Chinese doctors are consulting with European doctors. They stamped a face mask factory out of the ground in 11 days and their production is resuming. They are going to save a ton of lives.

Sue me. I have horrible thoughts all the time. Like castrating any man who harms my little girl or wife.

It was never the point I was making and any case worse policy abroad doesn't excuse our own bad policy. It's kind of exclaiming that dying from corona isn't so bad because you could be dying much more painfully from ebola.

You can't have your cake and eat it too with fake news media on the one hand and journalists being the main source of correct information for a pandemic on the other. All your arguments are, what they call in Dutch a gelegenheidsargument, eg. arguments for expediency to fit a world view that is simply not logically consistent (or as @Maw put it succinctly, stupid).

True. But each day counts.

The Netherlands is not one of them. I've decided to keep my kids home and I'm working from home.

Cynical me: The silver lining is that people at Trump rallies have a higher chance of getting the disease and dying.

But seriously I hope it won't overload the US cats system but I'm pretty certain it will unless there's a full lock down in the US banking internal flights.

Btw, if this is still a thing come election time I'm sure they will postpone it and Trump will remain president.

Your description suggests there is a free market system and a command economy existing next to each other. I'm not sure whether you mean that. But if you do, I think they really are intertwined in most instances. Regulatory licenses required to practise jobs or sell products are structural adjustments to the market, central bank rates are structural adjustments as well. Capital requirements likewise (and I could go on and on with respect to financial markets).

The post about the history of the corporation illustrates that the very "licensing" by government of corporations is a "command economy" measure that greatly affects the structure of the market. The most obvious one is that it affects market power. But so do the perpetual character of a corporation, its size and singular profit purpose.

We have too-big-to-fail banks (since the 80s) that actually get cheaper financing because of an implicit guarantee. We have corporations that are trying to buy a monopoly to then capitalise on that monopoly (see for instance: justeat and uber). There's no competition on "quality" in such cases. They just have such a ridiculous amount of capital they undercut the competition until it's dead and then cash in.

I think you missed this reply to you. I think the definition on which we should agree is "mixed economies".

That's not what I'm getting at. I'm very clearly talking about the effects government interference has on the operation of markets, not the oligopolistic competition, which is still a situation where the action of competitors matter.

In terms you're using I would say every economy in the world is a mixture of elements from free markets and command economies. To say the Netherlands or Finland are (unqualified) free market economies is simply incorrect. — Benkei

And pollution in those countries of course has nothing to do with environmental regulations?

Every Western government actively pursues growth. When environment and growth conflict, they will pursue growth. The concepts of wealth in its broadest sense and growth still haven't been integrated to make sensible policies. Instead they compete for government budget, with a final say by whoever is in charge of finances. That doesn't even have to mean major pollution immediately. But in the long run, we all know where it's headed. The costs of a diminishing quality of life is externalised, eg. borne by others than those making these decisions. Usually citizens in a given area.

Local examples: The Netherlands had a green space defined in the 80s where they would never build. They started building there in 2000. The airport wasn't supposed to have more flights. They changed the rules so the way sound pollution was measured changed. Roads have killed entire animal populations despite warnings it would do so because they were build across migration routes (and migration tunnels were too expensive). These were clear sacrifices for the benefit of economic growth. And here we're pretty environmentally minded due to a historic dependency on good land use planning since half the country is below sea level.

Austerity measures themselves are direct examples. A crisis created by banks and sovereigns results in bailing banks out, paid for by tax payer money. Instead of raising taxes for the beneficiaries so that they repay the bail out (which would even make economic sense) social benefit programs were cut. Wealth was destroyed because politicians fear a tanking economy if banks fail. Whereas the "free market" approach would be to have shitty banks fail for being shitty.

It's clear where a government's priorities lie and it isn't with sustainability or wealth creation but raw economic growth because that's the only measurement everybody talks about. How's the economy doing? Great, GDP was up! But that doesn't tell us anything (especially if it's credit/debt fueled).

So, no, this is not just a talking point.

Come home, come to the Netherlands.

Meanwhile, the Fed argues rates should be historically low and the money supply should grow to stimulate the economy because their old fashioned stochastic models tell them rational actors would then spend their money. Turns out people have actual goals in mind when saving so the savings rate still goes up! Fucking dinosaurs still don't understand stochastic models aren't sufficient to model a complex world.

