AnonymousActuary
No bio...
User ID: 2163
AnonymousActuary
13d ago
Yeah this is what I've emphasized - you will improve at this if you work at it, but doing so will result in a lot of losing along the way. We went to a chess club event recently and I prefaced it with "everyone here is going to be much better than you, but you will learn some things". She had a very good attitude, and I thought played some very solid moves that even I hadn't seen. She said she wanted to go again, so I think for now I keep nurturing it. Hopefully can find some people more her level for her to play soon.
AnonymousActuary
16d ago
What do we think about chess? My 5 year old daughter has become enamored with it lately, wants to play multiple times a day, doing some puzzles, all that good stuff. She's definitely improving fast - she impresses adults she plays who know how to play but aren't good haha - I'd benchmark at her at like a Class G player (ELO in the 600-700 range). I'm probably around an 1100 ELO, maybe a bit higher when I'm really focused.
Basically, trying to decide how much to encourage improvement in this vs other skills she enjoys (soccer, reading, etc) given Chess is a bit of a dead end? But if she enjoys it then it is a fun hobby and I like playing her...thinking we might try out a local scholastic club and see what we think.
AnonymousActuary
16d ago
interesting - We've enjoyed our guardian bikes a decent amount - what's the pitch with priority and woom?
EDIT: lighter weight? More expensive so just generally better? Our 5 year old is struggling a bit on hills though is very good at pedaling. 3 year old still working on balance with pedals.
AnonymousActuary
16d ago
just noticed this too - went to check the subreddit and it has 19k readers?? Since when? Is it just a bot paradise haha
AnonymousActuary
27d ago
Disclaimer: I am not a Medicaid expert Medicaid reimbursement is generally a lot lower than commercial - though maybe there is enough direct and supplemental payment shenanigans that it is worth it? I just know every time I have touched it it seems like a mess of different categories and paperwork
AnonymousActuary
27d ago
I think the USA's current healthcare system actually looks pretty good when you adjust for our terrible demographic/cultural headwinds (we are fat, love shooting each other, going fast in cars, drinking, and combining all 4 activities). People come to the US for top tier care (Mayo Clinic, Cleveland Clinic). We drive huge amounts of pharmacy innovation.
We absolutely spend a ton of money on it, but some of that is just we have a bunch of money to spend.
AnonymousActuary
27d ago
Posted this in the comments last week, but was curious to get some more thoughts on a potential path forward on the healthcare front that isn't just single-payer across the board:
I do occasionally wonder if you could get to a decent place via:
- Get rid of Medicaid. It maybe made sense at one point, but it's current incarnation is, as far as I can tell, such a disgusting mess for all involved parties that it's better to just kill it with fire.
- People who would be on Medicaid can now get insurance via the ACA exchanges - they'll get a 94% CSR plan for 2% of their income. There's some annoyance around how they will enter their income, but much less paperwork than it takes to interface with Medicaid. There would need to be a small legislative tweak to allow this to happen (let <138% FPL income people get subsidies), but in practice they should trade a bunch of annoying documentation and everything is free for a functional network (ie a blues plan) and everything is very cheap + 2% of their income.
- Expand Medicare to more disease categories other than just end stage renal disease (in addition to the elderly). In practice I think you want to try to capture an additional several million of the sickest people. Hemophiliacs, organ transplant, some cancers, some rare genetic disease perhaps, that sort of thing. This will dramatically lower premiums in the ACA. However power-law distributed you think healthcare costs are, the reality is they are likely more power law distributed than you think.
That's going to create some winners and losers, hospitals will be upset that more high cost people are on Medicare, but shifting people from Medicaid to commercial reimbursement rates should help out with that. The amount of bureaucratic nonsense saved by getting rid of Medicaid should be huge.
All a bit of pie in the sky dreaming anyways...
AnonymousActuary
27d ago
I do occasionally wonder if you could get to a decent place via:
- Get rid of Medicaid. It maybe made sense at one point, but it's current incarnation is, as far as I can tell, such a disgusting mess for all involved parties that it's better to just kill it with fire.
- People who would be on Medicaid can now get insurance via the ACA exchanges - they'll get a 94% CSR plan for 2% of their income. There's some annoyance around how they will enter their income, but much less paperwork than it takes to interface with Medicaid. There would need to be a small legislative tweak to allow this to happen (let <138% FPL income people get subsidies), but in practice they should trade a bunch of annoying documentation and everything is free for a functional network (ie a blues plan) and everything is very cheap + 2% of their income.
- Expand Medicare to more disease categories other than just ESRD. In practice I think you want to try to capture an additional several million of the sickest people. Hemophiliacs, organ transplant, some cancers, some rare genetic disease perhaps, that sort of thing. This will dramatically lower premiums in the ACA. However power-law distributed you think healthcare costs are, the reality is they are likely more power law distributed than you think.
