This is another attempt at explaining the propaganda hidden inside these promises of "free" things from the government when someone is running for a political office. There are other things they also tap into such as envy, jealousy, etc. The main thing I want to explain is that these people are LYING to you. Quit believing the lies.
Why do I say this?
Let's talk about Free education.
How does education happen?
It requires teachers, materials, buildings, utilities for those buildings, etc.
How can it be free? Are the teachers agreeing they no longer need to collect a wage?
School books, computers, art supplies, etc. Who will make those for free? Is there some magical company that agrees to do that for free? Do their employees agree to work for free?
I don't think so.
Buildings. Are they going to magically build themselves? Do we not need to hire people to build them? How about the people that maintain and repair them? Is that free too?
Now utilities. Garbage Disposal, Electricity, Gas, Water? All of those services and keeping those functional those are free as well?
No they are not.
So given that NONE of that is free. How can a government give everyone FREE education?
Do you know of any product the government produces? Generally they create rules, and wars. They are also typically highly inefficient so you could say they produce waste. That's about it.
So if they don't produce anything how are they going to pay for this FREE stuff?
If you think they will "print money". You'd be partially right. However, the federal government in 1913 actually gave the ability and control of printing money to a private banking cartel known as the federal reserve.
So when our government wants more money they really have two ways to do it.
First. They can increase taxes. So they will take money from your pocket, my pocket, and everyone elses pocket. (even those not in need of an education) and pay for it that way.
If they say NO NEW TAXES but promise you free things then they have to go to the second method.
They take out a loan. You see that is how the federal reserve works. The government says "we need more money" and the federal reserve prints it as a LOAN and starts charging interest. It is not backed by anything. So these banking families offer a loan on something printed out of thin air and backed by nothing. Yet the government must pay interest payments to the federal reserve for this loan that the cartel created out of thin air.
The same year 1913 the government created this Federal Reserve. They also created the IRS (Internal Revenue Service) and began charging income tax. Think about that... for over 100 years the United States government operated without being able to steal money from your paycheck. They even fought and paid for several wars. How did they do that?
How does the government pay the interest? They either use taxes, or they take it as debt. Remember they don't actually produce anything they could pay for these things with.
So if the government takes debt, what is that? Essentially it is as if they took a credit card out in your name, my name, and other citizens name and then they spend it. We don't get to spend it ourselves. So they put us into debt to pay for these "FREE" things.
Essentially when you hear a politician promising you "FREE" anything it should send very loud warning alarms for you. This is essentially this guy telling you he is completely comfortable with taking money from other people (even if they don't approve) and spending it. That includes you. Any promise of "FREE" you will end up paying for some other way. They can't give you anything FREE. They can just confuse you and make you think it is free because they don't explain how it is paid for.
Now how about health care.
Health Care and Health Insurance are very different things.
Health Insurance is becoming so expensive that with the deductibles, premiums, copays, as well as the rapidly accelerating costs due to a guaranteed pay check and it is virtually unusable. It is a great way to ENSLAVE the population by making them think they are getting something.
I financially am the best I've ever been in my life. I am the only person in my family with health insurance as we can't afford it for anyone else. I also have the best insurance I can get, and it is almost unusable. It is far more difficult to get actual HEALTH CARE than it was before this insurance existed.
So they talk about how we want to take INSURANCE away from people and how tons of people will die. INSURANCE is NOT Health Care. It is a scam.
Anecdote:
I went to the E.R. a couple of weeks ago with my Anthem Blue Cross Gold PPO. I wanted to make sure I wasn't having a heart attack as I had a lot of the symptoms. I paid $250 co-pay. I pay about $600/month for my premium. I was there for two hours. I got two EKGs. I got one chest x-ray. I got two blood draws. I didn't even take my pants off or shoes. I sat in one of their chairs for two hours while they monitored me.
They billed the insurance claim of $6000+ for that. The insurance paid $4000+. I owe $1700+ on top of that $600/month and $250 co-pay.
