4 ms·

yes 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 e

yes 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 ago
Blood, 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 ago
  Not 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 ago
Dunno, 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 ago
  It 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 ago
    True. 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 ago
  Only 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 ago
Heck, 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 ago
  It probably helps that they don't let you sell enough to damage or endanger your health.
vpribish 1y ago
blood 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 ago
It'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.

yes 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 ago

Blood, 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 ago
Not 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 ago

Dunno, 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 ago
It 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 ago
  True. 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 ago
Only 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 ago

Heck, 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 ago
It probably helps that they don't let you sell enough to damage or endanger your health.

vpribish 1y ago

blood 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 ago

It'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.