[ETWolverine]

Evening Elliot



Is the product manufactured is Israel?

Teva is an Israeli pharmaceutical company. And yes, most of their products are produced in Israel. They also have production facilities in North America, Europe and Latin America.

Among their many generic and brand-name drugs is Copaxone, which is the first drug that fights Relapsing-Remitting MS. The drug is sold in the USA, Canada, 22 European countries, Australia, Brazil, and Argentina, among others.

They also produce various drugs for auto-immune diseases, inflammatory diseases, oncological treatment, neurological and neurodegenerative diseases.

They are also a major producer of generic forms of well-known brand-name drugs, which are also sold worldwide.

Elliot

[ETWolverine]

The wage in israel is on average lower than the states

NIS 7500 per month average with approx 4NIS per dollar

When labour is cheap it is easy to produce a quality product

It is very difficult to praise a company for producing a better product when their labour market is not on par with your own

I'm not sure what your point is with that.

My point is that there is a very good drug manufacturer that manages to produce a quality product that is on par with anything produced in the USA that is not subject to the same government regulation and oversite.

My point is that you don't need the government to regulate a company to FDA standards in order to produce a good, effective, safe product.

My point is that you don't need government intervention.

Elliot

[NeedKarma]

My point is that there is a very good drug manufacturer that manages to produce a quality product that is on par with anything produced in the USA that is not subject to the same government regulation and oversite.

But they are - they have a federal regulatory agency in place. Just like the US.

[phlanx]

I understand what you are saying, and I was under the impression the FDA or any other country equivalent brought the minimum standard to the market, it was then up to the company to exceed those requirements if it wished to do so

Which leads us to my point, your idea of government intervention equals quality of product is was to simplified for it to work

Labour costs is a massive factor, it allows the company to earn high profits which then leads to good R&D

This however means the workforce will be shifted from one country to another depending on who can be employed the cheapest

So hey, yes no government intervention, but who cares as you will be out of a job next year, nice philosophy as usual Elliot :)

[ETWolverine]

I understand what you are saying, and I was under the impression the FDA or any other country equivalant brought the minimum standard to the market, it was then upto the company to exceed those requirements if it wished to do so

Which leads us to my point, your idea of government intervention equals quality of product is was to simplified for it to work

Labour costs is a massive factor, it allows the company to earn high profits which then leads to good R&D

This however means the workforce will be shifted from one country to another depending on who can be employed the cheapest

So hey, yes no government intervention, but who cares as you will be out of a job next year, nice philosophy as usual Elliot :)

Ahhh but if EVERY company operates under the same limited regulations, costs to every company go down... and profitability increases. And costs to the consumer go down as well.

If at the same time we eliminate government intervention via UNIONS (and in truth unions are just arms of government regulation today), we would decrease redundant employment costs as well, making the USA's pharmaceutical employment costs on par with the rest of the world's, thus making the American labor market just as competitive as Israel's or any other country's. And costs to the consumer go down again.

But I am having trouble with one part of your logic. If labor is the driving factor for profitability, why haven't the American pharmaceutical companies outsourced their manufacture to India, China, etc. where labor cost is pennies per hour? Most American pharma companies still manufacture in the USA despite cheaper labor elsewhere. Something is keeping them here... and it isn't the limited regulatory environment or the cheap cost of labor. Why hasn't that happened? Certainly the logic of your position vis-à-vis labor costs remains effective regardless of the regulatory environment.

Elliot

[ETWolverine]

But they are - they have a federal regulatory agency in place. Just like the US.

Their regulatory body has fewer regulations and fewer requirements. They are more hands-off. They are less intrusive. The government is less involved. So it is NOT just like us. It is a less regulated environment.

[phlanx]

Ahhh but if EVERY company operates under the same limited regulations, costs to every company go down... and profitability increases. And costs to the consumer go down as well.

