5 ms·

It isn't about good or evil, it's about the fact that relying on large corporations' profit interests to solve public ills is a fools errand. So, sure, the publ

by 49531 7y ago

It isn't about good or evil, it's about the fact that relying on large corporations' profit interests to solve public ills is a fools errand. So, sure, the public might get some good from a corporation's program, but as soon as the profit dries up, the corporation will move on. This isn't a moral thing, it's just a thing profit-driven organizations do. People don't want welfare infrastructure to be contingent on a corporations ability to profit, because in the end it will be a fickle thing.

afarrell 7y ago
Will it be more fickle than a politician's ability to get votes? The answer here is probably "yes". But the question is worth asking. If we can construct some system where the profit motive does motivate ongoing maintenance of welfare infrastructure, thats a win.
- 49531 7y ago
  Not only will it be more fickle, there is 0 accountability from the public, and the corporation has unilateral control over the programs existence. Contrast that with entrenched public goods like schools, libraries, police and fire departments. Most politicians don't have the ability to suspend those programs if the quarterly numbers are low. So yes, private welfare infrastructure is inherently less stable than public. > If we can construct some system where the profit motive does motivate ongoing maintenance of welfare infrastructure, thats a win. There are some things that just aren't profitable, and never will be, like rural mail delivery. Not to be dramatic or anything, but I think if the last 30 years have taught us anything, it is that the more we try to solve problems with profit driven organizations the more anemic our society will become.
danShumway 7y ago
Will this effort make it harder to build public infrastructure in the future? I'm sympathetic to the argument you're making, and I've even used it a couple of times when talking about stuff like browser standards, Facebook Basic Internet, etc... It's not a dumb argument. But at the same time, homeless people don't care about your theoretical utopia. They need help right now, and there's a very real cost to saying, "nobody should help this person suffering until we can do it right." There's a balancing act here. Unless private care is going to make it harder to solve homelessness in the future, we should embrace it as a band-aide solution while we work on public infrastructure. Because let's be honest, public solutions like guaranteed housing are likely pretty far in the future -- I don't see a lot of evidence that there is enough political momentum right now to make that happen. The evidence I see suggests Medicaid has a decent chance of even getting worse in the immediate future. We need band-aide solutions right now.
- _jal 7y ago
  To be clear, I mostly agree with you. But: > Will this effort make it harder to build public infrastructure in the future? It might. Things like this are frequently invoked in policy arguments to claim public efforts are unnecessary or ideologically suspect. Again, that's not to say this is a wrong-headed effort, but not being clear-eyed about the role of patchwork private efforts in public policy arguments is unhelpfully naive.
- 49531 7y ago
  > Will this effort make it harder to build public infrastructure in the future? Yes, most likely. > But at the same time, homeless people don't care about your theoretical utopia. They need help right now, and there's a very real cost to saying, "nobody should help this person suffering until we can do it right." I don't know who you are arguing against here. I never said any of these things. I'm not advocating we prevent corporations from doing things that help people, I am only pointing out that they are fickle friends, and we shouldn't count on them to be reliable providers of aid.
EricE 7y ago
>It isn't about good or evil, it's about the fact that relying on large corporations' profit interests to solve public ills is a fools errand. Why? Are corporations going to make more from dead consumers than healthy, happy and live ones? Again where is this pervasive attitude that anything "large corporations" do is immediately suspect or presumed evil? It just doesn't make sense. >So, sure, the public might get some good from a corporation's program, but as soon as the profit dries up, the corporation will move on. This isn't a moral thing, it's just a thing profit-driven organizations do. So your saying at some point people won't need health care? >People don't want welfare infrastructure to be contingent on a corporations ability to profit, because in the end it will be a fickle thing. Yes, because uncountable bureaucrats aren't fickle. Since we are talking about healthcare just look at the way the US treats it's veterans in the VA. In Washington DC, look how poorly the Metro system is run compared to other similar systems. I have zero faith in the governmental complexes, in the US at least, to be more effective than properly motivated private industries. If you removed restrictions on selling insurance across state lines, allowed the creation of non-profit insurance corporations similar to credit unions or electrical cooperatives and made some changes to the sue-happy culture (tort reform) the vast majority of the US healthcare "issues" would balance out rather quickly. And far more effectively than layering on more bureaucracy. Even without the above you are still seeing trends like: http://selfpaypatient.com/selfpayhealthcaremarket/ http://selfpaypatient.com/selfpayhealthcaremarket/ But for some reason in the US we seem to think health insurance = health care. That's pretty daffy! Health care is when I get to see a doctor. Running to insurance every time you have a sniffle is what is driving up costs - bureaucratic overhead and complexity (bureaucracies live in any large human powered organizations - not just governments!) in health care is truly bizarre. I watch my mother who has a background in healthcare dissect and destroy bills from hospitals for care given to my family members - often she gets the final bill down over %50 - but how many people have the expertise to do that? We've outsourced all knowledge about our healthcare to others and we are confused when the price and quality goes down? People spend more time researching a good deal on the latest electronic gizmo but have got the first clue about what it should really cost to get an X-ray or other medical procedure done? Who's really at fault here?

by 49531 7y ago

afarrell 7y ago

Will it be more fickle than a politician's ability to get votes? The answer here is probably "yes". But the question is worth asking. If we can construct some system where the profit motive does motivate ongoing maintenance of welfare infrastructure, thats a win.

