Category: Society
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Why Wiki Isn’t New to Government
In government, where change is recurring and often stressful to the employees affected, Web 2.0 can be a tough sell. One of the biggest hurdles in implementing technology in the workplace is not resistance to technology per se, but the cultural shift that the new software represents. But when a technology is introduced which replicates…
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The Thousand Tiny Knives
In privacy management, it’s the major data breaches that grab the big headlines. In personal brand management, it’s the high profile embarrassments resulting from carelessness, ignorance and poor judgment that capture public attention. Janine Krieber, Nathalie Blanchard, Stephen Fry, Tiger Woods… who’ll be next? Not you, certainly. For most of us, risks to our privacy and reputation…
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GCconnex Development – November 2009
Note: This post contains links only accessible within the Government of Canada network. In my last GCconnex update about the recent user survey, I encouraged everyone to contribute their opinions about the look, feel, and usability of the Government of Canada’s internal professional networking platform via the GCconnex Professional Network Pilot Working Group forum. I’m…
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US Health Care: Why Privatization Is Inefficient – Part 4
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4Arguments Against Universality It is often argued that socialized medicine in the US would introduce a wealth of problems, worse than those currently faced. Government is often regarded as wasteful, rigid and out of touch with the real needs of its citizens. In comparison, private…
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US Health Care: Why Privatization Is Inefficient – Part 3
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4The Industry of Illness It is a reality of our time that the same companies promoting health care products are also largely responsible for underwriting their research. Skepticism about this model of business has led to pharmacoeconomic studies of the popular antidepressants, which demonstrate a…
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US Health Care: Why Privatization Is Inefficient – Part 2
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4Spending More, Getting Less — The Public System Because of their identity as government programs, societal scepticism about the US government’s ability to manage efficiently, and the relative reduction of power and status allotted to the primary recipients of public health care (the poor and…
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US Health Care: Why Privatization Is Inefficient – Part 1
Update: Feb 15, 2010 — Since this post was originally published, the Democrats lost their vote in the US Senate, but the Obama Administration is still pushing for a major overhaul of the American health care system. Twenty-one members of Congress (12 Democrats and 9 Republicans) have been invited to a conference on healthcare set…
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How GCPEDIA will Save the Public Service, revisited
In March of 2009 David Eaves suggested that GCPEDIA will save the public service . As a public servant and a GCPEDIA administrator, I’d like to believe he’s right. His main argument was that GCPEDIA has the potential to become the repository of much knowledge that will be lost (or at least not conveniently accessible) once…
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The Future of Health Care?
Should health care be rationed? It’s really a moot question because health care is already being rationed in the United States. HMOs (health maintenance organizations), like any other (successful) insurance company, remain profitable by taking in as much money as possible, while paying out as little as possible. Instead of looking at your car, calculating…