[Hat tip Kevin Drum] Kleiman makes a nice point about health care waiting times:
“This is a point that’s worth keeping in mind when you hear about waiting times in other countries. The only reason we even know they have waiting times is because they measure it. We don’t. That doesn’t mean we don’t have waiting times. It just means we don’t know how long they are, which in turn implies that we don’t have any interest in reducing them. After all, if we did, we’d measure them, wouldn’t we?”
The same principle applies to other things - like the American military doesn’t count Iraqi death in the current war - some times when things don’t count, they are treated as if they don’t count.
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