Things I have to post - libertarianism derail

[Seth]

I think your false premise here is that the US (I assume you're alluding to the US given your smug reference to "sensible" countries) is as you describe, which it isn't.

You personally are expected to pay for your medical care, while you may or may not be able to sue people to pay for it thats not something I would want to be worrying about until after I actually get the medical care

You do realize that in the United States we overwhelmingly have insurance? And, the woman with the dodgy French breast implant would by law be treated even if she didn't have insurance? If you are of the notion that she'd be ushered out the door with defective breast implants, you are wrong. Flat, unadulterated, massive amounts of wrong.

Are you certain about that Coito? I don't mean to dispute that, being here in the U.K. but I'm sure a contact of mine in New York was in their spare time part of a group of doctors and nurses helping out people without insurance that had been turned away.

I may have got the details of that wrong though, can you elucidate?

There are only about 8 million US citizens in the US who are actually physically or economically unable to obtain health care insurance. I happen to be among them. Of course, I don't WANT health insurance, I prefer to buy my health care a la carte as I need it, as do an undetermined number of those 8 million "uninsured." The vast majority of the falsely-claimed "40 million" people "without insurance" are a) people who have temporarily lost their insurance because they have left their job who most often become reinsured within about six months when they get a new job, and the rest are illegal aliens who are not entitled to publicly-funded health care in the first place, but who actually receive it for free at ER's, which is why the ER's in our major cities are so overcrowded.

We could afford to give gold-plated, Congressional-level HMO plans for free to each of those 8 million people for a fraction of what Obamacare is going to cost the nation and consumers.

The vast majority of people, more than 70 percent, are perfectly satisfied with their health care plans and don't want them meddled with by Obama.

[MrJonno]

You do know what the average savings for someone even in the middle classes once you allow for debts give you a clue its signficantly less than zero!.

Ie your average person is permanately in debt so paying for medical care is a joke

[Seth]

You do know what the average savings for someone even in the middle classes once you allow for debts give you a clue its signficantly less than zero!.

Ie your average person is permanately in debt so paying for medical care is a joke

And that means that I'm obligated to pay for their medical care how, exactly?

[Gawdzilla Sama]

True, you should have only the medical care you pay for. So, when you decline an MRI because you didn't pay for the development...

[Seth]

True, you should have only the medical care you pay for. So, when you decline an MRI because you didn't pay for the development...

I'm not obligated to pay the full price for the development of any medical device, drug or procedure, I'm only obligated to pay what the businessperson offering the device, drug or skill chooses to charge for the use of the device, drug or skill that they own. They are the ones who are paying for the development by offering the device, drug or skill to patients at a price that the patient can afford to pay, and the developers are likewise depending on large numbers of device, drug or skill owners paying an amount smaller than the total cost of development to cover the costs of development.

That's called "free market economics."

You've still not addressed the core question, which is why *I* am obligated to pay for someone else's medical care.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Oh, well then. If nobody pays for the development, it doesn't get done. Government funded research doesn't exist in your paradigm. Things like the fundamentals of the MRI system.

[Seth]

Oh, well then. If nobody pays for the development, it doesn't get done. Government funded research doesn't exist in your paradigm. Things like the fundamentals of the MRI system.

If it needs to be done, private industry and free markets can do it far more quickly, efficiently and cost-effectively than government scientists swilling at the taxpayer-filled government slop trough.

"Government scientist" should be an oxymoron because government has, at best, the authority to "promote" science, not perform it.

Were I in charge, I'd defund every government science lab and fire ever government scientist and let those who have an interest in the commercial exploitation of scientific discoveries pay for it through the free market.

If the government really needs some science done, it can contract with a private company after a competition to see who can do the job for the least money in the shortest time.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

"
If it needs to be done, private industry and free markets can do it far more quickly, efficiently and cost-effectively than government scientists swilling at the taxpayer-filled government slop trough. "

But only if they see a profit in it. That's where libertarianism screws the pooch.

[Seth]

"
If it needs to be done, private industry and free markets can do it far more quickly, efficiently and cost-effectively than government scientists swilling at the taxpayer-filled government slop trough. "

But only if they see a profit in it. That's where libertarianism screws the pooch.

If nobody sees a profit in it, why spend taxpayer money to do it? That's just somebody wanting somebody else to pay for their play so they can be employed doing "basic research" at somebody else's expense.

Alexander Graham Bell didn't need a government lab to invent the telephone, nor did Edison need a government lab to invent the light bulb (among other things), and Henry Ford didn't need a government lab to invent the automobile assembly line.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

The key word is "sees". Profit doesn't lead to vision.

[Seth]

The key word is "sees". Profit doesn't lead to vision.