Labour Costs my NJ friend, Labour costs! Still too simplified for it to be workable

[/QUOTE]If at the same time we eliminate government intervention via UNIONS (and in truth unions are just arms of government regulation today), we would decrease redundant employment costs as well, making the USA's pharmaceutical employment costs on par with the rest of the world's, thus making the American labor market just as competitive as Israel's or any other country's. And costs to the consumer go down again.[/QUOTE]

If you remove the unions, well let me say what the fundamentals of a union is for, to safe guard the basics of employement wages and the long term future of employement, then you would have to reduce the costs of a product anyway as half the workforce couldn't afford it

Cost of a product is linked to the cost of living

[/QUOTE]But I am having trouble with one part of your logic. If labor is the driving factor for profitability, why haven't the American pharmaceutical companies outsourced their manufacture to India, China, etc. where labor cost is pennies per hour? Most American pharma companies still manufacture in the USA despite cheaper labor elsewhere. Something is keeping them here... and it isn't the limited regulatory environment or the cheap cost of labor. Why hasn't that happened? Certainly the logic of your position vis-à-vis labor costs remains effective regardless of the regulatory environment.[/QUOTE]

Government Intervention :)

Lets face it, if we went into every single little aspect of why and where businesses create and do business, we would be here all year

What I was saying is, a company cannot be compared from one to the next when the labour markets, and governments are different, different strokes and all that

In europe we probably have the closest thing to free trade between nations, and yet each country attracts different businesses for all manner of reasons, - political, historic, sociology, and so on.

Eventually, all our markets will be the same, and what I mean by that is the same standards governing the minimum requirements of a product will be international

It will still be up to the competition market for companies to find ways of selling their products based on benefits and features, which is the backbone of capitalism

And the only way we as a nation are going to have minimum requirements is through government intervention stating what these min requirements will be

Businesses left to their own devices are dangerous, just as givernments left to theirs is the same

It is a happy mix of the two which will safe guard future food supplies and stable economies, which we all need to survive in

[paraclete]

I don't get this argument about labour costs in drug manufacture. The costs are in the R&D and that is where you need world class facilities, not third world conditions and the market is in the first world who have the ability to pay, drugs is one case of where you pay according to your ability. The value of labour in the product is negligible because the drugs are produced by machine and labour only becomes a factor in packing and shipping. Do you have any idea how high the costs of shipping is these days?

I recall not so long ago a furore about medical supplies (bandages) sourced from India, the material had been washed in the Ganges and the dressing caused infections. You cannot rely on third world countries to maintain the standards we require.

[NeedKarma]

Their regulatory body has fewer regulations and fewer requirements. They are more hands-off. They are less intrusive. The government is less involved. So it is NOT just like us. It is a less regulated environment.

I haven't brought drugs to the public markets in both countries like I'm sure you have - can you show us examples of the differences please?

[phlanx]

Eveing Clete

It is very much a simplified version of how a company works, labour costs are a part of the bigger picture

As I explained above we can't go into every little aspect of what makes up a companies overheads as we would be here all year

But to say that labour costs are not a major factor in anything is understating it to say the least

The facility needs to be built, maintained, and operated and as such the wages in Israel are lot lower than the US or UK, and as such the company can increase its spending on R&D (both personnel and equipment) with the saving of made on labour wages

Having been to india I can say there are two countries in one, the first being the poor, and when I say poor I mean shockingly poor, and I would be surprised if they had bandages at all, then there are the rich. The two worlds there are so separate it is shocking

When you state, a third world country I can see your point as I was out there sourcing new equipment, and all I saw was HAJ syndrome everywhere (Half a Job)

But isn't that point of the argument - standards we require - through education which is government intervention, the education of a nation is based on what it learns and implements in the future, which we all know cannot be left to companies to govern themselves, because sooner or later we would be supplied cheap bandages from india so somebody can make a profit

Therefore, government intervention is always required to make sure we learn from the past to help safeguard the future

Originally Posted by ETWolverine View Post
Their regulatory body has fewer regulations and fewer requirements. They are more hands-off. They are less intrusive. The government is less involved. So it is NOT just like us. It is a less regulated environment. - THEY still need to pass the countries regulations to be allowed to export to it

If other counrties regulations are good enough then why would they intervene, rather than would just copy and follow, either way it is still government intervention that assits us all

[ETWolverine]

I am MOSTLY in agreement with you, but I don't have time to delve too deeply into it right now.

