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Open thread May 6, 2014

Dan Crawford | May 6, 2014 7:52 am

Tags: open thread Comments (5) | Digg Facebook Twitter |
5 Comments
  • Denis Drew says:
    May 6, 2014 at 5:36 pm

    Reading Piketty, I just found out that China prohibits the kind of capital outflows that are stripping Russia. Be a good point to make to the Russian people on Putin’s inability or lack of interest in protecting their core economic welfare; while he is playing nineteenth century geopolitical games (not that we may not be grossly at fault in turning a potential ally into an adversary with boorish bulling after “winning the Cold War”).

    (Finally finished Piketty — free at last!)

  • Denis Drew says:
    May 6, 2014 at 7:21 pm

    Labor organizers say fast-food protests planned for more than 30 countries on May 15
    Associated Press
    By Candice Choi, AP Food Industry Writer 46 minutes ago

    “Louise Marie Rantzau, a 21-year-old McDonald’s worker in Denmark”

    ” … Rantzau said she earns about $21 an hour because of the collective agreement.”

    http://news.yahoo.com/organizers-plan-fast-food-protests-202012183.html;_ylt=AwrBJR.jTGlTdhAA84PQtDMD

  • amateur socialist says:
    May 8, 2014 at 12:09 pm

    Watched an absolutely terrifying Frontline Tuesday night about the fight against new superbugs – antibiotic resistant outbreaks that medicine has no tools to fight.

    The last 3rd of the program examined the business aspects focusing on longtime antibiotic market participant Pfizer closing their world class antibiotic research facility in CT. Multiple pundits explain the “market based” reality: Antibiotics are not “once a day for the rest of your life” kind of drugs unlike hypertension/depression/cholesterol/diabetes meds. In fact it’s kind of the opposite you really don’t want them prescribed unless they are needed – over prescription is one of the things that created the mess.

    Which triggered an economics question I thought pertinent esp wrt our semi-foray into national health policy: Why don’t health insurers invest in antibiotic research? You’d suspect that a $1B price tag for a new antibiotic would pale in comparison to the cost of treating 10K high isolation extremely sick patients with drug resistant infections, some of which (featured in the program) required transplantations to treat.

    There is actually a reasonable similar scenario with building/property insurers funding things like UL and participating in writing electrical and building codes etc. They spend money to affect fire safety because it controls losses. Why wouldn’t health insurers see the same incentives to invest in next generation gram-negative antibiotics? Especially in an era where a cut can kill you.

  • Tzimiskes says:
    May 8, 2014 at 4:14 pm

    Amateur Socialist,

    My first thought on that is unlike building or property insurers health insurers historically haven’t had much trouble passing on their costs. Plans have been sufficiently complex and opaque that consumers can’t compare health insurance plans as easily as they do casualty plans. Unless this changes and health insurers have to start absorbing costs I don’t think health insurers will have much incentive to invest in antibiotic research.

    I’m not sure how a market is supposed to work when consumers have effectively 0 sensitivity to price when faced with the prospect of death. It makes it very easy to pass costs on. Made even easier by the diversity of players in health care all with a dominant strategy of passing costs on rather than dealing with costs directly.

  • amateur socialist says:
    May 8, 2014 at 5:59 pm

    Maybe the key problem lies in the phrase “not sure how a market is supposed to work” in this case. Serious clinical need/threat but the business case sucks so too bad we all have to risk death from minor cuts.

    More to the point – is the (problematic) market for next generation antibiotics an example of marketplace failure? It’s a reasonable question.

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