rayiner

16 ms·

451.
by rayiner 3mo ago
Yes, facts are more important than framing. Look how many people in this thread are thinking about avoiding health insurance based on the premise that you’ll be financially wiped out by a catastrophic event even if you have insurance. That’
452.
by rayiner 3mo ago
It sounds like this guy needed around-the-clock, in-patient care. That's inherently expensive. While those facilities exist in countries with publicly funded healthcare, there's a huge shortage of in-patient beds, so there is some
453.
by rayiner 3mo ago
Show me a country where that's the goal. Every other developed country has a goal that's something like: "provide the best outcomes for the population as a whole, at a cost the public is willing to pay."
454.
by rayiner 3mo ago
A bad result is not evidence that a system failed or did anything wrong. To show a problem with the system, you need to show, for example, that other systems do things differently in a way that would have avoided what happened here.
455.
by rayiner 3mo ago
The article doesn't just tell a story about one person, it makes a general point about the healthcare industry. The title is: "My husband’s suicide shows there’s something very wrong with the U.S. insurance industry ." How e
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by rayiner 3mo ago
To understand how doctor's recommendations for in-patient care are treated in the health system of another developed country?
457.
by rayiner 3mo ago
> This is definitely a case where the insurance company holds the majority of the blame. What facts are the basis of your conclusion? There is no health system in the developed world where a doctor's recommendation will guarantee ex
458.
by rayiner 3mo ago
A major use of AI that would save the economy hundreds of billions of dollars, if not a trillion plus, would be to streamline routine medical malpractice and personal injury cases by taking them out of the court system. I suspect there woul
459.
by rayiner 3mo ago
You're correct that China today is not fully capitalist, but you're using the term "5 year plan" in a way that overstates the difference with the U.S. The term "5-year plan" means different things pre- and post
460.
by rayiner 3mo ago
Gotcha. I was talking about American "people" generally; I don't know enough about the financial world to know if assets are appropriately priced or not. If you're talking about investment into China versus the U.S., I a
461.
by rayiner 3mo ago
I think that’s correct. One way to look at it: when the Greek world expanded geographically, the new people tried to connect themselves with the Homeric stories (as did the Romans). Whose stories serve that function today? Disney.
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by rayiner 3mo ago
It’s obviously Twain.
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by rayiner 3mo ago
> From what I can tell, China has a capitalism problem, not an industrial wealth problem - they could house every one of their citizens in a decent apartment and give them gadgets and a car to drive This is wildly incorrect.
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by rayiner 3mo ago
Most of them. Semiconductor fabrication is a big one. Metallurgy in general, with specific application to jet turbines. Aerospace broadly. The Chinese can’t build anything like a 787. Radars and most weapons systems.
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by rayiner 3mo ago
Exactly. China is a real tech power now, just like Japan and Taiwan. The U.S. is ahead in a lot of areas of technology, but China has home grown talent that is taking the lead in other areas. And unlike Japan and Taiwan, China has a much bi
466.
by rayiner 3mo ago
Americans optimize for hyper-individualistic convenience. The average one-way commute in Dallas, Texas is under 30 minutes. The average in Tokyo is 48-50 minutes. And the guy in Dallas goes to work in a perfectly climate controlled bubble w
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by rayiner 3mo ago
China has pursued a phased approach to growth. Instead of trying to pull everyone up at once, it’s trying to get top tier cities to a high level of development before moving to other cities. Shanghai already has a GDP per capita (PPP) that’
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by rayiner 3mo ago
How is the efficient market hypothesis applicable here?
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by rayiner 3mo ago
The desire to accuse China of just copying is like 20 years out of date. It’s been wrong since some people on HN were in diapers. People are going to be gobsmacked when, in our lifetime, China becomes a world power comparable to the U.S. P
470.
by rayiner 3mo ago
We won’t have real AGIs until they can see this kind of pattern in logos.
471.
by rayiner 3mo ago
It's not as simple as "3 cones = 3 primary colors." Each type of cone has a response curve and three curves overlap: http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/vision/colcon.htm... . And each cone ha
472.
by rayiner 3mo ago
How would obesity rate be related to “exploitive labor” or “income gap?” It seems like you’ve got a hammer and are looking for a nail. Obesity rates don’t follow any predictable pattern: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Li
473.
by rayiner 3mo ago
If you want to adjust for cost levels in different countries, you’d use a PPP adjustment: https://www.visualcapitalist.com/ranked-education-spending-p... The U.S. is at $20k, well over the OECD average of $15k. O my Austria
474.
by rayiner 3mo ago
The big 7 U.S. health insurers made $55 billion in profits in 2025. Pharma industry profits on U.S. revenue was about $100 billion. Total U.S. healthcare spending in 2025 was $5.7 trillion. Cutting insurer and pharma profits out of the equa
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by rayiner 3mo ago
Medicare is cross-subsidized by private health insurance: https://chatgpt.com/s/t_6a5838016cf88191bce90f346ee16ab6
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by rayiner 3mo ago
> Also, as your description of overcare is happening under the current system, a profit-oriented one at that (which incentivizes the ordering of unnecessary tests and procedures) Profit is part of it, but the legal system and culture are
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by rayiner 3mo ago
But our publicly run systems are full of inefficient bureaucracy and red tape, too. Why shouldn’t we assume our public healthcare system would be operated the same way as the public school systems in Chicago, New York, or Los Angeles? Moreo
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by rayiner 3mo ago
Yes, good point. That’s one of the switches that will have to be flipped.
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by rayiner 3mo ago
The U.S. spends more money on education per student than any OECD country other than Norway and Luxembourg. Yet it gets quite mediocre results. Why do you think the U.S. will be able to do public health care in a more cost efficient way tha
480.
by rayiner 3mo ago
No, I'm trying to correct a poisonous misconception. Many people try to justify affirmative action based on the premise that "white people" continue to benefit from slavery economically, and that's just not true. The pro

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