ThoughtsOnThinking

Healthcare Problem in a Nutshell

2009-07-28T22:54:31-07:00

A brilliant summary by Jacob Pollack re: what drives healthcare costs, as a comment on a WSJ article about China's concerns about US debt:

Healthcare costs in the U.S. are driven by the following:

(1) Workers being given very extensive healthcare insurance that give them easy access to all manner of healthcare at little marginal cost to them. The richness of these benefits is boosted by exemption of these benefits from tax.

(2) Without a price inhibitor, lack of other restriction to prevent overuse of the system, which naturally results when the price of use is artificially low.

Nationalized healthcare systems suffer from problem #1 (since the marginal cost of using the system is 0), but resolve it by putting in place restrictions on overuse of system. Usually these take the form of some sort of panel of experts which decides what care people can have and what care they can't have and deliberate under investment in capital equipment which means people have to line up and wait (for example, by buying only 2 MRI machines to service an entire city). This is the so-called "rationing" which Americans fear.

To stem increases in healthcare cost, the U.S. must either put in rationing, like in other national healthcare systems, to restrain overuse of the system (which results from not exposing patients to prices) or it must scale back the richness of the benefits afforded under insurance policies so that average citizens have to pay out of pocket for a lot more of the care they receive. The latter could be accomplished by shifting to insurance which looks a lot more like true insurance and only insures "catastrophic" care costs. Such policies would have high annual deductibles, requiring people to bear most of the cost of their ordinary day-to-day care. Although they would offer much less benefits, such insurance would be far cheaper and by exposing people to the costs of the services they use, they would not overuse the system (and providers would be encouraged through competition to offer good prices to attract clients). By accepting less expensive insurance, Americans would receive higher salaries or other forms of compensation. Healthcare for the true poor can be resolved through direct government subsidies to provide basic insurance or provide direct services in public clinics, or similar solutions. This latter approach would be a more American free-market solution.

Mass Delete Twitter Cleanup Utility - TweetDelete

2009-04-28T18:05:55-07:00

If you are looking to clean up a clogged up Twitter account, like the people asking questions here and here, this utility might be just what you are looking for (make sure you note the deletion caveats mentioned in those links though):

Announcing TweetDelete, the Twitter Mass Delete / Cleanup Utility that helps you mass-delete Outgoing Tweets, and Incoming and Outgoing DMs.

This is a very-much-beta version, and donationware. Use the feedback form if you find any problems (which I'm sure there are plenty), and if it proves valuable to you, feel free to donate to the cause.

Download TweetDelete here. No install required -- just download and run. : )

* * *

(Later Update: Having some issues with the update server; if you get in an endless loop of "checking for updates" clicking "Next" on the welcome tab, you can skip to the login section directly via the numbered tabs at the top. Should be squared away tomorrow if it's still a problem).

* * *

Update: New release (minor edits, modified expiration date) released today 07/20/2009. Apologies to the folks who got caught by the expiration period.

* * *

Update: 08/18/2009 Users have recently begun reporting "mo Messages found to to delete" as the result they are getting, and I now get the same result here. Looks like Twitter has changed their API, blocked this app in some way, or something along those lines.

Given the minimal support/contributions this app has received thus far, it's not high on my priority list, but I do plan to look into it eventually. Currently this app appears to no longer work, due to changes in the Twitter service.

* * *

Update: 09/21/2009 A number of daring souls have tried the app in its current form anyway, and feedback comments (built into the app) seem to indicate positive result. Your mileage may vary, but feel free to try it out, and let me know how it works for you.

Non-Adaptation

2009-04-23T08:55:00-07:00

"The strategy has also splintered the file sharing space into many, many different players, many of them way underground, unlike in the early days when there were a manageable number of players who could be worked with proactively." (...more...)

Time Perception

2009-04-22T15:52:26-07:00

Layers of Time:

"Civilization is revving itself into a pathologically short attention span."

* * *

When Brian first moved to New York City he found that in New York here and now meant this room and this five minutes, as opposed to the larger here and longer now that he was used to in England. We have since adopted the term as the title of our foundation as we are trying to stretch out what people consider as now.

