User talk:Regulations

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Hello, Regulations, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful:

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I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you need help, check out Wikipedia:Questions, ask me on my talk page, or ask your question and then place {{helpme}} after the question on your talk page. Again, welcome!  MastCell 03:44, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Thank you. Regulations 03:51, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Contents 1 Hi there 2 DiMasi (copied from Talk:Food and Drug Administration) 3 Copyright issue with The Polling Company 4 My concern about your username (Regulations) 5 Sockpuppet?

[edit] Hi there

I've asked for mediation for the dispute over the JAMA study. The request is here if you wanted to take a look. I'm hoping this will help us come to agreement. TimVickers 17:42, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] DiMasi (copied from Talk:Food and Drug Administration)

What kind of idiocy is this, from DiMasi? "At the time that drug prices are determined, the associated R&D spending for a drug is a sunk cost. Basic economic logic tells us that R&D costs do not determine prices." Doesn't he realize that that the cost won't be "sunk" in the first place unless it is projected that the investment can be recouped ...unless it is projected that there a market for a high priced drug? If it's cheaper to bring that same drug to market then a lower price can be charged, and, quite possibly, therefore higher profits. It's as if he thinks higher prices = higher profits. That is not the case unless demand is inelastic, which it is not. It is often more profitable to charge a lower prices than a higher price. And, of course, he ignores competitive pressures. If you can bring a drug to market for a lower cost, then you are able to better compete against other drugs, which can institute a price war. It's hard to belief that DiMasi is an economist. Regulations 02:26, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

"If it's cheaper to bring that same drug to market then a lower price can be charged, and, quite possibly, therefore higher profits." No, this is flat wrong. The price which maximises profits (sales X price - production costs) is independant of the cost of development. You point about competition would make sense if pharmaceuticals operated anything like a perfect market, but it doesn't - the reasons for this are complex & controversial - you can exchange angry letters with DiMasi if you want details. By the way, I'm still waiting for a real published reference from any of the economists you are fond of quoting. -Rustavo 02:44, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes the price which maximizes profit is independent of the cost of development, but the cost of development won't be taken unless it is projected that the cost can be recouped ..unless it is projected that there is a market for a high priced drug. If there is not such a projection, then the costs won't be expended. Let's say for example, that the profit maximizing price is $1/pill. If they cannot charge that low of price but charge a higher price and still be profitable, then they will expend the investment and charge higher than $1/pill. If the same drug can be produced for a lower cost, because of the elimination of coercive regulation, such that they can actually charge $1/pill and be profitable then that's what they'll do because that is the profit maximizing price. There is a direct relation between prices charged and costs of investment. Regulations 02:54, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

This doesn't make any sense. How could the drug be unprofitable at the profit maximizing price, but be profitable at a higher price? The definition of a "profit maximizing price" is that any price - higher or lower - is less profitable. Seems pretty clear to me. Either they can make an net positive profit at the profit maximizing price or they can't - as you say, if they know in advance that the latter will be the case, then they will not develop the drug, but the price of the drug if they do develop it will be no different (the "profit maximimizing price" could still result in a negative profit - it would just be the smallest possible loss.)-Rustavo 03:13, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

You can make a profit selling at a higher price, even though selling at a lower price will reap more profit. Understand? Beginning at some point, the higher price you charge the more customers you start losing. There is some price X which maximizes profit, above which starts eroding profit and below which starts eroding profit. Let's say X +10 is the price where you will have zero customers. You will make any investment that will allow you to sell your drugs at any price from X all the way up to X+9. If the costs to you are so great that you can only charge greater than X, but less than X+10, then you will invest and sell at a price greater than X. If the costs to you are low enough that you can charge X, then you will invest and charge X. Regulations 03:24, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

You are digging yourself deeper into a hole of noncomprehension. Let's spell out a simplified example. A drug company calculates that the profit maximizing price of the drug is $20 per dose, and at that price, they will sell 10 million doses over the lifetime of the drug for net proceeds of $200 million - since it costs $5 per dose to make the drug, their profit (not counting development costs) at the profit maximizing price is $150 million. If they raise the price to 21 dollars, they will only sell 9 million doses (people are priced out) so their profit would be only $144. If they lower the price to $19 dollars, they will only sell a few more doses, and will also end up with a lower profit. That's why $20 is the "profit maximizing price." And that is what they will charge, however much we as consumers might want them to set a lower price. So far so good?

First let's say the development costs for the drug are $100 million. They'll change the PMP and make an overall net profit of $50 million. Now let's say an evil regulatory agency makes them do more tests and development costs $200 million. In this case, at the PMP, they will lose $50 million. If they know this and have not yet "sunk" the development costs, they will simply not make the drug. If they HAVE already "sunk" $100 million in development costs, they WILL develop the drug because their future development costs ($100 million) are less than their future profits ($150 million) - so they will be out a total of $50 million instead of $100 million if they chose to abandon the drug. If they have already sunk $200 million, again they will still sell the drug at the profit maximizing price for a net loss overall of the same $50 million. In NO CASE would it help them to change the price of the drug because our earlier calculation is unaffected by the development costs - raising the price to $21 would give them an even greater loss ($56 million) than at the PMP.