49531 7y ago
Not only will it be more fickle, there is 0 accountability from the public, and the corporation has unilateral control over the programs existence. Contrast that with entrenched public goods like schools, libraries, police and fire departments. Most politicians don't have the ability to suspend those programs if the quarterly numbers are low. So yes, private welfare infrastructure is inherently less stable than public. > If we can construct some system where the profit motive does motivate ongoing maintenance of welfare infrastructure, thats a win. There are some things that just aren't profitable, and never will be, like rural mail delivery. Not to be dramatic or anything, but I think if the last 30 years have taught us anything, it is that the more we try to solve problems with profit driven organizations the more anemic our society will become.

danShumway 7y ago

Will this effort make it harder to build public infrastructure in the future? I'm sympathetic to the argument you're making, and I've even used it a couple of times when talking about stuff like browser standards, Facebook Basic Internet, etc... It's not a dumb argument. But at the same time, homeless people don't care about your theoretical utopia. They need help right now, and there's a very real cost to saying, "nobody should help this person suffering until we can do it right." There's a balancing act here. Unless private care is going to make it harder to solve homelessness in the future, we should embrace it as a band-aide solution while we work on public infrastructure. Because let's be honest, public solutions like guaranteed housing are likely pretty far in the future -- I don't see a lot of evidence that there is enough political momentum right now to make that happen. The evidence I see suggests Medicaid has a decent chance of even getting worse in the immediate future. We need band-aide solutions right now.

_jal 7y ago
To be clear, I mostly agree with you. But: > Will this effort make it harder to build public infrastructure in the future? It might. Things like this are frequently invoked in policy arguments to claim public efforts are unnecessary or ideologically suspect. Again, that's not to say this is a wrong-headed effort, but not being clear-eyed about the role of patchwork private efforts in public policy arguments is unhelpfully naive.
49531 7y ago
> Will this effort make it harder to build public infrastructure in the future? Yes, most likely. > But at the same time, homeless people don't care about your theoretical utopia. They need help right now, and there's a very real cost to saying, "nobody should help this person suffering until we can do it right." I don't know who you are arguing against here. I never said any of these things. I'm not advocating we prevent corporations from doing things that help people, I am only pointing out that they are fickle friends, and we shouldn't count on them to be reliable providers of aid.

EricE 7y ago

>It isn't about good or evil, it's about the fact that relying on large corporations' profit interests to solve public ills is a fools errand. Why? Are corporations going to make more from dead consumers than healthy, happy and live ones? Again where is this pervasive attitude that anything "large corporations" do is immediately suspect or presumed evil? It just doesn't make sense. >So, sure, the public might get some good from a corporation's program, but as soon as the profit dries up, the corporation will move on. This isn't a moral thing, it's just a thing profit-driven organizations do. So your saying at some point people won't need health care? >People don't want welfare infrastructure to be contingent on a corporations ability to profit, because in the end it will be a fickle thing. Yes, because uncountable bureaucrats aren't fickle. Since we are talking about healthcare just look at the way the US treats it's veterans in the VA. In Washington DC, look how poorly the Metro system is run compared to other similar systems. I have zero faith in the governmental complexes, in the US at least, to be more effective than properly motivated private industries. If you removed restrictions on selling insurance across state lines, allowed the creation of non-profit insurance corporations similar to credit unions or electrical cooperatives and made some changes to the sue-happy culture (tort reform) the vast majority of the US healthcare "issues" would balance out rather quickly. And far more effectively than layering on more bureaucracy. Even without the above you are still seeing trends like: http://selfpaypatient.com/selfpayhealthcaremarket/ http://selfpaypatient.com/selfpayhealthcaremarket/ But for some reason in the US we seem to think health insurance = health care. That's pretty daffy! Health care is when I get to see a doctor. Running to insurance every time you have a sniffle is what is driving up costs - bureaucratic overhead and complexity (bureaucracies live in any large human powered organizations - not just governments!) in health care is truly bizarre. I watch my mother who has a background in healthcare dissect and destroy bills from hospitals for care given to my family members - often she gets the final bill down over %50 - but how many people have the expertise to do that? We've outsourced all knowledge about our healthcare to others and we are confused when the price and quality goes down? People spend more time researching a good deal on the latest electronic gizmo but have got the first clue about what it should really cost to get an X-ray or other medical procedure done? Who's really at fault here?