Definitely. They also should stop having an education because it doesn't help them get out of poverty thanks to crushing student loan debt afterwards.

Governments actively pursue GDP-growth at the expense of general well being (pollution, living space).

This is another way of saying poor people shouldn't have kids. So that would be another privilege for rich people.

Or as a society you can try to protect kids from the inevitable bad choices assume parents make.

From a certain perspective, centrism looks leftist.

That's not what I'm getting at. I'm very clearly talking about the effects government interference has on the operation of markets, not the oligopolistic competition, which is still a situation where the action of competitors matter.

In terms you're using I would say every economy in the world is a mixture of elements from free markets and command economies. To say the Netherlands or Finland are (unqualified) free market economies is simply incorrect.

the ones who get shafted are the middle class who do earn pay but they get squeezed a little. — BitconnectCarlos

That's probably the 40% of Americans that are one payslip away from poverty.

The liberty people? — ssu

The liberty they think they're pursuing...

So your reason is that those Americans believing in liberty and small government are the cause of the problem and hence basically hurting others? Sounds like they are like those gun enthusiasts. No wait, they are the same Americans! Oh those terrible people!!! — ssu

... by resisting a government run solution to healthcare. It's a very specific issue addressing a very specific argument. Your reaction seems to be to something else than I actually said.

I'll just follow a different path of thinking here. I think that the issue really is that enough people have to be at least somewhat OK and accept the present system for it to exist. If asked, they may not like it. Maw earlier is the perfect example. We know what he thinks about this, yet he himself says he's OK, because he is fortunate to have a good job. And there's services where he lives. Isn't that a huge issue for many: being fortunate to have a good job? — ssu

The issue of (un)employment is a totally different one yet again. Of course that's a huge issue. The reply is though "so what?" when we're talking about healthcare. If only good jobs (whatever that even is) gets you coverage then that means poor people just get shafted (again), besides the lower wages they also have to pay more for healthcare because their coverage is worse or non-existent and they usually have worse lifestyle choices requiring more healthcare. The government has to step up in some way to make sure people have healthcare regardless of whether they have a "good" job or not.

Let me put it another way: Is there something you don't like in your country, but you aren't willing to take up arms and man the barricades or simply move out of your country because of it? I think there might be something like that which annoys you. — ssu

If there was a system that randomly killed 1 jobless person out of 10, and of the working population 6% of people are jobless. Would you be ok with that just because the percentage is low and you have a job (so you're safe)?

People like to obfuscate the moral dimension here but not being able to afford healthcare means people die from otherwise treatable diseases.

The point being that corporations are a structural effect on markets, just like monetary policy and what not. There isn't "just" demand and supply so talking about "free markets" is just an ideological term with no real content.

A thing that even Sweden has it's economy based upon. A free market is one where voluntary exchange and the laws of supply and demand provide the sole basis for the economic system. Yet for that to work, there have to be institutions and rules that are enforced by a legal system, a government. And with that comes the fact that some issues aren't so well taken care of by free markets. Things aren't a juxtaposition between free market capitalism and non-capitalist socialism, but this simplistic position is how things are portrayed. — ssu

There are no free markets. Not in Sweden either. And you're not seeing it because you've grown up with a certain mode of production for quite some time now. But prior to more or less 1860 (and some exemptions of course, such as the East India Company!):

1. Corporate status is natural to the state. Hence, any government institution, whether central, regional, or local, should automatically be incorporated from inception.
2. State permission is required for the incorporation of private institutions.
3. The incorporation of private nonprofit organizations is awarded when parliament (we assume a democracy) judges their goals to be serving some area of public interest.
4. The incorporation of private business firms is awarded when parliament judges them to be pursuing the public interest within a certain limited public domain.
5. The charter explicitly states the area of public interest for which incorporation is approved, from which private corporations deviate on penalty of having their corporate status revoked.
6. Incorporated institutions are obliged to have an open door and open book policy so that the public (in particular, private journalists and state officials) can check whether their activities conform with the public interest to which their charter restricts them. Thus, some degree of privacy needs to be given up in order to acquire the public characteristic of incorporation, which is again just a matter of not granting rights without accompanying obligations. The fact that modern business corporations are also obliged to issue publicly accessible financial statements is partly a legacy of this principle.
7. Incorporation is conceded for a limited period only and the merits of each case are to be reviewed periodically.

The corrolary to this was also that a profit motive was not a "public interest" and therefore not admissable.

