Tag Archive: “risk”

On Taxes, Republicans Bet Against America

Posted in society by Adam

18 November 201712 October 2021

The Republican tax plans come together with a theme, which is a unifying feature that is found throughout. In this case, that theme is that America is a loser.

We see it in their continued indifference to maintaining a modern healthcare system with universal coverage. They plan to repeal the individual mandate without replacing it. They bet that either:

The mandate is ineffective, in which case the deficit rises by hundreds of billions more.
The mandate is effective, in which case millions will be without coverage.

In either case, healthcare costs will continue to worsen due to this bet, and there will be no benefit to the country.

We see it in their treatment of deductions and carve-outs. They leave subsidies for oil and gas and coal. They remove others, like deductions for medical care, school supplies. They bet that teachers and the infirm will suck it up. That teachers are not the backbone of the nation. That sick lives don’t matter.

They bet on debt, claiming that the cuts will result in unprecedented growth. They bet that all of the cuts in spending that will be required under paygo will either not occur, or won’t result in reduced economic activity. They bet on increased investment by businesses that themselves say they won’t increase investment very much.

And then they bet that the overall economy is not due for another recession. A recession that would be more harmed by the lack of opportunity to cut taxes further among other anti-recession treatments that would be needed.

In short, the Republican tax plans continue their march against knowledge, defying physics and reason. They even bet against their own reelection, as when the mess of this risky nonsense unfolds, there’s no way that folks are going to send a majority of the designers of misery back to DC.

The kicker to all of this is that all these cuts will be reversed in the aftermath.

Everybody expected the Republicans to cut taxes as part of tax reform. Nobody expected them to be fully-responsible stewards of our government, as we all know that’s not who they are. But once again they show themselves to be far worse than our expectations, as they did with healthcare.

Instead of pushing for a conservative bill, they push for a monstrosity. Instead of doing away with almost all subsidies, deductions, and credits, which would be the conservative move, they have chosen to write bills that are extremely lopsided.

We need real conservatives that actually hold to their notions, to balance with the progressive impulses of their counterparts, but we get faux conservatives that care not for governing responsibly. They will raise the deficit and debt. They will not create balanced legislation. They are snot-nosed brats that should be sent to time-out come 2018, come 2020, and until they are willing to govern with the integrity the legislature demands.

Understanding Harm in Electronically Vaporized Nicotine Products

Posted in society by Adam

7 December 2013

An attempt to explain the idea of a baseline risk profile for electronically vaporized nicotine, which should be the basis for discussing risk in their usage.

There are a large number of legislative and public-health efforts surrounding electronic vaporizers of nicotine-containing liquids. Some positive, some negative. Likewise, a large number of studies are either underway or have been conducted. Some positive, some negative.

But at the base of the questions comes a single question: how do we quantify the potential harm?

For this we turn to what we can call risk profiles. We’ll start with an unrelated subject: knives.

There’s an anecdote that says roughly that the duller the knife, the less safe it is. How can that be? Well, we can imagine all the potential knifes, from blunt to dull to barely sharp to razor. The duller end of the spectrum tends to require more cutting force, which leads to a greater potential for that force to become misdirected or wild. A sharper knife also tends to command more attention to handling, more respect.

And so on. So we look at so-called e-cigarettes.

One study purports to find minute levels (but not levels that raise concern compared to current occupational guidelines) of certain metals. The methodology of this study may have other issues, but take it as granted for the moment that for the tested devices these metals are present in minute levels. This is an increase in the risk of these particular devices.

But we want a baseline risk profile. A baseline gives us the ability to ascertain the ideal level of risk for any actual use. It gives us something to compare actual risk against. While we can compare risk to the control, or to the cigarette, comparing to a meaningful baseline gives us a better gauge of how much risk we are adding in a more complex scenario, rather than relative to control or to cigarettes.

What’s safest, according to what we know? A dripping atomizer made of a well-machined, clean, single, high-purity/surgical-grade metal. A coil made of clean resistance wire and with a silica wick. Juice made with only propylene glycol, vegetable glycerin, and nicotine (no flavoring). A device that heats the coil only enough to vaporize the liquid.

