The Next Four Years

[Mr. Perfect]

Elderly man in my church just had Medicare heart surgery. The bill was half a million dollars. His house is worth like 150,000. He had a surgery that is worth more than his house, and a significant portion of his lifetime income. And he's just getting started.

More coming. They can't forecast this stuff. It's coming to an end. And people voted for it. They want it. Give the people what they want I guess.

[Zack Morris]

Elderly man in my church just had Medicare heart surgery. The bill was half a million dollars. His house is worth like 150,000. He had a surgery that is worth more than his house, and a significant portion of his lifetime income. And he's just getting started.

More coming. They can't forecast this stuff. It's coming to an end. And people voted for it. They want it. Give the people what they want I guess.

How should that heart surgery have been paid for?

[Endovelico]

I keep coming back to this moronic solution:

Cancel all debt!!!...

But some people oppose it on the basis of "moral risk"...

[Mr. Perfect]

Elderly man in my church just had Medicare heart surgery. The bill was half a million dollars. His house is worth like 150,000. He had a surgery that is worth more than his house, and a significant portion of his lifetime income. And he's just getting started.

More coming. They can't forecast this stuff. It's coming to an end. And people voted for it. They want it. Give the people what they want I guess.

How should that heart surgery have been paid for?

Great question Zack, but a question that should have been answered 20 years ago. Unfortunately people asking that question were denounced as racists and child killers and murderers by people like you. All that is left is bills no one can pay.

Tell me Zack Morris, how do you think your generation is going to be able to pay for this over your whole working life? With a worker retiree ratio of 4/1 how are you going to come up with half a million dollars from 4 people to pay for one of these?

[Mr. Perfect]

I keep coming back to this moronic solution:

Cancel all debt!!!...

But some people oppose it on the basis of "moral risk"...

Endo, if my life's savings are all tied up in bonds and you cancel my bonds, what happens to me?

[Endovelico]

I keep coming back to this moronic solution:

Cancel all debt!!!...

But some people oppose it on the basis of "moral risk"...

Endo, if my life's savings are all tied up in bonds and you cancel my bonds, what happens to me?

Go to work?... But I would favour guaranteeing small savings which are kept under the form of debt.

[Mr. Perfect]

What if I'm old? And if I'm young and lose all my savings, obviously I'm going to have to save everything I earn, what do we do with the economic effect of that?

[monster_gardener]

It's been 30.

30 years of debt powered boom that hid the underlying death of the real export economy.

this bit is non trivial, and the aspect i still dont get what mr p is on about.

30 years.

Exactly.

Thank You VERY Much for your post, Typhoon

30 years.

Exactly.

Maybe not exactly 30 years today but pretty darned close if I am guessing right......

August 1981 when Ronald Reagan betrayed the PATCO Air Traffic Controllers, many ex-military, who had foolishly supported him against that Holy Jerk Jimmy Carter.....

Legacy

In 2003, Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, speaking on the legacy of Ronald Reagan,[10] noted:

Perhaps the most important, and then highly controversial, domestic initiative was the firing of the air traffic controllers in August 1981. The President invoked the law that striking government employees forfeit their jobs, an action that unsettled those who cynically believed no President would ever uphold that law. President Reagan prevailed, as you know, but far more importantly his action gave weight to the legal right of private employers, previously not fully exercised, to use their own discretion to both hire and discharge workers.

Michael Moore said that Reagan's firing of the PATCO strikers was the beginning of "America's downward slide", and the end of comfortable union jobs, with a middle-class salary, raises, and pensions. Wages have remained stagnant for 30 years. Moore also blamed the AFL-CIO for telling their members to cross the PATCO picket lines.[11]

President Reagan's director of the United States Office of Personnel Management at the time, Donald J. Devine, argued that "when the president said no...American business leaders were given a lesson in managerial leadership that they could not and did not ignore. Many private sector executives have told me that they were able to cut the fat from their organizations and adopt more competitive work practices because of what the government did in those days. I would not be surprised if these unseen effects of this private sector shakeout under the inspiration of the president were as profound in influencing the recovery that occurred as the formal economic and fiscal programs."[12]

In 2011, Oxford University Press published Joseph McCartin's book, "Collision Course: Ronald Reagan, The Air Traffic Controllers, and the Strike that Changed America". Reviewing the book in Review 31, Richard Sharpe claimed Reagan was "laying down a marker" for his presidency: "The strikers were often working class men and women who had achieved suburban middle class lives as air traffic controllers without having gone to college. Many were veterans of the US armed forces where they had learned their skills; their union had backed Reagan in his election campaign. Nevertheless, Reagan refused to back down. Several strikers were jailed; the union was fined and eventually made bankrupt. Only about 800 got their jobs back when Clinton lifted the ban on rehiring those who had struck. Many of the strikers were forced into poverty as a result of being blacklisted for employment."

