).
How about don't get drunk unless you have a safe way of getting home, or face the consequences of your actions? Seriously, why do *I* have to pay so people can get drunk? If you can't or don't want to afford a taxi, don't get drunk at night instead of asking the government to raise everyone else's taxes. Because I'm not sure at all that the costs (in monetary terms) would be lower.
Better yet, why get the government involved at all? If you think this would be a good idea, start your own shuttle bus service. I find it ironic that your signature proclaims that the government is our enemy, but your first reaction in this case is to ask for more government intervention.
Copyright is there because, believe it or not, people respond to incentives. Copyright provides just such a monetary incentive to write or perform new songs. Although as a songwriter or performer you're very likely never to make any real money, in the off-chance that you do make it big, copyright law ensures that part of the revenue that your song generates will go to you and, for instance, help you support your family.
It's ludicrous to think that, should copyright disappear, the music industry would immediately collapse. The most likely thing that would happen is that instead of signing new artists, they would just cruise the bars of Nashville or Austin, look for new songs, and get a cover band to play it before sending it to all the radio stations. Of course, since record companies have access to better facilities and have a lot more money they can devote to marketing, there is no way an unknown artist would be able to compete against them, internet or not.
If there truly was no need for a music industry, it wouldn't exist in the first place. I'm afraid that, like so many on Slashdot, you're suffering from the delusion that everyone behaves in exactly the same way as you do. You might enjoy browsing a website in search for a new sound that you like, but most people don't. What they want is quality music available anytime they want. They want to be able to turn on the radio and hear good music, not spend an hour separating the wheat from the chaff.
Right now, artist can already operate along the guidelines you suggest. Nobody is forcing them to sign with a major, they can release their songs on the internet and make money playing concerts.
As a general rule, I'm not really in favor of giving customers the right to return what they have purchased. People should realize that it's up to them to do their homework before buying something. There are of course a limited number of exceptions to this rule, primarily when information asymmetry is an issue. Does this apply to videogames? Probably not. It is after all rather easy to try a game before buying it; download a demo, rent the game, etc. Alternatively, you can always read reviews.
Purchasing a video game is no different from going to the movies. There is no guarantee that you'll enjoy the experience, but you can try to determine whether you're likely to beforehand.
What objective indicator do you suggest we have to determine whether copyright promotes the progress of the arts? Since copyright gives an incentive to create, I'd say it does promote the progress of the arts. It's not because you don't like the music that's being made today that it's not "useful"...
As for college students, maybe if they were better informed as to what copyright accomplishes, they would have a different opinion. Seriously, is that even an argument? Most college students I know also fail to understand what comparative advantage is. By your reasoning, we should implement protectionist measures immediately since, eventually, these students will rule the world. Or maybe the 18% of students who support the current copyright system will be the rulers of the world?
The consumer habits change argument is hardly convincing. Copyright law does indeed secure a source of income for artists but it is not the rationale for its existence. At the root, the idea is that a temporary monopoly over one's works is necessary to motivate artists to devote time to creating new works.
If it were simply a change in consumer habits, I'd happily say laissez-faire . If people are not interested in music anymore, let record companies disappear! Here, however, we are faced with a slightly different situation. It is not that people are not interested in music anymore, but that they have found a way to illegitimately acquire a perfect substitute without having to bear the costs that went into producing it. In other words, we have a free rider problem, and I'd argue that it will lead to societally sub-optimal outcomes
Currently, the problem cannot yet be felt. In the short-term, indeed, people will still buy CDs and legitimate copies of songs, partly out of fear, partly because they think it's their moral duty to compensate artists. As a result, record companies have an incentive to sign artists, who have an incentive to devote their time to music.
In the absence of copyright law, the amount of music created would not be the socially optimal one. Fewer people would choose a career in music (and, contrary to popular misconceptions, it is not true that genuinely talented individuals would play anyway -- you can be incredibly talented and motivated by profit, romantic myths notwithstanding), less good music would be made (since record companies would have less money to spend on new artists), etc.
