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[S13 E08] Inequality’s Insidious Spread – COVID-19, India, Insurance
In this week’s show, Prof. Wolff presents updates on India’s extreme inequality and its lesson, employers squeeze employees with “non-compete” job contracts, and how the profit motive distorts the concept of insurance. In the second half of the show, Wolff interviews Dr Stephen Bezruchka on how deeply and globally inequality endangers health with special attention to the US and Covid-19.
Timestamps:
00:00 – 01:14 – Introduction
01:15 – 06:55 – India’s inequality
06:56 – 10:03 – “Non-compete” job contracts
10:04 – 14:47 – Insurance
14:48 – 16:12 – Announcements
16:13 – 30:55 – Interview with Dr. Stephen Bezruchka
Economic Update with Richard D. Wolff is a @democracyatwrk production. We make it a point to provide the show free of ads. Please consider supporting our work. Join our Patreon community: and help us spread Prof. Wolff’s message to a larger audience. Every donation counts!
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About our Guest: Stephen Bezruchka, a graduate of Harvard, Johns Hopkins and Stanford universities, teaches courses in population health in the Departments of Health Systems and Population Health and of Global Health as faculty in the School of Public Health at the University of Washington.He worked clinically as a doctor for 35 years including three decades as an emergency physician. He spent over 11 years in Nepal, writing the first trekking guide to that country, running a community health project, training Nepali doctors in a remote district hospital and advancing concepts of population health. He focuses on creating greater public understanding of the determinants of health through teaching, talking and writing at various levels from middle school onward. He created the Population Health Forum in 1997. He serves on the board of directors of the Washington Physicians For Social Responsibility and works with its Economic Inequity Health Task Force.
His book: Inequality Kills Us All: COVID-19’s Health Lessons for the World is published by Routledge. (blurbed by Richard on the back cover)
Links:
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Check out the 2021 Hardcover edition of “Understanding Marxism,” with a new, lengthy introduction by Richard Wolff is now available at:
“Marxism always was the critical shadow of capitalism. Their interactions changed them both. Now Marxism is once again stepping into the light as capitalism shakes from its own excesses and confronts decline.”
Check out all of d@w’s books: “The Sickness is the System,” “Understanding Socialism,” by Richard D. Wolff, and “Stuck Nation” by Bob Hennelly
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SOURCES FOR SHOW SEGMENTS:
1. Oxfam report on India:
2. “Non-compete” job conditions:
women-people-color/11046736002/
Watch more new videos about Insurance | Synthesized by Mindovermetal English
I bet usa longevity would be highest in the world without Tylenol, preventable gun crime absent regulation, and the opioids legally peddled for a decade. I bet longevity would be the best in the world without the prison industrial complex and war machine spending
The guest is part of the problem…shockingly simplistic notions that ignore the corruption at all levels of the for-profit business of health care in this country…it starts with the med schools (all of which provide a total of 12 hours class time on nutrition) then the AMA, then big Pharma..
Sorry, but that guy was so pathetic, so clueless regarding the deeper issues ….and what's more depressing is that I appear to be the only one in this comment section that perceives this…this does not make me hopeful !!
Do you think, India become independent, or colonialism changed forms… And the colonialists shifted assets to US… This was actually planned in the meeting between Churchill and Rosevelt in 1941 ??? Anyway, take care you are great.
Thanks DaW!!!
Congratulations on reaching 300,000 subscribers.
Professor, what do you think of Bernie's new book?
Same thing fred hampton talked about
The richest man in Babylon.
1. https://youtu.be/wglndSWrvsM
Pay yourself first.
2. https://youtu.be/qkUgmolMI9I
3. :
Wolff getting spicy with the examples on this one.
The hardest intro ever.
"Subhas Chandra Bose" ♥️
❤❤❤❤❤❤❤BEST DR. RICHARD D. WOLFF ECONOMIC UPDATE EVER. I did not understand why the previous mayor of ;LOS ANGELES , AND HIS parents wanted him to quickly become US AMBASSADOR TO INDIA. BUT NOW I IT IS CLEAR.
Commenting on 11:54. My younger sister, who lives in Illinois lost her job, because she could not report to work. She had fallen sick to the point that she had to be hospitalized for a week. A situation beyond her control. Does not matter that she was an reliable employee and a good worker. She was terminated and replaced. Snap of a finger.
