Dept. of Health and Human Services Stimulus Program: Mail $2 to Blacks, Hispanics
So it isn't an intentional stimulus, but HHS's program probably stimulates the economy just as well as stimulus money spent on socially conscious puppet shows in Minnesota, or the underground turtle tunnel in Florida, or the GPS equipped helicopter to hunt radioactive rabbit droppings in Washington state, or the checks sent out to dead people (yes, these are all real Obama stimulus projects, not products of my wild imagination). The Daily Caller has the details:
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is conducting a national survey about HIV vaccines. To encourage people to go online and spend 20 to 30 minutes completing the survey, the NIH is mailing each recipient $2 in cash.
According to the letter, this taxpayer money is a “token of appreciation,” and “you can keep the money even if you decide not to take part in the survey.”
In a phone interview, the letter’s signatory, Katherine Kripke — the assistant director of the Vaccine Research Program at NIH — said the goal of the survey is “to get a sense of people’s understanding of biomedical HIV prevention research.” However, the NIH really only wants to survey African-Americans and Hispanics. Anyone who isn’t African-American or Hispanic gets bounced from the survey on the fourth question.
Rather than using available Census data to send this letter only to their preferred respondents, Kripke says they used zip code data to target predominantly African-American and Hispanic areas.
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Jan '11
Re: Dept. of Health and Human Services Stimulus Program: Mail $2 to Blacks, Hispanics
$2 buys a vote? That the Democrats already had locked up anyway?
If my tax money is going to be spent on corruption, at least have the decency to make an effort.
Jul '11
Re: Dept. of Health and Human Services Stimulus Program: Mail $2 to Blacks, Hispanics
Distribution of heterosexual HIV rates in populations most likely to be on government sponsored health care.....call it a preemptive strike at cost containment. Or call it what it is, a stupid program
Aug '10
Re: Dept. of Health and Human Services Stimulus Program: Mail $2 to Blacks, Hispanics
This strikes me as the NIH doing its job and doing it well.
In the broad sense, we can argue about whether the government should be planning public health campaigns around infectious diseases and particularly targeting relatively high risk populations. This isn't exactly the night watchman state, but neither is it cowboy poetry festivals. I'm inclined to think it's good government.
In the narrow sense, we can ask whether slipping a few bucks in a recruitment letter is an efficient way to conduct a survey. I can assure you that it is. Survey methods experts have done experiments and found that you get excellent bang for the buck by including a few dollars in the recruitment letter. Recruiting survey respondents is very difficult and expensive. If including the money in the mail survey leads to an extra 10 or 20% completing the survey then this is much cheaper than doing follow-up phone calls.
The reason they're not directly targeting minority households from the last Census is because this would be a serious privacy violation. Also, people have moved since the Census, especially young black men.
Re: Dept. of Health and Human Services Stimulus Program: Mail $2 to Blacks, Hispanics
Is there a purity test to qualify for the money? How African do you have to be?
I'm Sicilian. As Father Guido Sarducci used to say, Sicily is closer to Africa than Brooklyn is to Manhatten.
This dark skin of mine had to come from somewhere in Africa (actually I'm not joking there - I've always figured it that way).
Can I get a check? I'm not saying the full $2, but certainly I'm more deserving of the money than white guys who cook French desserts like Rob Long.
Aug '10
Re: Dept. of Health and Human Services Stimulus Program: Mail $2 to Blacks, Hispanics
massive mission creep like all those spooky " this sponsored by the ad council and the fill-in-the-blank government agency AND BY fill-in-the-blank advocacy program". protect your pet from whatever only way to reduce cost of issuing checks is to issue alot of them ( dysfunctional economies of scale )
May '10
Re: Dept. of Health and Human Services Stimulus Program: Mail $2 to Blacks, Hispanics
I like your thinking, Tommy. I've got some Cherokee and Pamunkey ancestry somewhere down the line. That's worth at least 15 cents.
On the other hand, 15 cents would buy me what? A toothpick? Remember when you could buy candy for a quarter?
Re: Dept. of Health and Human Services Stimulus Program: Mail $2 to Blacks, Hispanics
Aaron Miller: I like your thinking, Tommy. I've got some Cherokee and Pamunkey ancestry somewhere down the line. That's worth at least 15 cents.
On the other hand, 15 cents would buy me what? A toothpick? Remember when you could buy candy for a quarter? · Jul 12 at 3:48pm
Dude you qualify for a Casino license! What are you waiting for?
