Recent submissions

Comment · 6 years ago
Negative feedback is far more valuable to the receiver then it is to the giver. In fact the giver is often punished for his presumption.

Therefore its no surprise negative feedback is not a popular concept among the plebs.

Comment · 7 years ago
Your angry because you think that he fires those that are unwilling to play along with what he thinks is "right", and you think the solution is to "Fire those unwilling to play along" with what you think is "right".

If you don't see the irony in that your an idiot.

Comment · 7 years ago
Which is why I deliberately left that sentence in there. Its because there is a profound misunderstanding of the definition "free market". I also disagree with the contention that what the most number of people mistakenly define to be true is justification for miscategorizing and dismissing something.

The "cheerleaders" you are talking about clearly did not understand these concepts, and the result is mis-association, and thereby in effect dismissal of the idea of freedom as absurd.

Even though "ideally", "In a free market, the laws and forces of supply and demand are free from any intervention by a government or other authority", In practice to achieve this end, this means creating a level playing field which take things into account such as "IP protections, environmental costs, etc."

From a libertarian perspective, in order to eliminate a "government or other authority from all forms of economic privilege" in the long term, is to in the short term work to better define property rights and rules to play by to force more accountability with the individuals involved.

Comment · 7 years ago
I don't get why "Equitable rules to play by" is a concept so hard for everyone to understand.

The free market is about creating a level playing field. Globalization was shit because because it did not create a level playing field, it created a subsidy for "developing" countries, at the expense of "developed" ones.

Its hilarious that people think that somehow free markets and libertarians are responsible

Comment · 7 years ago
Contrarian viewpoint: NOT focusing on the profits is the cause of the problem.

Hypothesis: Prices are high because of inefficiencies in the markets caused by bad laws attempting to subsidize one class of people by another. Hospitals aren't able to refuse treatment by law to those that can't afford to pay for their services and insurance companies are coerced to insure unprofitable people by law and the net effect is to try and coerce people into a redistribution of money from people that require more care from those that require less care to cover these expenditures.

Because there is no mechanism to coerce people to do this willingly that's efficient enough for the increasing demands of those requiring care, both industries to give the invoices to the government (who created the problem) thereby getting rid of the requirement to think about how they will fund their expenditures - making it the governments problem to figure out.

This thereby allows them to continue uncontrolled expenditure resulting in exuberant prices in an ever increasing downward spiral to catastrophe as in effect they are spending 'other peoples money' in the hopes that "eventually these invoices will be paid" through some sort of government sponsored coercion mechanism forcing socialized heath care or some other such method with the same result.

Its really quite simple and clever and funny how it still works.

-5% of the population accounts for more than half of all health spending.

-50% of the population with the lowest spending accounts for only 3% of all total health spending.

Edit: Anytime I share this viewpoint, a bunch of either misguided or prejudiced people downvote me. I'm guessing its because they don't understand the argument completely, or see its logic, but disagree with its implications.

Comment · 7 years ago
Whenever I hear the word "Egregious" I always think here come the lawyers.
Comment · 7 years ago
Its an acknowledgement that knowledge grows like a tree, and every new creative work has a root or foundation in the past which was used as inspiration and leverage to reach new heights and without which, perhaps those heights might not have been possible to reach.

A good one - "If I've been able to reach new heights, it's because I strove after the examples set by my inspirations."

Comment · 7 years ago
The problem with the teacher pay to me is obvious, market forces aren't allowed to play themselves out.

Think about it: A teacher should be paid according to their skill, supply, and demand. A great teachers time is highly valuable and there should never be a cap on how much they make or considerations on such an important task to hinder on concepts such as tenure.

If I hire a private teacher for my kids to teach them programming, I know that a great teacher has options to go work anywhere and I need to pay enough to afford a good one. I might get a couple friends kids to join to afford his time. Put together a few different subjects and all of the sudden you have a school.

So the question is why is this simple concept not being followed? The answer is lack of accountability, artificial barriers to entry, limitations on control to pick your instructors, standardized testing requirements, checkbox mentality, teachers unions, etc.

I think Steve Jobs was right in this regard, if we're going to continue to coerce money out of peoples paychecks to fund a dilapidated educational system, we are much better off giving the money we spend on a kids education directly to the parents (with the obligation to spend it only on education), and letting them select the course of education for their own kids themselves.

