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“Everyone always acts in their own self-interest” is a hyperstition — if enough people believe it, this will become true. But it is also possible that most doct
by freeone3000 2y ago
“Everyone always acts in their own self-interest” is a hyperstition — if enough people believe it, this will become true. But it is also possible that most doctors go into medicine to cure patients and that most nurses want to do the job they signed up for. That humans are inherently social creatures who have intrinsic desires which can be things other than personal financial gain, and that the social context in which they experience these desires affects whether it’s a “good idea” to act on them. You are discarding every bit of pure altruism, every bit of pride in a job well done, every bit of contributing to your community for the good of all.
The rise of the American administrative sociopath is neither a fait accompli nor a laudable end-goal.
- zeroCalories 2y agoCan you show me a single situation in which this has happened at scale? Has any communist country not had major productivity problems? The explanation is simple, really. Social groups were never meant to be larger than a town, and human empathy breaks down when considering millions people.
- itishappy 2y agoI don't understand the focus on communism. The US healthcare system is rated well behind similar capitalist countries. https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/issue-briefs/2023/jan/us-health-care-global-perspective-2022 https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/issue-briefs/2... If socialized healthcare makes a country communist, then I'd argue exchanging capital for goods makes China capitalist. > The explanation is simple, really. Social groups... https://xkcd.com/592/ https://xkcd.com/592/
- zeroCalories 2y agoDid I ever say the U.S system is perfect? Do you think other countries have no problems? You people focusing on "people over profits" is literally communism, and is worthless. You're never going to get people to care about others beyond a superficial show of solidarity. That's why I said we need to align people's outcome to profit. Do you think that means an ancap healthcare system? And nice comic. I completely agree that your attempts to change human psychology will fail.
- itishappy 2y ago> Did I ever say the U.S system is perfect? Not explicitly, but I'm reading between the following lines: > That's why I said we need to align people's outcome to profit. Where do you think the US rates from a "focused on profit" perspective?
- zeroCalories 2y agoFocusing on profits isn't the issue.
- itishappy 2y agoRight, you said it's the solution. In your mind, what drives the measured disparity? What is the issue?
- taylodl 2y agoNo one said other countries don't have problems with their healthcare, what has been said and is demonstrated with ample data is they're getting far better health outcomes for far less money. The 2nd half of Adam Smith's book was a treatise in all the different ways markets would fail. Adam Smith identified so many failure modes that the Founders thought Capitalism would never work (regardless of what the history revisionists now say). Healthcare is one of those verticals for which markets demonstrably don't work.