Before all of this insurance scam and guaranteed paychecks the overall bill would have been a fraction of that. The insurance is designed so people won't use it that often. It is intentional as it maximizes the profit margins of the insurance companies.
So it is important you realize that INSURANCE is not the same as HEALTH CARE. I state it is far more difficult and more tedious to get HEALTH CARE now than it was a decade ago. So they put FEAR into people when this is attacked and talk about how you want people to die. They play upon emotions. I would suspect less people are getting health care now than they were before these stupid INSURANCE laws/bills existed.
So if less people are getting health care DUE to the insurance and how it is done wouldn't it be logical that more people are dying?
So how FREE or AFFORDABLE is my so called health care with the passing of things like AFFORDABLE HEALTH CARE?
You see they are NOT offering Universal Health Care. Not even close. They are offering Universal Health Care INSURANCE that you have to pay insane amounts for. Insurance is NOT health care.
This is what socialists think will work. Yet it never does. Socialism is another name for self justification of stealing from others to pay for the things you want. Such people have been studied and they donate less to charities than non-socialists. Why should they? They can steal your money instead and then tell you how they are giving you free things.
Such as Obamacare and the fact males pay for maternity care even if they are not married, can never physically get pregnant, etc. Steal from everyone to give an insurance company its guaranteed paycheck. Why should that insurance company compete if they are guaranteed payment? It turns out socialism is the ultimate form of cronyism and monopolies.
I'm confused. Are you denying the existence of basically every first world that isn't the United States when it comes to having humane health care systems (and in some cases, free tuition)? Or are just hand-wringing about the semantics if the word "free"?
You're failing to see the other side of the economic ledger in those other countries. Those 'other' countries don't spend nearly the amount on their defense as the U.S. Let those other countries fund their own defenses, without American aid, and let's see how long they're able to provide "free" healthcare then. Their brand of socialism only has a facade of working due to the fact that they are being subsidized by America.
You are assuming that health care costs more in the rest of the first world. It doesn't. It costs less - far less. In many cases, these countries have total per capita health care costs equivalent to just the US government's per capita share of US health costs, which is about half the US total. The reason they have lower costs is that they have designed their systems to largely circumvent the bureaucratic bloat and profit leaching of the private sector, and to negotiate with providers and supplies on equal footing in order to get fair, competitive pricing. These and other advantages don't exist in the absence of government action.
I re-read my post. Where is the part where I assumed health care costs more in other countries? However, that said, your post raises 2 questions: 1. would you be willing to pay more, for a better product? 2. Why has it been historically the case, that people come from these countries (that offer free healthcare) to America, but not the other way around?
Willing, perhaps, depending on the product. Able, not necessarily.
This is not the case currently. People coming to the US from other first world countries for healthcare fall into two groups, rich people getting elective procedures, and people seeking a particular kind of cutting edge treatment that has recently been developed in the US and hasn't yet spread elsewhere. On the other hand, the numbers of people from the US seeking medical treatment in foreign countries has grown so large that it's become an industry. There are foreign hospitals designed from the ground up to cater to people traveling from the US to get essential procedures done. Health tourism destinations include not just developing countries like Mexico and India, but also first world countries like Spain. As I understand it, a foreigner traveling to a country that provides health care for its citizenry specifically to take advantage of it's health care system is charged for the care they receive, and even so it is often still beneficial for them to make the trip.
Ahh, you touched on the magic element in our (former) healthcare system - that is isn't socialized and run by the government. That is the very thing that drives innovation. Those are the innovations that attract people from all over the world. Get government involved and you kill that innovation, less people want the product, and it will forever depend on your tax $$ to support it. That is failure.
if you have found a way to circumvent the Iron Law.
more power to you.
See you are voting for every one of your own comments.
Interesting. Not illegal. Just interesting. And not exactly in line with the intellectual direction of your posts....
Only two ways to limit costs. By competition, or by rules.
"first world countries" that are socialist limit costs through rules.
Very difficult/impossible to sue your doctor -- essentially, you are suing the government. So "defensive medicine" doesn't get practiced.