Was when the CEO Officers stopped sharing the Prize Money with the enlisted men & women Down in the Black Gang.......

Got even worse for the Black Gang with all the Flat Earth oops I mean World is Flat stuff under Bush & Clinton: NAFTA.... GATT......... Off-Shoring..... etc.....

[Simple Minded]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Idx8ovCXVxs

[Nonc Hilaire]

Elderly man in my church just had Medicare heart surgery. The bill was half a million dollars. His house is worth like 150,000. He had a surgery that is worth more than his house, and a significant portion of his lifetime income. And he's just getting started.

One problem here is that Medicare costs too much because the government refuses to control the charges. The value of that heart surgery was much less, but the entire American medical system depends on Medicare overpayments and the $10 aspirin. How much would that operation cost in India or Canada? Maybe we should offshore medical care.

Nursing home care bills out at $12k per month. Anyone who has visited a nursing home knows that the services provided are not worth nearly that much. But, government does not want to address the overcharging or submit it to a system which requires competitive bids.

It's like EBT. Remember the days when people without food received real food? The infamous government cheese? Instead of credit cards which kick back 2.7% to J.P. Morgan and require the government to subsidize the retail and processed food industries?

We could afford to pay for health care and food for the poor if we demanded value for money, and negotiated prices like any other large consumer.

[Typhoon]

Elderly man in my church just had Medicare heart surgery. The bill was half a million dollars. His house is worth like 150,000. He had a surgery that is worth more than his house, and a significant portion of his lifetime income. And he's just getting started.

Singapore | heart surgery: US$ 12,200

India | heart surgery: US$ 5,500

Survival rates at hospitals, in these countries, that do medical tourism are as good as or better than the US.

Mexico is a popular destination for dentistry for some Americans.

More coming. They can't forecast this stuff. It's coming to an end. And people voted for it. They want it. Give the people what they want I guess.

Even after taking PPP into account, the question still is who is pocketing the huge difference in the US?

[monster_gardener]

Elderly man in my church just had Medicare heart surgery. The bill was half a million dollars. His house is worth like 150,000. He had a surgery that is worth more than his house, and a significant portion of his lifetime income. And he's just getting started.

One problem here is that Medicare costs too much because the government refuses to control the charges. The value of that heart surgery was much less, but the entire American medical system depends on Medicare overpayments and the $10 aspirin. How much would that operation cost in India or Canada? Maybe we should offshore medical care.

Nursing home care bills out at $12k per month. Anyone who has visited a nursing home knows that the services provided are not worth nearly that much. But, government does not want to address the overcharging or submit it to a system which requires competitive bids.

It's like EBT. Remember the days when people without food received real food? The infamous government cheese? Instead of credit cards which kick back 2.7% to J.P. Morgan and require the government to subsidize the retail and processed food industries?

We could afford to pay for health care and food for the poor if we demanded value for money, and negotiated prices like any other large consumer.

Thank you Very Much for your post, Nonc.

Seconded.

High Health Care Cost because of lack of Diligent Inspectors.....

What is the value of a diligent inspector?...... Beyond Rubies......

Even though they can be difficult and prickly rather than go along to get along......

Both in the public & private sector........

To make sure the job is done right and not overcharged.......

Have met a few...... people who will make sure that the contractor is using the right number of nails on the shingles and tell the lazy greedy contractor who threatens to throw him off the roof that if so you are going down with me........

[monster_gardener]

It's been 30.

30 years of debt powered boom that hid the underlying death of the real export economy.

this bit is non trivial, and the aspect i still dont get what mr p is on about.

30 years.

Exactly.

Thank You VERY Much for your post, Typhoon

30 years.

Exactly.

Maybe not exactly 30 years today but pretty darned close if I am guessing right......

August 1981 when Ronald Reagan betrayed the PATCO Air Traffic Controllers, many ex-military, who had foolishly supported him against that Holy Jerk Jimmy Carter.....

Legacy

In 2003, Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, speaking on the legacy of Ronald Reagan,[10] noted:

Perhaps the most important, and then highly controversial, domestic initiative was the firing of the air traffic controllers in August 1981. The President invoked the law that striking government employees forfeit their jobs, an action that unsettled those who cynically believed no President would ever uphold that law. President Reagan prevailed, as you know, but far more importantly his action gave weight to the legal right of private employers, previously not fully exercised, to use their own discretion to both hire and discharge workers.

