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The Role of Blood Plasma Donation Centers in Crime Reduction
- idle_zealot 1y agoSo in summary, a large portion of crime is due to economic deprivation. Giving the poors the opportunity to sell their blood alleviates that deprivation enough to notably reduce crime in the area surrounding donation centers. Am I getting that right?
- sc68cal 1y agoyes this is my read too. In true classic American fashion, instead of investing money to help uplift disadvantaged communities, we treat them as a resource to extract
- altruios 1y agoBlood, like the sun: is renewable... up and until a point. /s People get all huffy when you suggest criminal activity isn't an innate trait of a person but due to life circumstances and desperation, as if they would never steal to eat/survive. It's an attack on a person's identity to insinuate that the only difference between them and a 'criminal' is one of circumstance. For some, such is too much to even consider. This is the real barrier to fixing the problem: a lack of imagination and empathy.
- mc32 1y agoNot innate but some people will breach mores more readily than others under similar circumstances. Some people feel deep shame and failure if they have to steal, others not so much. So there are degrees.
- altruios 1y ago> some people will breach mores more readily than others under similar circumstances > Not innate These two thoughts seem to be in conflict. You are describing an innate difference. I agree there is nuance. We are a product of our environment and innate nature. I suspect the environment is (far: by orders of magnitude) easier to change. I don't think we only need to change the environment, but I would venture the 80/20 estimation here... This says nothing for 'truly evil' people, which - I suspect - is a vanishingly small number of people. I also think that such people require a degraded environment to operate effectively (according to their goals) and by focusing on improving the conditions people are in: we remove a lot of leverage for those people to act as they wish (maliciously).
- hombre_fatal 1y agoDunno, I sold blood plasma in uni. IIRC I made $75/week doing it. I think the trade offs are all sensible here. 1. It doesn't depend on politics, it already works today 2. You have to plan for and show up to a place to get the money and ensure your blood remains valuable, all of which promote a basic semblance of order in your life, especially when you're on the ropes. 3. You save lives and are compensated for it 4. In the area between having no money vs having a job, pretty much anything I can think of to make money is worse than selling plasma. It's a lucky quirk that you can sell your plasma, because you usually can't sell your blood even though countries, industry, hospitals, and insurance companies pay each other good money for it, just not to the person who created it.
- Avshalom 1y agoIt does depend on politics, the USA being on of the few countries that allows payment for plasma is result of politics, to the degree that blood products make up ~3% of US exports. Like yeah, I give (double red) blood as often as I am able because, well civic duty and all but it's still real fucked.
- hombre_fatal 1y agoTrue. But what I mean is that cash handouts are a constant contentious political battleground that feels like a pipe dream where I live while selling plasma was a political decision made before we arrived and probably not something most people feel quite as strongly about. The danger as I see it is that we can let perfect be the enemy of good, though I suppose you aren't suggesting that it's bad that people have the option to sell their plasma as everything currently stands. I do see it better than the alternative of prohibiting it.
- pkaye 1y agoOnly five countries allow payment for plasma donations: US, Germany, Austria, Czech Republic and Hungary. The reality is the countries that don't allow payment for plasma donations don't produce enough plasma drug products for self sufficiency within their country. They have to import it from one of the other countries (primarily US because it has the biggest population of those five.) This is all due to a policy pushed by the WHO recommending countries not pay for plasma donations.
- ahartmetz 1y agoHeck, if that happened in a book or a movie, I'd think that the metaphor was too heavy-handed - extracting and selling the literal blood of the poor. And it might be better than it sounds like, all else being equal in this timeline.
- BobaFloutist 1y agoIt probably helps that they don't let you sell enough to damage or endanger your health.
- vpribish 1y agoblood is a top-ten US export (#7 in 2024) - like 2.5% of our exports by value. It's a surprisingly big business. https://www.cnbc.com/2022/06/30/why-blood-makes-up-over-2point5percent-of-all-us-exports.html https://www.cnbc.com/2022/06/30/why-blood-makes-up-over-2poi...
- SoftTalker 1y agoIt's not just giving out money. We've tried that in a number of ways and it mostly doesn't work, or incentizes the wrong behaviors. It's an economic exchange; there is a sense of having provided something of value for the payment.
- docsaintly 1y agoIt also points out that the requirement (or belief one exists) to have "clean" blood causes would-be donors to avoid drugs, which also has a benefit. I'm guessing less drugs consumed means better health, better choices, and more money available for necessities.