My biggest disagreement with you is regarding the unions. Yes, their stated purpose is to protect the workers.

Problem is that in practice they do the opposite.

I used to work for a bank that was owned and managed by a Union. The Bank is known as Amalgamated Bank of NY. Since it was union owned, it's employees (except for officers) were all union members. The union cut what SEEMED to be a very good deal for the employees. Good pay, decent benefits, yada yada.

Problem is that the union also built a codocil into their employment contract that said that if a union member is promoted or transferred out of his current position, the bank had to replace that employee with TWO employees. The idea was for the union to at the very least maintain its current level of membership, and if possible grow it.

The result, however, was the bank simply never promoted or transferred anyone, regardless of merit or longevity. Employees lost out on promotion opportunities or opportunities to transfer to a different department. The UNION RULES resulted in employees being KEPT DOWN instead of protecting their interests.

What we see across the board is similar short-sightedness on behalf of unions. In the US auto industry, the unions managed to force management to accept contracts that were way out of the market in terms of pay and benefits. Employees though they were getting a great deal... great pay and great benefits. But the result was that the auto industry couldn't sustain those costs and had to close down operations at many of their plants. And as you know, GM and Chrysler went bankrupt earlier this year. These events resulted in massive layoffs. So what good was the union contract with the great pay and benefits if those contracts forced the companies to go out of business and the employees onto the unemployment lines? Again, this is a case of union action resulting in employees being hurt.

This has been the story across the board for unions in the USA over the past several decades.

There was a time when unions were a necessary part of making sure employees were treated fairly and safely in dangerous jobs. They are an important part of building the economy of the USA.

But now the government has laws to do what the unions were trying to accomplish in terms of safety and job security. And employers are more aggressive about obtaining and keeping good employees, so a private employee can often negotiate a better contract than the union can.

In short, the unions serve no purpose other than as a political arm of the Democrat party. They no longer serve their original purpose, and they actually end up acting in most cases AGAINST that original purpose.

The time for unions is up. They should be disbanded.

Elliot

[ETWolverine]

I haven't brought drugs to the public markets in both countries like I'm sure you have - can you show us examples of the differences please?

Sure.

For one thing, Israel has no equivalent of OSHA. Safety is maintained by the production facility, not the government.

For another, drugs can get approval in a couple of years instead of waiting literally decades for FDA approval. There is no massive spending for tests upon tests upon tests for the same thing over and over again. Once efficacy is proved, safety established and dosage determined, the drug can be sent to production. They don't need another 10 years of testing to make sure their first 5 sets of tests were right. Those decades of needless tests they don't have to do can result in literally BILLIONS in savings on the cost of R&D for every drug.

That's just TWO examples.

Elliot

[paraclete]

Eveing Clete



But isnt that point of the argument - standards we require - through education which is government intervention, the education of a nation is based on what it learns and implements in the future, which we all know cannot be left to companies to govern themselves, because sooner or later we would be supplied cheap bandages from india so somebody can make a profit

Hi Steve. We have all gone mad on this multinational idea that we should invest in poor countries and make bigger profits because our own labour costs are too high. This is madness which will ultimately see decline of the western nations. If we were to suffer another world war our economies would collapse because we could not produce essential items, we would become like Gaza producing munitions in backyard workshops.

