opportunity__cost

http://live.prokhorenko.us
Oct 8 2010

Groupon Going Wild

$35 for a 60-Minute Acupuncture and Massage Treatment at Elements Total Health Center in South Pasadena ($85 Value)

Sounds like a heaven, right? One of the best rated massage salons (http://www.yelp.com/biz/elements-total-health-center-south-pasadena) in my area and $35 bucks sounds like a steal. What am I thinking of?! Buy!!

Lets do a quick calculus first. Still 2 hours left and there already 650 groupons are sold. Each of them is for exactly 1 hour treatment. Salon works for 61 hours a week. So they have at least one person who is already booked for more than 10 weeks in a row. And this person will get paid not more than $17.50/hour (as Groupon typically takes half of the deal). We are talking about quite an upscale salon ($85/hour is a regular rate, salon is well respected, so my wild guess would be that workers are paid fair enough). Of course, not everybody will come. I think 1/3rd will never bother. But we are still talking about 2 freaking months with 61 hours per week for some poor guy to be paid $17.50/month (and this offer is very generous - I'm assuming that the owner will cover all the maintenance loss out of his own pocket, as he wants to bring more clients - or am I fooling myself?)

So what do you think? Can you enjoy this offer in full or there is some major trap around (and it does not seem to matter much are you being trapped or the vendor)? Someone is getting royally screwed up.

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Mar 9 2010

Health Reform by the Numbers

  • $1,115 – that’s the average premium for employer-sponsored family coverage per month in 2009.  Annually, that amounts to $13,375 – or roughly the yearly income of someone working a minimum wage job. (Source)
  • And if nothing is done to reform our broken health care system, a recent survey found that over the next ten years, out-of-pocket expenses for Americans with health insurance could increase 35 percent in every state in the country. (Source)

Health system is indeed broken. Health insurance is indeed expensive.

But what's up with this number - $1,115? Any numerology subtext (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numerology)? Hypnosis? Zombing? Anything else? :)

Too much stress on numbers, while it's the alliance of a number-outcome.

P.S. My family coverage is less than that.

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Dec 22 2009

Health Care in the US

The United States is the only industrialized country that does not have universal health care. Despite exorbitant spending, health care results are mixed at best.

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As I said, the system is so freaking broken. This is not a choice anymore. And it has to be fixed.

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About Olexandr Prokhorenko

My name is Olexandr Prokhorenko. I am passionate about building products that users *love*.

My LinkedIn profile is www.linkedin.com/in/white.


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