health care | Moral Markets?

Moving Forward and Finding Balance in a Dynamic System

by Michiel van Veluwen | 12 Apr 2021 | climate change & sustainability, critiquing / reinventing capitalism

We must place current developments in perspective. Rightly pointed out by some, climate change is the much bigger wave that lies behind Covid and that approaches faster than many care to admit. The parallels between dangerous climate change and the above-described flaws in our financial and economic system are plain. In fact, climate change and a flawed economic system might not even be two separate problems.

Nominated essay in the category master students of the Future Markets Consultation essay contest

Big Pharma Wants to Pocket the Profits From a COVID Treatment You Already Paid For

by Institute for New Economic Thinking (association of heterodox economists) | 7 Jul 2020 | governments & markets, health care, health care, health care, health care, health care, health care, health care, health care, health care, health care, health care, health care, health care, health care, health care

“Our data suggests that Gilead’s considerable accomplishment in securing authorization for use of remdesivir in treating COVID-19 represents only the culminating step in a cumulative process of innovation that involved the collective action of public, as well as private, enterprise. While Gilead will likely invest several billion dollars in bringing remdesivir to market, our data suggests that the public sector, in aggregate, has already invested much more. Patent law and the USPTO recognize the role played by Gilead in the discovery and development of remdesivir. There is, however, no mechanism for similarly recognizing the decades of foundational, basic research that made this discovery possible.”

Pay for Plasma? We Bloody Well Should

by CapX ("for popular capitalism") | 30 Jun 2020 | the limits of the market

“As for the purported evil of ‘commodifying’ plasma collection, it’s hard to see how our current situation of importing paid plasma is morally distinct from allowing British donors to be compensated. It’s also worth asking how much extra death and suffering we would be willing to tolerate from plasma shortages in exchange for keeping markets out of our lives. The only moral answer is zero. As Jaworski and his co-author Jason Brennan make clear in their book Markets without Limits, the anti-commodification thesis about how markets can corrupt or offend our dignity, is on very shaky ground.”

Coronavirus: Big Tobacco Sees an Opportunity in the pandemic

by The Conversation ("Academic Rigour, Journalistic Flair") | 14 May 2020

“Over the last few months, as COVID-19 has spread around the world, big tobacco has exploited the pandemic to push its branding and products. The industry never misses a trick when it comes to exploiting the chaos of international crises, including wars. The current pandemic is no exception.”

Think Big Pharma Won’t Profiteer in the Race to Treat Coronavirus? Think Again

by Institute for New Economic Thinking (association of heterodox economists) | 6 May 2020 | business ethics & CSR, business ethics & CSR, interviews

“Rosie Collington […] has studied how major insulin manufacturing companies jack up prices in order to line the pockets of shareholders, leaving many diabetics at risk of kidney failure, blindness, and even death if they can’t afford to pony up. Amid the Covid-19 crisis, some are hoping pharmaceutical companies can stop prioritizing profits over human life and redeem themselves following decades of abuses ranging from price gouging to tax dodging. […] In the following interview, Collington explores what’s at stake”

Capitalists vs Covid – The Freer the Country, the Safer You Are from the Virus

by CapX ("for popular capitalism") | 5 May 2020 | freedom / liberty

“Does the corona crisis expose the failings of capitalism? A look at the data make a nonsense of the idea that capitalism is somehow to blame for this pandemic. Strong capitalist freedoms are the bedrock of the countries responding best to Covid-19.”

Capitalism Is the Elephant in the COVID19 Isolation Room

by Discover Society ("Measured – Factual – Critical") | 26 Mar 2020 | critiquing / reinventing capitalism

“The materialist analysis of the coronavirus pandemic conducted here suggests that now that the Covid particle has become part of the global capitalist market-assemblage, there is no way to resolve both public health and economic crises in parallel. […] The alternative is to re-engineer the social and economic relations of the economy. It is unrealistic to imagine the wholesale abandonment of global capitalism any time soon, and it is unclear what might be put in its place. But there are some measures that can mitigate the way a virus such as Covid19 can spread.”

‘Market failure’ Is Not to Blame for Sky-High US Drug Prices

by CapX ("for popular capitalism") | 23 Sep 2019 | opinion & ideas

“it’s altogether more complicated than simply markets vs state provision. The actual cause of the problem is idiot regulation. That is, it’s the rules set by the US government that let drug companies charge patients through the nose. So, change the regulation and the problem will be solved – the arrival of that bright new dawn of true socialism isn’t the cure, a properly free market is.”

Paying for Love in the Caring Economy

by JSTOR Daily ("Where News Meets Its Scholarly Match") | 4 Aug 2019

“Culturally, we like to think that once money is involved, a transaction becomes clean and passionless. It’s an adjustment that isn’t merely economic, but sociological as well. It requires grappling with how we define intimacy, what we view as transactional, and how we categorize what’s business, what’s personal…and what’s both.”

Market Power

by Economics and Ethics (academic group blog) | 3 Feb 2019 | Adam Smith, research updates, research updates

“It is a no-brainer that business people don’t really like competitive market capitalism, despite all their exhortations about the value of markets. Just read any of The Wealth of Nations to find Adam Smith with the same view. Business people much prefer rigged markets, as long as they are on the inside. So it is no surprise that new research finds that converting health care insurance from non-profit to for-profit leads to a rise in premiums (not the fall that would be anticipated because of greater market efficiencies).”

Moral Markets?

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