You have no say over what you get. That is determined by government. Think you want a second opinion? Think you want services in a timely manner? Think you want an option that the system has decided is not "cost effective?" Too bad. You are SOL.
It is very difficult to compare European society to ours. Their public health system is very different. Lots of chemicals are outlawed there that aren't allowed here, so that's vastly less chemical burden in their food. They don't for the most part fluoridate their water, so they don't have all the health complications associated with this. They walk a lot more. They eat less. They eat more local produce. They have more time off. They focus more on life and less on things. These all lead to better health and have nothing to do with universal healthcare.
I see you are still pursuing the "monopoly produces highest quality at the lowest price point" non sequitur. Wonder why that doesn't work on the private side of things......
Once the size of government has been decided upon, then buying the things that the government wants to buy is easy. All that matters is that there's enough real resources available for them to buy without people jacking up the prices for everyone else.
In the case of pensions, the question is whether or not there's enough stuff for retirees to buy.
In the case of education, the question is whether there are enough teachers to provide the education.
In the case of healthcare, the question is whether there are enough medical professionals, medicines, etc. available.
In the case on infrastructure, are there enough engineers, architects, building materials, etc. for the government to spend money on without causing an increase in prices that the private sector would have to pay for the same things.
If the answer is yes, then funding it isn't a problem. If the answer is no, then it might be best not to do it.
Even then. It isn't free. They still pay taxes. Though you are right about a lot of what you said. :)
thanks for sharing and resteem..
None of those countries give "free" healthcare either. Governments cannot give FREE anything. They pay for things by taking from citizens or putting them into debt. They have no other product. So I don't care what country it is. It isn't free. So I am calling out the lies of politicians that use promises of "free" services to convince people to vote for them. It is a huge lie.
As to the places with humane health care. As I stated many times in the post. Health Care Insurance is NOT the same as Health Care. In the U.S. the Affordable Health Care Act is purely based upon Health Care Insurance and it is anything but affordable.
Some countries offer health care to all of their citizens. It is not free. It is paid for by their taxes. Depending upon who you talk to the quality of those systems is very debateable. I know people that come to the U.S. from say Canada just because they have trouble getting what they need in Canada. I even have met people that moved to the U.S. due to the taxation to pay for medical in Canada. Though they moved here before the Affordable Healthcare Act (aka Obamacare) and I doubt things look that much different financially now.
Prior to this you could still get healthcare. You might have a debt to pay off, but an ER would not turn you away. Now you have what essentially is an expensive tax and you still are in debt in the U.S. The prices have increased so much the debt actually is worse than it was before this mess.
The specifics of other countries I can't argue. I can tell you governments can't give any FREE services. There is no such thing as a FREE from governments unless we are endorsing enslaving the workers to provide that service, and we still must pay to feed, clothe, and house them so even then it still isn't free.
People are IGNORANT of the fact that a new service is something they STILL pay for. It typically comes in the form of more taxes. So suddenly they are getting less money from their paycheck. Or perhaps it is debt and printing money which devalues the currency and now their paycheck is not able to pay for as much due to inflation. So the people ENCHANTED by promises of "free" end up paying for it. They just generally are so emotionally caught up by "free" they miss the fact of how that is paid for.
It is worse. If people pay for things themselves they pay for things they need, and want. If the government pays for things with taxes then people end up paying for things and services they themselves would never use or need.
There is nothing compassionate about spending other people's money.
The ACA was handicapped by the fact that the entire Republican Party opposes any action to improve the health care system, and half of the Democratic Party is owned by the insurance and pharmaceutical industries, including Obama's chief of staff at the time. It net-improved coverage, but did so by doing the policy equivalent of shuffling around deck chairs on the Titanic.
Other first world countries successfully use insurance-based models in their health systems. Some just run it directly by the government. All perform better than the US system, and for less money.
None of them - no country on Earth - has a successful, humane health care system that doesn't involve taxing somebody in some way. So if you're going to say "the health care system is bad, and taxes are bad", the onus is on you to convince us how it is possible to have a good health care system without government involvement, a notion that would seem absurd to most everybody else on the planet, including health policy experts.