The fact is that the new regime favored by some would be more restrictive than the current one. At the moment, each artist is free to choose whether he wants to release its works for free, or charge a fee. If this fee is too high, consumers can buy another, less expensive CD, or simply not listen to music anymore. The government's job is simply to make sure that everyone's choice is not violated. Nobody looses out because of copyright law: if you refuse to listen to a song because it is too expensive, you haven't lost anything!
If, however, copyright is abolished or file sharing legalized, the artist's freedom is threatened (since he cannot decide who gets access to his music). How is this an improvement over the current system in which the price of music, which can be equal to zero, is determined by supply and demand?
Well, for starters, maybe it's also impossible to determine whether the right to vote is objectively good or bad?
Regardless, the major problem with your analysis is to assume that people do indeed vote randomly. If it were the case, your argument would be spot on and one of democracy's biggest flaws would not be a source of concern. If uneducated people vote randomly, their votes basically cancel out (as your correctly pointed out) and smart people choose which policy will be implemented.
In the real world, however, voters do not simply vote randomly. They have systematically biased beliefs that influence the way they vote.
In the world you describe, if asked about NAFTA, average people would basically flip a coin and vote either in favor or against it at random. Economists, however, would know better and choose the right policy, which would then be implemented. In the real world, people are much more likely to vote against it because they share the same misconceptions about NAFTA and free trade! Thus, although some people know better, their voices are not heard and bad policies get chosen.
You should read Caplan's The Myth of the Rational Voter , he makes this argument very convincingly.
Slashdot Mirror
"go part time at work and volunteer at the local EFF"
Fire up the stake! We all know that there is no such thing as an income effect and that lower taxes will mean that you'll work MORE, not less! How dare you challenge libertarian orthodoxy!
Disclaimer: I'm a classical liberal myself. I just couldn't resist pointing this out though ;-)
1) This is the low-hanging fruit. It has been picked already. Most of the things that we could just "stumble upon" or discover/isolate rather easily are long gone, simply because many people have looked very hard for a very long time. It's just diminishing returns and it also explains why we've been making slower progress in many fields: what was easy to discover has been discovered already. There's the hard(er) stuff left and it takes more money and more effort.
2) Nowadays, Pasteur would get prosecuted. Testing a vaccine on a few dogs before administering it to a child just doesn't cut it anymore. You need a multi-million dollar clinical trial before the FDA will even consider approving your new drug. And it's not enough that it's safe; it also has to be effective enough.
I don' t know the specifics of this operation. Maybe it is the one exception that proves the rule and it is a great idea. However, I should point out (if not for your colleague's sake at least for that of others who might be contemplating to do the same thing) that the consensus among aid scholars/professionals is that gifts-in-kind shipped from abroad are generally a bad idea. Why? Many different reasons:
1) Shipping is expensive. Not so much the actual journey across the seas (although it is still a factor, especially with bulky equipment such as computers), but just the logistics involved. It takes time to ship things overseas and this has an opportunity cost. Overall, it is usually estimated to be much cheaper to just source everything locally. Including labor whenever possible, which is most of the time since a project that relies crucially on foreign expertise to continue is likely to be a bad idea in the first place. If you actually go there, you'll end up doing unqualified/semi-qualified work that locals could do just as well, if not actually better. Are there no IT people in Ghana who can set up a computer lab? I'm pretty sure there are.
2) It might not be what people need. Would you be happy if you had to maintain a computer lab made up of second-hand computers that might have been refurbished but are still more prone to hardware failures than new equipment and that additionally has two dozen different kinds of hardware and software because different donors all gave whatever they had at their disposal? This would be a nightmare for any organization (there is a reason why many universities/companies standardize on 1 brand/basic configuration and stick with it as much as possible). It's the same in the developing world.
3) It promotes false ideas about developing countries. In most cases, the problem is NOT that whatever people want or need is not available locally. The problem is that people are poor and don't have enough money to purchase these goods. Electronics, including PC and parts, are available in Africa. Especially in a country like Ghana. For the matter, there are Dell distributors in Ghana and virtually all African countries. There are also wholesalers that carry all the parts that you might want to buy, that will sell you computers that are suited to your needs, etc.
