I posted the following two comments to "Lost Einsteins, the Innovations We Are Missing", David Leonhardt, New York Times, 2017-12-03.
One could also make a correlation between innovation and the type of industries in the area.
The Minneapolis-St. Paul area once drew a lot of people to work in the computer industry. I was one of them. Then the medical device industry drew a lot of people.
Rochester MN has been drawing medical talent for generations. It also once had a large IBM facility.
I wonder what all the patents in NW Minnesota were for. Snowmobiles, fishing gear?
And then there is politics. Do the local governments make their places nice places to live, and so many people move there?
Follow-up comment
Well, I looked up several facts about Roseau County, MN, way up north on the Canadian border. It was where Polaris snowmobiles were invented. For more seehttp://www.polaris.com/en-us/company.
The Census 2016 estimate of Roseau’s population is 15,629 with 18% of school age 2813 students. So, it would be quite “easy” for Polaris to have three patents.
The research triangle of North Carolina is another high patent area. The triangle is University of North Carolina, North Carolina State University, and Duke University, all well-known research universities.
I think a more interesting correlation would be how much people were open to new ideas. I think the willingness to do something different would have a better correlation than number of children.
Showing posts with label Mayo Clinic. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mayo Clinic. Show all posts
Tuesday, December 05, 2017
Saturday, July 01, 2017
Modern medical care precludes a “free market”
One of the latest to call for a free market in health care is Bert Stephens, one of the New York Times “conservative” columnists. His latest column, “A Price for the G.O.P.’s Health Care Insanity”. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/30/opinion/congress-health-savings-accounts.html He takes on Obama for creating the mess and the Republicans for making matters worse with their “fixes”.
He blames it as the “third party problem”; the consumer of health care does not shop around for the best deal but depends on an insurance company to pay the bills.
There may still be a free market in dentistry, but there cannot be a free market in health care. Why? What is one of the criteria for a “free market”: many sellers. We have long ago lost many of our independent doctors: they are mostly in large clinic/hospital complexes.
In Duluth, Minnesota, we have two choices: Essentia Health or St. Luke’s. It may still be that if you have company-provided health insurance, then your only choice may be a given clinic. I know that we have switched clinics when we switched jobs.
Oh, sure, if we can’t get into one of these clinics or decide an out-of-town clinic is a better choice, we can drive a few hours or stay overnight to visit other clinics. My wife couldn’t get into a dermatologist in Duluth and so drove to the Twin Cities. We have had several friends who have stayed in Rochester to use the services of the Mayo Clinic.
There are certain specialties that are available outside the clinics, such as eye care.
A clinic may give you a choice of doctors, but you are often limited to those who have current openings in their schedule. If your doctor leaves the clinic, the clinic may assign you to the next available doctor I don’t remember if I chose my first cardiologist, but I know I was assigned to another when my then current cardiologist went elsewhere. When my cardiologist decided that I needed heart surgery, I was assigned all the subsequent surgeons.
Another consideration is our knowledge of the available doctors. Do we know who is available? Do we know their credentials and reputations? A free market includes having all the information to make a decision. Very few of us will take the time to get the information, or, if we get it, have enough knowledge to make a decision.
He blames it as the “third party problem”; the consumer of health care does not shop around for the best deal but depends on an insurance company to pay the bills.
There may still be a free market in dentistry, but there cannot be a free market in health care. Why? What is one of the criteria for a “free market”: many sellers. We have long ago lost many of our independent doctors: they are mostly in large clinic/hospital complexes.
In Duluth, Minnesota, we have two choices: Essentia Health or St. Luke’s. It may still be that if you have company-provided health insurance, then your only choice may be a given clinic. I know that we have switched clinics when we switched jobs.
Oh, sure, if we can’t get into one of these clinics or decide an out-of-town clinic is a better choice, we can drive a few hours or stay overnight to visit other clinics. My wife couldn’t get into a dermatologist in Duluth and so drove to the Twin Cities. We have had several friends who have stayed in Rochester to use the services of the Mayo Clinic.
There are certain specialties that are available outside the clinics, such as eye care.
A clinic may give you a choice of doctors, but you are often limited to those who have current openings in their schedule. If your doctor leaves the clinic, the clinic may assign you to the next available doctor I don’t remember if I chose my first cardiologist, but I know I was assigned to another when my then current cardiologist went elsewhere. When my cardiologist decided that I needed heart surgery, I was assigned all the subsequent surgeons.
Another consideration is our knowledge of the available doctors. Do we know who is available? Do we know their credentials and reputations? A free market includes having all the information to make a decision. Very few of us will take the time to get the information, or, if we get it, have enough knowledge to make a decision.
Sunday, October 04, 2009
Paul's song
Our friend Paul is at Mayo undergoing some patience-trying therapy. A relative and a couple of friends wrote additional lyrics to "Frère Jacques". I finally made a half-way decent recording of it. If you're not a musical perfectionist, click here. I also posted it on his site on Caring Bridge.
If you have difficulty listening to "Paul's Song", you can download a free copy of QuickTime for the PC at http://www.apple.com/quicktime/
If you have difficulty listening to "Paul's Song", you can download a free copy of QuickTime for the PC at http://www.apple.com/quicktime/
Tuesday, January 08, 2008
The sorry state of foreign languages in the United States
I went to the UMD library today for another purpose, but before I left, I scanned the available newspapers. There were only two foreign language newspapers: Le Monde and Le Monde Diplomatique. They used to have Die Zeit, Dagens Nyheter (Swedish), and a Spanish language newspaper or two.
I knew UMD* had dropped Dagens Nyheter a few years ago. I found that surprising because they generally have at least a half dozen students from Sweden. In fact, I would often hear Swedish in the hallways.
I suppose that there was no demand. That is sad that so few people are interested in reading material in other languages.
The good news is that the Rochester Police recently hired a woman from Superior WI. Her education and experience includes a major in modern Arabic from the Defense Language Institute and five years as an Arabic translator for the Army. Click here for the story.
Why would the Rochester Police need an Arabic speaker? The Mayo Clinic draws people from all over the world, including many Arab countries.
* University of Minnesota, Duluth
I knew UMD* had dropped Dagens Nyheter a few years ago. I found that surprising because they generally have at least a half dozen students from Sweden. In fact, I would often hear Swedish in the hallways.
I suppose that there was no demand. That is sad that so few people are interested in reading material in other languages.
The good news is that the Rochester Police recently hired a woman from Superior WI. Her education and experience includes a major in modern Arabic from the Defense Language Institute and five years as an Arabic translator for the Army. Click here for the story.
Why would the Rochester Police need an Arabic speaker? The Mayo Clinic draws people from all over the world, including many Arab countries.
* University of Minnesota, Duluth
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