[lit-ideas] Re: From today's paper
- From: Eric Yost <mr.eric.yost@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 03 Nov 2008 17:20:53 -0500
Simon: And on balance do such systems do more harm than
good?
Eric: We can only try to evaluate the systems that fall
inside our direct experience. Even within that narrow
group, it's difficult, if not impossible, to assess
their ultimate good.
I do know of some "systems" that seem drafted by Satan.
Here's one.
Consider the Stark Laws -- drafted by Pete Stark
(Democrat-CA) -- governing the use of visa-waiver
physicians to provide medical care to underserved areas
of the US. They are astoundingly corrupt.
Under the good old Stark Law, a US business-type weasel
doctor can recruit a physician from, say, India, on a
visa-waiver. The business-doctor weasel can then build
a new facility, say an expensive sleep-clinic, and
under Stark's Law, the Indian visa-waiver physician
would be liable for half the cost of the new clinic,
despite the fact that the Indian physician had no stake
in the weasel's company, and merely was trying to
perform public service to get a Green Card for himself
and his family.
Stark wrote his law to give weasels advantage over the
poor Indian doctor. The result is that the visa-waiver
physician would be liable for, in a reasonable example:
* $3 million for the clinic, whether they stayed here
or not; and should they try to leave weasel's practice,
* $200k for recruiting violation penalties, and another
* $250k penalty from the sponsoring governmental
commission.
In short, a guy comes to help an underserved area in
the US to get a Green Card for his family. In return,
he is paid at 1/2 the rate of US physicians and has a
$3.5 million penalty over his head by the enslaving
sponsor. The sponsor can lord it over the Indian
physician, demand outrageous hours, because he has
leverage.
NOW, DOES THIS HELP IN THE BIG PICTURE?
NO. As soon as possible, the Indian doctor leaves the
sponsor's area rather than setting up a new practice
there, so the area continues to be underserved, and the
business-type weasel doctor, enriched by the slave
labor, can recruit his next victim, this time from,
say, the Czech Republic.
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