Overall, you're much better staying at home and donating the money that you'd have spent on a plane ticket to a reputable NGO or to your local partners (e.g. the school). It's even better since it allows *them* to prioritize their spending. Maybe they have a roof that needs fixing and that might be more important than setting up a computer lab.
It doesn't have to be a bubble. It's only catch-up growth. The same phenomenon is at work in India for instance. If you move people from very unproductive sectors like traditional agriculture to foreign-built factories with (almost) first-world level of productivity, you get a lot of growth. Until you actually hit the technological frontier and you can't just adopt the latest and greatest technologies that are already out there but have to figure out things on your own. Most developped countries had that same period of catch-up growth after WW2, then it ground to a halt in the 1970s and we have seen much lower growth rates since then.
We can expect China's growth to slow down once it's institutions become the limiting factor. Then it will be adapt or stagnate.
Will China be the largest economy? Maybe. But the USSR used to be the second largest economy. That didn't make it a good example of shining economic policy.
Comparing the US and China and their growth rate makes about as much sense as comparing a newborn baby and a 15-year-old. Yes, the baby growth faster, but it won't last forever!
inner lanes DON'T have right of way, which makes no sense...
It actually makes a lot of sense. The basic principle is that the car who changes lane has to yield. This is why you look before changing lanes and you don't expect the other driver to hit the brakes.
In fact, I'd say that it would make no sense for inner lanes to have right of way. If you're driving in the outer lane and getting ready to exit the roundabout, you wouldn't expect to have to look *left* to make sure that nobody is trying to merge onto the outer lane. Very counterintuitive for traffic coming from the left AND changing lanes to have right of way.
I don't have a dog in this fight (not a US citizen), but let me guess, you're a Democrat? I think reactions like yours are one of the main reasons why compromise has become impossible in the US. How can you make a deal when you think that the other party is a bunch of morons and "neo-fascists" (yeah, right, don't you feel a little ridiculous?). If they're so bad then they can't possibly have a point, their voters are morons and we shouldn't pay any attention to them regardless of the fact that they control half of Congress.
First, everyone should take issue with the fact that a Harvard-man and a policy wonk are *necessarily* the best suited to run a country. Do you realize how condescending that sounds? "Oh my, this Sarah Palin only has a B.S. from the University of Idaho... How awful!". Isn't the Democratic Party supposed to be the party of the underdog?
In terms of credentials, Bush/Cheney should have been great. Bush: Yale & Harvard, Cheney: M.A. and some doctoral coursework... All we need to do to see that the "best and the brightest" mentality does not lead to great achievements is look at the 60s with Kennedy & Johnson and the Vietnam War. The "best and the brightest" (read the book) got the US into an unwinnable war.
I think we also have a different definition of what actions one needs to take not to start a war. By my definition, launching 100+ missiles into a sovereign country and destroying their airforce IS making war on this country. Attacking a foreign country is a very strange way of trying to keep a nation at peace. Or maybe the Japanese were also engaging in "kinetic military action" at Pearl Harbour? Have you been reading Orwell lately?
Strangely enough, it seems to ring a bell... Didn't the previous administration also use euphemisms to hide the dirty reality of what they were doing? They didn't torture people, they used "enhanced interrogation". Likewise, the present administration is not waging war on Libya, they are engaging in "kinetic military action".
Didn't you hear about the hawks in the Obama administration advocating military action in Libya? Do you believe that only the GOP has that kind of people?
Anyway, you seem to focus solely on the rhethoric. I say that actions speak louder than words. There seems to be a lot of continuity between Bush & Obama. When the GOP is in power, all they do is talk about deregulation, etc. while voting for NCLB. Talk about small government while voting for the PATRIOT Act. Talk about cutting the deficit while making sure that Medicare and all the popular programs don't get cut, etc.
