10 ms·

yes there is, and its called public finance medicine, and health care, in my opinion, seem to fall nicely in that category you as someone who is not infected

yes there is, and its called public finance medicine, and health care, in my opinion, seem to fall nicely in that category you as someone who is not infected with the hepatitis C virus, would benefit from others getting cured from it, to reduce the possibility of you catching it and this is just one example and to be clear, i am not saying, that all health care should be exclusively public i am just saying that public finance of not for profit organization working on creating medicine, should be an option

geezerjay 9y ago
> yes there is, and its called public finance > > medicine, and health care, in my opinion, seem to fall nicely in that category Then get your government institutions to spend your taxes to do the legwork. Meanwhile, don't hinder progress by barring everyone else from doing the job your state is incapable of doing or doesn't want to do.
- ubernostrum 9y ago
  We already put tax dollars into research. Huge amounts of tax dollars into research. Some quick Googling says in 2016 just the federal government -- not counting state/local grants -- dedicated $145 billion to R&D. We just also let that research be locked up with patents and published in pay-to-read journals, because apparently "we pay for your R&D" is not enough "incentive" to get people to invent/develop new things, we also have to give them additional millions/billions of dollars in later sales.
  - rayiner 9y ago
    > We just also let that research be locked up with patents and published in pay-to-read journals, because apparently "we pay for your R&D" is not enough "incentive" to get people to invent/develop new things, we also have to give them additional millions/billions of dollars in later sales. In the R&D sector, the government is an investor like any other. Imagine a VC that offered you the following terms: we'll pay your salaries (which we'll heavily scrutinize) while you get your product a third of the way towards being commercial ready. After that, you can keep commercializing on your own dime, but we'll own anything you developed up to that point and give it away to your competitors for free. Would anyone with other options take that offer? But that's exactly the offer the government would be making if research initially funded by government grants wasn't eligible for patent protection.
    - ubernostrum 9y ago
      Flip your argument around: suppose a startup walked into a VC firm and said "we want you to fully fund us for our first couple years, which will be expensive, and in return we expect to give you nothing -- no equity of any sort, no shares of future profits, nothing". Would anyone who had the ability to invest in something that actually provides a return take that offer? But that's exactly the offer researchers -- many of whom work at publicly-funded universities -- are currently making.
      - deleted 9y ago
        [deleted]
      - deleted 9y ago
        [deleted]
      - rayiner 9y ago
        Except you can’t flip it around because it’s not symmetric. From the point of view of the investee, the government is just another investor and can’t demand more onerous terms. From the point of view of the government, it’s not just another investor, because it can capture public benefits private investors cannot. At most, you might be able to argue that the government should be able to seek an equity stake in return for funding R&D. That’s not enough to support your original point however, which was that government funded research should be in the public domain.
        ubernostrum 9y ago
        the government is just another investor and can’t demand more onerous terms Companies with different classes of investors, who have different rights, are common. can capture public benefits private investors cannot And if that stops happening -- as it is, when government-granted monopolies are used to gouge -- then it's time to make the companies involved suffer a bit until they remember where their R&D money came from. At most, you might be able to argue that the government should be able to seek an equity stake This lacks imagination. You could impose limits on the term and scope of patent for inventions resulting from public funding. You could prevent patenting of, say, modified formulations of a publicly-funded drug whose only purpose is to secure a new patent and another term of monopoly. Or you could make publicly-funded patents expire sooner. Or you could impose price caps on patented products derived from public funding, until the amount of "lost" profit from the caps equals the amount of public money put in. Or you could use tax penalties against companies who price-gouge -- say, if you acquire an unpatented drug, obtain a monopoly on its production and start jacking up the price, you immediately get taxed into bankruptcy. There are all sorts of possible ways to do something here.
rayiner 9y ago
There are two orthogonal issues here: 1) how do you finance drug R&D? 2) how do you pay for people to get the resulting drugs? Public finance is a reasonable option for (2). It is not a reasonable option for (1). If you made it so, for example, going into drug development meant a career stuck on the GS scale, you'd drive away huge numbers of highly capable people. There is no link between technical competency and altruism. If there was, you wouldn't have huge numbers of people at HYPS jumping at the chance to go work at Wall Street and FANG companies instead of more altruistic pursuits.
- davmre 9y ago
  What do you think about government-financed prizes for private-sector drug development, e.g., the government pledges $X billion if you develop an Alzheimer's cure and place it in the public domain? Bernie Sanders has a proposal like this: https://www.vox.com/2015/9/25/9397069/bernie-sanders-drug-prices https://www.vox.com/2015/9/25/9397069/bernie-sanders-drug-pr.... It seems like that retains most of the advantages of the current system, incentivizes private-sector development, but also eliminates the problem of high prices at the point of delivery. (i.e., it correctly prices the marginal cost of treating someone at the marginal cost of producing the drug, which is generally low).
  - rayiner 9y ago
    I think they would work if the government priced them appropriately. But the government is terrible at pricing things. E.g. how nearly every government under prices water/sewer and public transit, leaving those systems in a state of decay.
    - Firadeoclus 9y ago
      Government provided services are not necessarily meant to be profitable in the business sense. It is enough if their global benefits are worth the cost, even if those benefits cannot be captured as direct profits. For example public transit is worth a lot more in external benefits than just the fares paid.

