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So, pharma ∩ capitalism ∩ consulting appears to be in the news today.
Projecting forward, which “business model” is the Covid vaccine going to end up monetized with?
Projecting forward, which “business model” is the Covid vaccine going to end up monetized with?
The “annual fees” model is consistent with razor blades and printer ink – there might be a higher death rate globally but the recurring revenue argument is hard to resist; one might call it rent-extraction by one sector of the economy at the expense of others
The “elimination” model is less profitable — “Institutions will try to preserve the problem to which they are the solution.”
I wonder which pharmas will argue, “I’d rather sell you the milk, so if you want to buy the cow, it’ll cost ya.”
Cue talk of market failure, competition
I wonder which pharmas will argue, “I’d rather sell you the milk, so if you want to buy the cow, it’ll cost ya.”
Cue talk of market failure, competition
Prediction: the world will partition into green zones and red zones; in the red zones, unmasked “greenies”(neo-sumptuarists) will be the targets of occasional street violence by the “unwashed” masses who cannot afford the vaccine and must actually be *more* hygienic for own sake
In 2011, a tiny fragment of Hollywood’s creative energies sufficed to work out most of the details, in the form of the Justin Timberlake / Amanda Seyfried vehicle “In Time”, and the less allegorical “Contagion” from Steven Soderbergh which shows how we get to that future.
Green zones will be virus free due to state-funded compulsory vaccination, lockdowns, and contact tracing. Individualists will reject it as too high a price to pay. They will quote Franklin on liberty vs security, though the quote is actually more nuanced. https://www.npr.org/2015/03/02/390245038/ben-franklins-famous-liberty-safety-quote-lost-its-context-in-21st-century
This is a good occasion to consider “freedom to” societies vs “freedom from” societies — individualism vs collectivism.
Intersecting with these ideas is the freedom of religion — what some have called “the right to be wrong.” Which could, perversely, also be considered the slogan of science, but in a very different way lol
Ever since the invention of the agricultural surplus it has been possible for humans with strange ideas to comfortably pass them on to their children. Ironically, our current age of unparalleled prosperity creates correspondingly little pressure toward “scientific” truths…
Perhaps an analogy is that the strongly motivated, battle-hardened, fierce-eyed takers of thrones lol upon their soft and spoiled progeny with disappointment; hence the sayings about wealth not crossing three generations.
John Adams might ruefully agree that his grandchildren who studied “painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry and porcelain” will perhaps not be able to stand up to other more brutish kids in the playground who are still on war and politics.
Societies which have gained the most from science will be the fastest to abandon it; it is Eloi vs Morlocks all over again.
And ultimately we will see that some societies do in fact choose Darwinism: if the price to pay for natural immunity is mass death, well, that’s just the hand of God at work, culling the herd. This is actually the historical norm for humanity, and deep-rooted in our psychology.
It’s what they used to call r-selection vs K-selection; different societies have different preferences. Some connect it to “lie back and think of England”, others to Roe v Wade, and to fears of being overrun by “the quicker-breeding races”
I like how all this ties back to Moral Foundations theory, on care-for-others vs freedom-from-coercion being the pivotal priorities in conflict.
The red-zone lower class will be forced to buy masks good enough to protect the wearer: $20/week
The middle class will buy vaccine shots costing $200 every 6 months
The upper-middle will move to a green zone for a $15,000 one-time relocation cost and never worry about it again.
The middle class will buy vaccine shots costing $200 every 6 months
The upper-middle will move to a green zone for a $15,000 one-time relocation cost and never worry about it again.
In some segments of society the consensus will be: Some of us are naturally asymptomatic. Those are the ones destined to pass on their genes to the next generation. Some of us are not so lucky – and they will inherit the earth, six feet deep. And that is all God’s will.
I don’t think the reports of 3,000 deaths per day are going to bother people whose response is to say, “sure, but we have 10,000 births per day, so we’re still ahead, what’s the problem?”