As for these "unions" its not so much that they care about the kids as they care about themselves. They just use the kids as leverage to get subsidies.

Comment · 7 years ago
The problem is the "services" the state is providing are economically unprofitable. Proposition 13 was passed to force the state to have controlled expenditures by not allowing the majority to extort the minority by using their property as extortion through property taxes.

The causes are actually bad laws which are put into place by an increasing majority of people living in want trying to force the "State" into providing it services they cannot pay for themselves.

The "state" can't afford to pay for their services either, and the net effect is to try and coerce people into a redistribution of money from people that have money to those that don't have as much to cover these expenditures.

Because the mechanism used (income taxes) to coerce people to do this now isn't efficient enough now to meet their ever increasing demands, and the voters force the government (who created the problem) to fund these "services" without really thinking about how they will fund their expenditures - making it the governments problem to figure out - which it can't without using coercion.

This thereby allows them to continue uncontrolled expenditure in an ever increasing downward spiral to catastrophe as in effect they are spending 'other peoples money' in the hopes that "eventually these invoices will be paid" through some sort of government sponsored coercion mechanism forcing socialized redistribution by holding peoples and companies properties or income hostage or some other such method with the same result.

Its really quite simple and clever and funny that it still works.

Comment · 7 years ago
Prices are high because of inefficiencies in the markets caused by bad laws attempting to subsidize one class of people by another.

Hospitals aren't able to refuse treatment to those that can't afford to pay for their services, insurance companies are forced to insure unprofitable people and the net effect is to try and coerce people into a redistribution of money from people that require more care from those that require less care to cover these expenditures.

Because there is no mechanism to coerce people to do this willingly both industries to give the invoices to the government (who created the problem) thereby getting rid of the requirement to think about how they will fund their expenditures - making it the governments problem to figure out.

This thereby allows them to continue uncontrolled expenditure in an ever increasing downward spiral to catastrophe as in effect they are spending 'other peoples money' in the hopes that "eventually these invoices will be paid" through some sort of government sponsored coercion mechanism forcing socialized heath care or some other such method with the same result.

Its really quite simple and clever.

-5% of the population accounts for more than half of all health spending. -50% of the population with the lowest spending accounts for only 3% of all total health spending.

Comment · 7 years ago
Yes very interesting. How everything fits together is still being worked out and it would be exciting to see more research to get a more accurate picture.

I myself always wonder about "Genetic memory" and the idea about how certain instincts/intuition are past down in genetics.

Comment · 7 years ago
That why I used "Your" genes in quotation marks.I think that saying that this process is not genetics is not factually accurate, as its obviously clear it affects genetic expression. Its just a paradigm shift of how you would traditionally view "genetics" to be more broad than just your direct inheritance.

Lets go with the Hilter example since I think this is an interesting thought experiment.

Was Hitler a failure? (From his evolutionary perspective.)

At first glance you would say yes, obviously. He had no kids, he killed himself and was probably very unhappy and distraught with how things turned out in the end. The very people he thought were the "best" in his society actually suffered the most (as defined by him as he said "all the best have already died in Germany").

Now, if you think about it as a kid who was born with almost no family structure, no inheritance, and not very competitive in terms of capability compared to his peers (He wasn't a good architect, he wasn't a good painter, most of the esoteric things that he tried at he failed). I don't think its a stretch to suppose he thought his environment didn't bring favorable advantages for him (and others) and he sought a remedy to this. What did his remedy amount to?

The destruction of a large part of genes from the gene pool. And what where the genes that were largely removed composed of? You could argue he was wildly successful in influencing the genetic frequency of expression of a certain types of genes, while suppressing others.

Comment · 7 years ago
I wonder sometimes, is selling existing land that just happens to fall within a certain "political" border so out of the question?

Example: It feels like Japan is trapped and can't grow where it is anymore. Is it so out of line for them to offer to Russia or Brazil like $10B over 10 years for like 1000 sq KM?

Comment · 7 years ago
The reason people don't like remote workers by instinct isn't because they don't realize that they people COULD be more productive at home.

Its because they worry that it creates incentives that could lead to a decrease in productivity over time.

I think the root of it really is the first line Management. These guys need to be really good at their job in order for WFH FT to be more productive. If these aren't all that efficient to begin with, that will make it much more visible in a WFH situation. I think all parties intuitively feel this.

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