If you want something, who pays?
Discussion
Very open ended discussion I know.
Yet seems to be that we all want stuff, and some of us pay for our own, some want other people to pay for it. Some get it without question. Some go without.
Who decides what is acceptable, and what isn't?
When does an individual gain or lose from the system.
What if the state choses to do something that most find unpopular, yet no one can criticise? or vice versa, if the system refuses to help people who most would want to help?
Why can't those who want to help a cause be allowed to help it, and those who don't, refuse to fund it.
I know it's a tough topic but how does it all work? and why does it look the system gets it wrong so often?
Yet seems to be that we all want stuff, and some of us pay for our own, some want other people to pay for it. Some get it without question. Some go without.
Who decides what is acceptable, and what isn't?
When does an individual gain or lose from the system.
What if the state choses to do something that most find unpopular, yet no one can criticise? or vice versa, if the system refuses to help people who most would want to help?
Why can't those who want to help a cause be allowed to help it, and those who don't, refuse to fund it.
I know it's a tough topic but how does it all work? and why does it look the system gets it wrong so often?
The general run of things seems to be a response to a crisis of some sort based on the prevailing ideas of the time which then gets locked in.
Income tax was brought in to pay for the Napoleonic wars at a time when the nation state was deemed to be the right way for a country to protect itself.
Policing was established shortly after as cities grew and there was more to steal.
Schooling was established for the masses because it was thought that we needed a more educated work force for more complicated industries that were springing up.
Labour laws were tightened in the early 20th century when people started to think communism might be a better idea.
The NHS and welfare state were brought in at a time of great need after the second World War at a time when state control and the redistribution of wealth was thought to be the best way to improve the lot of large numbers of people.
We have elections every few years but very rarely do any of the main parties challenge the basic premise of these sort of things. They compete to spend more, spend better and tax less but seldom do they ask "should the state be doing X."
It seems to me that the most logical answer to that question is usually No. Unfortunately though there is virtually no political capital to be had from saying "we don't know what to do about X. So we'll just stay out of it" and very much political capital in promising to fix and improve X.
How do these crises come about and from where do we get the tools employed to solve them is where things get a bit murky. I'm not convinced that the huge scale statism brought in after WW2 was ever necessary or even that the best of our knowledge at the time really supported them. I'm quite sure if we didn't have these things nobody would be clamouring for them now. Yet getting rid of them is nearly impossible.
Income tax was brought in to pay for the Napoleonic wars at a time when the nation state was deemed to be the right way for a country to protect itself.
Policing was established shortly after as cities grew and there was more to steal.
Schooling was established for the masses because it was thought that we needed a more educated work force for more complicated industries that were springing up.
Labour laws were tightened in the early 20th century when people started to think communism might be a better idea.
The NHS and welfare state were brought in at a time of great need after the second World War at a time when state control and the redistribution of wealth was thought to be the best way to improve the lot of large numbers of people.
We have elections every few years but very rarely do any of the main parties challenge the basic premise of these sort of things. They compete to spend more, spend better and tax less but seldom do they ask "should the state be doing X."
It seems to me that the most logical answer to that question is usually No. Unfortunately though there is virtually no political capital to be had from saying "we don't know what to do about X. So we'll just stay out of it" and very much political capital in promising to fix and improve X.
How do these crises come about and from where do we get the tools employed to solve them is where things get a bit murky. I'm not convinced that the huge scale statism brought in after WW2 was ever necessary or even that the best of our knowledge at the time really supported them. I'm quite sure if we didn't have these things nobody would be clamouring for them now. Yet getting rid of them is nearly impossible.
JuanCarlosFandango said:
I'm quite sure if we didn't have these things nobody would be clamouring for them now.
This.Can you imagine if we had European Style health provision and someone said "What we need is to create an artificial monopoly and then make it state owned.". We'd have thought it was insane.
It's self evidently a bad idea for literally everything else yet for health care we're all in.
gazza285 said:
Fat people will get the injection to make them lose weight, but I won’t get the injection to sort out my Dupuytren’s contracture.
I have that in my left hand but it's in the early stages and not causing problems yet. I didn't know there was an injection to counter the effects. 
wc98 said:
gazza285 said:
Fat people will get the injection to make them lose weight, but I won’t get the injection to sort out my Dupuytren’s contracture.
I have that in my left hand but it's in the early stages and not causing problems yet. I didn't know there was an injection to counter the effects. I think most of us are normalised so that if we want something, we have to pay for it, and we are surprised when we don't have to pay for it. I'm pleasantly surprised when I visit museums and galleries and find that it is free. If it's worthwhile, I'll drop a note in the donations slot/bucket.
Things like the NHS are essentially free for most, apart from elements of dentistry and prescriptions. We can have the feckless who create their own constant issues such as alcoholics and their seeming endless drain on A&E/NHS.
The BBC Licence has been another one discussed on the legal forum. Most of us pay it and some want us to pay it so that it is cheaper for them, rather than a subscription based system.
Things like the NHS are essentially free for most, apart from elements of dentistry and prescriptions. We can have the feckless who create their own constant issues such as alcoholics and their seeming endless drain on A&E/NHS.
The BBC Licence has been another one discussed on the legal forum. Most of us pay it and some want us to pay it so that it is cheaper for them, rather than a subscription based system.
vikingaero said:
I think most of us are normalised so that if we want something, we have to pay for it, and we are surprised when we don't have to pay for it. I'm pleasantly surprised when I visit museums and galleries and find that it is free. If it's worthwhile, I'll drop a note in the donations slot/bucket.