When we develop something worthwhile, like a new drug, the logic should be to keep that development in our own nation and exploit the idea, not see if we can make it marginally cheaper somewhereelse after making a massive capital investment. There will be copyists soon enough. I too have been to the subcontinent and I know there are and will be many opportunities there for multinationals to exploit those people and the only reason they don't do it is stability. They would exit China and go there now if it were not for the on going difficulties between India and Pakistan and the proximity of war to Pakistan, but we must not put our fate in their hands. What has been done with the H1N1 vaccine is a tremendous development, there are laboratories in various nations making and distributing vaccines so that no one has a monopoly and no country has advantage. This is as it should be

[phlanx]

I am MOSTLY in agreement with you, but I don't have time to delve too deeply into it right now.

My biggest disagreement with you is regarding the unions. Yes, their stated purpose is to protect the workers.

Problem is that in practice they do the opposite.

I used to work for a bank that was owned and managed by a Union. The Bank is known as Amalgamated Bank of NY. Since it was union owned, it's employees (except for officers) were all union members. The union cut what SEEMED to be a very good deal for the employees. Good pay, decent benefits, yada yada.

Problem is that the union also built a codocil into their employment contract that said that if a union member is promoted or transferred out of his current position, the bank had to replace that employee with TWO employees. The idea was for the union to at the very least maintain its current level of membership, and if possible grow it.

The result, however, was the the bank simply never promoted or transferred anyone, regardless of merit or longevity. Employees lost out on promotion opportunities or opportunities to transfer to a different department. The UNION RULES resulted in employees being KEPT DOWN instead of protecting their interests.

What we see across the board is similar short-sightedness on behalf of unions. In the US auto industry, the unions managed to force management to accept contracts that were way out of the market in terms of pay and benefits. Employees though they were getting a great deal... great pay and great benefits. But the result was that the auto industry couldn't sustain those costs and had to close down operations at many of their plants. And as you know, GM and Chrysler went bankrupt earlier this year. These events resulted in massive layoffs. So what good was the union contract with the great pay and benefits if those contracts forced the companies to go out of business and the employees onto the unemployment lines? Again, this is a case of union action resulting in employees being hurt.

This has been the story across the board for unions in the USA over the past several decades.

There was a time when unions were a necessary part of making sure employees were treated fairly and safely in dangerous jobs. They are an important part of building the economy of the USA.

But now the government has laws to do what the unions were trying to accomplish in terms of safety and job security. And employers are more aggressive about obtaining and keeping good employees, so a private employee can often negotiate a better contract than the union can.

In short, the unions serve no purpose other than as a political arm of the Democrat party. They no longer serve their original purpose, and they actually end up acting in most cases AGAINST that original purpose.

The time for unions is up. They should be disbanded.

Elliot

I AM IN AGREEMENT!!

For the Uk Unions were started primarily for safe guarding the safety of workers, especially those working in foundries, imigrants who were being mistreated in a shocking way

SO where I said what I said, please don't get me wrong, I agree with you that the unions have done everything they set out to do - force The Givernment to intervene and create laws to guarantee the saefty of workers, their pay and continued employment in a fair way

But then how can I agree with you when you will not agree with me that there is a need for government intervention :eek:

[paraclete]

I AM IN AGREEMENT!!!!!

For the Uk Unions were started primarily for safe guarding the safety of workers, especialy those working in foundries, imigrants who were being mistreated in a shocking way

SO where I said what I said, please dont get me wrong, I agree with you that the unions have done everything they set out to do - force The Givernment to intervene and create laws to guarantee the saefty of workers, their pay and continued employment in a fair way

But then how can I agree with you when you will not agree with me that there is a need for government intervention :eek:

You don't happen to have the UK mixed up with the US there do you unions protecting immigrants? The only thing the UK unions ever protected were the locals. Sometimes the Unions have to stand against government in order to protect the workers, government is not the protector of the workers it is the exploiter, creating an environment where business can thrive by exploitation. This after all is the model which has existed in western countries from time immemorial, typified not only by the US but by the UK as well. A recent example in my own land tells you which side the government is on

