[paraclete]

Actually we understand the system very well of mutual assurance as that is how home and auto insurance works here. The biggest difference between that and heath insurance is when you want to purchase home or auto you get to choose and it is a needs based system. But with health insurance its not needs based nor can you bypass it. And the monies that many policy holders are getting hit with has nothing to do with actual policy rates. It has to do with how much handout they are to recieve based on how much money they make. So to me wealth transfer is iheirent in the system.

I'm trying to explain to Tom that health insurance is not a ponzi scheme or a wealth transfer, OK, this differs for other insurance because you have a third party involved, and there, if anywhere, you have socialisation, with the government meeting part of the premium and defining the benefits but it is no more a wealth transfer than social security

P.S. > If your having trouble or do not want the spell checker you can now go to your "options" page in your profile page and turn it off if you like.

Thanks, I'll try that

[tomder55]

but it is no more a wealth transfer than social security

I rest my case . It may not be one in theoretical concept ...but it certainly has evolved into one . There is not a young American today who thinks that SS will be available to them when they retire . We just don't make babies like we used to ;especially when we have already wacked 50 million of them .The trust fund is full of IOUs and there aren't enough at the bottom of the pyramid to fund it . In fact ;it looks like a reverse top heavy pyramid with the baby boomers retiring as we speak.

[talaniman]

Back in the day we thought SS wasn't going to be there for us either. We were wrong.

[paraclete]

I rest my case . It may not be one in theoretical concept ...but it certainly has evolved into one . There is not a young American today who thinks that SS will be available to them when they retire . We just don't make babies like we used to ;especially when we have already wacked 50 million of them .The trust fund is full of IOUs and there aren't enough at the bottom of the pyramid to fund it . In fact ;it looks like a reverse top heavy pyramid with the baby boomers retiring as we speak.

you see Tom you can't have low taxation and Social Security and you need to be kicking the arses of those lazy politicians of yours from Maine to New Mexico so they can do some real work and sort the mess out. If your baby boomers have been doing it right they will have their own schemes anyway, after all, isn't that the land of opportunity. No what has happened is you have been overtaken by the BULLSHlT

[talaniman]

Its far from as gloomy a picture as Tom paints Clete.

[paraclete]

Tal we are all aware of the problems of an aging population, your system is not alone in groaning under the weight. What it comes down to is making sure that the population is making investments for the future no matter how difficult it seems. The ME generation does want to think about the future and Tom is defending them with all this objection to SS, health Insurance, etc, but I for one am sick of making a wealth transfer to the young, let the lazy little buggers get off their arses and earn for themselves

[tomder55]

oh in other words ,people should be planning for their own retirements . But that's the problem when you nurture this nanny state mentality .People stop being self sufficient .

[paraclete]

oh in other words ,people should be planning for their own retirements . But that's the problem when you nurture this nanny state mentality .People stop being self sufficient .

yes that's the idea whether it is a government scheme tied into taxation or a personal scheme mandated by government, in other words no free rides and that goes for health insurance too

[talaniman]

The wealth transfer to the young is a MYTH. Debt and low wages but no evidence of wealth. Retirement planning takes MONEY and I doubt middle income folks will ever squirrel away enough and all we need is another bank robbery on Wall Street to wipe out the few bucks you do save.

Nobody is talking about fixing the broken capitalist business model that has transferred all the worlds wealth to the very few. Trickle down economics has been replaced by austerity. The nanny state hides the oligarchy, and job creators are a marketing strategy. That's where the true transfer of wealth resides.

[paraclete]

The wealth transfer to the young is a MYTH. Debt and low wages but no evidence of wealth. Retirement planning takes MONEY and I doubt middle income folks will ever squirrel away enough and all we need is another bank robbery on Wall Street to wipe out the few bucks you do save.

Nobody is talking about fixing the broken capitalist business model that has transferred all the worlds wealth to the very few. Trickle down economics has been replaced by austerity. The nanny state hides the oligarchy, and job creators are a marketing strategy. That's where the true transfer of wealth resides.

