tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19727420.post5060747221615898486..comments2024-03-23T12:05:13.464-07:00Comments on Ideas: My Response to Robert Frank's ReplyDavid Friedmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06543763515095867595noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19727420.post-30727511961493566412010-05-13T14:26:58.207-07:002010-05-13T14:26:58.207-07:00If everybody gets richer, the quality of schools c...<em>If everybody gets richer, the quality of schools can increase everywhere....<br /><br />Your claim is correct only with regard to the status output, not the schooling output. If you go to Harvard and I to Cornell, that may result in your winning out over me in our courtship of the woman both of us wish to marry.</em><br /><br />Or in our courtship of a job offer. In practice, any given employer has a limited number of jobs available, and those won't go to <em>everyone</em> with a "good" education from a "good" school, they'll go to the candidates with "the best" education from "the best" school. (Which, as others have pointed out, may have little correlation with actual learning, but that's beside the point.)<br /><br />Doubling the educational level of everybody in society may eventually lead to more economic activity and more good jobs, but not for years -- and even then, it won't double the number of good jobs available. In this sense, education's value to an individual <em>is</em> largely relative -- much more so than health care's, which as Frank has acknowledged is mostly absolute.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19727420.post-21897768102133920422010-05-12T18:11:58.607-07:002010-05-12T18:11:58.607-07:00Alex Tabarrok presents empirical evidence that Fra...Alex Tabarrok presents <a href="http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2007/08/home-envy.html" rel="nofollow">empirical evidence</a> that Frank got the externality backwards.TGGPhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11017651009634767649noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19727420.post-61737478285354963082010-05-12T09:48:56.822-07:002010-05-12T09:48:56.822-07:00The "preventable deaths" talking point c...The "preventable deaths" talking point comes from a study that only compared the number of deaths <i>amenable to medicine</i> in various countries. What they did not look at was the number of deaths <b>attributable</b> to medicine in each country. Given that we have on the order of 200,000 iatrogenic deaths annually in the US - deaths caused by <i>too much medicine</i>, it's not immediately obvious that providing <i>more</i> health care would on net save more lives.Glenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14661650090485723755noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19727420.post-24160588845244523592010-05-12T07:10:42.632-07:002010-05-12T07:10:42.632-07:00David Freidman makes the decisive point.
The mar...David Freidman makes the decisive point. <br /><br />The market is a mechanism by which the relevance of positional factors in the productivity of the firm can be approximately measured. So that if what Frank says is quantitatively important it will be taken into account (more or less). <br /><br />The political system, on the other hand, is incapable of measuring the positional effect as contrasted with rent-seeking and other "perverse" effects.<br /><br />As far as I am concerned, the policy-relevance of Frank's theory falls to the ground because of these considerations alone.<br /><br />I am rather surprised at all the mileage Professor Frank has gotten out of this very pedestrian idea. I guess there is always a market (so to speak) is redistributionist rationales.Mario Rizzohttp://thinkmarkets.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19727420.post-8893819599051589212010-05-12T04:36:56.733-07:002010-05-12T04:36:56.733-07:00'preventable ddeptths' is a leftist term. ...'preventable ddeptths' is a leftist term. they're preeventable only at the cost of having somebody else pay for your health care, which has many costs. we in america choose not to pay those costs, which makes the deaths not preventable.Russ Nelsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17586083637805291834noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19727420.post-53167398566596841162010-05-12T01:41:22.313-07:002010-05-12T01:41:22.313-07:00I've really learned something today.
You shou...I've really learned something today.<br /><br />You should have more of such debates on the blog.markonoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19727420.post-40665030762200197842010-05-11T10:28:34.294-07:002010-05-11T10:28:34.294-07:00Daveon, I read prof Frank as saying that due to re...Daveon, I read prof Frank as saying that due to resources being limited, wealth distribution determines how much health care you get, because any wage increases are absorbed by the producers since supply of medicine is fixed.<br /><br />I think that's the point that prof Friedman was addressing in your out of context quote.Unconformist Sheepnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19727420.post-5911329607235076392010-05-11T10:23:13.044-07:002010-05-11T10:23:13.044-07:00Prof Friedman writes: If everyone else’s real inco...Prof Friedman writes: <i>If everyone else’s real income doubles and mine increases only fifty percent, that means that the total supply of goods and services has gone up--roughly doubled. There is no particular reason why that shouldn't include the supply of medical services</i><br /><br />Yep, and even if such wealth increase means a productivity boost everywhere except medicine, it still frees resources to be redeployed to that area. ie. People have now more money to spend on health insurance. Unless supply of medicine is inelastic due e.g. to restrictions on medical schools.Unconformist Sheepnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19727420.post-91201006374381633742010-05-11T10:17:22.289-07:002010-05-11T10:17:22.289-07:00If we all get richer, we can all have more medical...<i>If we all get richer, we can all have more medical services. </i><br /><br />That's a fairly glib thing to stick in their as part of your argument though. <br /><br />We have a good empirical case example to look at. Healthcare access in the relatively rich US (at least by any GDP measure) versus the "poorer" EU countries [NOTE: I realize I'm splitting hairs here as actually there's not a lot in it income wise...]<br /><br />At what point does healthcare access improve for the poorest members of society? The US still leads among preventable deaths and the US spends significantly more as a percentage of GDP than any of the "poorer"/comparable countries.<br /><br />While I can see your argument having merit with access to esoteric cancer treatments or similar, I'm struggling with idea that it's acceptable for a person to ignore a cough and die of untreated pneumonia when they arrive in ER, or end up in renal failure because of untreated, undiagnosed hypertension...<br /><br />To be harsh on this: saying that things will get better as people get richer seems to be an outrageous cop out.Daveonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04071426261030988611noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19727420.post-79514652006890902422010-05-11T09:44:00.175-07:002010-05-11T09:44:00.175-07:00I knew this would come down to disagreement over t...I knew this would come down to disagreement over the appropriate temporal and spatial horizons for comparisions.<br /><br />Unless I misunderstand him, Prof. Friedman takes the view that any choice of such horizons should be made to maximize aggregate wealth (or welfare). This tends, of course, to push out to larger and longer horizons.<br /><br />But people don't live an infinite amount of time. Shouldn't we be concerned with the quality of life for individuals over horizons that reflect the average life span and social circle?<br /><br />To make the point more concrete: does it matter to the person living below the poverty line in the Appalachians that the quality of public schools in the United States today is far superior to what was available in 10th Century Europe?Michael F. Martinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15279501532684851571noreply@blogger.com