Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by throwawaygh 1497 days ago
This is exactly right. In huge swaths of the US, your local county's Mosquito Control department is probably a small number of full timers (maybe one or even zero), some budget for seasonal staff, and some commercial F-150s with sprayers in the bed. They probably have six-seven figures a year in budget.

They don't have a PR budget, just trucks and sprayers. But they are absolutely the reason that there isn't endemic malaria in your county.
1 comments
achenatx 1497 days ago
there is no doubt that government employees can innovate. Anyone can innovate. Provided with the correct competitive structure (large market rewards, big prizes, etc).

And yet, the F150 was built by capitalists, the sprayers are built with capitalists. The chemicals were built by capitalists.

so yes some problems are best solved by government, but innovation isnt one of them.

link
throwawaygh 1497 days ago
> so yes some problems are best solved by government, but innovation isnt one of them.

1. I've worked in gov labs, industry labs, and academic labs. Mostly industry labs. People and culture are the most important thing. The variability in innovation between companies is often WAY higher than the variability between the public and private sector. Gov labs can be insanely innovative or quagmires. Same for industry labs. It's all about the people and culture. Good people and good culture and possible in the public and private sectors. Bad people and bad culture are also possible in the public and private sectors. Anyone telling you otherwise is trolling and/or selling an idiology (sic).

2. The whole point of the above post was that there's ENORMOUS value in the "tried and true". Getting rid of endemic malaria has been possible for the better part of a century. It's a governance problem, not an innovation problem.

link
HWR_14 1497 days ago
> Anyone can innovate. Provided with the correct competitive structure (large market rewards, big prizes, etc).

Please explain why winner-take-all competitive rewards are necessary for innovation.

I mean, they seem to work today in the US. But I don't see why that means they are the only possible way forward.

link