- SoftTalker 1y agoAnd lower crime, since a lot of crime is related to buying and selling drugs.
- mc32 1y agoIt’s “giving the poor…” You don’t have to pluralize poor. In rural America you do have some poor people selling their plasma to afford gas. Drug screening means they avoid doing drugs. Not being on drugs lowers propensity to engage in petty crime. I knew a couple like this.
- Glyptodon 1y ago"Poors" is a specific expression with connotation. Presumably used sarcastically, but potentially not.
- mc32 1y agoWhen making an argument, using slang like that kind of lowers it’s impact.
- Glyptodon 1y agoI mean I didn't use the term, it just wasn't clear if it was known based on the message I replied to.
- idle_zealot 1y agoThanks for the tip. I'll make sure to avoid using slang, allegory, metaphor, or sarcasm when communicating in the future. On a related note, I find that making elementary grammatical errors, like using the wrong "its" or "there", can detract from the impact of an argument.
- mc32 1y agoSo you agree! I have point that term usage and grammar matter when talking about serious issues. Sorry about the typo, I'll be more mindful. Thank you.
- pimlottc 1y ago"The poors" [0] is a satirical way of mocking how poor people are disdained by the elite, it's almost certainly an intentional choice of words. 0: https://old.reddit.com/r/NoStupidQuestions/comments/199e6mc/are_there_examples_of_the_phrase_the_poors_being/ https://old.reddit.com/r/NoStupidQuestions/comments/199e6mc/...
- RobGR 1y agoMy gut feeling is that is what is going on. But, the creation of new plasma donation centers is not a random process, so we've identified a correlation, not a definitive cause and effect. What if areas that are on an upward economic trajectory are more likely to have new businesses open ? Maybe those are the areas where it is easier to get the necessary zoning or building permits.
- potato3732842 1y ago>Maybe those are the areas where it is easier to get the necessary zoning or building permits. Which, at least on the highly regulated coasts and comparable midwest areas, are the areas that are/were depressed by manufacturing pulling out.
- potato3732842 1y agoExactly. You walk out of the plasma center, sawzall in hand and $20 in pocket, and because of that $20 in pocket you walk a little further before cutting the cat off anything. Metaphorically of course, but also almost literally.
- zipy124 1y ago> rugs possession offenses also drop noticeably once a plasma centers opens – by 14.3%. We posit that this relates to the drug and blood-quality regulations implemented plasma centers. This is rather wild as a fact, but also correlates well with previous studies, showing financial incentives do indeed help regulate health for example weight loss (https://www.stir.ac.uk/news/2024/may-2024-news/cash-incentives-drive-weight-loss-in-men/ https://www.stir.ac.uk/news/2024/may-2024-news/cash-incentiv...).
- pimlottc 1y agoI would think people would have more money for rugs, carpets too.
- jihadjihad 1y agoDoes compensating people reduce the number of rugs micturated upon?
- vpribish 1y agoso the do-not-remove tag inspectors work at the plasma center?
- analognoise 1y ago"How we keep the poor inline by ghoulishly selling their literal blood" Not a very advanced society at all. Gross on multiple levels.
- crossbody 1y agoYes! Let's campaign to stop this exploitation! Drug use shots up, crime rises as a result, people die due to plasma shortages, but at least it's not gross, right?
- analognoise 1y agoYes there’s nothing we can do. Not socialize medicine and return to a 90% top marginal tax rate for a new deal - you’re right, our only option is increased crime and violence or ghoulishly profiting on the blood of the poor. No other options. /s
- crossbody 1y ago"Socialize medicine and 90% top marginal tax rate" - great ideas of you ignore all second order effects (well researched and proven). But then you propose to take away a clearly beneficial opportunity to donate plasma just because it sounds personally gross to you (while people make their own free choice to take this opportunity or not), so not sure a nuanced conversation about 2nd order effects can be held here
- analognoise 1y agoYou’re arguing the “second order effects” are literally worse than selling the blood of the poor. Gonna need a source for that trash, chief. Considering we’re the only “advanced” country that does healthcare this poorly, and we have a wild oligarch class that desperately needs to be put in its place, I’m really curious how “healthcare for all and not requiring the poor to sell their own plasma” is the worse option.
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- lupusreal 1y agoThis reinforces my belief that legalizing and incentivising casual labor would be immensely helpful to the lowest rungs of society. The money they make from selling their plasma cannot add up to much, getting a job would give them much more money, but regular employment is beyond the capabilities of people who have very irregular lives due to drug abuse, mental illness, etc. Making it easier for people to work even just a few hours, on short notice whenever they can muster the energy and willpower, would allow them to have a much better source of income than is available to them currently.