This would be something close to the baseline. It is a conservative set-up. You remove as many extra parts as possible. No filler, no cotton, no non-resistance wire, no solder joining non-resistance to resistance wire, no rubber o-rings, etc. You still need an insulator to separate the positive and negative posts, but that can be ceramic, and contact with the vaporization chamber and juice can be minimized.

With a baseline setup, the risk seems to come down to three substances in very low levels. Formaldehyde, acetaldehyde, and acrolein may be present at low levels. The less heat, the less chance of them being present and the lower levels they will be found at. Acrolein will be entirely absent unless excessive heat is being produced (280°C) in vegetable glycerin.

In all likelihood the risk of the baseline is significantly lower than the average North American diet. But that’s the baseline. The more complex the setup (adding a plastic tank (glass maintains the low risk), cotton wick (that’s organic and capable of burning in contact with a coil if dry), rubber (o-rings and insulators), solder, and flavorings) all add potential increases to the baseline harm.

The baseline has very minimal harm potential. Low enough that adding it to your normal life should not increase risk significantly. That’s what the data says today, anyway. And compared to the levels of volatile organic compounds in actual cigarettes (which do contain a significant risk, but not an absolute risk like being shot point-blank as the risk is often portrayed in the media), it is low enough risk that wasting time on public-use bans and other inanities miss the point.

Even the more complex vaping scenarios still stay well below the risk of traditional cigarettes and many other daily risks.

The Food and Drug Administration should be proposing their regulations for electronically vaporized nicotine products in the near future.

Risk Management These Days

Posted in unAmerican by Adam

24 August 2013

A look at risk mismanagement circa 2013.

It seems like companies and governments can’t effectively manage risk. From a nuclear disaster apparently made out of a radioactive Pinocchio’s nose (it keeps growing every time the management lies), to badly bungled warzones, to banks that can’t pay for their mistakes, to the spill in the Gulf of Mexico…it’s like a thousand points of light, each representing some mismanaged risk that’s turned into a fire leaving people worse than they came.

Often it is the government that first requires an industry to manage its risk, then decides to help by assuming the risk (and in some cases even paying for the privilege). But you and I help, too.

In every contract of adhesion with major businesses, the language is replete with the customer holding the risk. And if that risk materializes, you can challenge in binding arbitration.

Systemic risk mismanagement is what we see, from the congress failing to do their jobs, to businesses going scot-free (or maybe they pay a modest tribute to the gods the judge favors) no matter how egregious their crimes.

But combating the problem seems difficult. For one, the governments that are supposed to enforce risk management seem ill-equipped and reluctant. For another, while much of the internet passes around image memes of one sort, the corporations pass around their own image memes detailing how to deflect, understate, or otherwise mismanage their risk. [Use your imagination, “destroy all the things,” or “why don’t we take our risk, and move it to the children of the earth,” etc.]

Lots of solutions come to mind, but most of them rely on functional government. And unless we solve the problem of functional government soon, that’s just not a viable option to force the proper management of risk.

Why do companies insist on being risk-addled so-and-sos? The naive belief that not paying for risk will make them more money? Their corporate brothers bragging up how they just built a new virulence research facility on the roof of a preschool? Do regulations contribute to a false sense that risk is overmanaged? Is it overmanaged in some places which gives the illusion of safety?

These questions, this post, tends to overstate the problem. There are problematic industries, yes. But in all likelihood many industries are doing a great job of managing their risks. Statistically we’re pretty safe these days. It’s easy to overstate some risks, due to their visibility, magnitude, impact.

Yes, government is currently mismanaging some risks due to their inaction. The banking industry has it as an endemic problem (and it even seems somewhat proud of the fact). And a few other bad industries can be lumped in with these.

But most business doesn’t seem to like the risk. We should expect them to tire of helping prop up or cover the risk loving industries. That leverage they hold should be key, if they ever wake up to what the bad bets and deflected risks are costing them. Indeed, in many cases they may be required to take action, as they are otherwise not maximizing their shareholders’ value.