Same thing for the Dems. They badmouth deregulation a lot but, you know what, they supported most of it. Airline deregulation (mind you, this was a good thing)? Carter era, sponsored by a Dem. Repeal of Glass-Steagall? Clinton era, bipartisan vote.
And who promised to "end welfare as we know it" in his 1992 campaign?
Are the two parties the same? Of course not. But the policies they implement are reasonably similar. I'm not convinced that the US would be a very different place if the GOP had won the 2008 elections. Now with Libya, you can't even say that Obama will not engage in military action without the approval of Congress...
At the risk of sounding like a philistine, I wonder to what extent this loss is "painful". What exactly would have changed for 99.999999% of people if Ovid's Medea had not been lost? If you lose historical works, it does actually have an impact as it limits our understanding of the past and can distort our view of history. But is it such a big deal to lose a work of fiction?
How many people today have read Ovid's works that are still extant of their own volition? How many people go to a bookshop and say "I so want to read the Metamorphoses!"?
There are already much more works of fiction than could ever be read in a lifetime. I'm not convinced that one more ancient book gathering dust on a shelf would be such a great improvement. Not to say that *some* people would not be happy to read it, but it's really a marginal phenomenon. To me, the loss of Medea is on par with, say, losing an episode of a popular TV show. Maybe the world would be a marginally better place with it, but it's really no big deal.
Wonderful! Now Markey can show that he cares by spending other people's money and imposing time-consuming, expensive regulations on all of us.
What's the point of requiring *all* VoIP phones to be hearing-aid compatible? It'll just make all phones more expensive for everyone, including those of us who don't need have hearing aids! It's not insensitive, it's just common sense; we don't mandate that all books be written in 20pt, we just allow publishers to sell both regular-print and large-print books! There are currently cheap VoIP phones that are not compatible with hearing aids and slightly more expensive VoIP phones that are. And it works just fine this way, the deaf can just use some of the $10 million that Markey wants to give them to purchase fancier phones!
The same applies to screen readers for mobile devices. Some are already available, what about the radical notion that those who benefit from them should purchase them with their own money? Not everyone who is blind is poor and helpless and so destitute as to not be able to afford the spend $300 on software that, according to Markey, is indispensable to live a fulfilling life. And if these politicians feel generous, they should just donate a portion of their income to organizations that help the blind. They're wealthy enough that don't have to stick taxpayers with the bill when they're feeling generous.
That's right, our biggest addiction rates came from the men in "clean white coats".... but it was all legal.
[...]
The biggest aid in bringing down both the addiction rate, and cleaning up the quality of drugs? A government law. The Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906, which prohibited the consumption of opiates without a prescription.
Presumably, obtaining a prescription would not have been very hard if, as you argue, doctors were so keen on giving morphine to their patients. I think your post is quite self-contradictory. If the large addiction rates came from men in clean white coats, then the Food and Drug Act would not have made any difference. Might it not be like OHSA, i.e. the law came into force as other factors were influencing drug use/workplace safety and did not directly cause any change? Could it not indicate that, by 1906, people, including the government, had realized the risks associated with the use of morphine and were becoming less willing to use it? This would make a lot of sense since the Act was only passed *after* journalists wrote scathing articles about the patent medicine industry. Another element that bears this out is that Coca Cola stopped including cocaine in its beverage in 1903.
Furthermore, the Act did not even prohibit the consumption of opiates without a prescription. Rather, it imposed mandatory labeling requirements for drugs and food containing alcohol, opiates, etc. Most of the rules laid out in the Act are common sense rules that are simply meant to prevent fraud and ensure that individuals can give informed consent before taking a drug. Seems a lot better than assuming that people can't make the right decision when they are presented with all the facts. My point of view is that drug abuse and alcoholism were rampant in the 19th and early 20th century because standards of living were much lower, many diseases that are now considered minor inconveniences could kill you, and, for many people, life was overall much less enjoyable than it is now. Given these constraints, it is understandable that these people would have different time preferences than we do and favor present enjoyment (i.e. getting high, smoking, etc.) over future benefits.