Nov '10
Re: Dept. of Health and Human Services Stimulus Program: Mail $2 to Blacks, Hispanics
Tommy De Seno: Is there a purity test to qualify for the money? How African do you have to be?
I'm Sicilian. As Father Guido Sarducci used to say, Sicily is closer to Africa than Brooklyn is to Manhatten.
This dark skin of mine had to come from somewhere in Africa (actually I'm not joking there - I've always figured it that way).
Can I get a check? I'm not saying the full $2, but certainly I'm more deserving of the money than white guys who cook French desserts like Rob Long. · Jul 12 at 3:40pm
The phrase I always heard from northern Italians was "Africa starts in Rome."
On a more serious note, I agree with anon_academic. HIV is a communicable disease, which is something legitimately in the purview of government. The techniques they used to get their data are sound. It's just that the thought of an unpopular department of government handing out money to minority groups in return for nothing tends to produce a gag reflex in libertarian types.
Aug '10
Re: Dept. of Health and Human Services Stimulus Program: Mail $2 to Blacks, Hispanics
Tommy De Seno:
I'm Sicilian. As Father Guido Sarducci used to say, Sicily is closer to Africa than Brooklyn is to Manhatten.
This dark skin of mine had to come from somewhere in Africa (actually I'm not joking there - I've always figured it that way).
Sicily is 96 miles from Tunisia (that's about 300 times wider than the East River for those of you keeping score at home). It's quite a bit further from Sub-Saharan Africa which is really what we think of as "Africa," not places that are peopled by the descendants of the Carthaginian, Roman, and Abbasid empires.
Aug '10
Re: Dept. of Health and Human Services Stimulus Program: Mail $2 to Blacks, Hispanics
Jan-Michael Rives
The phrase I always heard from northern Italians was "Africa starts in Rome."
Small variation on the little England notion that "the wogs begin at Calais"
Thanks. FWIW, you actually get better response by offering the money first than making it a quid quo pro. the same principle explains why some charities give you mailing labels or that sort of thing as part of a solicitation rather than only after you send your check.
Jul '11
Re: Dept. of Health and Human Services Stimulus Program: Mail $2 to Blacks, Hispanics
Why wouldn't the NIH just go to various and sundry medicaid clinics in areas they are interested in and have the patients fill out the surveys for 2 dollars during what is usually an extended waiting period.
I clearly recall my time in the aids ward in 1990 and, interestingly enough, the blacks frequently thought it was a white mans conspiracy which produced some unusual debates with the white gay man or heroin user in the bed next to him. A sly wink from me to the conspiracy theorist would renew the debate with vigor.
The larger question I have regarding a viable HIV vaccine is whether the government will pull a Rick Perry(ala gardasil for HPV) and mandate vaccination for children irrespective of personal choice. This does produce a gag reflex in me by the way.
Tommy De Sono, there is an amusing monologue by Dennis Hopper to Christopher Walken in the movie "True Romance" that explains these racial connections quite well.
Aug '10
Re: Dept. of Health and Human Services Stimulus Program: Mail $2 to Blacks, Hispanics
Because that would be a nonscientific convenience sample.
Jun '10
Re: Dept. of Health and Human Services Stimulus Program: Mail $2 to Blacks, Hispanics
And yet the NIH thinks they're too good to give me a grant?Psh, I didn't even want it anyway, so.. joke's on them.
Re: Dept. of Health and Human Services Stimulus Program: Mail $2 to Blacks, Hispanics
anon_academic
Tommy De Seno:
I'm Sicilian. As Father Guido Sarducci used to say, Sicily is closer to Africa than Brooklyn is to Manhatten.
This dark skin of mine had to come from somewhere in Africa (actually I'm not joking there - I've always figured it that way).
Sicily is 96 miles from Tunisia (that's about 300 times wider than the East River for those of you keeping score at home). It's quite a bit further from Sub-Saharan Africa which is really what we think of as "Africa," not places that are peopled by the descendants of the Carthaginian, Roman, and Abbasid empires. · Jul 12 at 4:02pm
If you just parsed a Guido Sarducci joke for geographic accuracy, you sir, are the first.
Re: Dept. of Health and Human Services Stimulus Program: Mail $2 to Blacks, Hispanics
I love that movie, and I love that scene. Any time that movie is on cable, I can't help but to stop and watch it. So many stars in it.
That scene with Walken and Hopper is a masterpiece.