The Long Now

Bailout Nation

2009-04-01T06:55:58-07:00

10.5 Trillion dollars allocated and counting, in case you lost track.

eBay Stock Devaluation, 101

2009-02-24T00:30:43-08:00

Bingo:

But in an attempt to give users a more consistent and professional experience—professional as in free shipping, 24-hour customer service and instant purchases—is eBay abandoning everything that made it work, everything that made it the world’s largest and best garage sale? Sure, garage sales might be more efficient if they had self-checkout and kiosks that listed all of the merchandise and networked POS units ringing up orders while they update your POS card, but that’s not likely what you went to a garage sale for.

This comment is not to suggest that free shipping and 24-hour customer service are not good services, but that understanding why customers come to you is much more important. If eBay becomes just like Amazon, why would this be good news for eBay fans?

It's obvious to the point now, that someone has even written a book about it. Analysts are even finally catching on to the real issues behind this:

Oct 12, 2007: $39.90 per share
Feb 23, 2009: $11.53 per share

=========
Update: Four days later, eBay shares hit their lowest price in seven years.

Entrepreneurial DNA

2009-02-23T12:45:48-08:00

I found this comment from Michael Olenick on this WSJ article (title: "So, You Want to Ben an Entrepreneur") funny, mostly true, and telling:

If you should start your own business you've probably already tried a few times by now: you can't help yourself. People cut out to make businesses do just that, and there's no stopping them. They sometimes end up at larger organizations -- especially if a prior business was acquired -- but there they'll naturally either fall into the new business group or find they're a bad cultural fit. It's just one of those things baked into people.

I have two dogs, brother and sister. One is a fanatical fetcher: she's not doing you a favor by bringing the ball back, you're doing her a favor by throwing it. She'll play fetch anywhere, anytime and for anybody -- if you woke her up in the middle of the night to play fetch she'd be happy. The other has no interest in fetching and just ignores all the fetch toys. Despite that they're together constantly he just doesn't show any interest.

Entrepreneurs are basically the same way: you either have it or you don't. I remember reading somewhere that Ben & Jerry started something like seven businesses before coming up with their ice-cream stores: that's the spirit you'd need. If you don't, you may want to be careful investing your life savings starting a business because you'll be competing with those that do, and they're (we're) basically workaholic maniacs who will blow through any obstacle the world -- or our competitors -- might throw at us. And with that rant, I'm finished lunch and back to coding/selling/bookkeeping/managing ... just after I take a moment to empty my own trash bin.

The 2000-Year Advance Payment

2009-02-14T12:07:32-08:00

Let's just say, at this price tag, I sure hope it works:

If nothing else, the plan is a striking return of big government. It also symbolizes continuing partisanship, despite Mr. Obama’s promise of new cooperation. No House Republican voted for the measure, and the three in the Senate who did are viewed as renegades by their party’s leadership.

Whatever the result, future generations will get the bill.

“This is so much money that if someone had begun spending $1 million a day — $1 million every day — when Christ was born,” said Senator David Vitter, Republican of Louisiana, “we would not yet be in 2009 to the full cost of this bill.”

(emphasis added)

...and this, from the "smaller, faster" version of the bill.

Essentials Of "Economic Stimulus"

2009-02-09T12:15:31-08:00

My basic economic/political belief is that the government is and will never be as efficient a means to "creating wealth" as private enterprise. I would even go so far as to say that "creating wealth" and "creating jobs" isn't even in the purview of what the government is here for. It's here to provide services that can't or shouldn't be privatized (military and police being two good example), and to reasonably ensure that people "play by the rules" that are required for a healthy, functioning society.

That said, I"m skeptical at best, of the ability of government to "rescue" our economy, especially by bailing out capital markets which have gotten where they are primarily by behaving badly.

I'm no economist though, and as such, I appreciated the WSJ's nice summary (via an opinion piece) of some of these dynamics here:

A dollar doled out in jobless benefits may well be spent by the worker who receives it. That $1 of spending will count as economic activity and add to GDP.

But that same dollar can't be conjured out of thin air. The government has to take that dollar away from someone else -- either in higher taxes, or by issuing new debt in the form of a bond. The person who is taxed or buys the bond will have $1 less to spend. If the beneficiary of that $1 spends it on something less productive than the taxed American or the lender would have, then the net impact on growth will be negative.

Internal Server Error

2008-12-29T10:42:11-08:00

On those days when I'm struggling to get my brain in gear, I'm thinking maybe I could pretend I'm a web server and just wear this as a placard around my neck:

Internal Server Error

The server encountered an internal error or misconfiguration and was unable to complete your request.

"Sorry, can't help you," and then just point to the sign... ; )