But if you are poor, God help you, because you can't afford it.
In most cases, poor people are covered under Medicaid or similar programmes. The middle class is covered by private plans. The elderly have Medicare. There are relatively few people who 1) would want to have health insurance and 2) do not qualify for Medicaid/etc. Many of the insured are either the "young invincibles" or individualswho could qualify for Medicaid but never bothered to fill in the required paperwork (or simply don't know that they qualify).
The bill was over $2000 USD for that hour and a half!
This has a lot to do with the fact that, in most cases, someone else is footing the bill.
1. Do people and companies react in a sane rational way, especially when it comes to healthcare?
No. But government officials are people too and, in theory at least, respond (albeit imperfectly) to the demands of their constituants, who are even more irrational when it comes to politics than in market settings (see Bryan Caplan' s The Myth of the Rational Voter . The issue is not whether individuals always make good decisions. The issue is whether individuals typically make better decisions about their healthcare than a central planner.
Also, it is probable that the current system encourages people to be irrational. I.e. they are rationally irrational. If you don' t have to foot the bill (because the governement/your insurance company) pays for your healthcare, why shouldn' t you ask for this very expensive treatment that only has limited benefits?
2. Are you aware that large free markets have been proven to be disconnected from what is called "the fundamentals"?
It's very hard to prove such a thing and depends on what you include in " the fundamentals". If, for instance, a housing bubble is fueled (among other things) by misguided government policies, is it disconnected from the fundamentals? Or is it that market participants were reacting to then-present incentives and then-valid assumptions? Once again, if large free markets can be wrong (investors are not prescient, market value is only a best-guess), so can large government.
Ex post, it is easy to see how market value did not reflect the fundamentals. Ex ante, how do you suggest we identify bubbles? If it were that easy, then, by definition, there would not be a bubble as investors would exploit this profit opportunity.
Is a person or company acting in what is in their best interest always acting in the interests of the whole community?
No. The same remarks however applies to governement officials. The question is whether there is more accountability in the political or economic market. I believe that feedback is more direct and more accurate in the economic arena. If a product does not sell well, it can be easily killed. If you don't like a particular political decision, what do you do? The average congressman probably votes on thousands of policies every year. Maybe, on balance, you like the incumbent more than the challenger and you' ll still vote for him even though you disagree with many of the policies that he supported.
4. Have you ever heard of game theory [http] or the prisoner's dilemma [wikipedia.org]?
Have you ever heard of Public Choice?
5. Can we expect everybody patients have access to all information, allowing them to act rationally, or will they be making decisions on incomplete information?
There are always information asymmetries. Taken to its logical extreme, your argument should lead us to disenfranchise patients. Doctors should make decisions for them and pooh-pooh their concerns which, by definition, would be illegitimate.
Do note that most people don't know much about computers, cars, clothes, etc. Yet, there are functionning markets for all these things. When you don't know much about a field, you don't purchase things at random. You rely on other people's advice (e.g. Consumer Reports, what your more-knowledgeable friends advise you to do, etc.).
If people make spectacularly bad decisions about health care, I'd rather it be with their money (which should make them think twice about making unecessary expenses) than with mine.
2. Why do the foreign quacks selling Cancer treatments and fake stem cell therapies not go out of business?
Because there will always be a minority of people who can be defrauded of their money. Which is why fraud and false advertising are illegal. Once again, the question is whether the vast majority of people can make good decisions about their health, n
I knew you were a Fleming when I read your first sentence. So am I FYI, and I fully support Flemish independance, but could you *please* get your history right?
For starters, the was a ruling class that *spoke* French. But they were not French or Walloons. I hate to break it to you but if the elite in Flanders were French-speaking Flemings! They only spoke French because it was fashionable to do so. Just like the lower-classes in Wallonia spoke... Walloon (not French).
Now, once again, I'm sorry to rain on your parade, but those who fought for independence were mostly Flemish-speaking inhabitants of Brussels. Who was *opposed* to independance? The French-speaking (Flemish) upper-classes in Antwerp and Ghent, because they derived their wealth from trade with the Dutch and Indonesia.