Things like the NHS are essentially free for most, apart from elements of dentistry and prescriptions. We can have the feckless who create their own constant issues such as alcoholics and their seeming endless drain on A&E/NHS.
The BBC Licence has been another one discussed on the legal forum. Most of us pay it and some want us to pay it so that it is cheaper for them, rather than a subscription based system.
Alcoholics = feckless. I'm not sure that's correct. We are bombarded with adverts showing how essential alcohol is for the full adult life and how Xmas can't go ahead without bottles and bottles of booze. TV presenters regularly say how much they enjoy wine, or other alcoholic intoxicants. If you are tee-total, you are treated as odd, as indeed you are. They push you to drink alcohol. 'Go one, try one,' just as if they think the person hadn't ever tried it. Things like the NHS are essentially free for most, apart from elements of dentistry and prescriptions. We can have the feckless who create their own constant issues such as alcoholics and their seeming endless drain on A&E/NHS.
The BBC Licence has been another one discussed on the legal forum. Most of us pay it and some want us to pay it so that it is cheaper for them, rather than a subscription based system.
The problem with addiction is that you don't see it coming, unless your are sober of course. One moment you're a social/occasional drinker, or at least that's what you tell yourself, and the next you can't come home from work without a drink. Or two. And why not? After all, the adverts are all telling us just how much it is essential to the full enjoyment of life.
The adverts don't mention that alcohol is carcinogenic, that it effects your appearance, that it negatively affects most organs of the body. If you drink, even up to the guestimate that is defined as the acceptable limit, you are one of the feckless that the tee-total have to pay for when the medical problems of the so-called social drinker appear. If you drink, will you be so bold as to suggest you brought whatever your problem is on yourself?
You may have guessed I'm tee-total. It gives me a vantage point unavailable to those who do drink. The biggest problem, next to the effort of those to drink to pull me down to their level, is the temptation to feel superior. Very difficult to avoid.
I'm told.
Derek Smith said:
vikingaero said:
I think most of us are normalised so that if we want something, we have to pay for it, and we are surprised when we don't have to pay for it. I'm pleasantly surprised when I visit museums and galleries and find that it is free. If it's worthwhile, I'll drop a note in the donations slot/bucket.
Things like the NHS are essentially free for most, apart from elements of dentistry and prescriptions. We can have the feckless who create their own constant issues such as alcoholics and their seeming endless drain on A&E/NHS.
The BBC Licence has been another one discussed on the legal forum. Most of us pay it and some want us to pay it so that it is cheaper for them, rather than a subscription based system.
Alcoholics = feckless. I'm not sure that's correct. We are bombarded with adverts showing how essential alcohol is for the full adult life and how Xmas can't go ahead without bottles and bottles of booze. TV presenters regularly say how much they enjoy wine, or other alcoholic intoxicants. If you are tee-total, you are treated as odd, as indeed you are. They push you to drink alcohol. 'Go one, try one,' just as if they think the person hadn't ever tried it. Things like the NHS are essentially free for most, apart from elements of dentistry and prescriptions. We can have the feckless who create their own constant issues such as alcoholics and their seeming endless drain on A&E/NHS.
The BBC Licence has been another one discussed on the legal forum. Most of us pay it and some want us to pay it so that it is cheaper for them, rather than a subscription based system.
The problem with addiction is that you don't see it coming, unless your are sober of course. One moment you're a social/occasional drinker, or at least that's what you tell yourself, and the next you can't come home from work without a drink. Or two. And why not? After all, the adverts are all telling us just how much it is essential to the full enjoyment of life.
The adverts don't mention that alcohol is carcinogenic, that it effects your appearance, that it negatively affects most organs of the body. If you drink, even up to the guestimate that is defined as the acceptable limit, you are one of the feckless that the tee-total have to pay for when the medical problems of the so-called social drinker appear. If you drink, will you be so bold as to suggest you brought whatever your problem is on yourself?
You may have guessed I'm tee-total. It gives me a vantage point unavailable to those who do drink. The biggest problem, next to the effort of those to drink to pull me down to their level, is the temptation to feel superior. Very difficult to avoid.
I'm told.
otolith said:
Bill Hicks, on self-righteous ex-smokers - "My biggest fear is that if I quit smoking, I'll become one of you."
It's more a matter of whether those who drink alcohol are feckless rather than how self-righteous non-smokers and non-drinkers are.The poster made a general condemnation of those who are alcoholics as if they set out to become addicted.
There was an article in a national newspaper from a columnist who managed to go a whole month without drinking. She struggled. She was tempted a number of times. She took extreme measures, for her, to reduce temptation by not going out of an evening and giving all - yes, the word used was all - her bottles of alcohol to friends to look after. She said, a number of times, she was just a social drinker and not an alcoholic. She was sure. Yet she had to lock herself away in her flat to stop herself drinking.
Obviously not a feckless alcoholic, and not one who will depend on the NHS and other support later in life. You'd have to be drunk to miss the obvious in the column.
I do see the point you are making, that even people who aren't visibly problem drinkers incur social costs. As a former police officer, though, you must be well aware of how the costs escalate when people really go off the rails. There's a hell of a difference in social costs between people politely exceeding their government approved units while keeping it all together and people whose drinking is bringing the police, ambulance, and social services to their door.
Derek Smith said:
...lots of balanced points of view, an opinion from a tee-totaller, fair enough...
But where to draw the line about eligibility for 'state-funded health repairs'?Smokers? Fatties? DIY-ers? Horse riders? Mountaineers? Motorcyclists?
All make a drain on public funds for what could be regarded as self-inflicted problems.
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