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> If you reward something, you get more of it. This creates a black market of arranging kidnappings for the tax break. This is the kind of unhinged batshit eco

> If you reward something, you get more of it. This creates a black market of arranging kidnappings for the tax break. This is the kind of unhinged batshit economic thinking that leads to people dying because they can’t afford insulin.

ahzhou 5y ago
It’s not that crazy. People sometimes sell their baby off to finance gambling debts. Some parents are terrible and we shouldn’t be giving them economic reason to have more children.
qeternity 5y ago
No, it's not. This is a well studied phenomenon, and completely unrelated to healthcare affordability.
- roughly 5y ago
  The core argument from economists for things like co-pays and against free healthcare is that absent a cost, people will over-consume health care, which misses the forest for the trees in the same way that the post I was responding does. The notion of humans as primarily rational actors and the conception of policy as needing primarily to guard against exploitation by those actors leads to policies like saying "sorry, as far as the IRS is concerned, those aren't your kids anymore" or "sorry, guess you gotta go without insulin or food," which are frankly fucking monstrous and should be rejected by reasonable people.
  - dragonwriter 5y ago
    > The core argument from economists for things like co-pays and against free healthcare is that absent a cost, people will over-consume health care People dying because they can't afford insulin are usually not dying because they have insurance where the prescription co-pays for insulin is too high, but because they either are actually uninsured, are effectively uninsured because of a high deductible, or have insurance that works on a coinsurance rather than co-payment model. And even then that's usually not really the problem, the problem is usually that they can't afford a more basic life necessity (often food or shelter) for themselves or their dependents, and voluntarily forego (or limit use of) insulin to afford the other need. Which is a real problem (and a real public economic policy problem), but usually not fundamentally a healthcare policy problem. (On the other hand, it's often a problem where moral hazard arguments of the type at issue here contribute to the failure to solve, so the argument about that being the problem may still be correct by a less direct route then seems to have been intended.)
    - roughly 5y ago
      I am not arguing about health care policy, I am arguing about the core economic philosophy that makes "just give them the insulin they need so they don't die" not a tractable proposal in our society.
- Sebguer 5y ago
  Please show me the studies that suggest people would arrange kidnapping of their children for tax improvement if the IRS hadn't put this in the codes.
  - motoxpro 5y ago
    I think it's similar to people adopting kids for the payment. Nothing to stop these people from then arranging for a "kidknapping" afterward. Some tangential articles to show that people exploit children for money. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/10/25/how-an-adoption-broker-cashed-in-on-prospective-parents-dreams https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/10/25/how-an-adoptio... https://www.npr.org/2019/10/09/768533784/arizona-official-arrested-in-multi-million-dollar-baby-mill-adoption-fraud-schem https://www.npr.org/2019/10/09/768533784/arizona-official-ar...
  - darawk 5y ago
    Every study ever done on demand curves for literally anything shows that they consistently slope downwards, with the exception of Veblen goods, which kidnapped children most certainly are not.
    - dragonwriter 5y ago
      > Every study ever done on demand curves for literally anything shows that they consistently slope downwards, with the exception of Veblen goods Since Veblen goods are defined as anything where the demand curve slopes upward, that would only be a result of an empirical study if the study was designed to test, and strong enough to confidently disprove, the existence of goods with a flat demand curve. But it's not meaningful in any case. > Veblen goods, which kidnapped children most certainly are not. [citation needed]
      - darawk 5y ago
        > Since Veblen goods are defined as anything where the demand curve slopes upward, that would only be a result of an empirical study if the study was designed to test, and strong enough to confidently disprove, the existence of goods with a flat demand curve. But it's not meaningful in any case. Look at the other things that are Veblen goods. They are status symbols. Handbags, rare cars, etc. Kidnapped children are clearly not a member of this category. > [citation needed] Please. This is a ludicrous demand for rigor, and not how science actually works.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
joshspankit 5y ago
Kind of, yes. Health care for profit rewards companies who limit supply, increase prices, and set the goal of having long-term “customers” because each of those things brings in more cash. It’s not economic thinking that’s driving the ship though.
Guest42 5y ago
I wish more data was available for this phenomenon, I estimate the number of deaths would be surprisingly high.
more_corn 5y ago
I understand what you’re saying. I too hate the practice of discarding real solutions because of overblown fears of misuse. But on the other hand, go and look up The Cobra Effect.
- roughly 5y ago
  > go and look up the Cobra Effect So, first, the "cobra effect," like most economic proverbs, is apocryphal. It didn't happen. It's a story economists tell their kids to keep them from sharing. Second, there's a big damn difference between "I'm going to grow a snake because I'm getting paid for it" and "I'm going to get my kids kidnapped so I can collect a tax credit without actually having to pay for the kids." It may not appear that way if one's working model of people is "dispassionate rational actor," but it turns out in the real world most people have some kind of irrational emotional attachment to their kids. Finally, I'd submit that "Cobra Effect"-type problems arise as a factor of two errors - the first is misunderstanding the cultural group for which you're designing practices, and the second is a weirdly inflexible view of society that accepts someone manipulating the system as just a sort of thing that happens and not an egregious breach of the social contract warranting a response.
  - manicdee 5y ago
    There are people who have no attachment to their kids and would happily use them as ammunition in personal conflicts, as cheap labour for their business, or as property to exchange for other goods. Don’t assume that everyone else subscribes to your morality, ideology or “ethics”. It’s a brutal world out there and some people value power much more than you do.