Michael Moore said that Reagan's firing of the PATCO strikers was the beginning of "America's downward slide", and the end of comfortable union jobs, with a middle-class salary, raises, and pensions. Wages have remained stagnant for 30 years. Moore also blamed the AFL-CIO for telling their members to cross the PATCO picket lines.[11]

President Reagan's director of the United States Office of Personnel Management at the time, Donald J. Devine, argued that "when the president said no...American business leaders were given a lesson in managerial leadership that they could not and did not ignore. Many private sector executives have told me that they were able to cut the fat from their organizations and adopt more competitive work practices because of what the government did in those days. I would not be surprised if these unseen effects of this private sector shakeout under the inspiration of the president were as profound in influencing the recovery that occurred as the formal economic and fiscal programs."[12]

In 2011, Oxford University Press published Joseph McCartin's book, "Collision Course: Ronald Reagan, The Air Traffic Controllers, and the Strike that Changed America". Reviewing the book in Review 31, Richard Sharpe claimed Reagan was "laying down a marker" for his presidency: "The strikers were often working class men and women who had achieved suburban middle class lives as air traffic controllers without having gone to college. Many were veterans of the US armed forces where they had learned their skills; their union had backed Reagan in his election campaign. Nevertheless, Reagan refused to back down. Several strikers were jailed; the union was fined and eventually made bankrupt. Only about 800 got their jobs back when Clinton lifted the ban on rehiring those who had struck. Many of the strikers were forced into poverty as a result of being blacklisted for employment."

Was when the CEO Officers stopped sharing the Prize Money with the enlisted men & women Down in the Black Gang.......

Got even worse for the Black Gang with all the Flat Earth oops I mean World is Flat stuff under Bush & Clinton: NAFTA.... GATT......... Off-Shoring..... etc.....

Thank You VERY Much Again for your post, Typhoon.

Extending my remarks.......

Stuff like what Reagan did is probably another reason Romney lost.......

Even if folks Dislike Anti-American Gun Grabbing Scheming Socialist DemonRats such as Obama, Bill Ayers and Rev. Wright.......

They also know that Randian Republican WereRat Officers will betray the Ratings Down in the Black Gang their own peculiar way.....

Just like the DemonRats will betray the Ratings in their own peculiar way.........

IMHO I may not be quite as alienated as Bezerk..... If it had mattered I would have voted for Romney rather than Johnson as it was time for vain hope and change again.....

IMVHO Reagan was a Great President...... Shot Down the Duck and Cover World of my youth with a Ray Gun .........

But at a high unequally distributed cost........ Which His Disciples have Doubled Down on........

And again taught uz not to trust the Bosses........

And thus it is hard to avoid Sinful Schadenfreude in wishing that some of Reagan's friends and family were on a certain jet plane that crashed in part because there was only a Singly Sleepy Air Traffic Controller on duty.......... And that this had happened while Reagan was still alive and in his Right mind

Proof that I too am a Depraved Sinful Egotistical Killer Ape Chaos Monkey Pig...........

[Endovelico]

What if I'm old? And if I'm young and lose all my savings, obviously I'm going to have to save everything I earn, what do we do with the economic effect of that?

Don't forget that you would also benefit from a global debt pardon. In respect of your mortgage, for instance.

[Ibrahim]

I keep coming back to this moronic solution:

Cancel all debt!!!...

But some people oppose it on the basis of "moral risk"...

There is some historical precedent for this, but it was before modern investment and credit systems existed, and under monarchical governments with relatively few assets and commodities in play (mostly grain), so its hard to predict exactly what it would do to a modern nation state and therefore the global financial system. Though I suspect we will be carrying a canary or two down this mineshaft.

[Ibrahim]

They were warned! They were and they still chose Coke instead of Pepsi, and now its all their fault. The few real Americans will roam the wasteland in one-armed leather jackets, muttering to their dogs about how things could have been different.

Ah, that's the one! Now where is my sawed-off....

[YMix]

They were warned! They were and they still chose Coke instead of Pepsi, and now its all their fault. The few real Americans will roam the wasteland in one-armed leather jackets, muttering to their dogs about how things could have been different.

Ah, that's the one! Now where is my sawed-off....

[Enki]

I keep coming back to this moronic solution:

Cancel all debt!!!...

But some people oppose it on the basis of "moral risk"...