As for the current political situation, what business of mine is it what language my neighbors speak? For all that matters, they can speak Chinese, I don't care!
We should beware of physics envy. Do we really need pseudo-complex econometric studies that probably fail to control for many variables (most of which might not even be clearly identifiable in the first place)? I'm always amazed when people argue that a statistical analysis or econometric study is what we need, when all it takes is 5 minutes of rational thought.
Maybe not everyone will always act rationally. Maybe *some* people will say "I've been playing for 1-hour, I should buy a legit copy". But most people will behave rationally and not buy what they can get for free. The precise percentage of people who will still buy video games is unknown, but it is lower than if piracy did not exist (the availability of free perfect substitutes causes the demand curve to shift to the left).
I think the pro-piracy movement should learn more about economics. They seem to assume that people either would be willing to buy a game or would not. In the real world, people make decisions at the margin. Maybe you're not willing to pay $50 to play the game now but, in two years' time, when it costs $10, you'd be willing to buy it. Is it a lost sale or not? Perhaps not at current prices (thus, "I'd never have bought it anyway"), but a lost sale indeed at a lower price.
Just so you know, you can get an MS in Philosophy. The University of Utah, for instance, offers this degree.
Yes, especially since laid-off construction/manufacturing workers can be turned into scientists with just a wave of the government's magic wand. I don't think there is massive unemployment among people who are capable of conducting such a study, and therefore no need for stimulus. And since when has Paul Krugman been an expert in Macro?
Right. That's why police officers are utterly uninterested in getting you to confess, and the Miranda warning does not say anything about anything you say "being used against you in a court of law".
"Party admission" (e.g. confession) is *not* hearsay. It is admissible in virtually every jurisdiction. Your example was poorly chosen, as it is obvious that no charges would be pressed against you for having imaginary cocaine in your trunk. Should you however confess to, say, a murder (and there are other indications that the person you allege to have murdered met an untimely death, your statements could very well be used against you.
I imagine a lot of people do when their box eventually gets hosed
It simply goes to show how little you know about the windows world. No, most people will *never* install the OS themselves. Should their machine become compromised, they will use the recovery CD, which will take care of all this dirty business for them.
And, if you weren't relying solely on second-hand knowledge and the experiences of a few people you know, you'd also know that most users will never re-install the OS period . All windows boxes are not fated to get hosed at some point. And if it does five years away, the user will most likely put it down to his aging hardware and buy a new computer. Are consumer-grade computers even built to last 5 years without experiencing some kind of trouble.
I see that you don't use any windows boxes yourself. That in itself should disqualify you from judging the merits of Vista. But most importantly, it makes me wonder if you would happen to be a linux user. If so, how do you think people would react if they had been given a shiny, new OS that, for instance, does not support Itunes? What about driver support? Can I use any scanner I want in linux? Or this no-name wireless card that works just fine in Vista? But, hey, we're talking Linux here, so it must be the manufacturer's/MS/Apple's fault if all these things don't work.
If you're just making it up as you go, I can also do it. I'd say that gamers make up a large part of those who buy parts, and that small systems integrators are also a rather important market. Linux users? Very few and, in all likelihood, most of them wouldn't be using a Foxconn motherboard anyway.
This is really a tempest in a teapot. How many people are affected by this issue? A thousand? Ten thousand? Gee, Foxconn's bottomline will *really* suffer from this. I mean, with that measly $40 billion they made in 2006, they must deeply care about a handful of angry geeks who wouldn't have been their target market anyhow.
If you've read TFA, the only conclusion you can draw is that this guy needs to get a life. How many hours did he spend working on this and sending useless e-mails to Foxconn? Something you bought doesn't work as expected, the manufacturer tells you to contact the retailer to get a refund, that's it, end of story. But, hey, we're talking linux here, so here comes the persecution complex (evil company, they must be in MS pocket) and the associated messiah complex (I have a blog, I'll sound the alarm and save the day!).
