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On October 05 2010 16:16 Droodjerky wrote:Show nested quote +On October 05 2010 16:01 bbq ftw wrote:On October 05 2010 15:39 Droodjerky wrote:On October 05 2010 15:35 xbankx wrote:On October 05 2010 15:24 Droodjerky wrote:On October 05 2010 14:36 xbankx wrote:
Personal responsibility is important that guy choose not to pay the fee and he suffered the consequences. Same with health insurance of many young people in US. I don't care much. I mean as long as the fire department knew that there was no people trapped inside then its fine. The $75 fee was Insurance. So, they didn't have to do a damned thing to save his house. You should also know they would be under no obligation to save anyone/anything in the house. Basically, if they (and you) were to follow your logic to it's conclusions. You'd sit outside and watch people burn to death in the house as well. You see, the man didn't pay to have anyone rescued in case of a fire. Money doesn't give a crap about anything other than money. You see, it's not profit that helps people. It's people that help people. Watching someones house burn down is a douche thing to do. And you sir are a hypocrite for not standing with your logic all the way through. As I said as long as there is no people in the house then the fire department is under no obligation to help. The guy didn't pay his fee so he suffered the consequence by losing his monetary property. Life is another case though that is why I put in the clause that "as long as there are no people in the house". Look life is hard, nothing is free so you either pay the fees or suffer the consequences. People can be generous and help but don't expect it every time. So, you're a hypocrite. You're not following your logic to it's conclusion. You see, he didn't pay the bill. So, you should watch the people burn like you watch the house burn. It's analogous to health insurance. You don't/can't pay, you don't get your life saved. There E.R. circumstances that you do get saved (from immediate danger) and charged out the arse for it later. Which, is why I think they should have saved the house and charged a large fee. Since it's in line with other Insurance Industry Standards. Regarding the term hypocrite: I know its tempting, but its just a terrible idea to throw out terms you don't understand in the blood sport of internets debating. Its not like he's lying about his beliefs--you can argue that they're inconsistent, sure. Are they? Sometimes common sense isn't a terrible metric (see: search and seizure precedents), which Mr. xbankx seems to subscribe in this case. But if you want a more rigorous argument: one could argue that life has a value that transcends a mere monetary value. Its not as hokey as its sounds--its the same line of argument used in death penalty, abortion, healthcare, etc. debates. To pose a quick question, regarding your ER example: would you say that the ER shouldn't save someone who can't 'pay out the arse' for their life-saving treatment? His and a few other peoples argument in this thread is simple: Pay for service = Get service Don't pay for service = Don't get service What they don't understand is that part of that service in this case is saving people from that burning property. If you agree with their argument, the logic is exactly the same as Health Insurance. Pay for service = Get service Don't pay for service = Don't get service The arguments even more closely resemble one another when you take into account both Insurances have saving a life as part of them. He's a hypocrite, because he pretends to subscribe to a position he doesn't actually subscribe to. Then he uses an Ad Hoc argument to distance himself from my accusation. You see, saying Human life is worth more than the property has no bearing on the Insurance Policy. If anyone refuses to accept the logic above, they are at the very least cognitively dissident. To answer your question, I would say that Health Care should be universal and government provided (aka, from taxes). However, in the current state of the system. They should treat the person and charge them an appropriate sum. The E.R. should also give a detailed bill on what the person is being charged for.
I think the position he claims to subscribe to is:
Pay for service = Get service
Don't pay for service = Don't get service UNLESS you will die in absence of said service
Which I think is not necessary a flawed or even that much of a self-inconsistent argument. Seeing as normally you certainly wouldn't give away food to someone who hadn't paid for it...unless they were starving to death. Call it irrational or whatever (many human impulses are). I think this would be the normal pattern of human behavior nonetheless.
By the way, I could easily flip your reductio ad absurdum argument using your claim that "Human life is worth more than the property has no bearing on the Insurance Policy." by casting your argument as:
Pay for service = Get service
Don't pay for service = Don't get service unless you get harmed by withholding that service
And since you 99% of the time get harmed in some way by denial of service, that means get service if you don't pay in most cases.
To summarize: using the equal statements one could think there are only 2 tenable positions to argue from. However, that's oversimplifying the situation. And there's a middle ground between rigidly holding to contractual agreement and forcing altruistic behavior all the time.
