Comment by edwcross
4 days ago
Given the amount of injuries related to mountain biking, is there some specific insurance needed for it? It seems one of those "net-negative for the society activities", like trampolines.
4 days ago
Given the amount of injuries related to mountain biking, is there some specific insurance needed for it? It seems one of those "net-negative for the society activities", like trampolines.
this is such a wild take to me... it's impossible to quantity at what point something becomes a net negative for society. Smoking seems to be an obvious example, because it's addictive quality inhibits a fair decision to the smoker, and it's something with a lifelong pathology.
But trampolines and mountain biking are both activities that result in ephemeral injuries. There is the rare case where a particular injury might become chronic, but how is that a drain on society, and not primarily the individual?
by your logic, should we also ban (or require insurance?) for football (hand egg), boxing, martial arts, (Tai chi?), cars, religion, guns, knives, prescription medicine, children, leaving your house at all?
edit; I'm happy to steal more ideas from sibling comments! I already stole football, but now I want to add obesity, and all mental health conditions.
I'm really curious about the context the idea of net negative comes from, but I probably should also take a stab at a conclusion; why contrast individual actions and decisions in the context of society at all? The decision to do anything should stop at 1st order, and maybe 2nd order effects. That is to say, when trying to improve society, it's fair to look down into smoking and say, we should spend attention on fixing this. But it's incorrect to look at an individual decision "should I smoke" and weight it's effects on society. (How will this effect my family, or my environment is 2nd order, and should be accounted for)
> but how is that a drain on society, and not primarily the individual?
There are two factors.
The first is that a drain on individuals is a drain on society. That's why we outlaw risky behavior like lethal recreactional drugs, driving without seatbelts, driving without a driver's license, etc. We try to protect people from themselves in some of the worst aspects that we can.
Second, of course, is health care costs. Activities that constantly result in injury wind up raising the health care costs for everyone, since that's how insurance works.
> by your logic, should we also ban (or require insurance?)...
You already have to have car insurance, yes. And yes lots of kinds of guns are banned in lots of places.
We draw the lines in different places.
It is a pretty interesting thought experiment to wonder whether people shouldn't be allowed to engage in organized sports that are risky, without paying an additional health insurance premium? E.g. if you play professional football, then your league has to pay extra money into the health insurance fund to compensate for all the extra health care treatment their players need and will need.
> It is a pretty interesting thought experiment to wonder whether people shouldn't be allowed to engage in organized sports that are risky, without paying an additional health insurance premium? E.g. if you play professional football, then your league has to pay extra money into the health insurance fund to compensate for all the extra health care treatment their players need and will need.
Isn't this already in use in multiple countries? I.e. if you want to play football (european) in a league, you have to have a license and also insurance that covers playing it in an organized way - for example in a league.
So team sports are already covered by such things, but individual sports like mountain biking or skiing aren't at the moment.
We draw the lines in different places.
e.g. amateur MMA is illegal in Norway and I think a couple of other places too.
> The first is that a drain on individuals is a drain on society.
Citation needed. I don't outright disagree, but I do think you state this as if it's a much simpler fact of life then it really is.
> That's why we outlaw risky behavior like lethal recreactional drugs,
Outlawing drugs is a perfect example, that's something we've done in the US that has gone flawlessly. No one has any notes, complete unambiguous success.... oh wait!
You even elude to this, I assume, by restricting it to just lethal drugs. That's misleading at best. There is plenty of space to say this is more likely to harm the community, than it is to support the individual. PCP is a popular example where the misapplication directly causes said individual to become a direct danger to the community.
> driving without seatbelts, driving without a driver's license, etc. We try to protect people from themselves in some of the worst aspects that we can.
It's legal to drive a car without a license. You need a license to prove you're able to do it safely on public property. It's very different to say, you can't do X ever, and you can't do [something unsafe for other people], around other people who are being safe.
> Second, of course, is health care costs. Activities that constantly result in injury wind up raising the health care costs for everyone, since that's how insurance works.
> You already have to have car insurance, yes. And yes lots of kinds of guns are banned in lots of places.