So no, a free market would've been the unincorporated world of partnerships. Even then, judges and governments have caused structural effects in markets due to limited liability, duty of care, EH&S, minimum wage etc.

That's the thing, you said it right there.

I don't know if it is 25% to 75% ratio, but something along the lines it has to be. Hell, even Maw is personally OK how things are in his life when it comes to health care!

Then of course, you are talking at a "Philosophy Forum", not on a forum dedicated to either golf or yachting. So I guess many here are younger than Bitter Crank and don't have a luxurious health insurance policies. Or if they do, then they have their principles. — ssu

Typical technocratic approach, which isn't necessarily the right approach. It's also rather callous. How many people should have shitty healthcare before admitting the system isn't working? 30, 35, 40... or even 50%? The liberty people think they're pursuing by resisting a government run solution to healthcare (which works as shown in many countries across the world) actually hurts a fair amount of people causing them to have the liberty to choose between paying a healthcare bill and becoming homeless. Which is no choice at all in a civilised country. John Mill had something to say about exercising liberty when it hurts others but God forbid you pay a bit of extra tax (@fishfry I'm talking to you).

40% of Americans are one paycheck away from poverty because they don't manage to save enough. That means that even with insurance, one serious condition can bankrupt you due to deductibles and co-payments. While wage increases are stagnating, we can only expect this percentage to increase.

The guy who ran on a platform "the US sucks" and we should make it great again is naturally optimistic?

They did in the past and they went underground.

I'm quite optimistic about the approach so far in the Netherlands. Less cases today (which are results from testing on Sunday) than the day before, peaking for now at 77 new cases on Saturday. No exponential growth so far unless they're not taking testing seriously. I was actually expecting triple digits in new cases by now.

Let me help you hate it again. Can't have this country overrun with Americans or we have to build another ocean and have the USA pay for it.

Well, we also had this one; after which the rest of the world followed:

Informative posts by you in this thread. Thanks.

It's also interesting that the private calculus about the disease can run against what is socially advised. My dad is in a higher risk category, he's 70 years old and has chronic respiratory problems. If he develops corona now he's still assured to get the best health care the Dutch system can provide. If he gets it during the peak, this is not likely.

German and Dutch bonds trade with a yield now below 0% up to a maturity of 30 years and considering the swapcurve a 40-year bond and possibly even a 50-year bond would trade on or around 0% yield.

The flight to safety is in full swing but it's unclear how much flatter this curve can go.

Simple statement of fact. Annoying, eh? — Nobeernolife

Whoossh.

:rofl:

I do not have TDS, you do. — Nobeernolife

Strong come back. Erudite and all.

It's not anti-Trump to point out he's doing a shit job. But if you have TDS, everything is about Trump innit?

It's a rerun from 4 years ago: choosing between two evils.

One word: Senile.

Two wolves and a sheep deciding what to have for dinner. I prefer liberty. The left has a tremendous authoritarian streak. See Mao, Stalin, Castro, etc. The US is not a democracy, by the way. It's a Constitutional republic. — fishfry

This is just lazy reasoning. The "left" like the right is on a spectrum. Equating it with the worst we've seen is just silly. Most western countries are more "left" (eg progressive) than the USA and they're better places to live.

Also, democracy and republicanism aren't mutually exclusive. "Greatest democracy on earth" was coined and used by Americans.

You don't have TDS? Then why go off like a rocket every time I make fun of Trump? :rofl:

But to answer your question directly, as to why I'd feel that way, I instinctively distrust any humongous one-size-fits-all government program. I do like Mayor Pete's idea of Medicare for all who want it; that is, a public option. But giving people choices is not what leftists are about. It's their way or the highway, and that's the kind of authoritarianism I oppose. Not to mention the competence issue. The government could never pull it off, even with the best of intentions. — fishfry

If you think a democratic process resulting in a medicare for all solution is authoritarian then the problem is you don't understand the different political modes of government.

In the Netherlands, if your fever status below 38, it is assumed your don't have corona and don't have to call the GP. Strikes me as arbitrary.

A runny nose is nevertheless a symptom.

So the CFR in the US is over 5% now. Not even China's or Iran's is that high. That leaves a couple of possibilities:

1. Not enough testing/leg-work to identify cases;
2. Crappy healthcare;
3. Pre-existing conditions/bad lifestyle choices exacerbating likelihood of dying.

A combination of those three.

Or bad luck. For having Trump as president I suppose.