universal healthcare

[Thecla]

I too want our tax money to help the poor.

Actually, I was under the impression that you were opposed to this --- isn't it up to the individual to help themselves and not depend on the government? (No matter if they're from some wealthy politically connected Texas family, get handed an Ivy league education on a platter, screw up utterly every single thing they touch, and still get invited to the Dallas Cowboys owners box for the NFL playoff; or they're some poor black kid from the inner city who graduates from high school against all odds, does everything right, and still gets laid off from McDonalds.)

[DeeBye]

I'm not really sick or anything, but since I live in Canada and I get free healthcare I think I might just hit up the local hospital for whatever free stuff they will give me.

edit: mission aborted. too many death panels and really long waiting lists in my way.

[--Pete]

Hi,

I'm not really sick or anything, but since I live in Canada and I get free healthcare I think I might just hit up the local hospital for whatever free stuff they will give me.

edit: mission aborted. too many death panels and really long waiting lists in my way.

Try bone marrow aspirations, the lines for that should be short. Failing that, lower GI series, colonoscopies, thoracoscopies, and other invasive procedures are fairly unpopular and should be easy to get without a long wait. Of course, if you're a wimp, you can stick to biopsies and non-invasive procedures -- but the lines at the MRI machines do tend to be long. And if you really want to become a professional patient, then major chemo, joint replacements and organ removals are the way to go. That way, you get the maximum bang for your health care tax dollar.

Good luck on your new advocation. :P

--Pete

[kandrathe]

I'm not really sick or anything, but since I live in Canada and I get free healthcare I think I might just hit up the local hospital for whatever free stuff they will give me.

edit: mission aborted. too many death panels and really long waiting lists in my way.

You might shorten another's wait by donating a kidney.

[kandrathe]

Actually, I was under the impression that you were opposed to this --- isn't it up to the individual to help themselves and not depend on the government? (No matter if they're from some wealthy politically connected Texas family, get handed an Ivy league education on a platter, screw up utterly every single thing they touch, and still get invited to the Dallas Cowboys owners box for the NFL playoff; or they're some poor black kid from the inner city who graduates from high school against all odds, does everything right, and still gets laid off from McDonalds.)

Nope. I'm not the utterly one dimensional person (neo-con???? :blink:) you thought I was.

I'm for teaching people how to fish, rather than giving them fish. But, fishing is hard on an empty stomach. I've always said that we need a social safety net to catch people before they hit the ground, but we don't have anything like that. The government actually moves too slow. The way it works now, people/families become homeless, hungry, and destitute before things kick in to provide them any comfort at all. Unless we work in a homeless shelter, or a soup kitchen we may not notice because we are too busy handing out money to EVERYONE, just so that it seems fair that we take money away from everyone above the poverty line. I have no faith that the political class or government can solve this problem. They've got a good thing going by exploiting all the people waiting in line for their bread and diverting themselves with daily doses of cheap entertainment.

A significant number of people in our society are one "event" away from losing it all, whether that be an economic downturn, a layoff, a car accident, a fire, or some stranger getting injured on their property.

My layman's prediction is that the suffering is just beginning, as I fear the current administrations economic interventionism has an eerie parallel to the spend and tax legacy of Herbert Hoover and FDR's first two terms.

I would point you to Hazlitt, and his Broken Window Fallacy. This is what our current administration wants us to believe, that by breaking windows we are encouraging the economy. What we are doing really is taking money (less the cost to administer the tax, less the cost to administer the redistribution to those who will spend it) away from someone else who would have put it to a good economic purpose. For example, to grow a business that would hire some of the millions of people unemployed. Another way to think about it would be; how many private sector middle class taxpayers does it take to pay for one government agency? Governments cannot create wealth, although they can redistribute it and take a sizable cut for that service. Government, and its growing debt has become a millstone around the neck of the US economy. The absolute wrong answer is to grow the government (which means siphoning money out of the private sector), just when we need to be focused on building up the private sector to grow our way out of this recession/depression.