> We draw the lines in different places.
Right, I'm aware, but prove that's actually a bad thing? That's what I'm asking. Is it sane to go "AHHHHH THAT'S RISK! All risk is bad for society! Quick, ban it!". Again, using "Non-lethal" drug, seem to suggest that the risks of banning something out weight the risks of that thing. We already learned that banning alcohol was a net-negative, and we seem to be figuring that out for marijuana now too.
> It is a pretty interesting thought experiment to wonder whether people shouldn't be allowed to engage in organized sports that are risky, without paying an additional health insurance premium? E.g. if you play professional football, then your league has to pay extra money into the health insurance fund to compensate for all the extra health care treatment their players need and will need.
Is this a good idea? Car insurance protects others from your carelessness. Sports insurance protects you from... you? Is it reasonable for society to subdivide itself like that? Should old people have to pay more money for insurance? Should people with diabetes pay more? Should women of childbearing age pay more? Or should we as a society, look down from a higher level view, acknowledge that healthy individuals are better for society, and decide that we're not going to treat individuals differently, that because everyone is in this game of life together, where nobody gets out alive, that we're all going to make it as easy as we can for everybody to be their best, while refusing to define best for any individual.
Yes, we should absolutely ban, at the very least, contact football among minors. We have ample evidence of football (and soccer, too, for that matter) student athletes developing full blown CTE by their 20s, and with lifetime risk thousands of times the general population.
A few years back, I thought there would be more of a push to regulate/limit American, at least contact, football. But didn't happen. Soccer? Good luck.
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> now I want to add obesity, and all mental health conditions
If you have a way to just not have those, the way you can just not use trampolines, I would love to hear it.
Don't forget about the alternatives. Is mountain biking worse than watching movies - biking will of course have more injuries, but it also builds physical fitness and so long term is probably better for you. (or maybe just my anti-movie bias is showing?)
I agree that a ban doesn’t make sense, but even “ephemeral” injuries routinely generate significant costs.
(In my experience, musculoskeletal injuries are rarely completely ephemeral, they tend to have long-term effects, even if minor.)
I'm gonna call that sample bias. If you exclude all injuries that are ephemeral, (because they don't get reported, because they're ephemeral, and forgotten), you're left with the injuries that aren't ephemeral. I mean duh, obviously lol. But my point is still, yes injuries are bad, and as a society, we're pretty trash at healing them, but injuries are more impactful for the individual, than for society.
And bonus point; if we're talking about sociatial responsabilities, given injuries are unavoidable, shouldn't we be trying to fix our responses to them rather than trying to limit people from enjoying life? Mountain biking in fun, so are trampolines. Strictly speaking, the world where we've solved injuries (think any sci-fi pantopia) is better than the world where we didn't because we just outlawed getting injured.
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Controversial take: On a population level, the negatives of smoking are at least partially mitigated by the "smoking suppresses obesity" side effect. Obesity is such a huge (pun not intended) public health issue in modern American society that any intervention reducing it is actually quite valuable.
It's at least arguable and perhaps even true that we as a society would be better off if everybody used tobacco at 1950's rates and therefore got skinnier, especially if we all just dipped Zyns or similar smokeless "low harm" nicotine formats instead of smoking.
That said, I personally use 0 tobacco/nicotine etc.
Smoking is significantly worse for you and your family than obesity. It causes a greater reduction in life expectancy, and can impact the physical health of those who live or work with you via secondhand smoke.
It is simply wild how many ways nicotine can find to kill humans. All kinds of stuff stems from the lowly cigarette. Obesity impacts many more people (that is to say, we have more fat people than smokers/tobacco users), but it's far from as significant a health risk. I'm not sure we know enough to quantify vapes and chew vs. obesity.
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I don't know that "normal" mountain biking is any worse than cycling in general, or sports like tackle football.
A lot of the injury risk when mountain biking is reasonably easily mitigated by controlling your speed and walking the bike through terrain that's above your skill level. There was a report out of British Columbia a few months ago about injury rates, and they were high, but BC is also a major downhill trail region.