geezerjay 9y ago

> yes there is, and its called public finance > > medicine, and health care, in my opinion, seem to fall nicely in that category Then get your government institutions to spend your taxes to do the legwork. Meanwhile, don't hinder progress by barring everyone else from doing the job your state is incapable of doing or doesn't want to do.

ubernostrum 9y ago
We already put tax dollars into research. Huge amounts of tax dollars into research. Some quick Googling says in 2016 just the federal government -- not counting state/local grants -- dedicated $145 billion to R&D. We just also let that research be locked up with patents and published in pay-to-read journals, because apparently "we pay for your R&D" is not enough "incentive" to get people to invent/develop new things, we also have to give them additional millions/billions of dollars in later sales.
- rayiner 9y ago
  > We just also let that research be locked up with patents and published in pay-to-read journals, because apparently "we pay for your R&D" is not enough "incentive" to get people to invent/develop new things, we also have to give them additional millions/billions of dollars in later sales. In the R&D sector, the government is an investor like any other. Imagine a VC that offered you the following terms: we'll pay your salaries (which we'll heavily scrutinize) while you get your product a third of the way towards being commercial ready. After that, you can keep commercializing on your own dime, but we'll own anything you developed up to that point and give it away to your competitors for free. Would anyone with other options take that offer? But that's exactly the offer the government would be making if research initially funded by government grants wasn't eligible for patent protection.
  - ubernostrum 9y ago
    Flip your argument around: suppose a startup walked into a VC firm and said "we want you to fully fund us for our first couple years, which will be expensive, and in return we expect to give you nothing -- no equity of any sort, no shares of future profits, nothing". Would anyone who had the ability to invest in something that actually provides a return take that offer? But that's exactly the offer researchers -- many of whom work at publicly-funded universities -- are currently making.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
    - rayiner 9y ago
      Except you can’t flip it around because it’s not symmetric. From the point of view of the investee, the government is just another investor and can’t demand more onerous terms. From the point of view of the government, it’s not just another investor, because it can capture public benefits private investors cannot. At most, you might be able to argue that the government should be able to seek an equity stake in return for funding R&D. That’s not enough to support your original point however, which was that government funded research should be in the public domain.
      - ubernostrum 9y ago
        the government is just another investor and can’t demand more onerous terms Companies with different classes of investors, who have different rights, are common. can capture public benefits private investors cannot And if that stops happening -- as it is, when government-granted monopolies are used to gouge -- then it's time to make the companies involved suffer a bit until they remember where their R&D money came from. At most, you might be able to argue that the government should be able to seek an equity stake This lacks imagination. You could impose limits on the term and scope of patent for inventions resulting from public funding. You could prevent patenting of, say, modified formulations of a publicly-funded drug whose only purpose is to secure a new patent and another term of monopoly. Or you could make publicly-funded patents expire sooner. Or you could impose price caps on patented products derived from public funding, until the amount of "lost" profit from the caps equals the amount of public money put in. Or you could use tax penalties against companies who price-gouge -- say, if you acquire an unpatented drug, obtain a monopoly on its production and start jacking up the price, you immediately get taxed into bankruptcy. There are all sorts of possible ways to do something here.

rayiner 9y ago

There are two orthogonal issues here: 1) how do you finance drug R&D? 2) how do you pay for people to get the resulting drugs? Public finance is a reasonable option for (2). It is not a reasonable option for (1). If you made it so, for example, going into drug development meant a career stuck on the GS scale, you'd drive away huge numbers of highly capable people. There is no link between technical competency and altruism. If there was, you wouldn't have huge numbers of people at HYPS jumping at the chance to go work at Wall Street and FANG companies instead of more altruistic pursuits.

davmre 9y ago
What do you think about government-financed prizes for private-sector drug development, e.g., the government pledges $X billion if you develop an Alzheimer's cure and place it in the public domain? Bernie Sanders has a proposal like this: https://www.vox.com/2015/9/25/9397069/bernie-sanders-drug-prices https://www.vox.com/2015/9/25/9397069/bernie-sanders-drug-pr.... It seems like that retains most of the advantages of the current system, incentivizes private-sector development, but also eliminates the problem of high prices at the point of delivery. (i.e., it correctly prices the marginal cost of treating someone at the marginal cost of producing the drug, which is generally low).
- rayiner 9y ago
  I think they would work if the government priced them appropriately. But the government is terrible at pricing things. E.g. how nearly every government under prices water/sewer and public transit, leaving those systems in a state of decay.
  - Firadeoclus 9y ago
    Government provided services are not necessarily meant to be profitable in the business sense. It is enough if their global benefits are worth the cost, even if those benefits cannot be captured as direct profits. For example public transit is worth a lot more in external benefits than just the fares paid.