We also don't see that pumping money into ever increasing college grants and easy loan money drives tuition costs up and up, until it becomes too risky for the under classes. We don't see that pumping money into the housing market, through FHA, Freddie, Fanny, FTHB grants, and coercing banks to loosen borrowing rules has the same effect of driving home prices up and up, until they too are out of reach of the under classes. Then this latest bill raise the tax rates on non-wage income like rent, thus driving up the costs for renters who by and large are these very same disadvantaged people we want to help. And, since they don't care about the ultimate consequences, they will want to toss more bail out money and loosen up credit for markets that are trying to deflate rather then allowing them achieve some easy correction. Cash for caulkers, cash for clunkers, and the bonus money for home buyers are all just ways to re-inflate markets that need to achieve correction. In other words, the very thing that they coerce sympathy for has exactly the opposite long term effect. I've also said, for along time now, that we've got to end our obsession with consumption. A big part of our current problem has been wasteful over-consumption, money being pumped into things that are anti- or unproductive.

No, as much as you might want to paint me as the hateful Mr. Scrooge. I actually believe that most of the disadvantaged can climb out of the gutter, rather than delivering a free basket of goodies paid for by the toil of the middle classes to them year, after year. I want to give them productive lives, and self sufficiency. I want them to have "the American dream", in that everyone can improve their lot, and their childrens lot in life through hard work, ingenuity, and an entrepreneurial spirit. You do that by creating opportunity, and not by purchasing for them a gilded cage. Or, even one of iron bars, by making more, and more things illegal.

[--Pete]

Hi,

I'm for teaching people how to fish, rather than giving them fish.
. . .
I actually believe that most of the disadvantaged can climb out of the gutter, rather than delivering a free basket of goodies paid for by the toil of the middle classes to them year, after year. I want to give them productive lives, and self sufficiency. I want them to have "the American dream", in that everyone can improve their lot, and their childrens lot in life through hard work, ingenuity, and an entrepreneurial spirit. You do that by creating opportunity, and not by purchasing for them a gilded cage. Or, even one of iron bars, by making more, and more things illegal.

OK, you have a lot of good points and a lot of valid ideas in that post. And it goes well beyond health care. But the problem is that your ideas are nineteenth century solutions to twenty-first century problems. What good does it do to teach someone to fish if the fishing grounds are depleted?

Assume all those fiscal and regulatory corrections have been made. The free market rules and people can stand or fall (with a minimal safety net) on their own. How are all those people going to make a living? The vast majority aren't intelligent enough, creative enough, self motivated enough to become scientists, engineers, authors, artists. There are only so many McDonalds and Starbucks. One harvester does the job that took 100 men. Robots assemble everything from cell phones to cars. One crane operator replaces a crew of stevedores.

So, where is the non-Einstein, non-Shaw, non-Frost, non-Newman going to do this fishing that you're going to teach him?

I share your principles, but I think they are yesterday's solutions and will fail to solve tomorrow's problems.

--Pete

[kandrathe]

I share your principles, but I think they are yesterday's solutions and will fail to solve tomorrow's problems.

Thanks Pete. It is encouraging at least that we have some common ground in the principles. Sometimes I wish in school I had not avoided the whole business department, in favor of the science and mathematics departments. I've been involved with the management of enough dot com's and new ventures to know that it is not intelligence, or even a brilliant concept or invention that spells success. Much of it is timing, luck, personality, and perseverance.

It was Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, and Bill gates who ushered in the microcomputer revolution. Not IBM, DEC, UNIVAC, or Control Data. We don't need more Starbucks, or McDonalds. We need more people who think out of the box, who understand free market, who are taught entrepreneurship in early high school, actually go out and do it rather than hang out at the mall getting themselves into trouble. Whenever I cross over the border into Mexico, I'm overwhelmed by how many people (of all ages) are practicing the essence of sales and marketing. The average grade school child near a border town has more experience in free enterprise than a dozen average HS Americans. Sometimes I go buy things there, just for the experience of seeing real raw capitalism in action.

When is that last time you had someone under 18 come by looking for odd jobs to do for extra income? Around here it is rare, and even if we can find just a dependable baby sitter, they charge almost as much as a licensed day care provider. Which means, there is not enough competition. The same trend is true for all levels of new venture. We have so many barriers in place which discourage anyone from stepping out beyond a garage sale, or maybe selling something on Ebay.

