[kathys]

Add it all up food, utilities,transportation maintainence, transportation insurance and licenses,health care, taxes, household neccesstites. The pay you get. What is left? And it is only going to get worse.People are having a hard enough time taking care of themselves and their families.They are always being asked to give, and do more and make sacrifices.
Congress and senate vote themselves raises while they ask us to that. How is that fair?

[Ivorytickler]

Originally Posted by Cliffie

You're making it sound like he died of self-neglect or senility, Driller. They shut off his electricity.

Yes, that's what they do when you don't pay your bills. With $1000 in unpaid electric bills, he, obviously, wasn't able to live alone. The electric company can't be expected to know the circumstances of every customer. It's up to family, friends, neighbors and churches to prevent these situations. Though I have to question the logic of turning off the electricity in the dead of winter.

[wanderer74]

Originally Posted by michiganmom48

People better snap out of this idea that things are like they were. Isn't Michigan the state with the highest unemployment rate. We are no longer living in the times of saying people without or who get welfare are welfare trash. We can't say that women are having children just to get more welfare. We all need to take responsibity for each other and if the companies need to do extra stuff so what. People who once had good jobs and nice homes don't anymore. This man might have been able to pay but many can't. Many people have there gas turned down and lights off and still in the winter the bill is still high We are living in a period where some of us never thught we would be as parents. I'm 48 I had a home, food went to the doctors and true couldn't have the best of everything. Now we as parents are saying this isn't want we wanted. People don't have insurance so even if they get sick they can't go. These comercials about doing this and getting a flu shot and all that are so ignorant. People can't do that they don't have the money. State aren't sure if they can even cover all the unemployment they have. As much as I think are new President is trying , nothing will change anytime soon. It most likley will get worse. In the USA THERE SHOULD NOT BE PEOPLE FREEZING TO DEALTH IN THEIR HOMES. We all have to watch each other and yes too bad electric and gas companies better fiqure out some safe gaurds before they shut off stuff in states where it is below zero.

And yet people are still saying just those kinds of things, that people who are on welfare are just popping out more kids to get a bigger welfare check, that people who are unemployed just don't want to work, etc. Nevermind that we officially have an unemployment rate above 10 percent and welfare reform has made it much more unlikely for the old style 'welfare queen' to successfully keep doing the same tricks. People say "go get a job at McDonalds" but even when I worked there as a teenager I saw men in their 40s, laid off from GM, trying to get hired there and get passed over every time in favor of a teenager with no work experience. Despite the fact that MI has been in bad financial shape for decades, I've never lived anywhere else where people were LESS sympathetic to the struggles of their neighbors. Here it seems like everybody is so afraid of somebody else getting something for nothing that they would rather see people freeze to death. Call me a socialist or whatever, but I think that people deserve to have the bare minimum basics of survival, especially in a state with a harsh climate and harsher job market. That motto goes "what would Jesus do?"...I'm pretty sure Jesus wouldn't let people die because they couldn't afford their heat.

[Ivorytickler]

Originally Posted by kathys

Add it all up food, utilities,transportation maintainence, transportation insurance and licenses,health care, taxes, household neccesstites. The pay you get. What is left? And it is only going to get worse.People are having a hard enough time taking care of themselves and their families.They are always being asked to give, and do more and make sacrifices.
Congress and senate vote themselves raises while they ask us to that. How is that fair?

Seniors need to give up the idea of living in their own home on a fixed income. The solution is in community. One senior might not be able to afford to keep a three bedroom house on a fixed income but three pooling their income might. We need to accept our need for community support as we age and quit trying to pretend we can live alone when we can't.

I see too many elderly insising on living alone when they shouldn't be. I've already decided I'm moving into a senior comlex before I'm 60. I'll be there long before I actually need help and help will be there when I need it. It's such a shame that people hold on to the idea of independence longer than they should.

[Driller1]

Originally Posted by wanderer74

And yet people are still saying just those kinds of things, that people who are on welfare are just popping out more kids to get a bigger welfare check, that people who are unemployed just don't want to work, etc. Nevermind that we officially have an unemployment rate above 10 percent and welfare reform has made it much more unlikely for the old style 'welfare queen' to successfully keep doing the same tricks. People say "go get a job at McDonalds" but even when I worked there as a teenager I saw men in their 40s, laid off from GM, trying to get hired there and get passed over every time in favor of a teenager with no work experience. Despite the fact that MI has been in bad financial shape for decades, I've never lived anywhere else where people were LESS sympathetic to the struggles of their neighbors. Here it seems like everybody is so afraid of somebody else getting something for nothing that they would rather see people freeze to death. Call me a socialist or whatever, but I think that people deserve to have the bare minimum basics of survival, especially in a state with a harsh climate and harsher job market. That motto goes "what would Jesus do?"...I'm pretty sure Jesus wouldn't let people die because they couldn't afford their heat.

Jesus??? People died in the bible all the time. What was more tragic then the story of the "she bears" eating children???

[wanderer74]

Yes people died all the time in the Bible...but remember what Jesus said about greed and the money-changers too?

[Driller1]

Originally Posted by wanderer74

Yes people died all the time in the Bible...but remember what Jesus said about greed and the money-changers too?

Where was the greed? The man had a unpaid balance on his bill.

[magellan]

Originally Posted by wanderer74

Yes people died all the time in the Bible...but remember what Jesus said about greed and the money-changers too?

Wait a minute. Now I don't have to pay my house payment because my mortgage company isn't walking in Jesus' shoes?

This is getting a bit silly.

Here we are bemoaning the death of one 93 year old. How many people, much younger than 93, are literally starving to death in places where heat isn't an issue every day? Again, we in America tend to sensationalize some of the most trivial things. Why didn't someone just get this guy on Extreme Home Makeover and all would be fine? <sarcasm>

[ScranBarre]

Originally Posted by magellan

Why didn't someone just get this guy on Extreme Home Makeover and all would be fine?

Well, from what I've researched that show often times doesn't do much good in the long-term anyways when families can't afford to make the high property tax payments or pay for the high utility/maintenance costs on the new McMansions that were bestowed upon them.

[janetvj]

Some of the folks here sound pretty callous (he was going to die anyway?!). If he had the money, then it seems clear to me that he was more than likely suffering from some form of dementia. People who are playing with a full deck don't just decide to not pay their bills. I remember when I found out my father was starting to lose touch with reality and my siblings and I took over his checkbook. He had paid some bills two and three times and others not at all. He was trying, God love him, but he got confused so easily. This situation could have been so easily avoided by requiring that a third party be notified of the action. How hard is it to do that? Just require that they notify someone or some agency before pulling the plug. Yes, they should be paid for what they sell, but what's a day or two while an advocate is being tracked down or assigned?