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On October 05 2010 15:35 Zzoram wrote:
That's like saying if you're driving along the road, a deer runs out and hits your car (no fault of your own) resulting in total destruction, but you haven't been paying for car insurance, you should get a free car repair. No, you shouldn't, because you weren't paying your insurance and it would be unfair to everyone else who does if you take money out of their pool without contributing to it.
The analogy is flawed. Specifically, in your case the damage is already there and you are talking about trying to unload it onto somebody else. There is also no harm coming to living creatures which could be perceived as members of the family.
In the house burning scenario, the damage can be prevented for a fraction of the cost, but the firefighters refuse. If you prefer: this is refusing to help somebody in danger, not refusing to cover up the damages afterwards. The part about four pets dying in there can be particularly nasty, but that's a message which is particularly hard to get across to people with different outlooks on life and animals, so I'll just say it and not get into specific arguments about it.
Also,
On October 05 2010 15:22 dogabutila wrote:Show nested quote +On October 05 2010 14:26 Romantic wrote:
Given the system they have (insurance) I suppose you can justify letting it burn.
But, uh, who really thinks 911 services should be voluntary insurance? The town has just lost this man's business because he now has to struggle to replace his home instead of purchasing what he would have purchased without his home burning. Sucks for all involved except the fire department. Or, he would be purchasing the materials for rebuilding and all that stuff that goes in your house from that city as well, so they don't really lose anything.
Abstract the town as a single block. The system, as a whole, has the choice between:
1) leaving the house burn and rebuild it. The community has to put effort and work into remaking the house, from creating/extracting the raw materials to putting them all together.
2) hosing down the fire. The community as a whole has to expend the work and resources needed to put out the fire and to make repairs.
Option 2 is clearly the more efficient. Money exchanges are just a way to regulate who has to do the work, but in the end they do not change the total amount of effort that has to be put in. So... the system as a whole loses out by choosing 1. Could it be argued that the losses are ultimately limited to the owner of the house? Possibly, but no man is an island. It is generally a good bet to say that, by impoverishing some members of the community, the others are going to suffer as well.
Ideally, society norms should guarantee that a solution like 2) always gets picked over something like 1); whether such norms can exist without more unpleasant side effects is a much wider question, of course.
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On October 05 2010 15:54 Helios.Star wrote:Show nested quote +On October 05 2010 15:52 dogabutila wrote:On October 05 2010 15:50 Helios.Star wrote:On October 05 2010 14:41 FabledIntegral wrote:On October 05 2010 14:23 Manifesto7 wrote:On October 05 2010 14:21 FabledIntegral wrote:
Honestly... I kinda agree. Otherwise it just goes to show you can not pay the fee and still get the protection when the fire happens. Or they could have put it out for $7500, saved the man's house, and still sent the same message. Honestly though, this is why funding for the fire department should come from the city, which collects from people through land taxes, rather than each entity collecting separately for each thing. A fire department shouldn't be run like the cable company. Yes and no. What are the chances you're going to get your house run down? There's a difference between the message sent "I won't get ANY help," vs "I'll have to pay a lot, but still only a minute fraction of my total cost." One's your entire life savings gone, the other is a large fee, something still less than a DUI (although I'm fully aware you arbitrarily picked $7500 as 100x the regular fee). Because $7500 would simply be gambling that your house doesn't burn down in ~8 years. And if it does burn down around the 8th year, you break even. Economically speaking, I think a lot of people would take that risk that their house doesn't burn, and unless it's in a fire prone area, I'd say the firedept would lose money on it. It'd have to be an obscenely high fee, which the guy might just "say" he'd pay and with no contract or anything I'm not sure how it would legally hold up (literally I have NO idea... anything against nullifying oral contracts made in extreme stress/pressure, etc?). Lets say your figures are correct, and it was a monthly fee instead of yearly, the way the report is worded indicates he only forgot to pay once, and they still let his house burn to the ground. Does a family deserve to lose their home over $75? Do four animals deserve to burn to death over $75? If it was a yearly fee then $7500 is way more than anybody would pay in a lifetime, assuming they didn't own their home for more than 100 years. If you can't be responsible enough to own a home and do everything that comes with it...... Yep, humans never forget to do anything. Apparently you never have.