If buggy whip manufacturing is old news, then there are plenty of new productive things that can be done. I know many MBA's who have little clue on how to start or run a new venture. It's just sad. Everyone is brainwashed into thinking they need to work for someone else, rather than begin to become the owner of their own future. It's the one thing I find remarkable about new immigrants. They are tireless entrepreneurs, and small and large set backs don't phase them much. It's as if they see opportunity, while those Americans who've been here longer are complacent or accepting of some invisible status quo. What I think we can do though, is get the damn government off their/our backs.

Let's make this place a great place to start small family run businesses. When I make a plea for pro-business, I really don't care as much about Starbucks, or GM. I care about the family owned Vietnamese restaurant down the street run by the first generation Americans who fled tyranny in their home land. I don't want my neighbor, who runs a flooring and carpet installation business to lose his house.

[Thecla]

Nope. I'm not the utterly one dimensional person (neo-con???? :blink:) you thought I was.

I'm pretty sure "heartless" was in there too at some point, but actually I view you as neither a neo-con nor heartless. A stubbornly eccentric loony, perhaps, but that's a different thing entirely.:P I was just surprised by your statement that you wanted to see "our" --- presumably including "your" --- tax money go to help the poor, since it seemed so at odds with what you've said before.

It may seem odd, but my feelings about what the government forces us to do are very different from the compassion I feel we should show to each other freely. Bad things happen, and good people do something about it. Not because we are forced by the laws and government to do it, but because we are compassionate and caring beings who form societies. Government is not the glue that holds a society together, it is merely an agreed upon coda that attempts to give us justice. It cannot give us equality, as that is measured in the character of each individual.

[--Pete]

Hi,

Everyone is brainwashed into thinking they need to work for someone else, rather than begin to become the owner of their own future.

Back at the turn of the twentieth century, when people still took care of their own, there was a small town that had a resident who was, as they said in those times, slow. To preserve his pride, the town made up a job for him. There was a brass cannon in front of town hall, and every day he polished it -- and that was his job.

One day, he strode into the mayor's office and announced he was quitting. The mayor asked him how he was going to earn a living. He replied, "I've saved my money and bought my own cannon. I'm going into business for myself." (Thank you, RAH).

What I think we can do though, is get the damn government off their/our backs.

You mean the government that supplies the national defense, the police departments, the fire departments, many of the hospitals, a lot of the schools and universities, emergency medical services, funds much of the basic research (that has no near term payback), sends out cutters to save incompetent yachtsmen (OK, maybe that can be eliminated), etc. etc.?

Let's make this place a great place to start small family run businesses. When I make a plea for pro-business, I really don't care as much about Starbucks, or GM.

OK, but what is the basis for an economy? Buying and selling is all very good, paperwork has its place. Services are nice. But none of that generates wealth. Adding value generates wealth. The value that is generated when an ore is brought to the surface. Or when it is smelted and cast, rolled, hammered into useful shapes. Or when those shapes are turned into cars, toasters, airplanes, golf clubs. An individual might run a bodega. Or write software. Perhaps cast skillets and dutch ovens. But he's not going to build a 777. Or a Pentium processor.

Yeah, we can probably go back to 1800 with small family run businesses and farms. After 90% of the population dies from starvation, that model would even work again -- for a while. But we can't even do that for 1900. By then the railroads and other industrial endeavors required more manpower than a family owned business could supply and more capitol than most families had.

I don't think so. I don't think there is enough need for the things a family run business can supply to employ all the steelworkers, autoworkers, stevedores, and seamstresses who's livelihood has been outsourced overseas or to robots. I don't think it is still possible for everyone (or even nearly everyone) to make it by hard work. Too much of the population have no skills, no abilities, no talents. The mindless, repetitive work once on the farm and later in the factory is being done by machines. And the creative, original work, is beyond them. Just what are you going to teach them to fish?

--Pete

[Occhidiangela]

Hi Occhi my old friend :wub:

WHAT A CROCK OF $HIT [ALL of it...you're j/k right ?]

<strike>Best</strike> Regards,
a Moron...aka...>Jim

Edit: correct you'r to you're...only a spelling error or am I a moron ?

