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1. 

   gene berman

   October 11, 2004

   “the earlier you catch”
   I’ve heard (or read) commentary, especially with regard to breast cancer, that the apparent gain in longevity is primarily an “artifact” of the earlier detection and that not very much in the way of actual improvement (longevity-wise) can actually be attributed to such earlier detection. I’m also reminded that, nearly thirty years ago, a friend remarked to me that, whenever you became aware of a friend or acquaintance (or someone else’s friend or acquaintance) with a cancer episode of any of the more serious variety seemingly “taken care of” by any of the usual means or “in remission,” you could expect, upon checking back in a few years, to find that person no longer among the present. Since that time, though to a desultory degree, I’ve been noticing–and noticing few evidences for increasing optimism. As Dennis Miller says, “I could be wrong.” But it’s less unsettling to simply revert to noticing less. Head in the sand? Maybe so, but what’s the downside when it’s others’ misfortune which one is powerless to ameliorate?
   I came on to commend your writing, picked up on the TCS site.
   Insofar as the as the fractions of market prices paid are concerned (as between the various “factors of production”), forget dopes (or inventors of salable catch-phrases or scramblers for “place” in the competitive scholarly universe). That is to say, forget Schumpeter–read Von Mises (after which you can forget virtually everyone and everything else on that subject).
   Just as there is no merit to the Marxian rationale in which, after accounting for costs of production, that left over representing the “workers contribution” is simply appropriated by another (capitalist and entrepreneurial) class, neither are there any other specific portions over which participants can squabble by virtue of their relative power or positions with respect to the others. The specific (and relatively variable–at least potentially) portions are determined entirely by the particular market on which such goods and services are normally sold. End-consumers set end prices, borrowers determine the costs of loans (except for the interest portion), etc. But also remember something else: whatever the total that might be ascribed to innovation or entrepreneurship, its entirety can never devolve entirely on those seen primarily as entrepreneurs. Frequently overlooked is the inescapable fact that every lender and every loan (even, though to a lesser extent, those fully collateralized) involves risk; in this sense, the role of capitalist financier is, indeed, that central to the system and is always n entrepreneur.
   Tim adds: I’m aware of the cancer thought…I’m convinced that this is what it looks like but I think tht the underlying reality is, indeed,changing.
   Marx? A rhetorical device. Schumpeter? what the paper was talking about. Von Mises? Interesting. My views currently are shepherded by Hayek (distributed information), Buchanan (public choice), Smith (voluntary exchange) and Krugman (even though I, the leftist, have problems with capitalism, free trade is so obviously true that even I approve of it)….that provides a reasonable world view.

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