However, there's opportunity here. As the cost of building and maintaining software products collapses, taste and carefully choosing what to build becomes a major differentiator.
3,822 karma · joined July 16, 2021
The big weakness is industrial capacity, but only China can exploit that at scale.
The issue is general industrial capacity, not missiles specifically.
First, those are short- to medium-range weapons.
Second, the USAF and USN hold most of the US's long-range precision weaponry, the only real exception being the Long-Range Hypersonic Weapon (LRHW), which is not yet fielded.
This is definitely not true. A base model unequipped ambulance may be in that ballpark. A fully equipped ambulance will vary wildly in cost based on clinical level but will be about $250-500k in the US.
> Then you have liability, both for the vehicle and for the medical treatment; that's about $12k per year.
Maybe for BLS or non-emergency ambulances in a low-utilisation role? For ALS/Critical Care or higher in a busy jurisdiction it's going to be significantly higher.
FWIW I think that HEMS cost is significantly under costed, as the London HEMS H135s run about £2,500 per flight hour on direct flight costs alone, so I suspect the £4,748 figure is referring to that alone.
I think a closer estimate is probably total annual operational costs divided by total shouts, (£18 MM / 2,000) or about £9,000 per shout.
Even that's an under costing, as the clinical personnel, equipment, and liability is shouldered by the NHS. A pure costing is probably closer to 2-3X that per clinical flight.
Still an order of magnitude less than the commercial US operators.
Okay, so why don't we see this behaviour more in other countries?
In my jurisdiction, the incentives are actually weighted towards pushing people to ambulances, as there is a €100 fee for self-referral to ED which is waived if you're transported, but while there are time wasters and frequent flyers, the service is actually less abused than US ambulances under EMTALA.
Gov.nl is just a domain owned by the Dutch Government, like gov.ie or belgium.be.
I wonder if anyone else has experienced this?
> PS A "curve-off" public welfare policy is far more effective than banning guns.
Roll eyes emoji.
Companies don't have morals, only people. Abdicating your moral responsibilities because you're employed is cowardice.
In most countries, but not in the US.
This is an extremely miopic view (or maybe trolling).
The vast majority of software developers never study, learn, or write any code outside of their work hours.
In contrast, almost all professional have enormous, _legally-required_ upskilling, retraining, and professional competence maintenance.
If you honestly believe that developers have anywhere near the demands (both in terms of time and cost) in staying up to date that other professions have, you are - as politely as I can - completely out-of-touch.
In Ireland specifically, the cost of living is the key political issue at this time for Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. Neither has any mandate or capacity for military or economic conflict with the United States - our recent diplomatic efforts, in spite of the Greenland and Iranian crises, should highlight that.
Ireland is more dependent than ever before on the US. We would veto any EU efforts against them.
As for EU motivations, Orbán is the visible blocker, but the Western states are even more constraining than Hungary. It’s Spain, Ireland, Germany, France, etc. that have no appetite for war or economic upheaval, which would immediately topple governments across the bloc. EU defence policy requires unanimity across states, and it doesn’t exist.
Rhetoric is strong but thin, and almost everybody apart from yourself sees it. Let’s come back to this in a year, when production figures and defence spending for 2025 become public and see.