Of course I have. OTOH, I've never forgotten to pay car insurance, phone bills or credit card bills... etc.
On October 05 2010 15:55 Loranga wrote:Show nested quote +On October 05 2010 15:45 dogabutila wrote:
What exactly goes through your head when you choose not to buy protection from fire? Do you think, "What are they going to do, watch my house burn down?" or "Heh, why pay that? My house will never burn down!"
If you arn't going to rely on other people to fight your fires, wouldn't you want to be prepared for them yourself? This guy is either a real idiot, or a manipulative SOB who is now crying since people didn't act like he wanted them to. The fact that you have to pay for fire protection is the real issue here. Something so crucial shouldn't have a price.
Fire protection is basically like insurance. If you don't pay for it you will not receive it. No matter how it is structured, if you receive it then you are paying for it. In america, most police and fire rescue is local. In other countries, most of this is federal.
However, since things are run locally if you are outside local jurisdiction then you do not pay taxes for certain things, but do not receive benefits that those who pay for the taxes do. They give people the option to buy in.
Something so crucial should not be forgotten.
On October 05 2010 16:29 Meff wrote:Show nested quote +On October 05 2010 15:22 dogabutila wrote:On October 05 2010 14:26 Romantic wrote:
Given the system they have (insurance) I suppose you can justify letting it burn.
But, uh, who really thinks 911 services should be voluntary insurance? The town has just lost this man's business because he now has to struggle to replace his home instead of purchasing what he would have purchased without his home burning. Sucks for all involved except the fire department. Or, he would be purchasing the materials for rebuilding and all that stuff that goes in your house from that city as well, so they don't really lose anything. Abstract the town as a single block. The system, as a whole, has the choice between: 1) leaving the house burn and rebuild it. The community has to put effort and work into remaking the house, from creating/extracting the raw materials to putting them all together. 2) hosing down the fire. The community as a whole has to expend the work and resources needed to put out the fire and to make repairs. Option 2 is clearly the more efficient. Money exchanges are just a way to regulate who has to do the work, but in the end they do not change the total amount of effort that has to be put in. So... the system as a whole loses out by choosing 1. Could it be argued that the losses are ultimately limited to the owner of the house? Possibly, but no man is an island. It is generally a good bet to say that, by impoverishing some members of the community, the others are going to suffer as well. Ideally, society norms should guarantee that a solution like 2) always gets picked over something like 1); whether such norms can exist without more unpleasant side effects is a much wider question, of course.
I don't think thats correct. Nobody is losing money because he is still spending it all in town. The money might go to a different store, but it isn't as if he is spending LESS to rebuild his house and replacing everything in it vs buying new shit.
All that work and effort is what jobs are. People get paid to do things, otherwise if there is nothing to do then people do not get paid to do it.
Point is, there is no less money being spent either way. He is either buying new stuff since his house did not burn down, or buying stuff // hiring people to build / repair his house and then replacing it. The bolded part is what I am arguing about, although I might just be misunderstanding what you are trying to say.
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Osaka27172 Posts
On October 05 2010 15:42 BlackJack wrote:Show nested quote +On October 05 2010 15:18 illu wrote:
Wait.
What if my neighbour did not pay the fee, but I did... then his house got set on fire... but the fire department refused to help... then the fire spreaded to my house?
User was temp banned for this post. wtf why was this guy banned? I noticed like 5 people quoted him and said "thats what happened in the article" or something. You all misunderstood this post because he is asking what happens if the blaze runs out of control and it burns down the entire neighborhood just because the firefighters refused to put it out when it was manageable. Which is a valid question and no reason to ban him..
You are right, totally my fault. I thought he was talking about this incident rather than a hypothetical.
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fearghuiegeh
I fail at quote boxes and stuff.
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This reminds me of those ancient rome firefighters, they would burn peoples house down, and ask 1/8th of the value to put it out lol
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On October 05 2010 14:54 Jibba wrote:Show nested quote +On October 05 2010 14:50 Railxp wrote:
The only logical way for society to operate is through voluntary, non-coercive contracts, where everyone bears the full cost of their actions. Not only does this society not exist (nor has it ever existed), but you haven't stated (nor will you ever be able to) what prevents people from oppressing each other. Logic doesn't. Free market fire department would raise the price of putting out a fire until they reach the threshhold of what the "customer" is willing to pay. There is no competition for that service in your voluntary, non-coercive world because a monopoly is eventually going to control all the resources needed to extinguish fires. If you're going to abandon publicly owned firehouses, the next obvious step is police forces.