Tal I have to call you on this one, that is total BULLSHlT. Apparently I am among the top 5% of wealthy in my country because I own my own home, have no debts and have some retirement savings. I was middle income, if there is such a thing, though never among to top earners and I did all that in the last ten years of my working life, having gone through a divorce that stuffed any financial planning I had done. The wealth transfer to the young I am talking about is allowing them a free ride by not insisting they make contribution to health care, to social security and retirement planning and to meet their share of taxation so they pay for the economic resource they enjoy and use up.

Sure there are the super rich, a race apart as they have always been, users and usurpers the lot of them, but forget them and look to the average person, they have to change the paradigm they live in or the poor will always be with us

[talaniman]

All due respect but comparing what's going on in Australia to what's going on here in the USA is apple to oranges. Talk to me when you have to split your resources between 360 million people.

You are doing good, but we have far more cats to herd.

[paraclete]

Yes Tal I know you are different, we long ago found herding sheep was easier, less bullshlt and no meowing about me, you see that was your mistake thinking you need 360 million people, you got the people and you got their problems, we got 360 million sheep, well maybe not quite that many these days, and they don't take up the resources like cats do.

We can't get done what you get done and yet we seem to do what we do better, we have learned to do with less. I expect the cats are the problem, must be a shortage of cat wranglers

[Wondergirl]

I expect the cats are the problem, must be a shortage of cat wranglers

It's the car fur that keeps sticking to our clothes and getting into our food plus the hair balls blowing into the corners.

[paraclete]

It's the car fur that keeps sticking to our clothes and getting into our food plus the hair balls blowing into the corners.

so more work for cleaners then, my daughter has a Labrador like that

[talaniman]

Yes Tal I know you are different, we long ago found herding sheep was easier, less bullshlt and no meowing about me, you see that was your mistake thinking you need 360 million people, you got the people and you got their problems, we got 360 million sheep, well maybe not quite that many these days, and they don't take up the resources like cats do.

We can't get done what you get done and yet we seem to do what we do better, we have learned to do with less. I expect the cats are the problem, must be a shortage of cat wranglers

Its not like we needed 360 million people, but that's what freedom is about, the right to breed, and multiply. If the rich guys would stop playing hide the dollar, there would be plenty of resources to go around, and when the civil social war is over, back to work we go.

You shouldn't listen to TParty gloom and doom, we don't. Just grab 'em by the legs and pull 'em along. Be careful, they do kick.

[paraclete]

Its not like we needed 360 million people, but that's what freedom is about, the right to breed, and multiply. If the rich guys would stop playing hide the dollar, there would be plenty of resources to go around, and when the civil social war is over, back to work we go.

You shouldn't listen to TParty gloom and doom, we don't. Just grab 'em by the legs and pull 'em along. Be careful, they do kick.

Not interested in ultraconservatives, Tal anymore than I am interested in ultraprogressives. the rich have to be tamed and taxation is the way to do that, they have to learn that accumulation should be as the result of investment not hoarding so the tax system should lean towards giving incentives for investment and punishing super profits. There are some who think that the rich are generous but they do nothing from alteristic motives. They like to give handouts rather than contribute taxes

[speechlesstx]

Simply amazing. It's like Kramer is running the country and you people think he's a genius. You promised us muffin tops and gave us stumps. Put us in line with a promise of this fantastic soup only to hear "no soup for you" while making that can of generic condensed split pea unaffordable and telling us it's far superior. Don't even make me go into the whole library cop thing or how you've turned us into a nation of Georges.

[paraclete]

Simply amazing. It's like Kramer is running the country and you people think he's a genius. You promised us muffin tops and gave us stumps. Put us in line with a promise of this fantastic soup only to hear "no soup for you" while making that can of generic condensed split pea unaffordable and telling us it's far superior. Don't even make me go into the whole library cop thing or how you've turned us into a nation of Georges.

You want to use examples from a sitcom about nothing, The soup nazi is the Tparty and it's cronies with their no jobs for you mantra and what you have is a whole lot of Marie's looking for their douches. You are a nation run by Georges, just look at your Congress, you don't have Kramer in the White House, you have Jerry, the comedian who talks about nothing

[speechlesstx]

If you're going to try and top me at last make sense.

[paraclete]

If you're going to try and top me at last make sense.

Not interested in topping you just playing along with the theme