- cogman10 1y agoCasual labor is by and large quiet legal (at least in the US). The problem is it's not available or easy to find. I think bringing back something like the CCC [1] would do wonders for the US. It could even be made more available and accessible in the modern era. Imagine, for example, if you had something akin to a small jobs board. Citizens could apply for tasks to be done and the government could fund (or partially fund) the completion of those tasks. Could be things like scrubbing graffiti off a wall. Filling a pothole. Or any other community improvement (like taking care of a park). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilian_Conservation_Corps https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilian_Conservation_Corps
- gruez 1y ago> Could be things like scrubbing graffiti off a wall. Filling a pothole. Or any other community improvement (like taking care of a park). All of that requires funding. Where would that funding come from? If the answer is "just spend more money", why is it better to spend money on public works programs than paying it out via means-tested welfare programs?
- cogman10 1y ago> Where would that funding come from? Taxes. Ideally higher income taxes or even better a wealth tax (but that has dubious constitutionality). I also wouldn't mind pulling $100B, $200B, or $500B away from the military budget for such projects. > why is it better to spend money on public works programs than paying it out via means-tested welfare programs? Means testing requires someone to do the means testing along with additional bureaucracy to enforce it. It's, in fact, more expensive than just having an open program. Why would I actually care, for example, if we paid extra money for a billionaire's kid to get healthcare if that meant the 99% of the population that isn't billionaires got healthcare? A public works program is a welfare program. With the benefit that beyond just giving money to people that need it, it also improves public spaces for everyone. And, I think nobody would actually object to allowing anyone to participate in public works. Would you really care if a millionaire got a little extra cash cleaning a highway? But beyond that, it's better to spend money on people with the least amount of money because they drive the economy way harder than everyone else. A dollar given to someone poor is far more likely to be spent in the economy than a dollar given to a rich person. A healthy economy is one where money moves more frequently. A good example is what's predicted to happen with the medicaid defunding. Rural hospitals are likely going to shutdown as the majority of them receive their funding from medicaid. That hurts everyone in a rural community even if they aren't on medicaid. Now imagine the reverse. If that rural community had government works jobs, that'd be more money in the community which would ultimately mean more opportunities for new businesses in the community to exist. Where it previously may not have made sense for a grocery store to exist, now it might because more of the population has a stable income they are willing to spend.
- blindriver 1y agoThe implied end result is ghoulish. Open plasma centers in poor areas. Sooner or later they will ask for kidney donation centers. The rich literally feeding off the poor. This is a perfect case for UBI instead of feeding off the poor.
- vpribish 1y agoIt's only vampiric, not ghoulish.
- loeg 1y ago[flagged]
- williamdclt 1y agopretty sure everyone on the whole political spectrum uses pejorative adjectives to describe something they don't like. Would it have changed anything if they had said "horrific", "unsettling", "unethical"?
- QuercusMax 1y agoGhoulish refers to creatures who feed off the dead. Vampiric refers to creatures who feed off the living. Words have meanings even if you wish they didn't.
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- DantesKite 1y agoIf true, sounds like a strong argument for removing minimum wage laws, so as to provide more economic opportunities for people and create a skill ladder they can climb.
- soks86 1y agoWorking and not being able to live is not an "economic opportunity." It's more likely the reason some of these folks aren't employed. Lowering wages doesn't create anything except depravity on the part of employers.
- mjamesaustin 1y agoSounds more like an argument for universal basic income. Plasma donation is much closer to a cash grant than it is to a job.
- hollywood_court 1y agoThat will only increase 'socialism'. If a business doesn't pay a living wage, that effectively means that said business is being subsidized by a different entity. It could be the employee, the employee's spouse, the government, etc. But someone is subsidizing businesses that don't pay living wages.
- gruez 1y ago>If a business doesn't pay a living wage, that effectively means that said business is being subsidized by a different entity. It could be the employee, the employee's spouse, the government, etc. But someone is subsidizing businesses that don't pay living wages. I never understood this framing. If the person in question wasn't being employed, it's not as if he suddenly won't need food/housing/whatever, so why call it a subsidy when he decides to get a job?
- SubiculumCode 1y agoI actually expected the article to be something about how blood donations get sequenced and used to solve crimes.