There is some historical precedent for this, but it was before modern investment and credit systems existed, and under monarchical governments with relatively few assets and commodities in play (mostly grain), so its hard to predict exactly what it would do to a modern nation state and therefore the global financial system. Though I suspect we will be carrying a canary or two down this mineshaft.

It also benefits the title holders of actual property immensely. The biblical Jubilee included a transfer of land as well.

[Juggernaut Nihilism]

It ignores the fact that the entire global financial system is debt. Debt is not some individual part of the system. So we could do a debt jubilee, but it's the same thing as saying we should just scrap our economic system and start a new one.

[Enki]

It ignores the fact that the entire global financial system is debt. Debt is not some individual part of the system. So we could do a debt jubilee, but it's the same thing as saying we should just scrap our economic system and start a new one.

Yes.

Occupy Wall Street has a rolling Jubilee in the works. Not sure how it's going to look, but they intend to buy cheap debt and retire it using donations. The more successful it is the more it will drive up the price of debt resale.

http://www.mnn.com/money/personal-finan ... ovember-15

[Zack Morris]

Elderly man in my church just had Medicare heart surgery. The bill was half a million dollars. His house is worth like 150,000. He had a surgery that is worth more than his house, and a significant portion of his lifetime income. And he's just getting started.

More coming. They can't forecast this stuff. It's coming to an end. And people voted for it. They want it. Give the people what they want I guess.

How should that heart surgery have been paid for?

Great question Zack, but a question that should have been answered 20 years ago. Unfortunately people asking that question were denounced as racists and child killers and murderers by people like you. All that is left is bills no one can pay.

Twenty years ago, talk of health care reform was summarily dismissed. Nobody wanted to take 'Hillarycare' seriously. We tried to answer this question again a few years back but once again, you decided to derail the discussion by screaming 'death panels' and 'they're going to take away your Medicare!' Since then, your contribution to the discussion of our country's fiscal future has been limited to expressing gleeful delight at legislative gridlock. You are the problem.

Tell me Zack Morris, how do you think your generation is going to be able to pay for this over your whole working life? With a worker retiree ratio of 4/1 how are you going to come up with half a million dollars from 4 people to pay for one of these?

We're not going to be paying $500K for heart surgeries. There are many ways we can lower costs and improve health care outcomes for everyone. A simple solution would be to adopt another country's system -- say Canada or, as Typhoon pointed out, Singapore, which has a mix of private and public care that ensures everyone is guaranteed access to health care.

[anderson]

There is no imaginable rational combination of labor, equipment, supplies, and drugs costs that would justify anywhere close to $500,000 for a single procedure.

[Hoosiernorm]

http://www.toledoblade.com/State/2012/1 ... e-cut.html

Ohioans’ food stamp aid to be reduced
Benefit to fall $50 a month starting in January

Ohio families receiving food stamps could get an unwelcome surprise come January: $50 less every month in assistance.

For the 869,000 households enrolled in the program for the poorest Ohioans, that could amount to about $520 million annually out of the grocery budgets.

Because of the way the federal government calculates utility expenses for people receiving the benefit, a mild winter nationwide last year, and a lower price for natural gas, many families could experience a significant cut in aid, those familiar with the program say.

Recipients should get a letter from the state Department of Job and Family Services this month explaining the change, said Ben Johnson, a spokesman for the agency.

Meanwhile, food banks and others that distribute food assistance are bracing for increased demand.

“They are going to increase hunger among our most vulnerable — working families, seniors, children, and persons with disabilities,” said Lisa Hamler-Fugitt, executive director of the Ohio Association of Foodbanks.

Ms. Hamler-Fugitt said her organization is particularly concerned that some seniors or persons with disabilities who have a low benefit amount could lose all their monthly assistance.

Not so much...

[Mr. Perfect]

Elderly man in my church just had Medicare heart surgery. The bill was half a million dollars. His house is worth like 150,000. He had a surgery that is worth more than his house, and a significant portion of his lifetime income. And he's just getting started.

Singapore | heart surgery: US$ 12,200

India | heart surgery: US$ 5,500

Survival rates at hospitals, in these countries, that do medical tourism are as good as or better than the US.

Mexico is a popular destination for dentistry for some Americans.

More coming. They can't forecast this stuff. It's coming to an end. And people voted for it. They want it. Give the people what they want I guess.

Even after taking PPP into account, the question still is who is pocketing the huge difference in the US?

It doesn't matter. Nobody knows about it and nobody cares. The government at work.

[Mr. Perfect]

There is no imaginable rational combination of labor, equipment, supplies, and drugs costs that would justify anywhere close to $500,000 for a single procedure.

That's government for you. More coming. Getting what you wanted.