[phlanx]

Morning Clete

The unions were started, or at least recognised post war, and there job was the ideology of Unions, which was safety, pay, conditions, etc etc

What they achieved was good for its time and forced the government to change the laws to do more for workers rights

By the 1980s, they had gained too much power, and we eneded up with a battle between the unions and the government over the Miners Strike

Since then they have been somewhat quiet, but recently they have gained some momentum and as we speak today, the Royal Mail is on Strike (again)

Many of the large companies who send out parcels via royal mail are now moving away from Royal Mail losing them more money, Ebay is advertising an alternative carrier and it will not be long when these carriers can ship at the same price as royal mail

So here is a prime example of what unions do to ruin a business, something they are sadly missing

In refernece to outsourcing, I think you need to understand how the models of industry work

The more advanced a country, the less manufacture occurs, in the UK we have been moving into stem cell research for one and plus green energy. Where people who worked in the car industry, are now providing services to China and Korea instead of making the car

The world is shrinking and whereas it is important to ensure jobs are secure at home, the businesses need to move on

When I started sales repping many years ago, I would supply to manufacture, when I finsihed sales repping I was supplying to distribution, different strokes.

And you know, for a country that can play sports and has as much recreation time as you guys have, you don't doing that bad in compairson :)

[paraclete]

Morning Clete

The unions were started, or at least recognised post war, and there job was the ideology of Unions, which was safety, pay, conditions, etc etc

What they achieved was good for its time and forced the government to change the laws to do more for workers rights

By the 1980s, they had gained too much power, and we eneded up with a battle between the unions and the government over the Miners Strike

Since then they have been somewhat quiet, but recently they have gained some momentum and as we speak today, the Royal Mail is on Strike (again)

Many of the large companies who send out parcels via royal mail are now moving away from Royal Mail loosing them more money, Ebay is advertising an alternative carrier and it will not be long when these carriers can ship at the same price as royal mail

So here is a prime example of what unions do to ruin a business, something they are sadly missing

In refernece to outsourcing, I think you need to understand how the models of industry work

The more advanced a country, the less manufacture occurs, in the UK we have been moving into stem cell research for one and plus green energy. Where people who worked in the car industry, are now providing services to China and Korea instead of making the car

The world is shrinking and whereas it is important to ensure jobs are secure at home, the businesses need to move on

When I started sales repping many years ago, I would supply to manufacture, when I finsihed sales repping I was supplying to distribution, different strokes.

And you know, for a country that can play sports and has as much recreation time as you guys have, you dont doing that bad in compairson :)

Don't quite know where you are going with all of this Steve but be assured I understand only too well how models of industry work with 40 years experience in management. What seems a great idea is often a very poor idea in detail and we know that unions, communism and capitalism all share the common characteristic of excess. Unionism got a great start in this country in the shearers strike of the nineteenth century and has run its course so that less than 20% of workers are unionised today, perhaps this is why we are doing so well, perhaps not. But outsourcing and offshore manufacturing has decimated employment in traditional industries here and is highly undesirable. What has replaced unions interest in safety is an almost draconian government system of regulation. Your reference to sports would suggest you think our knuckles should be dragging on the ground and you don't know why they aren't. We don't make good spectators, we make poor servants, and that is why we have a dynamic society which can make capitalism work in a socialistic setting. Sport fuels that dynamic and our fiercely competitive nature

[phlanx]

Evening Clete,

Firstly, if I was trying to insult you I would bring up convicts and you would bring up pommes and I would bring up the Ashes and you would bring up the rugby and so on :)

What I was saying is, after visiting your shores and seeing for myself the lifestyle you have, it really isn't bad in compairson to a lot of western countries I have been to

In reference to what else you said:

Outsourcing has been a design by industry to serve the profits of industry, and yet you argue that anytype of government interference is bad for the people

Surely you want the government to intervene and prevent outsourcing?