Certainly, compared to road cycling, I know more people with major injuries from being hit by cars than from crashing solo on a mountain bike. And for my own cycling injuries - a few concussions, the worst of which was on the road bike (during a race) and a few torn rotator cuffs/mild AC joint separations.
The way I always looked at it (based on my own anecdotal experience, plus those of my friends around me)... you're probably more likely to get "hurt" in some sense while mountain biking, but probably more likely to get "killed or maimed" while road cycling (eg, being struck by a car).
Curiously enough, I have been road cycling for 10+ years now (and mountain biking much longer) and I only just picked up my first crash and injury from road cycling on Jan 1. I crashed and sprained my wrist. :-(
Another factor worth considering is that being physically active also prevents other ailments, so (even downhill) bikers may still be more profitable for insurance companies!
I couldn’t agree more. Road biking has entirely fixed my lower back and neck issues, my knees have come right and getting up hills has knocked 15-20kgs off me in the last year. I just wish I could get out there more.
> Certainly, compared to road cycling, I know more people with major injuries from being hit by cars than from crashing solo on a mountain bike.
Speed must be part of it. Low sun and going into the back of a parked car or other obstacle is a common mistake, and road bikes get up some good speed on most rides. Many riders pass 80kmh on a regular basis, which doesn’t leave a lot of room for error. I’m rather slower than that, but 50-60kmh would be a daily event.
> A lot of the injury risk when mountain biking is reasonably easily mitigated by controlling your speed and walking the bike through terrain that's above your skill level. There was a report out of British Columbia a few months ago about injury rates, and they were high, but BC is also a major downhill trail region.
Yeah, with downhill biking, “controlling your speed” means making sure you go fast enough to land the jump on the intended downslope. Go too slow and you’ll land wrong.
> I know more people with major injuries from being hit by cars
_hit by drivers_, you meant?
I think I like what you're getting at (placing blame on the human not the object), but could you tone the attitude down? This read to me as an almost snide correction, I genuinely think you'd convince people if you 'invited' them instead
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Well, it was the car that touched them. But yeah, the driver was at fault in ALL instances.
Yeah. I did have a fall (for no good reason) cycling on a carriage path in Acadia National Park. But that's almost certainly safer than road biking on a busy road. And I do think a world in which you have insurance companies micromanaging what they will cover for various outdoor activities is not one we want--and it's not clear that it even distinguishes from people who are very sedentary.
In general, "society" deciding what activities are too dangerous to routinely allow is a really nasty slope. Yes, there's some special insurance offered through private organizations for things like higher altitude mountaineering. But it's not that big a step to rule that any contact sport, for example, should require special insurance. I'm sure the insurance companies wouldn't mind.
One thing which comes to mind is - why should we stop at sports, then? we'll immediately be at the point where smokers, alcoholics, obese people etc. should pay more, after all, their way of life statistically causes higher costs.
(i don't think either of those things should result in higher insurance prices, just continuing the thought.)
> we'll immediately be at the point where smokers, alcoholics, obese people etc. should pay more, after all, their way of life statistically causes higher costs.
Wait, do they not? I genuinely assumed they did. I remember when I got private insurance through my work I had to fill in some questionnaire. It was "free", but it was a taxable benefit so you knew how much you were costing the company and me and my friends had different rates.
I wonder what the actual statistics are when it comes to costs with active people that are more likely to be injured vs obese people that are less likely to be injured but more likely to suffer obesity related illnesses.
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I don't know about alcoholics, but smokers and obese people actually cost less in medical care because they usually die before age-related diseases takes hold which are the most expensive, they most often die of heart attack and stroke which are the cheapest deaths, and being fat or a smoker disqualifies you from many procedures and operations that they otherwise would do without hesitation.
On top of that for smokers, the amount of sin taxes they pay on cigarettes over their lifetime almost always exceeds their entire life-time medical costs.
Some countries tax tobacco, alcohol and sugar at higher rates to offset the costs incurred to society?
You mean like an additional tax on tobacco, alcohol, and sugar?