Just a quick note that in Canada, our taxes only pay for a basic amount of healthcare. If you want more than the basic, additional money comes out from both your employer's and your pocket.
Yep I actually interviewed for a job in Edmonton once and encountered that. It was confusing at the time. That was many years ago.
ain't nothing free.
someone always pays.
How bout we change things.
only those who vote for something get to benifit from it.
but they also have to pay for it.
I'd be fine with that. Easy way to do that. Crowd source it.
works for me.
socialism works just fine until your run out of other peoples money
how well does it work when they use their OWN money?
Hahaha.... They don't like to use their own money. It is a system where envy and jealousy seem to be viewed as virtues.
the saying
put your money where your mouth is comes to mind.
Yep. Very few politicians do that. Very few socialists either.
It will be, or already is, impossible to have a good insurance for your health care. Just because of the fact that the montly premium is too high; so not evrybody is able to join.
Well and if you can join they now have copays and often high deductibles. So you pay the premium but have no money left over to pay the rest.
A question to the socialists among us. Why is it that the rise of a middle class, really only took root after the founding of America, and the advent of capitalism? Prior to the last 242 years, communism, socialism and authoritarianism did nothing to build a middle class.
All the socialist programs that have been invading the U.S. can be seen as eroding the middle class.
great content! and thanks again for following!
We do not have a lack of insurance in this country.
What we DO have is a serious lack of AFFORDABLE HEALTHCARE -- you nailed it dwinblood.
Most don't understand that insurance, the existence of insurance, is actually what has driven this cost into the stratosphere.
Insurance, no matter if it is public or private, is a shared good. And, due to how human nature functions, shared goods always get over-utilized until they collapse. It's called the Tragedy of the Commons. And it has nothing to do with public/private and everything to do with human nature. Human nature does not change when it goes back and forth between public and private. It always functions the same.
The concept of insurance is that we all pool our resources and then pay someone to oversee the distribution of resources to those with "needs." Problem is, that severs the link between consumption and payment. It breaks symmetry because it severs a feedback loop. And the system then goes through unregulated positive feedback until it explodes and collapses.
Consider. You go to the hospital. You don't feel any pain of the bill, so you exercise no cost/benefit analysis on any of the tests/treatments. Doctors are tasked with choosing the "safest" option no matter the cost. In fact -- imagine how publicly pilloried they would become if they were found to be denying care because they didn't think it was worth it for a patient. So they make recommendations without considering cost.
The insurance company really doesn't want to find itself in the crosshairs of being accused of denying care -- that's bad for public image and therefore bad for business. So, they pay whatever it costs -- and then just wrap those expenses around back to the patient as higher premiums.
Initially this was all hidden inside the higher costs of goods/services as most had healthcare through their jobs. The recession/depression of 2007 revealed what the system had been concealing, which was that these costs had steadily ratcheted up to the point that they were not affordable for the system, because no one had been exerting any control over costs for decades.
But by this point, healthcare had become so bloated, so unreasonable, that it was essentially unaffordable without insurance. So the focus became placed on insurance, without considering that the average individual HAS TO pay more in insurance premiums than they ever get back in the form of healthcare services -- otherwise the whole concept doesn't cash flow.
So high insurance costs isn't the problem - it's a symptom of the problem. The problem is high medical costs -- which were allowed to bloat because the existence of insurance blinded us to these costs.
That's right, look, in my country almost all of that is paid with the money coming from the oil, which is not a problem when the production stays at stable levels and the price is high, but the production or the price falls, inflation shoots up. One way or another people end up paying.
Your blog is educative. You talk about your education here in your blog. I liked it
Nailed it across the board, NOTHING is free....Makes ya want to hand them a sign "I am a idiot"...
Good afternoon, congratulations for that publication, it is an excellent topic, taking into account that a country does not stand alone, nothing in life is free and we all have to do our bit to move forward as a nation, as a society, always with the duties and values inculcated by our parents. A thousand blessings for you and your family.