Or do you accept that as a capitalist economy you recognise that the consumer what's it cheap and it wants it now, so industry was responding to the consumer

As regards unions, yep they have, replaced by The Health and Safety Executive in the UK, and what a he is at times

[paraclete]

Evening Clete,

Firstly, if I was trying to insult you I would bring up convicts and you would bring up pommes and I would bring up the Ashes and you would bring up the rugby and so on :)

What I was saying is, after visiting your shores and seeing for myself the lifestyle you have, it really aint bad in compairson to alot of western countries I have been to

In reference to what else you said:

Outsourcing has been a design by industry to serve the profits of industry, and yet you argue that anytype of government interference is bad for the people

Surely you want the government to intervene and prevent outsourcing?

Or do you accept that as a capitalist economy you recognise that the consumer whats it cheap and it wants it now, so industry was responding to the consumer

As regards unions, yep they have, replaced by The Health and Safety Executive in the UK, and what a he is at times

G'day Steve

I don't have to worry about convicts, my ancestors came here as free settlers from Ireland in 1822 but it is true that England exported its best and brightest to Australia. Our lifestyle is great and so is our weather and we don't want it to get any hotter or dryer.

The consumer buys what is available, if it is cheap they buy more articles but as there is a finite supply of money they ultimately only buy what their resources allow. There is a marketing technique that focuses on what is cheap but it only works to a certain degree. In Australia, for example, people buy certain brands of motor vehicle which might be $15,000 more expensive than cheap imports because they know they are better value. Yes I would like government to legislate against outsourcing certain functions so that we would not be inundated by pest telemarketers and a strong employment market is maintained. I also believe that the free market campaigns have gone too far and that preference should be allowed for locally made products particularly when supplied to government without screams of protectionism. I find it ridiculous that army uniforms are sourced from China as an example. Government interference is not necessarily bad but should be avoided if the market behaves reasonably. Unfortunately it has been recently demonstrated that the market cannot be relied upon to do so but the reason we here have survived better than most is our regulations prevent many of the excesses allowed elsewhere.

Industry doesn't always respond to what the consumer wants, but to what it has suggested is a good idea to the consumer. In a Capitalist society there always has to be something newer and better even if in name only to keep the economy going. This is wasteful and ultimately unnecessary since we ultimately refine products to the point that they have to be totally replaced or the market is saturated. I have seen the supermarkets in your country, as an example, and the contrast with those here is startling. How two peoples who started with the same diet could be so different is incredible and it come from marketing not from what the consumer wants

[phlanx]

Evening, Clete

The markets here are terrible, I'm just thankful I live in the countryside and get a lot of choice from local farms, I must admit though, it's the egg or chicken question?

Did marketing dictate the policy of cheap. Crap processed junk or was the demand from the comsumer

Did the marketing provide ease of microwaving or did the consumer demand the ease by allowing themselves to buy the product in the first place

I believe it was Sigmund Freud's nephew Edward Bernays who used the basis of physcology to invent marketing and the notion that keeps most of us going to work - you have the basic model, now look at the premium model with an extra button!

I think in a situtaion where marketing is creating a social problem of obesity which weighs heavily on the NHS and any other health system, the government have a responsibility to promote healthy options, and even further to provide tax breaks on what is classed as the salads and fruits etc, and add the lost tax put onto the junk

The same should be said for smoking drinking etc

However, I do not believe in prohibition in any form

Within a capalist economy, the black market is a by product of Bernays wants and desires, and yet we happily create one with banning of certain drugs

If we ban sugar or other related snack foods, we would just create a criminal network of chocalate smugglers

I believe in the education of the truth to provide a sound choice of freedom, which can only been done through government regulations, all of which is woefully lacking in the ability to carry out such duties

As regards your supermarkets, I love the one just outside Sydney where you can drive into the chiller and order your cases of larger, a drive through liquor store - Brilliant :)