So, Jim, where is the revenue stream that pays for this entitlement? Tell me.

Maybe you can ask our resident economics student where the revenue stream is, in the out years, to fund this, if you are unsure.

Passing a law/bill looks good, but if you look at where the mandate is funded from, you find pixie dust.

Reagan passed a few unfunded mandates along in his day, which came under the guise of getting the federal government out of our pockets. They were replaced by state governments and local authorities having to reise revenue. The money has to come from somewhere. Here in our county, the sales tax was 6 5/8 cents in the 80's, and it is 8 3/8 now, but the worst part is that property tax, on proptert owners, has nearly doubled, and "assessments" in an area with a buyers market for over ten years keep magically going up and up. Yet my old boss sold his house for thirty five thousand under assessed value when he moved after he retired from the Navy.

Where is the money coming from, Jim?

Someone else? Or YOU?

I repeat, in case you missed it the first time: what kind of free lunch do you think is being served here? See RAH on whether or not there is such a thing as free lunch ...

Occhi

[kandrathe]

Back at the turn of the twentieth century, when people still took care of their own, there was a small town that had a resident who was, as they said in those times, slow. To preserve his pride, the town made up a job for him. There was a brass cannon in front of town hall, and every day he polished it -- and that was his job.

One day, he strode into the mayor's office and announced he was quitting. The mayor asked him how he was going to earn a living. He replied, "I've saved my money and bought my own cannon. I'm going into business for myself." (Thank you, RAH).

:D You got me laughing.

You mean the government that supplies the national defense, the police departments, the fire departments, many of the hospitals, a lot of the schools and universities, emergency medical services, funds much of the basic research (that has no near term payback), sends out cutters to save incompetent yachtsmen (OK, maybe that can be eliminated), etc. etc.?

It's good to point at some of the stuff we really need, and can all agree that we need. I do have issues with our military spending, school spending, health care spending, and some of the risking of lives to rescue death defying fools who should know better. :)

A couple of things you mentioned had me meander off here with some thoughts, so if you'll pardon the diversions...

I'm glad you mentioned hospitals, as I was just discussing the state of rural non-profit hospitals with a friend tonight... In the US, hospitals are about evenly divided between public (mostly urban), non-profit, and private. Public and non-profit rural hospitals form a large part of the health care safety net for the uninsured and poor under insured. I was shocked that Obamacare did not include a substantial investment in re-opening, and building many additional hospitals. This would have actually helped to achieve the stated goal of lowering the price of health care by increasing the supply of services. Similarly, if you want to lower the salaries of doctors, provide incentives to attract more bright minds into the field. I'm not sure how I feel about the economics of it all, but it is worth noting. Think rural electric cooperatives, but instead make it hospitals and elder care.

Also, your mention of basic research got me to wondering what percentage of research funding actually comes from the government. So, I did a little googlefu and this appears to be a good source of the information I was looking for; New NSF Estimates Indicate that U.S. R&D Spending Continued to Grow in 2008 It looks like the feds supply about $42 billion, out of a pool of $397 billion. Granted, its all research and development dollars, so how much of industry research is in "basic science". It seems there is quite a bias in thinking that industry does not invest in basic research, and that in order to get this funding we need to turn to government. Francis Bacon, in his Advancement of Learning, published in 1605 argued that governments had to fund science because no one else would. But, I stumbled upon research done by Zvi Griliches at Harvard who in studying 911 companies found that those that engaged in basic research consistently outperformed those that neglected it. Anecdotally, both my sisters are published scientists, (one is a molecular biologist, and the other a chemist), and both do basic and directed research for industry, and (as far as I know) have never needed or received any federal funding. If fact my younger sister is a bit burned out by the decade of zeal in the new venture bio-tech industry. Her husband, who is also a NAS geneticist, worked with Barbara McClintock at Cold Spring Harbor on a company funded "sabbatical". But, perhaps some sciences are more popular, and that for stuff like particle physics might not attract huge corporate interest.