That's going to create some winners and losers, providers will be upset that people are on Medicare, but shifting people from Medicaid to commercial reimbursement rates should help out with that. The amount of bureaucratic nonsense saved by getting rid of Medicaid should be huge.
AnonymousActuary
28d ago
just wanted to say, extremely here for the anti-dog content. I love dogs, but like 5-10% of people max who own them should own them, and you should have to have a kid or be a single male (saying this somewhat sarcastically, but not completely).
This is one of my favorite blog articles on the subject: https://mattlakeman.org/2020/03/21/against-dog-ownership/
AnonymousActuary
1mo ago
Nope just remembered I had saved it one reddit
AnonymousActuary
1mo ago
There's a great FCCfromSCC post...maybe on reddit about confederate monuments...
Ope not FCCfromSCC, but here you go: https://old.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/comments/71ydqb/comment/dnfdfl3/?context=3
AnonymousActuary
1mo ago
I'd be worried about my daughter sleeping around outside of marriage in general
AnonymousActuary
1mo ago
Thinking that someone using natural family planning within a Catholic marriage is going to be what ruins their lives is uh, an interesting conclusion
AnonymousActuary
1mo ago
Tbh the distinction between forces attacking and just supplying other forces that attack is somewhat lost on me, but a cursory reading of cold war era conflicts (Vietnam, Afghanistan etc) clearly indicates states consider it to be very different.
AnonymousActuary
1mo ago
Citation needed
AnonymousActuary
1mo ago
I would be shocked if this results in boots in the ground. Like with Soleimani, seems like gamble that stops with the air strikes (plus whatever Israel is up to).
People exclaiming loudly about how dangerous this is while also campaigning for increasing escalation in Ukraine against an actual nuclear adversary are not serious people.
I'm highly against more foreign intervention but this seems fine to me. A nuclear Iran seems to be very bad in very obvious ways.
AnonymousActuary
1mo ago
I think "why is this bad thing happening to me" sorta a diet-problem of evil is an extremely common thing for people to think about? But yes, I doubt the median Christian has read the Bible through even once. I remember when I was ~10 talking to a Sunday school leader and mentioning I was starting my 3rd time through reading a chapter a day and he was shocked. I was like "wait doesn't everyone do this?" haha.
And the Bible as a whole definitely addresses it frequently - think the Tower of Siloam story, the story of the cripple ("who sinned, this man or his parents that he was born blind?") or like, the entire book of Job. I don't think the answers that come out are ones that are going to intuitively solve the problem for someone who doesn't already believe, but it is certainly considered.
AnonymousActuary
1mo ago
honestly even from a completely materialistic worldview, the idea that spending some time every day focusing on things you are grateful for, letting go of things you are worried about, and thinking about things you want to have happen could have positive impacts doesn't seem far-fetched.
EDIT: probably should add for the sake of debate I have also had (less dramatic than OP) experiences of immediate and hard-to-explain things happening after prayer on multiple occasions. Not impossible to explain, but felt quite meaningful at the time to me.
AnonymousActuary
1mo ago
Then if we're clearly going to make it to the stop sign well before anyone else, it's best just to blow through. Otherwise, the driver is going to be waiting far longer if we come to a complete stop.
This is just a general rule for no one obeying traffic laws if they think it will inconvenience themselves or others a bit?
AnonymousActuary
1mo ago
If anyone satisfyingly resolves the problem of evil in a forum post they are clearly misusing their talents.
I also will not solve the problem of evil for you here either. There are lots of books you could read by smarter people than me if that is what you are searching for (including books of the Bible), though it seems like you are just hoping bringing up the problem of evil will somehow magically turn someone atheist again like they've never thought about it in their life?
AnonymousActuary
1mo ago
insert Norman Rockwell Meme gray vinyl plank is awesome actually
Won't stain or scratch and easy to clean up any spills or messes no matter what the kiddos throw at it. And if I miss some mess it doesn't immediately show up with flashing lights like it might on something brighter.
Unfortunately, Mannington moved from China to Vietnam or vice versa a few years back and the product went to shit.
AnonymousActuary
1mo ago
I honestly can't tell if this is some kind of gotcha or you are trying to make some profound point that is whooshing right over me haha
AnonymousActuary
1mo ago
I don't understand why you think someone could believe that prayer sometimes works and not also believe that plate tectonics exists?
AnonymousActuary
1mo ago
The Obama-era democrats passed the ACA, got annihilated in basically every election other than POTUS '12 for quite a while, but the ACA still stands.
Rittenhouse was such a perfect little scissor...not shocking that was the first step in driving people apart
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