Yes, because people were completely incapable of taking personal responsibility for their own health care costs and indemnification before government run systems were put in place...
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Apple, Google Shuttles to Pay to Use Public Bus Stops in San Francisco
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Yes, because people were completely incapable of taking personal responsibility for their own health care costs and indemnification before government run systems were put in place...
Yes, because people were completely incapable of taking personal responsibility for their own health care costs and indemnification before government run systems were put in place...
Saved me from saying something more harsh. Thanks.
Oh yes, I forgot about how much peace, quiet, and safety there is when every other driver is texting behind the wheel and everyone else is wailing on the horn.
I'll pass.
(You potentially have a point on privacy. Although looking at the other people on this bus right now, I don't really get the sense that any of them are infringing on my privacy, nor have I ever felt that way. Then again, I seem to have a much smaller personal bubble than most people seem to have.)
Thanks for implying Im unable to take personal responsibility for my own health care. Im perfectly capable of it, actually, and am doing it now. But then, working full time at an hourly, unbenefited job and going to school full time, it wasnt possible for me to pay for health care for my child and keep a decent credit score, thereby allowing me to purchase a house and car when I could afford it. So my kid would have died in the birth canal (and probably killed my wife as well), or I would have spent the next decade on welfare and unable to contribute to society. So thanks for your concern. Theyre both fine, by the way. And have you noticed how much infant mortality has dropped over the past few years? But of course we should just go back to how it was at the turn of the 20th century. Heaven knows life was better back then.
Sorry, Im normally not abrasive, but when you accuse me of not being able to take responsibility for my actions, Im going to take offense at that. But at least you can take responsibility for your words, right?
----------
Oh, say it, friend. Im interested to hear what snap judgements youve made of me as a person based on a two sentence opinion on a forum.
The sum of all greeds
To sum all the comments up:
1. Government is a very bloated entity that are being run by greedy politicians are really only care about themselves and how much power they can grab (in turn how much money they can grab while in office).
2. Corporations are very greedy and bloated entities that put profit above all else.
3. The entities are getting what they want. They just put up smoke and mirrors to fool the people as if they care about the people/employees.
Am I missing anything else? Should we close this thread now?
To sum all the comments up:
1. Government is a very bloated entity that are being run by greedy politicians are really only care about themselves and how much power they can grab (in turn how much money they can grab while in office).
2. Corporations are very greedy and bloated entities that put profit above all else.
3. The entities are getting what they want. They just put up smoke and mirrors to fool the people as if they care about the people/employees.
Am I missing anything else? Should we close this thread now?
It's not government greed when your Muni bus can't get into a bus stop because a luxury coach that (until now) isn't supposed to be there in the first place is blocking -- keeping you from getting on or off, depending on the commute direction.
And the buses are getting a bargain. Any Joe Schmoe who parks their car in a bus stop gets a $275 fine.
in other words, its like Thatcher said: they would rather the poor were poorer, as long as the rich were less rich.
Most governments do more than spend all it's revenue, it heavily borrows even more. But regardless, how does spending all of ones income equate to being selfless? If that is your standard then Detroit should be renamed St. Detroit. Of course it's easy to spend other people's money until they get sick of it and move. Then the only people left in the city are the ones that can't leave because they have no money or skills to do so. Yes, being a spend thrift & not strategically saving is Scrooge-like for sure!
And to suggest governments can't be greedy -- where I live in solid blue county -- the local government has a 5% annual tax on vehicles. But then once you pay the tax you MUST buy a $25 sticker... $25 sticker!... as proof you paid the tax. Please. If, say, Apple charged $25 for a sticker as proof you have a valid basic warranty you'd be flipping. But it's greed no matter who perpetrates this kind of scheme, no?
The government doesn't have any money, as such. All of the money it spends is either the taxpayer's money or money borrowed from lenders. The former is forcibly taken, and the latter is debt. At least with a company they mostly get their money from people willingly handing it over because the company makes a product that they want.
So, what you're telling me is that, as full time student in a non-benefitted job you either:
1. Made the decision to have children when you were not financially stable enough to afford it.
or
2. Engaged in unprotected sex, thereby resulting in a pregnancy when you were not financially stable enough to afford it.
and then,
Expected society as a whole to underwrite your irresponsible decision.
Look, I am very happy that both your wife and your child lived, even if I underwrote the costs. But don't expect me to be happy about the fact that you have a sense of entitlement for me to pay for your life choices.
Sorry, I am not normally abrasive, either. And you can ask anyone I know and they will tell you that I am one of the most generous people they've ever met (to a fault, actually). But your belief that I and society owe you the ability to make personal life decisions with no long term ramifications is quite galling, to be sure.
Yes, and that's all very well... But it's still a system that relies on force rather than consent. If you don't like the way Apple treats its employees, for example, you can protest most effectively by not buying any Apple products -- you can opt out. But you cannot opt out of paying for things that the government does, or you become a "criminal". Some things that the government does you may agree with, and be happy to give your money to support... however if there's something you don't agree with, you can't exactly pick and choose which services your money goes to. If the government decides to start a war, or spy on its own people, you are forced to financially support that war or that domestic spying whether you agree with it or not.
