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> Europe is far ahead of us in terms of bullshit job creation due to government regulation, but we are catching up. To each it’s own. The lack of government re

> Europe is far ahead of us in terms of bullshit job creation due to government regulation, but we are catching up. To each it’s own. The lack of government regulations also creates job with discutable outcome in the US. Adminstrative medical staff to deal with the insurance quagmire and wallmart greeters comes to mind. I would also evaluate the number of waiter to be 1.5 times higher for the same quality of service ( and more icy glass refill )

snapplebobapple 3y ago
Medicine is a bad example because it seems to create bullshit jobs through regulation whether it is private or public payor/provider. I am personally in canada and the amount of bullshit jobs just moves from insurance yo a mix of insurance and public administration. Wallmart greeter and waiter isn't a bullshit job in the context of this article's definition because it is obvious both those jobs have purpose, even if it is purpose you may not value.
- dopidopHN 3y ago
  Totally fair, it deviate from grabber’s book. I’m shoving my agenda that those jobs are useless overall. But maybe people doing them would beg to differ. That just my perspective having lived elsewhere most of my life : those jobs don’t exists, and society goes on. But that’s a shitty metric. — What’s the purpose of wallmart greeters? I know they reduce the rate of theft but is it why Walmart is doing it ? — On health and insurance: I’m convince that a larger or even single entity is more efficient at negotiating drugs price down and avoid having 42 systems talking to each other and moving claims around
  - snapplebobapple 3y ago
    Reducing theft is the main reason I believe. Also providing someone who can direct you to where you go when you get in the store if you have questions. On negotiating drug prices: That market is pre-broken due to us handing out patents in an attempt to spur innovation (It's not a bad attempt, it's probably the best tradeoff one could come up with to push advancement, it just totally breaks the market for the drug while the patent is in force). You are certainly right that size will give negotiating ability. I am not convinced the organization needs to be extremely large but it probably requires at least a few million patients. That being said I don't know what the optimal system is other than we are probably far from it because it's kind of complex. If your pricing power is large enough to move the expected value of a drug down, you are diminishing the value of the patent and decreasing the effect on new research, for example. The large system's negotiating power is also only as valuable as the skill and motivation of that system's negotiators and that skill and motivation is far from guaranteed. There are also tertiary regulatory effects limiting the competition in the generics production sector. I am not sure the relative importance of any of the points I raised or or the relative importance of the numerous other factors I didn't list and/or didn't think of so it's really hard to say for sure what the optimal solution is and in that situation I am totally fine with a public provider but I want my ability to use a private provider to be maintained and ideally the public provider should be charged for as a user fee I can opt out of so if it's garbage none of us have to use it.
zeroonetwothree 3y ago
Giving customers water seems hard to argue is a bullshit job.
- dopidopHN 3y ago
  I guess it’s cultural ? I hate it. Bring me a pitcher of cold water and bring my food, but please don’t refill my glass and hover around the table. Unless you are elderly or impaired I don’t see the point :)

snapplebobapple 3y ago

Medicine is a bad example because it seems to create bullshit jobs through regulation whether it is private or public payor/provider. I am personally in canada and the amount of bullshit jobs just moves from insurance yo a mix of insurance and public administration. Wallmart greeter and waiter isn't a bullshit job in the context of this article's definition because it is obvious both those jobs have purpose, even if it is purpose you may not value.

dopidopHN 3y ago
Totally fair, it deviate from grabber’s book. I’m shoving my agenda that those jobs are useless overall. But maybe people doing them would beg to differ. That just my perspective having lived elsewhere most of my life : those jobs don’t exists, and society goes on. But that’s a shitty metric. — What’s the purpose of wallmart greeters? I know they reduce the rate of theft but is it why Walmart is doing it ? — On health and insurance: I’m convince that a larger or even single entity is more efficient at negotiating drugs price down and avoid having 42 systems talking to each other and moving claims around
- snapplebobapple 3y ago
  Reducing theft is the main reason I believe. Also providing someone who can direct you to where you go when you get in the store if you have questions. On negotiating drug prices: That market is pre-broken due to us handing out patents in an attempt to spur innovation (It's not a bad attempt, it's probably the best tradeoff one could come up with to push advancement, it just totally breaks the market for the drug while the patent is in force). You are certainly right that size will give negotiating ability. I am not convinced the organization needs to be extremely large but it probably requires at least a few million patients. That being said I don't know what the optimal system is other than we are probably far from it because it's kind of complex. If your pricing power is large enough to move the expected value of a drug down, you are diminishing the value of the patent and decreasing the effect on new research, for example. The large system's negotiating power is also only as valuable as the skill and motivation of that system's negotiators and that skill and motivation is far from guaranteed. There are also tertiary regulatory effects limiting the competition in the generics production sector. I am not sure the relative importance of any of the points I raised or or the relative importance of the numerous other factors I didn't list and/or didn't think of so it's really hard to say for sure what the optimal solution is and in that situation I am totally fine with a public provider but I want my ability to use a private provider to be maintained and ideally the public provider should be charged for as a user fee I can opt out of so if it's garbage none of us have to use it.

zeroonetwothree 3y ago

Giving customers water seems hard to argue is a bullshit job.

dopidopHN 3y ago
I guess it’s cultural ? I hate it. Bring me a pitcher of cold water and bring my food, but please don’t refill my glass and hover around the table. Unless you are elderly or impaired I don’t see the point :)