He didn't mention free markets... you can do it fine with government setting the prices...
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On October 05 2010 16:26 bbq ftw wrote:Show nested quote +On October 05 2010 16:16 Droodjerky wrote:On October 05 2010 16:01 bbq ftw wrote:On October 05 2010 15:39 Droodjerky wrote:On October 05 2010 15:35 xbankx wrote:On October 05 2010 15:24 Droodjerky wrote:On October 05 2010 14:36 xbankx wrote:
Personal responsibility is important that guy choose not to pay the fee and he suffered the consequences. Same with health insurance of many young people in US. I don't care much. I mean as long as the fire department knew that there was no people trapped inside then its fine. The $75 fee was Insurance. So, they didn't have to do a damned thing to save his house. You should also know they would be under no obligation to save anyone/anything in the house. Basically, if they (and you) were to follow your logic to it's conclusions. You'd sit outside and watch people burn to death in the house as well. You see, the man didn't pay to have anyone rescued in case of a fire. Money doesn't give a crap about anything other than money. You see, it's not profit that helps people. It's people that help people. Watching someones house burn down is a douche thing to do. And you sir are a hypocrite for not standing with your logic all the way through. As I said as long as there is no people in the house then the fire department is under no obligation to help. The guy didn't pay his fee so he suffered the consequence by losing his monetary property. Life is another case though that is why I put in the clause that "as long as there are no people in the house". Look life is hard, nothing is free so you either pay the fees or suffer the consequences. People can be generous and help but don't expect it every time. So, you're a hypocrite. You're not following your logic to it's conclusion. You see, he didn't pay the bill. So, you should watch the people burn like you watch the house burn. It's analogous to health insurance. You don't/can't pay, you don't get your life saved. There E.R. circumstances that you do get saved (from immediate danger) and charged out the arse for it later. Which, is why I think they should have saved the house and charged a large fee. Since it's in line with other Insurance Industry Standards. Regarding the term hypocrite: I know its tempting, but its just a terrible idea to throw out terms you don't understand in the blood sport of internets debating. Its not like he's lying about his beliefs--you can argue that they're inconsistent, sure. Are they? Sometimes common sense isn't a terrible metric (see: search and seizure precedents), which Mr. xbankx seems to subscribe in this case. But if you want a more rigorous argument: one could argue that life has a value that transcends a mere monetary value. Its not as hokey as its sounds--its the same line of argument used in death penalty, abortion, healthcare, etc. debates. To pose a quick question, regarding your ER example: would you say that the ER shouldn't save someone who can't 'pay out the arse' for their life-saving treatment? His and a few other peoples argument in this thread is simple: Pay for service = Get service Don't pay for service = Don't get service What they don't understand is that part of that service in this case is saving people from that burning property. If you agree with their argument, the logic is exactly the same as Health Insurance. Pay for service = Get service Don't pay for service = Don't get service The arguments even more closely resemble one another when you take into account both Insurances have saving a life as part of them. He's a hypocrite, because he pretends to subscribe to a position he doesn't actually subscribe to. Then he uses an Ad Hoc argument to distance himself from my accusation. You see, saying Human life is worth more than the property has no bearing on the Insurance Policy. If anyone refuses to accept the logic above, they are at the very least cognitively dissident. To answer your question, I would say that Health Care should be universal and government provided (aka, from taxes). However, in the current state of the system. They should treat the person and charge them an appropriate sum. The E.R. should also give a detailed bill on what the person is being charged for. I think the position he claims to subscribe to is: Pay for service = Get service Don't pay for service = Don't get service UNLESS you will die in absence of said service Which I think is not necessary a flawed or even that much of a self-inconsistent argument. Seeing as normally you certainly wouldn't give away food to someone who hadn't paid for it...unless they were starving to death. Call it irrational or whatever (many human impulses are). I think this would be the normal pattern of human behavior nonetheless. By the way, I could easily flip your reductio ad absurdum argument using your claim that "Human life is worth more than the property has no bearing on the Insurance Policy." by casting your argument as: Pay for service = Get service Don't pay for service = Don't get service unless you get harmed by withholding that service And since you 99% of the time get harmed in some way by denial of service, that means get service if you don't pay in most cases. To summarize: using the equal statements one could think there are only 2 tenable positions to argue from. However, that's oversimplifying the situation. And there's a middle ground between rigidly holding to contractual agreement and forcing altruistic behavior all the time.