Greed is unreasonable ....you cannot reason with those who care for others but don’t understand unwise caring is unreasonable because it’s coupled with ignorance and greed.....
I think compassion is a good thing. I believe true compassion only occurs when it is voluntary.
though...
There is nothing compassionate about spending other people's money. :)
if they're all THAT compassionate...they should start writing checks..
Studies show that people okay with redistributing other people's wealth are not that charitable.
kinda like a one way valve?
fine as long as they're getting it
but not so good the other way?
Yep. More of the double standard stuff we see a lot of these days.
I live in a country with free education and healthcare. Nobody here is crying about getting ripped off, at least not the ones holding a school degree or the ones who are sick.
I don't believe you. In fact I state it is not possible.
Do your doctors make money to pay for things?
Do the people that produce medicine charge someone money?
Who pays for that?
If you say the government then I suggest you reread my post.
How does a government pay for things when they produce nothing? Typically the answer is taxes. If you pay taxes and they use those to pay for you education and healthcare then it is not FREE.
In fact you pay for healthcare and education in that case whether you use it or not, as I assume you can't just stop paying taxes.
I'll go ahead and give you the benefit of the doubt. If you believe your education and healthcare are truly free then I'd be interested in knowing where you live as I do not believe it is possible.
we just have different definitions of free
I don't see taxes as a burden, but as empowerment for democracy and freedom, not libertarianism but democratic freedom
thus I have no quarrel with the system in Germany and most Germans don't
we view universal health care as a human right, It's part of our constitution, like being able to own guns in the USA
If it is involuntary it is not free. If you have a choice it is free.
Whether you decide to believe differently does not change that. Because you are okay with an involuntary choice does not make it free. It just means you are not burdened by that particular requirement from your masters.
Sure, but I would not want to live in a country where paying taxes is on a voluntary basis.
Would you, when you really and seriously ponder it?
I'd wager things would go awry for everyone, not just the poor or the rich, the sick or the healthy, pretty damn quickly...
I think it could be done. Though only now thanks to technology. Imagine for example that all services were funded by crowdsourcing them. If you want to use a service then you would crowd source and fund it. You would have access to that service.
The problem is that governments truly suck and are incredibly wasteful on how they spend.
They are also quite corrupt and hard to keep track of.
Were it not for technological advances it'd be a challenge. I am completely fine with voluntary. You get the services you agree to support.
Thus, you are not charging people to pay for education who will never get one and may already have one. Thus, you are not charging unmarried men for maternity healthcare.
In fact, people could make up crowd sourcing initiatives for whatever they wanted. If enough people were interested they'd get funded and the project would proceed.
Some such initiatives could be ongoing in the form of things like Patreon.
The point is that just because we ARE doing things a certain way now does not mean they are something we should keep doing, or that we should stop pointing out problems and seeking solutions to those problems.
Every solution should be viewed as an experiment. If it fails we learn something and will have new ideas. Yet we learn nothing by repeating things just because that is how they have always been done. In fact we keep repeating a lot of the same mistakes over and over again in historical cycles.
Your basic premise is that the recipient class is not complaining. That seems to be the issue thinking people have - it's the takers that are fine with socialism. When you become part of the 'donor' class it's a completely different story. Once socialism takes root, it becomes even more difficult to move into the donor class. See why socialism doesn't work - for very long?
if you're a greedy shit yes, but then society in general is bad, not just socialism
Socialism only guarantees equality of misery. Period.
The most important two field , health and education . But Politic is more important.
Such a great topic man @dwinblood. Thanks for sharing such a philosophy.
That's good to know about this thing.
Bernie Sanders has explained this many times, he has never said it would be FREE
Denmark is a nation of less than 6 million people. The United States is 53 times bigger. Secondly, Bernie has made his platform one that attacks "millionaires and billionaires", yet when he answers this gentleman's question, he doesn't deny that he will raise taxes on the middle class. Bernie talks out of both sides of his mouth.