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A comment on Just How Profitable Are Healthcare Insurers?. Parent comment

Re:Just How Profitable Are Healthcare Insurers? by jbooth on Monday March 08, 2010 @05:36PM (#1176710)
Well, if we're going to do apples-to-apples, given the recent statements on their ledger, we should ask "How much does it cost to find someone who will run us damn near into the ground and require a government bailout"? :)

Obviously it's more complicated than that, but the "we have to pay for the best and brightest!" meme starts to sound a lot more like self-dealing when it turns out the best and brightest do approximately the same quality job as one of those dipper things that replaced Homer Simpson at the nuclear plant for a week once.

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Re:Just How Profitable Are Healthcare Insurers? by pw0ncakes on Monday March 08, 2010 @05:52PM (#1176743)
Obviously it's more complicated than that, but the "we have to pay for the best and brightest!" meme starts to sound a lot more like self-dealing when it turns out the best and brightest do approximately the same quality job as one of those dipper things that replaced Homer Simpson at the nuclear plant for a week once.

Well said. My post above explains why CEO pay actually results in a worse product.

The "best and the brightest are not the ones who end up as CEOs of big companies." Pick one at random out of the Fortune 500. Give me a year to study the company and then replace him with me; I'm now the top dog. There is a 60% chance I will do a better job. I'm 26 and have no advanced degree. Do the same with a small business or a farm. There is almost a 0% chance I will do a better job. What does this say about large companies and their management?

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Re:Just How Profitable Are Healthcare Insurers? by CWuestefeld on Monday March 08, 2010 @10:20PM (#1177378)
I'd say that your belief that this is true is pretty much proof that it's not.

On what grounds do you believe that you can do better than the average Fortune 500 CEO? I assert that you're engaging in empty boasting, with absolutely nothing to back this up. How could there be? Have you any experience near the top management of a company this large and complex?

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