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We’ll just need documentation that you were born with profound foolishness, rather than having acquired it. Although benefits for this affliction may soon be suspended, as it uniquely qualifies you for public office.
Voluntary tax. Maybe 1/2% of taxable income. That would easily cover all costs of dealing with people born with long-term birth defects that prevent conventional productivity. Most people would be happy to contribute to the National Congenital Deficit Initiative. We see that some people tithe 10% of their income to their religious institutions. We see endless gofundmes for all kinds of unfortunate events. The evidence indicates people are more than happy to take care of horrific situations like this. People are natively good and want to help others. Especially when they are asked, rather than commanded.
How would you pay for medical services for the victims of auto accidents where the party at fault has no insurance? Or would you mandate insurance?
How would you pay for medical services for the victims of auto accidents where the party at fault has no insurance? Or would you mandate insurance?
Of course, the insurance market would evolve differently under a free system, but I would guess that all auto insurance purchased would be no-fault. If a non-insured person were to be involved in an accident, he would be subject to a tort suit, permanent wealth and earnings garnishment, and financial ruin. All rational people would have insurance. Kind of like they do now. I don’t have auto insurance because it is mandated by the State. I have it because I would like to keep my house and lifestyle.
Last edited by Marc Paolella; 01-15-2021 at 02:27 PM..
Of course, the insurance market would evolve differently under a free system, but I would guess that all auto insurance purchased would be no-fault. If a non-insured person were to be involved in an accident, he would be subject to a tort suit, permanent wealth and earnings garnishment, and financial ruin. All rational people would have insurance. Kind of like they do now. I don’t have auto insurance because it is mandated by the State. I have it because I would like to keep my house and lifestyle.
Low income people are most likely to risk no insurance, and they are also exactly the people against whom a tort suit would be pointless due to their inability to pay. You can indict a ham sandwich......
Neither consumers or the insurance industry is overjoyed with no fault. It has its drawbacks.
Will the state penalize you if you don't have insurance?
I don't have time to scroll through all 11 pages of this thread, but something that the US lacks (on the whole) is the concept of mutual obligation. That's to say, looking after the well-being of everyone and not just one's self. Yes, you take care of yourself, but you don't do it at the expense of someone else because my neighbors health and good fortune are tied to my health and good fortune.
The Puritan/Yankee ethos was always based on mutual obligation and it showed in concepts like the "Shining City on a Hill"/"New Jerusalem" that exuded universality. The concept of "town hall meetings" and "public education" originated in New England.
So while this concept of "mutual obligation" did exist, to some extent, in the early New England colonies, but was all but absent in the Southern colonies where there was a hierarchy:
By order from most prominent to least, the hierarchy was carried out as:
1.) White plantation families
2.) White small land owners/farmers
3.) White impoverished
4.) Black small land owners/sharecroppers/slave owners
5.) Black slaves
The Southern ethos is/has been, unfortunately, the dominant one in the U.S.
Had the New England ethos been more dominant, we would be better off.
American historian Michael Lind has written an extensive amount of literature covering this very topic.
Mutual obligation existed in Virginia in the colonial era. In modern terms it was to whom much is given much is expected. Thus, and this pertains to white men since women had little status (unless petitioned to and granted by the court) and Blacks no rights, the more wealth, the greater the responsibility. Thus the top tier managed not only their plantations which were little towns, but served in government, on juries, and the local church. Each Church of England church, the state church of the VA colony, was served by a minister and governed by a vestry committee (usually 12 men) formed by the local wealthy. For its civil duties, it oversaw social welfare, orphans, care of the sick and widows, it set the parish levy which was a tax - higher than the tithable tax, it managed the glebe lands as well as appoint individuals to oversee roads and ferries. They even had the right to sell the services of women and take their pay for the upkeep of their illegitimate children. George Washington started off as a surveyor. This fit in the one vestry duty which was to set the bounds of land periodically.
Everyone was required to serve in the militia (technically still a requirement § 44-4 et seq.) as well as work on roads. As I believe I noted above, even the most wealthy had to work on the roads, the Governor order that justices that did not require this would themselves be fined.
As for the (Lt) Governor, his obligation was the highest. There is a mention in the Papers of Francis Fauquier that as (Lt) Governor, he had to make up the budget shortfall for the colony out of his own pocket.
George Washington was on two vestries; Fairfax Parish and Truro Parish. On the latter he was on the vestry from 1762 to 1784. Up until he took command of the Continental Army he attended at least 23 of the 35 meetings of the Truro Parish vestry. His diaries show his absences were for illness, government business in Williamsburg, fighting the British and so forth. That was in addition to serving in the militia, as a juror when needed, as a member of the House of Burgess. Madison, Mason, Jefferson, they all served as vestrymen.
When the Church of England was no longer the official church of Virginia - and that did not happen until after the Revolution, most duties devolved to the government. The last of the glebe lands were sold in 1802 with the exception of the Fairfax Parish who held on to their glebe lands until 1815. For trivia about the last holdout:
Low income people are most likely to risk no insurance, and they are also exactly the people against whom a tort suit would be pointless due to their inability to pay. You can indict a ham sandwich......
Neither consumers or the insurance industry is overjoyed with no fault. It has its drawbacks.
Will the state penalize you if you don't have insurance?
No. The state has no say in who has or does not have insurance. That is a private matter. The insurance companies will price their product according to the risks. And even a poor person earns money over his lifetime. A lot of it. And it will be garnished. Along with any other wealth such as inheritance, etc. If you don't buy insurance, you will suffer. That suffering will lead others to make better decisions. Just like it has with Covid. Death leads to changes in behavior and what is socially acceptable.
Have some faith in people. They're not as stupid as leftists think they are and presume to address through tyranny and interference.
I don't have time to scroll through all 11 pages of this thread, but something that the US lacks (on the whole) is the concept of mutual obligation. That's to say, looking after the well-being of everyone and not just one's self. Yes, you take care of yourself, but you don't do it at the expense of someone else because my neighbors health and good fortune are tied to my health and good fortune.
The Puritan/Yankee ethos was always based on mutual obligation and it showed in concepts like the "Shining City on a Hill"/"New Jerusalem" that exuded universality. The concept of "town hall meetings" and "public education" originated in New England.
So while this concept of "mutual obligation" did exist, to some extent, in the early New England colonies, but was all but absent in the Southern colonies where there was a hierarchy:
By order from most prominent to least, the hierarchy was carried out as:
1.) White plantation families
2.) White small land owners/farmers
3.) White impoverished
4.) Black small land owners/sharecroppers/slave owners
5.) Black slaves
The Southern ethos is/has been, unfortunately, the dominant one in the U.S.
Had the New England ethos been more dominant, we would be better off.
American historian Michael Lind has written an extensive amount of literature covering this very topic.
Looking after the well being of yourself, or others, is a choice. There is no implicit obligation. We are not born in bondage to each other. There is choice and cooperation. Freedom and reason.
There is no southern or northern way to apply reason. It's universal. So let's not bring race into this, as we seem to bring it into every damned thing nowadays.
Yes, you take care of yourself, but you don't do it at the expense of someone else because my neighbors health and good fortune are tied to my health and good fortune.
Yes, but only to a limited extent. I can have a good life while just down a few blocks from my house a homeless person ODs in their tent. I would be willing to sacrifice some to support others in that precarious situation, but my first two obligations are to myself and my family. The fact that I'm self-sufficient - a relative to 'dogmatic individualism' that has been ridiculed in this thread - is what makes me capable of helping others in the first place.
Also most of the time helping yourself is not at someone else's expense. That sort of zero sum thinking is part of the problem and is counterproductive.
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