Repeat after me: "Development costs do not affect the profit maximizing price, and companies will ALWAYS charge the profit maximizing price if they decide to make the product at all." -Rustavo 03:59, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

On reading your re-write of your latest post, you seem to be under the mistaken impression that companies charge the lowest price that makes them profitable. This is not what companies do. They charge the price which yields MAXIMUM profits. No company ever charged a lower price just because they "could". -Rustavo 04:07, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

And, the price that yields maximum profit is lower than other prices it can charge and still profit but profit less. That's what you're missing. The lower the investment, the more profitable they can be, because they can charge that lower price. The investment is not "sunk" until it is made. A company has to make a profit. It won't make that investment unless it can profit. And, it will make that investment even if it can't reap maximum profit (which would come from charging a lower price than a higher price). Regulations 17:47, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

I thought we could continue this discussion here or on my talk page. I'd like to convince you that your point is erroneous so you will stop inserting in the FDA page. To review, you have proposed two ways in which development costs could affect the price of a drug: 1) By reducing the number of drugs brought to market, which reduces competition, which results in consumer willingness to pay a higher price since they have fewer alternatives to a given drug 2) That even in the absence of competitive factors, higher development prices will cause a company to charge a higher price to make a profit on a given drug. My contention is that point 1) is logically valid, and its importance depends on factors like the degree of competition that actually takes place between drugs in our system (which I think is much less than you assume). However, I believe, and DiMasi seems to agree with me, that point 2) is flat wrong and defies economic logic. I've pretty much laid out the explanation above - from your response, I'm not sure you read it thoroughly. Please let me know what part of my calculations in that example you think are erroneous, and why. To repeat one more time: the optimal price at which a company will see the largest profits or the smallest losses on a given drug is ONLY DEPENDANT ON MARKET DEMAND. It is NOT dependant on development costs, and if, due to high development costs, a company cannot make a profit at that price, it cannot make a profit at ANY price, higher or lower. -Rustavo 07:17, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Copyright issue with The Polling Company

Hello. Concerning your contribution, The Polling Company, we cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from either web sites or printed material. This article or image appears to be a direct copy from The Polling Company's website. As a copyright violation, The Polling Company appears to qualify for deletion under the speedy deletion criteria. The Polling Company has been tagged for deletion, and may have been deleted by the time you see this message. For text material, please consider rewriting the content and citing the source, provided that it is credible.

If you believe that the article or image is not a copyright violation, or if you have permission from the copyright holder to release the content freely under the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) then you should do one of the following:

• If you have permission from the author, leave a message explaining the details at Talk:The Polling Company and send an email with the message to "permissions-en (at) wikimedia (dot) org". See Wikipedia:Requesting copyright permission for instructions.
• If a note on the original website states that re-use is permitted under the GFDL or released into the public domain leave a note at Talk:The Polling Company with a link to where we can find that note.
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However, for text content, you may want to consider rewriting the content in your own words. Thank you, and please feel free to continue contributing to Wikipedia. MastCell ^Talk 19:20, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] My concern about your username (Regulations)

Hello, Regulations, and thank you for contributing to Wikipedia!

I hope not to seem unfriendly or make you feel unwelcome, but I noticed your username, and am concerned that it might not meet Wikipedia's username policy. After you look over that policy, could we discuss that concern here?

You have a confusing username which implies a Wikipedia function.

I'd appreciate learning your own views, for instance your reasons for wanting this particular name, and what alternative username you might accept that avoids raising this concern.

You have several options freely available to you:

• If you can relieve my concern through discussing it here, I can stop worrying about it.
• If the two of us can't agree here, we can ask for help through Wikipedia's dispute resolution process, such as asking for a "third opinion", or requesting comments from other Wikipedians. Admins usually abide by agreements reached through this process.
• You can keep your contributions history under a new username. Visit Wikipedia:Changing username and follow the guidelines there.

Let me reassure you that my writing here means I don't think your username is grossly, blatantly, or obviously inappropriate; such names get reported straight to Wikipedia:Administrator intervention against vandalism (WP:AIV), or blocked on sight. This is more a case where opinions might differ, and it would be good to reach some consensus — either here or at WP:RFC/NAME. So I look forward to a friendly discussion, and to enjoying your continued participation on Wikipedia. Thank you again! Patstuart^talk·edits 18:27, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm simply interested in examining the impact of government regulations on society. So I call myself "Regulations." Regulations 22:47, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't have a problem with it. It seems far enough from implying an "official" function on Wikipedia that it should be fine and appropriate per WP:USERNAME. MastCell ^Talk 03:31, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

As "Regulations" is a non-personal noun I don't think it is a problem. TimVickers 17:55, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Sockpuppet?

What is going on here? Billy Ego? Sockpuppet? I'm not a sockpuppet of Billy Ego. Someone please help and get me unblocked. Regulations 01:30, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

I just read that Billy Ego is/was a "Fascist Wikipedian." Anyone who has seen my edits knows that I'm a libertarian. Fascism stands for everything that I'm against. Look at my edits on Criticism of the FDA. I've never heard of a fascist quoting Milton Friedman. A fascist would be in support of the FDA because they're in favor of central planning. I'm anti-FDA and pro-free market. Regulations 01:35, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

As a matter of fact I even criticized the FDA as being fascist. Hold on and I'll get the link. Regulations 01:40, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

There you go: [1] Proof that I'm opposed to fascism. Now what? Regulations 01:46, 16 April 2007 (UTC)