OK, but what is the basis for an economy? Buying and selling is all very good, paperwork has its place. Services are nice. But none of that generates wealth. Adding value generates wealth. The value that is generated when an ore is brought to the surface. Or when it is smelted and cast, rolled, hammered into useful shapes. Or when those shapes are turned into cars, toasters, airplanes, golf clubs. An individual might run a bodega. Or write software. Perhaps cast skillets and dutch ovens. But he's not going to build a 777. Or a Pentium processor.

True. The things we do need for our economy must add value. I'd say it's imperative we start to transition to a production based economy again. We cannot continue our decline as the worlds largest indebted consumers. I didn't think of Google, and if I had, I wouldn't have considered it a viable business. You can look at some of the most successful entrepreneurs, or some of the most successful corporations and their humble beginnings (e.g. Dell, Cisco Systems, Motorola, Best Buy, 3M). They didn't start out in the Fortune 100, or even necessarily doing then what they are doing now.

Yeah, we can probably go back to 1800 with small family run businesses and farms. After 90% of the population dies from starvation, that model would even work again -- for a while. But we can't even do that for 1900. By then the railroads and other industrial endeavors required more manpower than a family owned business could supply and more capitol than most families had.

I don't think so. I don't think there is enough need for the things a family run business can supply to employ all the steelworkers, autoworkers, stevedores, and seamstresses who's livelihood has been outsourced overseas or to robots. I don't think it is still possible for everyone (or even nearly everyone) to make it by hard work. Too much of the population have no skills, no abilities, no talents. The mindless, repetitive work once on the farm and later in the factory is being done by machines. And the creative, original work, is beyond them. Just what are you going to teach them to fish?

Some of my wife's relatives started Windows Magazine, and sold it to CMP in 1990. They had no idea when they started how to run a magazine business. A local legend here is Earl Bakken, who pretty much stumbled into changing the world.

The new immigrants in Minnesota seem to figure out how to make it work. And, they are doing the things that the native born don't seem to want to do (source).

I might be more of an optimist than you are. :)

[kandrathe]

Where is the money coming from, Jim?

I was reflecting on this a bit tonight. Allow me to offer a layman's perspective, and help Jim out with his research.

The fact that this bill funnels about a trillion dollars (or maybe two) more into the US health care system, without addressing the causes of run away price inflation in health care screams for some economics sanity. Ostensibly, one of the reasons for this reform was to lower the rapid upward spiral in health care costs, and so to do this, we'll toss a trillion (or two depending on who you believe) dollars at it? Ok, will the money will go to provide coverage for the 36 million who are uninsured at $27,777 per uninsured? No, half of them will be pushed on to State funded Medicaid programs, and now force your states to raise taxes too. Only our government can figure out a way to spend ~$50K per uninsured for a $12K insurance policy. I'm still trying to figure out where the money will actually be spent.

This seems like utter nonsense. In fact, I find that as Obama tours this week with his sales pitch, that for what he claims this bill does, it actually does almost the opposite. The only significant change in insurance I see in it at all are the provisions forcing insurance companies to fore go actuarial science, and take on all comers and pay for them until they die or leave for a new plan.

{unhinged libertarian side comment: I think the truth is that this bill was designed specifically to destroy the private insurance market by those who want government to run industry.}

Now, granted, about a third of it was diverted from the 43 million Medicare recipients, so it was already in the health care system, but is being taken from those who actually paid for Medicare (about $12,000 per current recipient over the next 10 years). Some (about 150 billion), will be funneled into the health care market by driving private banks out of the student loan business, because we all know that colleges and universities should really be in the loan business. We just hired some additional administrative help at the college I work for, to process student loans (you'll know why tuition rates go up).

The rest, will be taken from the private sector in new taxes, or in ending tax deductions, and now instead of being used to buy goods and services from the broader economy, will be redirected into the health care sector, which is already bloated with too many dollars. Get used to the U3 unemployment rate of 10% or more (U6 at 18%).

[Jim]

So, Jim, where is the revenue stream that pays for this entitlement? Tell me.
Where is the money coming from, Jim?

Someone else? Or YOU?
Occhi

kandrathe Today, 10:45 PM
I was reflecting on this a bit tonight. Allow me to offer a layman's perspective, and help Jim out with his research.

