Readit NewsMany stores near me appeared to cut cashiers before they added self-checkouts. If anything, adding self-checkouts increased the number of available options to get out of the store faster.
I'd place my bets on curbside pickup getting pushed more before cashiers get added given how popular it's become as an option.
Perhaps on the cost, but the US has the best doctors in the world. If I need major surgery, I know I can get it in a reasonable amount of time. In many other countries in Europe or even Canada, the government gets to decide if I need to get it or not and the wait time could be in years.
Everyone says the elderly in the US will go broke after a single major surgery. My dad is on Medicare with a low-cost supplemental insurance. He's been in multiple hospitals for the last 6 months and short-term care for the last 6 weeks.
He was treated for sepsis twice and got a pacemaker installed (this doesn't include drugs, meals, everything else that comes with his stay). His cost out of pocket? $0.
My elderly relatives have to wait many months to get surgery in Canada. The UK also has a failing healthcare system. The issue is that in times of economic downturns, socialized medicine gets cut.
I don't think I've seen a single example of socialized medicine that doesn't end up with long wait times for major surgeries or the government making health decisions for you.
A better system would be to have no insurance on procedures that are extremely common (where the free market can reduce the costs, like Lasik eye surgery) and only have insurance on ones that aren't so common and won't benefit from the competition.
I think the government stuff is a bit of a farce. They have an incentive like any other institution. For instance, inflation metrics are tied to trillions of dollars in terms of retirement benefits or other programs that are indexed to inflation. They have a gigantic incentive to play with the numbers. And I'm 100% convinced that they do. Does anyone believe food prices went up only 28% since pre-covid? Did something go from costing $4 to $5? No, most things close to doubled. But they're able to play with the numbers changing the basket (beef getting more expensive, we'll just swap that out with Tofu!).
It isn’t unreasonable to want some alone time.
- science funding is controlled by the state (and thus politics) in many leading countries, especially China. Doesn't seem to hold them back
- the US pays people vastly more than other countries, and will continue to have the ability to fund expensive research more than others. Maybe it will regain the political will to do so in coming years
You're right that uncertainty is deadly to investment, and signing up for 5 years of a PhD is certainly an investment. But it's hard to see this turn into an actual brain drain, if only for lack of a better place to go.
After all, why bother doing research when the guy ultimately responsible for choosing your funding will take a sharpie to any data you collect if it looks bad?
Take the Photos app. I can type any object like “car” and it generally locates photos containing a car. This is far more useful to me than a LLM to generate paragraphs of text on a phone.
Using "big" as a synonym for "consumers are worse off than alternatives" does not do anyone justice.
> At least she was trying to enforce antitrust for once.
Her prejudice against big tech and pretty much ignoring any other industries is not something to be proud of.
> Now, postal services, online sellers, consumers and shipping companies are attempting to sort through the costly and complicated process to comply with US rules with little guidance from federal agencies.
I wonder what consideration individuals are giving this. . . The article says very little about consumer behavior save for the above two grafs. I very rarely buy directly from abroad and that is by design, with nothing to do re: de minimis. What bargains are people buying?! Especially in this economy.
Bags, odds and ends around the house, component assortments, screw assortments, and some tools (with careful judgement).
Sometimes the difference is only 1/3rd the cost, but I’ve had some items be 1/20th the cost by removing Amazon and whichever third party seller.