That's an excellent idea to pull the conversation into an elevator pitch. This is a very weedy subject that deserves a longer discussion, but you have to set it up succinctly to get people interested in the first place.
I've always been perplexed by the fact that the insurance financial model has been imposed on health care, and this video made some very good arguments that were also critical of this. Another reason is back to the fire insurance. You carry fire insurance in case of the unlikely event of a fire breaking out. You don't expect to have a fire anytime soon, and you have no certainty that one will occur within 5 years. So fire insurance is really not like health care at all. You know you or someone in your family will need some kind of care within 6 months if not sooner, and during a typical year a typical family receives a substantial amount of health care. Why would anyone have insurance against the inevitable? Well of course it is because the middlemen and the insurance companies can make a lot of money when it's arranged that way. But it is stupid! We don't need insurance against needing health care — we need to fund health care comprehensively and absolutely, and getting insurance involved is an impediment not to mention a type of corruption.
Should have on the People's CDC too. They're my #1 choice for COVID news.
Capitalists and other investors are leeches, expected to be paid a nice regular amount into the indefinite future for doing no work. Meanwhile hardworking people and their families suffer as a direct result. This system has got to go.
In the USA if you lose your job you lose your insurance. If you live in the USA, and if you lose your job the first thing you can get is Medi-Cal. It's for people who make less than $20k/year. If you lose all of your income due to a layoff or most of it, you would qualify for it. It covers hospital visits, and emergency room visits.
India falls behind China because there has been inter stare rivalries and lack of integration than because communism is better than an elected government. As previously during the mughal and British rule, you could manipulate one against other at the snap of a finger.
As number indicate, China could leave Europe behind too in time, the same divisions that hinder unity in India exist in Europe too. It is easy for one state or group of states, like France and Belgium or Germany and Austria combined to assert a clout that others may not have.
India has big regional clouts that derail its common agenda. India suffers bigger than Europe owing to lack of education or aspiration for education, as a result there is bigger tendency to vote for inferior systems of governance than the ideal system. So in conclusion the poor and uneducated prefer status quo as much as the rich. We inherited the colonizers criminal enterprise and made it more hurting than before.
India could show bigger numbers owing to international market equations but its inequality will deny it any respectabilty. Do not want it anyway.
Professor, we are Americans in China. We would like to give an account of Covid story from our experiences. We started watching YouTube since Covid began in January 2020 to get more news so we have both sides of stories. We intend to write a long comment: Wuhan lockdown began on January 23, 2020, two days before the Chinese New Year holidays, immediately followed by a nationwide lockdown. The protocols were the soon to become new normals including face masks and social distancing. However China was able to implement the protocols right away. Eateries and entertainment shops were closed as well as most public facilities such as banks. Schools were on holidays and to be continued. Food markets were opened and restaurants were encouraged to do deliveries. Courier service was a big help. Dr. Ian Lipkin, the renounced virus hunter from Columbia University came to China in January. Harvard came in February and set up joint studies for Covid-19 with a Chinese institute. All along there were CDC personnel and some European experts in China. Trump was in India negotiating Patriot missiles and F-35 after his trip to Japan. On returning to the US he praised China for Covid handling, timely revelation of the genome and lockdown measures. In February there was an infected cruise ship in Japan followed by outbreaks in Italy. Seattle was the first US city to have a major outbreak in March, some 500 cases and the lockdown they performed worked quite well in containing further spread. Bill Gates put out videos advocating vocally for nationwide lockdown, explaining doing so would cost the economy dozens of billions or more but save trillions, and save lives. He even explained one trillion is one thousand billion to make sure the public could understand. By April, Trump began calling China virus Wuhan virus. It was the turning point, a key moment not only concerned Covid but the direction of US attitude and policies over China. What happened? A news report by CGTN provided some answers. The title is called Anti-China Campaign, Wang Guan, CGTN Washington DC. Republican advisor O’Donell issued a 57 page anti China playbook with a theme “Attack China, Don’t defend Trump”. (this CGTN report is in YouTube) Although there seemed to be no details on the meaning of Don’t defend Trump, it is not impossible to theorise, which, I am quite sure you can do a better job than me because it must concerned money, the 1.9 trillion initial bailout funds or the potential global vaccine monopoly…Afterwards NYC went through a disaster before BLM which spread Covid all over. The fact that Bill Gates was able to suggest nationwide lockdown so confidently had to be info on China. By mid March, other than Wuhan, majority of cities in China had no new cases after 4 to 6 weeks of lockdown. Our city of 3.8 million had 44 cases in February and that was it. In the next two years we had but about a dozen or so cases total and no deaths. Some 4800 Covid deaths in Wuhan plus 200 for the rest of the country. China announced nationwide zero cases on May 28, 2020, for 20 months until Shanghai Omicron outbreak in January 2022, China had occasional countable cases from the Russian or Korean boarder towns, ocean going fishing boats, and mysterious import food packaging. During those 20 months China had less than 30 Covid deaths while the US had a million plus millions more suffered serious injuries. Jumping to the present, China has not discussed much about number of Covid deaths after relieving lockdown measures. According to various info from experts, an educated guess would be something between one death out of every 5000-10,000, predominantly very old seniors who have weakened immune system who also could die with seasonal flu. If the number is correct it would mean 140,000 to 280,000 total. For China with 1.4 billion people, normal annual deaths are 11 million. I believe China has done its best.