Hi :)

Thanks for the help kandrathe I need it I'm too old and too tired for this debate;)

<strike>BUT the man asks a question in good faith and deserves an Answer.</strike> [edit]
When a man asks a question in good faith he deserves an Answer.


Federal income Tax, paid by the good people of the USA. :wub:


edit: EVERYTHING is paid for by the people, for the people, so why not give them Health care.

[--Pete]

Hi,

It looks like the feds supply about $42 billion, out of a pool of $397 billion.

That's research and development. So money spent to make a vacuum cleaner lighter, or mascara thicker, or insoles softer all count. Basically anything that any company writes off as R&D is included in that figure. The further back you go from putting a product on the shelf, the more the research is funded by the government. I've often wondered if the government could have funded the nation if it had the power to patent the results of the products developed because of its research and charge reasonable royalties for the use of those patents.

I might be more of an optimist than you are. :)

I should hope so, if you're an optimist at all. I'm a realist. Or, more precisely, as I've said before, "I'm a cynical optimistic realist. I have hopes. I suspect they are all in vain. I find a lot of humor in that." (thank you NuurAbSaal for preserving that:))

--Pete

[kandrathe]

EVERYTHING is paid for by the people, for the people, so why not give them Health care.

Allow me to correct that statement...

EVERYTHING is paid for by some of the people, for some of the people, so why not give them <strike>Health care</strike> whatever they can vote themselves. Especially, as the number of payers becomes the minority.


"When the people find they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic." -- Ben Franklin

[Jester]

"When the people find they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic." -- Ben Franklin

"Making up unsourced quotes and attributing them to famous dead people to give one's prejudices the authority of great men is a worthy endeavour. Moreover, their endless repetition will serve the general welfare of the people." -Thomas Jefferson

Or was that George Orwell? I can never remember. Maybe Mark Twain. Or Yogi Berra.

-Jester

[--Pete]

Hi,

Making up unsourced quotes . . .

I could neither find a source for kandrathe's Franklin quote nor a refutation that it was one. Do you have support that it is spurious?

--Pete

[Jim]

Hi,
I could neither find a source for kandrathe's Franklin quote nor a refutation that it was one. Do you have support that it is spurious?

--Pete

Hi :)

When the people find they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic.

http://quotes.liberty-tree.ca/quotes_by/...n+franklin

QUOTE kandrathe Today, 10:26 AM
EVERYTHING is paid for by the people, for the people, so why not give them Health care.Allow me to correct that statement...

EVERYTHING is paid for by some of the people, for some of the people, so why not give them Health care whatever they can vote themselves. Especially, as the number of payers becomes the minority.


"When the people find they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic." -- Ben Franklin

edit: Soon to be a famous quote...> ***"Bring it ON" -Barack Obama***

[--Pete]

Hi,

http://quotes.liberty-tree.ca/quotes_by/...n+franklin

Sorry Jim, not good enough. I found a lot of places where the putative quote was listed. That is meaningless. Lists like that are all too often compiled from memory, by contribution, or by research into equally uncertain sources. What I want is a reference to where and when the quote was first uttered or written. Preferably written in a verifiable document, but attested to by a contemporary and reliable source would be almost as good. Or a reference to when the quote was made up, by whom, and why.

--Pete

[kandrathe]

Sorry Jim, not good enough. I found a lot of places where the putative quote was listed. That is meaningless. Lists like that are all too often compiled from memory, by contribution, or by research into equally uncertain sources. What I want is a reference to where and when the quote was first uttered or written. Preferably written in a verifiable document, but attested to by a contemporary and reliable source would be almost as good. Or a reference to when the quote was made up, by whom, and why.

I've been looking too. It is used often, and always credited to Ben. http://econfaculty.gmu.edu/wew/quotes/govt.html And another citation here; http://mises.org/daily/1144

Edit: Ok, attributed to Franklin in "Pearls of Wisdom", by Jerome Agel and Walter D. Glanze(Amazon)

How about; "If we can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people, under the pretence of taking care of them, they must become happy." - Thomas Jefferson

TITLE: To Thomas Cooper.
EDITION: Washington ed. iv, 453.
EDITION: Ford ed., viii, 178.
PLACE: Washington
DATE: 1802