Tag Archives: Perverse Incentives

Surgical delays cost Canadians nearly $1 billion in lost time in 2012

Posted on by

“Long waits for surgery and medical treatment in 2012 cost Canadians more than $982 million in lost time and productivity, concludes a new report from the Fraser Institute. The study calculates that the average value of time lost during the work week was $1,129 for each of the estimated 870,462 patients waiting for surgery last year.  Using data from the Fraser Institute’s annual survey of health care wait times (which found that Canadians waited 9.3 weeks, on average, from an appointment with a specialist to receiving treatment in 2012), the report estimates that patients across Canada waited a combined 10.6 million weeks for treatment last year.”

http://www.fraserinstitute.org/research-news/news/display.aspx?id=20207

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet

ObamaCare Dropping Full-Timers at Schools, Local Governments

Posted on by

“School districts in states like Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Utah, Nebraska, and Indiana are dropping to part-time status school workers such as teacher aides, administrators, secretaries, bus drivers, gym teachers, coaches and cafeteria workers. Cities or counties in states like California, Indiana, Kansas, Texas, Michigan and Iowa are dropping to part-time status government workers such as librarians, secretaries, administrators, parks and recreation officials and public works officials. The federal law forces employers with at least 50 full-time workers to cover at least 60% of health-care costs for employees who work 30 hours or more per week.”

http://www.foxbusiness.com/government/2013/07/31/obamacare-increases-part-timers-at-schools-local-governments/

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet

Large Depositors in Cyprus Lose 47.5% of Their Deposits. Good!

Posted on by

“If the principle of ‘depositor beware’ were allowed to spread across the world and down to every dollar or euro deposited, the world would then have something resembling a free market in banking. Every banker would know that a bank run on his bank could wipe it out at any time. Bankers would become far more careful with depositors’ money. Banking would become less inflationary. The world would be better off. The bankers in the rest of Europe are terrified that the ‘Cyprus solution’ will spread to their nations. That would place final authority in the hands of depositors. This thought terrifies bankers.”

http://teapartyeconomist.com/2013/07/31/large-depositors-in-cyprus-lose-47-5-of-their-deposits-good/

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet

Cities’ Strategy in Health Insurance for Retirees: “Dump Them Into ObamaCare!”

Posted on by

“The 61 largest U.S. cities in 2009 were in the hole by about $118 billion to retirees’ health insurance obligations. They now think they have a way out: default on these obligations and force retirees into ObamaCare. This gets the obligations off their backs and onto the backs of the federal government. This is what Detroit is doing. Other cities’ officials are impressed. But Detroit is declaring bankruptcy. How can the other cities get out from under without declaring bankruptcy?”

http://teapartyeconomist.com/2013/07/30/cities-strategy-in-health-insurance-for-retirees-dump-them-into-obamacare/

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet

Obamacare panel approves free cancer screenings for heavy smokers

Posted on by

“Using a highly sensitive test like a CT scan to look for early signs of lung cancer will undoubtedly result in high rates of false positives. The NLST found that 320 high-risk smokers had to be screened to prevent one lung cancer death. Because of that, and the risk from radiation from the CT scans, LeFevre stressed that the screening should only be used in the high-risk groups specified by the guidelines. What worries LeFevre and others is that some doctors and hospitals will try to profit from screening, which costs a few hundred dollars a test. ‘We hope that physicians will not use this recommendation to exaggerate the benefits of screening,’ he said.”

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/07/30/obamacare-panel-approves-free-cancer-screenings-for-heavy-smokers/

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet

More Coloradans than ever are packing heat

Posted on by

“More Coloradans than ever are carrying concealed weapons, according to data from the Colorado Bureau of Investigation, which processed 31,518 background checks for concealed carry permits in the first six months of the year. That’s more than in all of 2011 and just 1,300 fewer than in all of 2012, according to the Denver Post. County sheriffs are responsible for issuing concealed carry permits and 55 of the state’s 64 sheriffs are suing Colorado to overturn what they see as overly restrictive gun control laws. These include a law mandating universal background checks and one limiting the size of ammunition magazines.”

http://dailycaller.com/2013/07/29/more-coloradans-than-ever-are-packing-heat

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet

Enforcement of immigration laws could be making human trafficking tougher to detect

Posted on by

“The threat of arrest and deportation is a common tool traffickers use to control their victims, experts say. Even those immigrants who arrive on a legitimate work-related visa have become trafficking victims. These visas usually bind the worker to an employer, who can hold that requirement over their head and even become their trafficker. ‘If employment ends, then so does visa status,’ says Avaloy Lanning, a senior director at Safe Horizon, a New York-based victim’s services agency. ‘The trafficker uses that against them, [saying], if you run then you’re going to be illegal, then immigration is going to pick you up, arrest you and deport you.'”

http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2013/04/02/modern-slavery-emerging-from-the-shadows_print.html

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet

Working Class Whites Are Giving Up Hope.

Posted on by

“Working class whites are giving up economic hope, according to a recent poll. They did not vote for Obama. The article did talk about single-mother households. They are in poverty, of course. What did the social planners expect? If the government subsidizes a particular behavior, we get more of it. That was the conservative argument a generation ago. It was dismissed as heartless by liberals. This is what 80 years of welfare state politics have produced. But of course, no one in the mainstream mentions this.  Pessimism now reigns.”

http://teapartyeconomist.com/2013/07/29/working-class-whites-are-giving-up-hope/

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet

Colombia Illegal Gold Mines Prosper in Global Rout

Posted on by

“Investments by companies are being held back as ambiguous local regulations exacerbate the effects of the global gold slump. In contrast, informal operations in remote rivers and jungle areas are flourishing. The government acknowledges that the number of producers without licenses probably has risen from the last census in 2010-2011, when they accounted for 87 percent of all gold mines. While authorities are shutting down unregulated producers at an unprecedented rate, the growth of new operations shielded from environmental and labor restrictions is even faster, police say. Armed groups can reap more profit from illegal gold mining than cocaine.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-07-24/colombia-illegal-gold-mines-prosper-in-global-rout.html

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet

Kafka’s America: Secret Courts, Secret Laws, and Total Surveillance

Posted on by

AGOW_WebAD_Small2

“A mechanism to protect the American people from unwarranted government surveillance became instead a bureaucratic mechanism to rubber stamp government applications for surveillance.  The Court is structured such that applications for surveillance are rarely ever denied. If a judge were to reject an application, that judge would have to immediately write a report detailing every reason for the rejection, then transmit the report to a 3-person court of review. If that court finds that the application was properly denied, it must also write a report, which is then subject to a writ of certiorari by the Supreme Court. No reviews are necessary if an application is granted.”

https://www.rutherford.org/publications_resources/john_whiteheads_commentary/kafkas_america_secret_courts_secret_laws_and_total_surveillance

Scan to Donate Bitcoin to Freedomwat.ch Staff
Did you like this?
Tip Freedomwat.ch Staff with Bitcoin
Donate via Installed Wallet