I worked at hospitals for 30 years.MBA’s and BOD make all the decisions. They cut our hospital to barebones, in the ICU we we’re always short shorted and severely short staffed on the weekends. This has been escalating for 15 years. So not only do you pay though your arse for healthcare insurance you are getting comprised care. The medical staff do care but work under extreme stress
Why take care of the poor. They breed like rabbits and constantly replace the cogs who die. Thus the cycle continues and the caste system is preserved.
One of the big obstacles to social change in India is religion.
Eat the rich…there's far more of us than of them, so we each need to only take a little bite.
Its one of many common problems among you westerners looking at rest of world with same lense that you see your countries with, so again that's not the case from ground and above so educate yourself before you go spreading generalized, misleading, false ,half ended information.
Thanks gentlemen as a layman I learn so much by listening to caring people such as you
The America racket for getting old and die for profit! 💸
I think the usas healthcare system is looked at like designer brand clothing or shoes. so expensive because it was designed to be that way.
10:41 insurance – no surance. Insurance it’s just a way for you to pay tribute to your feudal lords. Have you ever wondered why insurance companies do not want to pay? It is in the name, they are not going to help. Just another way you do not understand language. Capital punishment? Does that mean people have their currency taken away from them? I have a question for you. Since you hate capitalism so much, does this mean you hate people?
the rich only exist because we allow them to
Point taken. What is said here is totally correct, and the next question is what the people at large in their greatest majority will do after knowing such reality so far pushed aside under the power of daily propaganda trying rather successfully to make most of us believe that the status quo is fair which it is not, far from it. The principle of absolute right of private property is in itself the biggest fraud ever invented by humans, it creates and facilitates the accumulation of money power in the hands of a tiny minority able to dictate their will which, no matter what angle one wish to look into, is directed to private interest of this minority called the dominating class. Money power is used by the dominating class to dictate and corrupt all forms of government. We, the people, are at war with this cluster of billionaires, oligarchs, banking aristocrats and corporations, all using the title of private property of the means of production and distribution to act against the interests of the majority with the powerful tool of accumulated wealth in private hands. Only by educating ourselves, organising ourselves and agitating ourselves to challenge the status quo can we hope for a progressive way of life. Power corrupt all humans, no exception here, therefore it is our objectif to make sure no one in particular can accumulate the money power to further private interests at the expense of the greatest majority.
US has the highest death rate(3413 death per M population) from Covid 19 among the top 10 economy countries. For comparison, Japan has only 571 death/M population. The major reason is US has a very high % people refused to wear face masks and receive vaccines. Inequality of wealth causes hardship on the low income people and leads to social disturbance and crimes.
What is the point? Always has been. Nothing new. Ancient civilizations were even worse!
It’s dumb to most people 9:33 but I’m tired of spending money for a dress code to go to work. All those women’s suits, separates and shoes- and I’ve been told what color hair to have multiple times. I get about 55% less income than I used to, but I cut my expenses even more – somehow I have created a financial eco system with a very similar quality of life, mostly just less stress… the key to enjoy being poor is spend your money on your everyday stuff you rely on, not disposable bs and be as self reliant as you possibly can!
✊👍