You're behind the times lol -- UK
insurance companies already buy up information from data brokers and use that to jack up people's rates according to whatever they happen to find to justify it. They won't tell you when they do it, you'll just be offered a very different price than you would have been given if you didn't buy as much alcohol, spent more time at the gym, only drove your car in the daytime, or lived in a different zip code.
Aren't there already insurance rebates in the US or something for tobacco-free attestation?
I play recreational hockey. All of the rinks around here (and most of the US) require membership to USA Hockey which, among other things, provides some kind of insurance to both the rinks and the players.
https://www.usahockey.com/insurancemanagement
Hockey Canada is similar.
Paid out a lot of $$$ to quietly settle numerous sexual abuse claims/lawsuits.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hockey_Canada_sexual_assault...
https://www.cbc.ca/amp/1.6695731
That must be relatively new. Never heard of such a thing. Wonder if it's a reason my undergrad really cut back on intramural hockey.
Trampolines are indicated because YOUR home insurance could be on the hook for someone ELSE being hurt on your trampoline. And it's easy for them to exclude it.
Medical insurance generally covers your own accidents/mistakes, because it's not like you're going out searching for them for fun.
> Medical insurance generally covers your own accidents/mistakes, because it's not like you're going out searching for them for fun.
I wonder if the guys from Jackass had trouble finding health insurance.
By this logic, most software engineers would also be considered high risk since they work a sedentary job and have higher risks for heart disease and obesity (which likely leads to higher healthcare costs over the long term)
Telling people they're not allowed to have fun in the manner of their choosing because it would be bad for society sounds like a great way to discourage people from caring about society.
Why should you be forced to pay insurance if you don't endanger others? Most situations where you are forced to have insurance are cases where others are endangered (eg. driving).
You mostly aren't. But you're also foolish to not carry health insurance and homeowner's insurance (even aside of liability) in the US.
No? I’ve been mountain biking for over 20 years and never any broken bones or had to go to hospital as a result, despite doing downhill, trials, and dirt jumping. And I have 20 years of fitness to show for it - that’s about as positive as it gets.
Get 8 billion people to flip a coin 30 times in a row, and one is likely to get heads 30 times in a row. It means nothing.
He's been flipping the same coin for 20 years and it has never come up tails. That's quite the coin. There is no data set more relevant to a person than their own experience.
Meanwhile I don't have enough fingers and toes to count up all the people I've known personally who have been killed or crippled in auto collisions.
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You haven't addressed the argument (riskiness of the activity) with your anecdote.
That was his point, or if it wasn't it's my point. It's a physical activity, one that from my POV improves health much more than reduces it. Take the hypothetical where he doesn't ever find a replacement activity, and instead of being fit becomes obese and depressed. that would be worse for society than mountain biking wouldn't it?
For society only; what's the TCO of a mountain biking injury times the rate of injuries, over the TCO of obesity and depression times the likelihood a sedentary lifestyle results?
without access to that data, his anecdote does appear to be a stronger argument than literally no data, no?
There is no specific insurance required that I'm aware of... It's an activity that's well within the normal allowance of jackassery that everyone is entitled to.
I think that a big part of the issue is that banning it sounds a little like banning all sex because someone might get a venereal disease. Yeah, maybe there are some negatives, but there are also a lot of positives, and people are really like the positives.
Kids have so much joy on trampolines! I know they have dangers but net negative? Do you have data or anything?
I'm all in behind your idea: let's do the net result for society of every activity, and mandate people to do the most positive one, while banning the most negative ones!
The good thing is, then, I'll be mandated to go mountainbiking instead of staying sitted in front of a computer all day long!
How can I vote for your program?
People slip in the shower so lets stop bathing.
I've been advocating mandatory shower-helmet laws for many years now; it would make as much sense as a lot of the other nanny-state regulation does.
On the other hand, mandatory rough surfaces on the floor of showers seem pretty reasonable.
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We probably should have lanyard-equipped showers.
people will hang themselves on the lanyard and die. Not all such cases will be suicide.
Why do you suppose hotel showers all have grip bars?
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