It’s kind of nice to have both.
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I get a lot of eggs from a coworker. His wife wanted fresh eggs, so they decided they were going to get some chickens. He said they were getting 12. I said “good grief, how many eggs do you go through a week?” He said “what do you mean? We want like a dozen per week”. I said “you realize a chicken lays like an egg every day or so, you’re gonna get 5-6 eggs per week, per chicken…like five or six dozen eggs every week?” Neither he or his wife had any idea how many eggs a dozen hens would produce. She figured each hen would lay one egg every week or so. Now he brings in a couple of dozen per week to pass around the office.
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Oh, yeah? Up yours, buddy!
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Yeah, they do this for a couple of years. Then they just turn into fluffy pets that shit all over the yard, require 1,000 expensive megawatts of electricity to run the water de-icers, cameras, decorative lights, etc… in the coops, countless runs to Tractor Supply for cracked corn and chicken feed and crushed oyster shell and meal worm treats, all in 1,000 lb bags and countless hours of honey-do upkeep, and keep the local bobcat, fox, hawk and raccoon population well fed with occasional chicken dinners. But, she sure likes ‘em.
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When the chickens are laying, you’ll have more eggs than you need. My cousins have about 30 birds as a hobby, and he sells 'em for $5/dozen, delivered to your door and such. Beats the hell out of grocery store eggs.
They let them out of the enclosure during the day as often as possible, but the problem is red-tailed hawks, who really like to murder chickens. Death from above and such.
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South Korea update: the second impeachment vote was successful and the ruling party have collapsed with in fighting and resignations. The Supreme Court now confirms the vote and we should be golden.
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There are a couple of “eggs on the honor system” around here. People just put a few dozen in the box at the road, and you take what you want, pay what you think they’re worth. I have no idea what they average per dozen, but I’d guess at least a couple of bucks.
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I had to double-check the source.
This should terrify the oligarchy, because it means that the trajectory we’re on is not going to end well if we don’t course correct.
https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/5044269-poll-finds-41-percent-find-killing-unacceptable/
A poll found 41 percent of adults under 30 consider the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson acceptable, more than the 40 percent in that demographic who consider it unacceptable.
They want to take America back to the 1950s or, as some would posit, 1930s Germany. What they’re going to get is 1780s France.
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I will also add a statistical quibble that there is no difference in that poll between 40 and 41.
The message rings thru either way.
This is the other side of coin.
Is curing patients a sustainable business model? No. No it’s not. That’s the entire fucking point.
I mean, where’s the profit margin in this?
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Options 1 and 2 have been the de facto approach from industry and in large part government funded research.
The term ‘orphan diseases’ has been around for decades and is even an NIH grant category. Allocating resources for research is a conundrum bioethicists have wrestled with for years. How Goldman Sachs views it is no surprise but it should serve as a warning for those who want to eliminate government funded research.
And the mindset isn’t limited to biotech. Private equity firms have heavily invested in clinics, free-standing ERs and some hospitals. Policies are ostensibly made with the notion that maximal profits and good patient care are aligned. That is not always the case.
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Make no mistake…insurance companies want lives “saved” so they can collect more premiums. They want to bilk every nickel they can out of you before you kick it. It’s entirely about maximizing profits and they dole out care based on that calculation. They have absolutely zero moral or ethical motivation for keeping you healthy or alive.
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Exactly. Healthy enough to keep paying premiums is the goal. Unfortunately, the same is true for government administration — it just translates to job security.
Right. That’s what insurance companies want. But they’re not the only for-profit element in this model.
Healthcare providers only make money off sick people. A clean “wellness” (I hate that word) screening once a year does nothing for shareholder value. So you have this constant tension between the two major elements of the supply chain - the payers and the providers - because they have opposing missions.
The thing getting stretched between these two forces going in opposite directions is you and I.
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The healthcare system is indeed a hot mess. Personally, this is why I choose a not-for-profit HMO as my provider. And made sure that they clearly stated that doctors are in charge of medical decisions, that personal wellness activities are the responsibility of the payee but is incentivized by the plan and that the plan administrator’s role is to run their operations as efficiently and effectively as possible to keep down costs as much as possible. I pay about one percent more than I would if I went with a typical insurance company, but, to me, it is a sound investment for me and all the people I care about.
This is as close as I have been able to find to a nationalized healthcare model. Take the UK for example. They spend roughly 7% less of their gross domestic product on healthcare, but the healthcare service is less effective than a moderately priced not for profit HMO. To elevate the service to that level, Brits then tack on privatized fee for service supplementals to the nationalized healthcare if they can afford it. The way I do it here, I don’t have to have that two part mechanism.
House Republicans negotiated a CR to keep the government running, but then President Elon Xitted that anyone voting for the bill should be kicked out next election. Then Trump saw that and Trothed “yeah, what he said”. President Musk further said that no bills should be passed until his boy Trump is sworn in on Jan 20th.
That’s still a month away. This is going to be great.
WTF is going on over there?
We’re just getting warmed up.
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