Better yet, why get the government involved at all? If you think this would be a good idea, start your own shuttle bus service. I find it ironic that your signature proclaims that the government is our enemy, but your first reaction in this case is to ask for more government intervention.
It's ludicrous to think that, should copyright disappear, the music industry would immediately collapse. The most likely thing that would happen is that instead of signing new artists, they would just cruise the bars of Nashville or Austin, look for new songs, and get a cover band to play it before sending it to all the radio stations. Of course, since record companies have access to better facilities and have a lot more money they can devote to marketing, there is no way an unknown artist would be able to compete against them, internet or not.
If there truly was no need for a music industry, it wouldn't exist in the first place. I'm afraid that, like so many on Slashdot, you're suffering from the delusion that everyone behaves in exactly the same way as you do. You might enjoy browsing a website in search for a new sound that you like, but most people don't. What they want is quality music available anytime they want. They want to be able to turn on the radio and hear good music, not spend an hour separating the wheat from the chaff.
Right now, artist can already operate along the guidelines you suggest. Nobody is forcing them to sign with a major, they can release their songs on the internet and make money playing concerts.
Purchasing a video game is no different from going to the movies. There is no guarantee that you'll enjoy the experience, but you can try to determine whether you're likely to beforehand.
As for college students, maybe if they were better informed as to what copyright accomplishes, they would have a different opinion. Seriously, is that even an argument? Most college students I know also fail to understand what comparative advantage is. By your reasoning, we should implement protectionist measures immediately since, eventually, these students will rule the world. Or maybe the 18% of students who support the current copyright system will be the rulers of the world?
If it were simply a change in consumer habits, I'd happily say laissez-faire . If people are not interested in music anymore, let record companies disappear! Here, however, we are faced with a slightly different situation. It is not that people are not interested in music anymore, but that they have found a way to illegitimately acquire a perfect substitute without having to bear the costs that went into producing it. In other words, we have a free rider problem, and I'd argue that it will lead to societally sub-optimal outcomes
Currently, the problem cannot yet be felt. In the short-term, indeed, people will still buy CDs and legitimate copies of songs, partly out of fear, partly because they think it's their moral duty to compensate artists. As a result, record companies have an incentive to sign artists, who have an incentive to devote their time to music.
In the absence of copyright law, the amount of music created would not be the socially optimal one. Fewer people would choose a career in music (and, contrary to popular misconceptions, it is not true that genuinely talented individuals would play anyway -- you can be incredibly talented and motivated by profit, romantic myths notwithstanding), less good music would be made (since record companies would have less money to spend on new artists), etc.
The fact is that the new regime favored by some would be more restrictive than the current one. At the moment, each artist is free to choose whether he wants to release its works for free, or charge a fee. If this fee is too high, consumers can buy another, less expensive CD, or simply not listen to music anymore. The government's job is simply to make sure that everyone's choice is not violated. Nobody looses out because of copyright law: if you refuse to listen to a song because it is too expensive, you haven't lost anything!
If, however, copyright is abolished or file sharing legalized, the artist's freedom is threatened (since he cannot decide who gets access to his music). How is this an improvement over the current system in which the price of music, which can be equal to zero, is determined by supply and demand?
Maybe it's because his wife is a singer?
Regardless, the major problem with your analysis is to assume that people do indeed vote randomly. If it were the case, your argument would be spot on and one of democracy's biggest flaws would not be a source of concern. If uneducated people vote randomly, their votes basically cancel out (as your correctly pointed out) and smart people choose which policy will be implemented.
In the real world, however, voters do not simply vote randomly. They have systematically biased beliefs that influence the way they vote.
In the world you describe, if asked about NAFTA, average people would basically flip a coin and vote either in favor or against it at random. Economists, however, would know better and choose the right policy, which would then be implemented. In the real world, people are much more likely to vote against it because they share the same misconceptions about NAFTA and free trade! Thus, although some people know better, their voices are not heard and bad policies get chosen.
You should read Caplan's The Myth of the Rational Voter , he makes this argument very convincingly.