Neither does coercing money by threat of armed jackbooted thugs with machine guns.

Profit leads where it leads. If there's no profit potential, there's no reason to force taxpayers to pay for the research.

There is NO justification for coercing other people's money from them to support someone who doesn't want to get a real job in a competitive free-market economy in their efforts to suck at the public teat while tinkering around in a government lab. Don't need 'em, don't want 'em, fire 'em all.

[Coito ergo sum]

"
If it needs to be done, private industry and free markets can do it far more quickly, efficiently and cost-effectively than government scientists swilling at the taxpayer-filled government slop trough. "

But only if they see a profit in it. That's where libertarianism screws the pooch.

I don't think that's where it "screws the pooch." It merely identifies the limitations in the free market.

Let people do as they please and invent things and sell them - why not? The alternative is to say they can't do it.

Like, the space industry. It makes sense for the government to spearhead things like Apollo, which would never have been done by private industry because they don't have the money, and the profit is too remote and speculative. Who would invest $50 billion in the 1960s to go to the moon, knowing that the only profits would entail hundreds of billions of dollars to bring stuff back to sell?

Now that there is a conceivable market for low-earth orbit activities, it makes sense to let private companies (properly regulated) do that shit. But, something like Constellation (the sadly and short-sightedly canceled program to get the US back to the Moon) or a manned mission to Mars, or even the robot missions we are still engaging in, have no reasonable profit realization potential. So, pragmatically, such things ought to be done by the governments - otherwise, they won't get done - at least not now or for many many decades to come. If national policy is to include exploration and utilization of the Solar System, then either the gubmint is going to do it, or nobody is.

[Coito ergo sum]

The key word is "sees". Profit doesn't lead to vision.

Neither does coercing money by threat of armed jackbooted thugs with machine guns.

This is hyperbole.

Profit leads where it leads. If there's no profit potential, there's no reason to force taxpayers to pay for the research.

There is NO justification for coercing other people's money from them to support someone who doesn't want to get a real job in a competitive free-market economy in their efforts to suck at the public teat while tinkering around in a government lab. Don't need 'em, don't want 'em, fire 'em all.

Well, there is, as it is called providing for the general welfare, providing for the common defense, security liberty for the people, and engaging in many other constitutional activities like regulating commerce among the several states. Running a government takes money.

This is where libertarianism - at least the extreme deontological and arnarchic kind that you're espousing here - diverge from both the ideas of the "Founders" (as you like to worshipfully refer to them as), and from reason and common sense.

[MrJonno]

You do know what the average savings for someone even in the middle classes once you allow for debts give you a clue its signficantly less than zero!.

Ie your average person is permanately in debt so paying for medical care is a joke

And that means that I'm obligated to pay for their medical care how, exactly?

Price for living in a country and having rights.

[Seth]

"
If it needs to be done, private industry and free markets can do it far more quickly, efficiently and cost-effectively than government scientists swilling at the taxpayer-filled government slop trough. "

But only if they see a profit in it. That's where libertarianism screws the pooch.

I don't think that's where it "screws the pooch." It merely identifies the limitations in the free market.

Let people do as they please and invent things and sell them - why not? The alternative is to say they can't do it.

Like, the space industry. It makes sense for the government to spearhead things like Apollo, which would never have been done by private industry because they don't have the money, and the profit is too remote and speculative. Who would invest $50 billion in the 1960s to go to the moon, knowing that the only profits would entail hundreds of billions of dollars to bring stuff back to sell?

And if that's the case, and it's a good idea to spend public money on such things, why not spend the money the public is willing to volunteer for the project? Why not convince the public of the value of the expenditure and get them to go along rather than coercively collecting taxes to fund JFK's POLITICAL desire to lord it over the Soviet Union after the embarrassing Sputnik and orbital launches that "beat" America in the "space race," which was nothing more or less than a politically-motivated boondoggle of enormous proportions that could have been done faster, better and cheaper by private industry, if there was any reason to do it in the first place.

We spent billions going to the moon, made a few visits, then completely abandoned it for the next quarter-century. What a waste.

Now that there is a conceivable market for low-earth orbit activities, it makes sense to let private companies (properly regulated) do that shit. But, something like Constellation (the sadly and short-sightedly canceled program to get the US back to the Moon) or a manned mission to Mars, or even the robot missions we are still engaging in, have no reasonable profit realization potential. So, pragmatically, such things ought to be done by the governments - otherwise, they won't get done - at least not now or for many many decades to come. If national policy is to include exploration and utilization of the Solar System, then either the gubmint is going to do it, or nobody is.

If the government is the only one who wants do it, then it doesn't need to be done. But if the government can convince taxpayers to VOLUNTARILY fund their space program, I'm all for it.