And the good services that the government does provide such as roads and healthcare wouldn't just go away if there was no government. If everyone never got taxed for anything, do you not think with all their intelligence and extra capital, that people could work out a way to maintain roads and run hospitals?
Yup, too much of the population is not responsible in one way or another. Too much of the population is either greedy, ignorant, unintelligent, or some combination of some or all of those. It would take a fairly drastic (although probably prolonged) evolutionary change of the human species overall to move away from all of that and perhaps improve. Until then, yes, all that extraneous "crap" is unfortunately pretty much a necessity.Yes, because people were completely incapable of taking personal responsibility for their own health care costs and indemnification before government run systems were put in place...
In the end all of this simply comes down to people, as in the overall general sense of the whole population--until that changes none of the other constructs, be they governments, corportations, etc. that come out from those people will be perfect or even good in the overall sense (and certainly far far from unnecessary).
You didnt pay for that. My parent did, by paying their taxes. Im paying for it now, by paying taxes. Thats how these systems are (supposed) to work. You get help when youre young and just starting out so that you get a good job, become a productive member of society, and then pay it all back later in taxes. Now, the system is sort of garbage, as the way they have it set up most people who get the money dont become productive member of society and dont pay it back in taxes. But like I said originally, I agree with you that these systems arent working properly. Does that mean that anyone who uses them is a freeloader? No.
So no, you didnt pay for me. You never have, and you never will. I dont want your money. I just needed a loan, that I am paying back and will continue to pay back for decades. To assume that anyone who accepts help from one of those programs, when they need it, is operating under a sense of entitlement simply because they accepted the help is close-minded and categorically false. Do the programs need to be revised to eliminate freeloaders? Sure. But should the government get rid of them all together? There is where I disagree with you, as I said originally. No.
Oh, and having children was a choice. Best choice I ever made. And thanks to programs designed exactly for those cases, I didnt have to pay for it with my career or wait seven to ten years. Dont judge the programs, judge the individuals abusing them. Sweeping accusations are never correct.
If corporations are greedy, then so are you good sir. I hate to burst your corporation-hate-bubble, but most people who run them are just trying to do what anyone else is trying to do when they earn a profit: Provide for their families, and give them the best kind of life they know how. You may call that greed, but like I said, according to that definition, almost everyone is greedy.
EDIT: To those who get the reference, this is what some random guy who will not be named meant when he said "corporations are people". These are people who are just damn good at providing for their family. For that they're evil? So be it.
No, he paid for it, at least incrementally, along with everyone else that made a net payment of taxes at the time.
Any taxes you are paying now are going to other beneficiaries, or to investors that actually loaned money to the government by purchasing bonds.
Unless you have a legal contract that requires repayment -- like a student loan -- there is no account balance (debit or credit) on your behalf. You don't get back the money you paid in, and you don't pay back the money you received.
The concept of an account balance is only a fictional creation that makes you feel better.
All true. The whole reflex to hate corporations comes from the same age-old anti-captialist reflex. I won't say where that largely comes from, but a recent quote from a certain pontiff might be a hint.
Your post above has done a much better job than I could of explaining my "snap judgement". You wanted all your ducks in a row, come what may - even if it meant that others would have to pick up part of the tab.
Life wasn't meant to be that easy. Sometimes, one has to take a step back in life, sort things out, then get back on track.
----------
No, you equate govt with commerce. The latter is supposed to make a profit.
Its an analogy, not an invention. Im perfectly aware of how the system works. My point is, a system like that (people pay into a pool of money or an organization so other people can receive help from that pool of money or organization, who are then required to pay into that pool or organization in turn), if managed properly, can work very well, for the benefit of many individuals and the economic strength of the organization or group in question. If someone is upset because of people abusing that system (taking money but never paying back in), fair enough. If someone is upset because the system if poorly managed, also fair enough. That upsets me also. But if someone gets angry simply because they are paying into a service that they never had to use, I dont understand that. I mean, thanks, honestly, because it was there when I needed it. And maybe its that perspective that makes me happy to help people further back along that ladder than I am.
Point is, Im not assuming that everyone who has fallen on financial difficulty is there because theyre stupid, or that everyone who has accepted monetary assistance is doing it because theyre a freeloader. Therein is the lie.
Everyone that pays tax pays for everything -- it's forced socialism. Your benefits were paid for the people that were paying tax at the time (and possibly by moneylenders loaning the government money). The taxes you pay now go to other people's benefits as well as everything else the government likes to do, such as throwing weed dealers in prison and maintaining 700 military bases around the world.
There's no loaning and paying back taxes/benefits as you suggest, because if you'd never used those government programs you'd still have to pay the same amount of tax now - not less. And if someone that had never used those programs started using them, he wouldn't have to pay more tax in the future to pay off his "debt". You do not pay for whatever you use. You pay for anything the government decides it wants to spend money on.
Well, thanks anyways for your help. I appreciate the support, both monetary and otherwise, during what was an extremely terrifying time of my life. Can we all assume, then, that if you ever seem to need help you dont want it? Well just let you step back and figure it out. You got this.
----------
Okay, note to self. Analogies not appreciated on forum. Got it.
Worked for more than three-quarters of a century, so perhaps I have "got it".
A dollar? That's not a fee, it's a service. It'll probably cost more to process the paperwork.
Gary