Elitist nonsense.
The great bulk of federal revenues is spent on war, welfare and interest on the debt. War does not help me. In fact, it makes me less safe. I don't receive any of the welfare dollars and again the inefficiencies of government means they do not do as much good for others as they could. Much of the welfare even impoverishes me further by ensuring that others resources are wasted on propping up inefficient enterprises.
No, it is not nonsense, and is the remedy to elitism rather than the thing itself. The great failing of the pay-as-you-go crowd is that they do not or will not acknowledge indirect, long term benefits.
"I don't ride the bus so the buses don't benefit me" goes the thinking -- such as it is. This kind of simply minded acquisitiveness ignores all indirect benefits, such as reducing the number of cars on the road, increasing the mobility of the unskilled labor force, and providing an emergency backup form of transport that's always available.
"I don't receive welfare and so welfare doesn't benefit me." Right. Allowing more people to starve to death in the street would be to your benefit. Quite apart from the public health issues, there's the fact that
anyone can end up on the receiving end of welfare -- or, in the Objectivist's paradise, dead in a garbage bin.
It's this narrow-mindedness that is nonsensical and elitist.
Merely pointing out that you're indulging in the (typical) capitalist's fear mongering about government services. "And the
Kremlins will get you if you don't . . . watch . . . out!"
Coercive monopolies only come about via physical force, that is, they are either government or quasi government.
Only governments ever apply physical force? Uhm, no: not true.
The only form of coercion that is unethical is the threat of physical force? Nope, that one's even less true. Coercion by the threat of physical force is the least of our worries, in most cases.
Your attempted syllogism has completely disintegrated. You're probably a Fox News pundit in real life.
Money spent on healthcare in the US has a lot more factors than private vs public. We also spend more money on dog food. Why, because we can.
Cute but completely immaterial. Obfuscatory, even.
The
percentage of what we pay for health coverage that goes to administrative paperwork is far higher than the
percentage of what the Canadians, British or French pay going to similar overhead. This has been documented many times and by many studies. The simple fact is that our system of (allegedly) competing private insurers is far less efficient than any known single-payer system. It is less efficient because more money is siphoned off for the benefit of shareholders and, more importantly, because so much of the red-tape inherent in our system is concerned with avoiding liability.
Our insurers will do anything to avoid paying up. In a single-payer system there's far less incentive to avoid paying claims. It's quite simple, really.
Health insurance is a poor example of private markets, as they are saddled with government demands that it cover various items and being subsidized and encouraged through the tax system. Our healthcare system can not be called private or free market anymore.
If it were then it would be far worse even than it is now. The underlying problem is the incentive to avoid paying claims. Healthcare is one of the best and easiest examples of why the profit incentive can't be allowed to motivate our entire economy.
OOOOOoooooo! How frightening. Are there bogeymen under your bed, too?
No, it's not new. It's an old and stupid concept that was discarded and then rehashed by the charlatan Keynes. The economy is not about money. It's about goods and services. Money is only a symbol of that. Somebody hoarding money has no effect whatsoever.
It may have little or no effect long term but it can have dramatic effects in the short term. So too can spending too much money in foreign markets.
The idle rich are poor stewards of our capital when it comes to the human costs of economic upheaval. This comes of treating labor as a debit rather than a credit.
If they bought up all the lathes they could and put them in a vault, where they would rot, that might hurt the economy. But who would do that?
Yes, and you are a bloke that is making clear he has no clue. What do you think they are going to do with our worthless fiat dollars? Stack them up in a vault somewhere? And if they do, who gives a crap? We got actual, useable goods in the trade. They got some pieces of paper. If they were as dumb as you think they are we'd be making out like bandits.
I assume that "they" are our foreign creditors. Like, say, the Saudis and the Japanese.
Those "pieces of paper" you disparage are our livelihood. Yeah, I know you don't think they've got any intrinsic value. Whoopie. For all I know you're convinced that the Earth is flat, too. Gold and silver have no more intrinsic value than have these pieces of paper. All money, whether backed by "precious" substances or not, is just a social fiction representing stored labor. All money is simply credit against what labor one has provided or will provide.
To bring this down to more concrete terms, you can belittle the foreign debt all you want. Those objections are not going to matter as much as an ant's fart if the Saudis call in the tab. The overwhelming majority of people in this nation, and all other nations, covet those pieces of paper. That's all that's required to give them value.
No, they do one of three things with those dollars.
1. Buy american goods. This offsets the trade balance you think is so fearful.
2. Invest in American businesses. This increases our productivity by providing capital.
3. Invest in government bonds. This provides resources for the services that you claim are so extremely valuable and represent the worst case. What they are buying, in effect, is access to the share of the future earnings of American taxpayers. Those dollars are extracted by your beloved government.
You have not offered any explanation of why you believe it helps our economy less?
It helps our economy less because it simply takes even more money out of circulation and into the reserves of hoarders playing the Game. What monies do return to the global economy -- in the short term: all will in the long term, as previously stipulated -- will often benefit the economies of other nations. I have absolutely no objection to benefiting the economies of other nations. In fact, I think that all such benefits are to our advantage . . . in the long run. Short term, though, our interests can be damaged. And in this context "short term" means "one or two generations."
What the hell are you talking about. I said, I don't feel the need... You extend that to some silly nonsense about me trying to dictate the needs of others. Non sequitur and a strawman.
My point, is you are going to be disappointed if your happiness depends on everyone else acting as you wish they would. It's beyond your control and your freedom does not imply that power, right or result.
I don't suggest it, but you can give it a shot, up until the point that you use physical force, and I would not give a crap.
Another thing that is sort of silly here, is that water implies the British or "liberal" societies are more tolerant. That's horseshit. Ask the muslim women there that care to wear their nijabs. But maybe those muslims are just being ignorant.
Neither non-sequitur nor a strawman. You are claiming the privilege of dictating to all other people what their happiness should depend upon and how they should feel. Again, this is the great flaw in atomism when it comes to practical policy: it depends upon a cultural homogeneity that can, in practice, only come about through violence and repression.
You demand the "right" to dictate to everyone else how they should find happiness and fulfillment. I do not and cannot ever acquiesce to such a demand.
