There have been cases of benzene being detected in sunscreen. It's not an intentional ingredient, just one that is common in industrial manufacturing. I don't think that's what the parent was worried about though.
No, benzene was specifically what I was thinking of to the point that I assumed it was so well known that it wasn't question as being a thing any more. Just like asbestos in baby powder
That’s thankfully no longer really a thing - the world has realised that there is no such thing as asbestos-free talc, so baby powder is now mostly corn-starch AFAICT.
Okay, and? If you can’t see a difference in benzene as a byproduct vs an ingredient people lather in their skin and rub in sold as a way to protect against skin cancer while giving you chances of a different cancer as something totally different, then your being deliberately obtuse and not contributing to this conversation in any meaningful way.
As long as they spend so much on marketing, it's hard to believe them when they say the only way they can recoup their R&D investments is to charge high prices.
- *For many large pharmaceutical companies ("Big Pharma"), marketing costs often exceed R&D spending.* In analyses of the top 10 drugmakers by revenue in 2020, 7 companies spent more on sales and marketing than on research and development. For example, Johnson & Johnson spent $22 billion on marketing compared to $12 billion on R&D; Bayer spent $18 billion on marketing vs. $8 billion on R&D[1][2].
- The combined marketing spend for these top 10 companies exceeded R&D by $36 billion (about 37%) in 2020[1][2].
Imagine how much cheaper healthcare could be if the US simply banned direct to consumer drug advertising.
Surely that's something that would be easier to get bipartisan support for, somewhat avoiding the "socialism vs capitalism" chasm between the parties that prevents meaningful healthcare reform.
If this bill passes[1] that's exactly what could happen. It won't, because this regime is irredeemably corrupt and controls all four branches of government, but it could.
The best piece of writing about the Economist you've ever read is a piece by an author who admits that "until last week, I had not read The Economist since high school"? This is the author whose opinion on the Economist you trust?
I haven’t read the piece, but if someone makes a well-reasoned argument, it doesn’t matter who they are or what credentials they hold.
It’s equally as meek a counter-argument as, “trust me because I hold degrees in this topic.” Good. Then it should be easy for you to make a well-reasoned argument.
> I haven’t read the piece, but if someone makes a well-reasoned argument, it doesn’t matter who they are or what credentials they hold.
I strongly disagree. Well reasoned means nothing if it is not based on anything real except own imagination. And it means nothing if it was not checked against reality.
Our tendency to favor "sounds plausible and logical" even when the person writing it never bothered to check reality is just yet another logical fallacy.
The author has discovered that The Economist is pro-market.
As someone who is a Yale educated leftist and believes that markets do not work Robinson is upset.
Meanwhile, when employers of his own magazine wanted it to become a worker owned socialist cooperative he got them to resign. Socialism for thee, not for me.
The best take on The Economist magazine that I saw (after subscribing for several years) is that it's News of the World for policy wonks. To be read for laughs. For maximum effect, leave your paper copy aside for six months, then read it.
Is it true that most of their writers are twenty-somethings?
I accept the article's assertion that their kneejerk free-market philosophy is, at the least, limiting. But to me, the tone has always suggested middle-age journalism grads, rather than the right-wing business-school types the article is suggesting.
They have a bias, but they don't seem stupid or inexperienced. So much of free-market thought in the US, and recently the UK, has been caught up in culture war, and the Economist is staunchly against that.
Which is to say, they don't read like twenty-somethings to me. So if I'm wrong about that, I need to take another look at the lens through which I view their writing.
I worked at the Gap and Banana Republic all through high school and college. This was well known amongst the sales staff. There's a small amount of variation between each pair of jeans because of how they're cut and how the material stretches during cutting. Also just different people on different sewing machines makes a difference. We always advised customers to try on a few pairs of the size they were looking for to get one that fit best.
I once took a pair of jeans back to Gap (UK) because they didn't fit. After trying on pairs for fifteen minutes I ended up on a pair that fitted perfectly, but which were the exact same size, style and fit. Weirdest experience exchanging an item for the exact same item.
I'm surprised they even get as good of results as they do with those cutting methods. Aligning the direction of the threads (called the grainline) before cutting is extremely important. To the point that the approach they are taking almost seems like making a knowingly defective product.
That is exactly what I did last year. Bought a low mileage 2003 9-5. Treated the whole process like owning a commercial aircraft where replaced as part as possible to start fresh. Easier in this day and age, with internet helping on guidance and parts. I am not a car guy overall, though average auto design, external and internal, low-priced or expensive, is like fingernails on a chalkboard. Saab was about only thing that was calming for me.
I occasionally answer a customer support survey, just because I know the person on the other end probably gets to keep their job or not based on some average score, but I am not wasting my time answering a NPS survey for some random app or company that I've used. It's just not worth my time and I get too many surveys to care.
Of course anyone who wanted to, including the Chinese, could just buy that exact data from data brokers in the US. It's readily available.[0] Nobody really believes this was about data.
Do you think he should? Do you think it's a healthy exercise in the country's checks and balances for the president to create a precedent where he directs the justice department to not enforce a law when Congress has drafted it, and the Supreme Court has unanimously upheld it? Last time anything like this has happened, it created devastating national history.
I don't think this compares, but I do see where you're coming from. Whereas the present SC has unanimously upheld this TikTok law, The Court has avoided taking a position on federal non-enforcement of marijuana laws in states where it is legalized
Not enforcing laws by executive decision happens all the time. Whenever police "crack down" on something, that means they were previously letting stuff slide.
I mean the same exact criteria happened in Marbury v Madison and it changed the entire nation's check and balance system, lol. Many will claim for better, but the opportunity is definitely there for worse.
How? The bill gives the president a power. SCOTUS has said the law is legal. Nothing compels the president to use the power. See Biden passing it along.
- you can't seek in a video either, you just have to watch the whole thing over
- reels interrupts your experience with awful ads every 2-3 swipes
- YT shorts probably has awful ads too, I haven't tried it
The time limit is probably going to be the biggest issue for YT and reels, but the ergonomics of both are so awful that I can't use them for more than a few minutes. I could scroll TikTok until the little video about scrolling too long came up (an hour I think).
https://www.ewg.org/sunscreen/beware-of-benzene-shining-a-li...