ahzhou 5y ago

It’s not that crazy. People sometimes sell their baby off to finance gambling debts. Some parents are terrible and we shouldn’t be giving them economic reason to have more children.

qeternity 5y ago

No, it's not. This is a well studied phenomenon, and completely unrelated to healthcare affordability.

roughly 5y ago
The core argument from economists for things like co-pays and against free healthcare is that absent a cost, people will over-consume health care, which misses the forest for the trees in the same way that the post I was responding does. The notion of humans as primarily rational actors and the conception of policy as needing primarily to guard against exploitation by those actors leads to policies like saying "sorry, as far as the IRS is concerned, those aren't your kids anymore" or "sorry, guess you gotta go without insulin or food," which are frankly fucking monstrous and should be rejected by reasonable people.
- dragonwriter 5y ago
  > The core argument from economists for things like co-pays and against free healthcare is that absent a cost, people will over-consume health care People dying because they can't afford insulin are usually not dying because they have insurance where the prescription co-pays for insulin is too high, but because they either are actually uninsured, are effectively uninsured because of a high deductible, or have insurance that works on a coinsurance rather than co-payment model. And even then that's usually not really the problem, the problem is usually that they can't afford a more basic life necessity (often food or shelter) for themselves or their dependents, and voluntarily forego (or limit use of) insulin to afford the other need. Which is a real problem (and a real public economic policy problem), but usually not fundamentally a healthcare policy problem. (On the other hand, it's often a problem where moral hazard arguments of the type at issue here contribute to the failure to solve, so the argument about that being the problem may still be correct by a less direct route then seems to have been intended.)
  - roughly 5y ago
    I am not arguing about health care policy, I am arguing about the core economic philosophy that makes "just give them the insulin they need so they don't die" not a tractable proposal in our society.
Sebguer 5y ago
Please show me the studies that suggest people would arrange kidnapping of their children for tax improvement if the IRS hadn't put this in the codes.
- motoxpro 5y ago
  I think it's similar to people adopting kids for the payment. Nothing to stop these people from then arranging for a "kidknapping" afterward. Some tangential articles to show that people exploit children for money. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/10/25/how-an-adoption-broker-cashed-in-on-prospective-parents-dreams https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/10/25/how-an-adoptio... https://www.npr.org/2019/10/09/768533784/arizona-official-arrested-in-multi-million-dollar-baby-mill-adoption-fraud-schem https://www.npr.org/2019/10/09/768533784/arizona-official-ar...
- darawk 5y ago
  Every study ever done on demand curves for literally anything shows that they consistently slope downwards, with the exception of Veblen goods, which kidnapped children most certainly are not.
  - dragonwriter 5y ago
    > Every study ever done on demand curves for literally anything shows that they consistently slope downwards, with the exception of Veblen goods Since Veblen goods are defined as anything where the demand curve slopes upward, that would only be a result of an empirical study if the study was designed to test, and strong enough to confidently disprove, the existence of goods with a flat demand curve. But it's not meaningful in any case. > Veblen goods, which kidnapped children most certainly are not. [citation needed]
    - darawk 5y ago
      > Since Veblen goods are defined as anything where the demand curve slopes upward, that would only be a result of an empirical study if the study was designed to test, and strong enough to confidently disprove, the existence of goods with a flat demand curve. But it's not meaningful in any case. Look at the other things that are Veblen goods. They are status symbols. Handbags, rare cars, etc. Kidnapped children are clearly not a member of this category. > [citation needed] Please. This is a ludicrous demand for rigor, and not how science actually works.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

joshspankit 5y ago

Kind of, yes. Health care for profit rewards companies who limit supply, increase prices, and set the goal of having long-term “customers” because each of those things brings in more cash. It’s not economic thinking that’s driving the ship though.

Guest42 5y ago

I wish more data was available for this phenomenon, I estimate the number of deaths would be surprisingly high.

more_corn 5y ago

I understand what you’re saying. I too hate the practice of discarding real solutions because of overblown fears of misuse. But on the other hand, go and look up The Cobra Effect.

roughly 5y ago
> go and look up the Cobra Effect So, first, the "cobra effect," like most economic proverbs, is apocryphal. It didn't happen. It's a story economists tell their kids to keep them from sharing. Second, there's a big damn difference between "I'm going to grow a snake because I'm getting paid for it" and "I'm going to get my kids kidnapped so I can collect a tax credit without actually having to pay for the kids." It may not appear that way if one's working model of people is "dispassionate rational actor," but it turns out in the real world most people have some kind of irrational emotional attachment to their kids. Finally, I'd submit that "Cobra Effect"-type problems arise as a factor of two errors - the first is misunderstanding the cultural group for which you're designing practices, and the second is a weirdly inflexible view of society that accepts someone manipulating the system as just a sort of thing that happens and not an egregious breach of the social contract warranting a response.
- manicdee 5y ago
  There are people who have no attachment to their kids and would happily use them as ammunition in personal conflicts, as cheap labour for their business, or as property to exchange for other goods. Don’t assume that everyone else subscribes to your morality, ideology or “ethics”. It’s a brutal world out there and some people value power much more than you do.