I would say people would help other people out most of the time without compensation. Someone comes over to your house, you offer them food. They're not starving, it's just a nice thing to do. Hell offer a drink to go with that food and a bed if they'd like to stay the night. Perhaps I'm mad and this isn't how other people think...
This mind set of letting money do all the talking is beyond my ability to accept. It also boggles my mind how people arbitrarily draw lines. Human life has no more intrinsic value than anything else when held up to the massive void that is our universe. But damn it, if they'res one thing we should be able to understand it's the plight of another one of our kind.
No ones life or lively hood should be decided on because of a payment or lack there of. Other countries seems to grasp this concept and have single payer systems for the obvious needs.
Yes, I understand it's about the here and now. That we must deal with what we have at this moment. But, what the hell people. How do you get to a better place/system if you just sit complacent and except that it's right because the contract said so?
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Where did this happen? Kazakhstan? Somalia? Niger?
... the USA?
There is nothing that can justify this sort of action... or inaction. This is a basic public service that should be provided to everybody no questions asked. I cannot see why such an important service should be provided in this way. It is something everybody needs and therefore should be provided from tax money to ensure that everybody is protected and bullshit like this doesn't happen.
A few years back, here in NZ, a power company shut off power to the house of a lady who was on life support because they failed to pay their power bills. She died, public outrage ensued, law change happened and we made an important fix to our system. I can only hope this leads to a fix in America's clearly flawed system.
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On October 05 2010 14:54 Jibba wrote:Show nested quote +On October 05 2010 14:50 Railxp wrote:
The only logical way for society to operate is through voluntary, non-coercive contracts, where everyone bears the full cost of their actions. Not only does this society not exist (nor has it ever existed), but you haven't stated (nor will you ever be able to) what prevents people from oppressing each other. Logic doesn't. Free market fire department would raise the price of putting out a fire until they reach the threshhold of what the "customer" is willing to pay. There is no competition for that service in your voluntary, non-coercive world because a monopoly is eventually going to control all the resources needed to extinguish fires. If you're going to abandon publicly owned firehouses, the next obvious step is police forces.
Maybe I'm just lacking info to how fire departments work, but what exactly can they monopolize? Water supply across the country? It just seems fairly unlikely that a private fire department could get to a point of perfect price discrimination.
As far as letting the guys house burn down, it seems like there should at least be a price he could pay, which I would imagine any successful private fire department would have. I don't even think it has to be perfectly lined up with insurance/odds because most people are probably risk averse in that kind of situation anyways.
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I can definitely follow the calculated risk line of thinking, the economics is simple enough. But doesn't it feel cold and inhuman to you? They were at his house, they were actually there before the fire started. They had the means and everything, and while the guy was standing in front of them telling them he would pay whatever, they just let his house catch fire and burn down? I mean, forget the economic viewpoint, what ever happened to human decency? Charge the guy afterwards or something, but help him out!
How do you walk down the street? Suppose something stupid happens, you trip, hurt yourself, can't get up. Does it really work this way that everybody will just pass you by thinking: he didn't pay me to help him out? Really, you will be there on the ground, and nobody will call anyone for you, because you know, it costs money?
Or are there several firefighting services in town, and they are not going to be able to balance their budget and will lose competitively?
Forget the economics, it just feels very morally wrong, either that, or there is more to the story that is not being told here. Call me a pampered European who has social services for everything, I don't care, it feels very wrong for them to be there and let a house burn down while they are watching it.
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Doesn't surprise me much in a country with such a desastrous health policy. Simply because that shows the amount of neoliberal asociality in parts of US politics, leading to such incredible events. I'm sorry for your right wing politicians responsible for such aberrations.
FDP party of germany would like to have the same conditions, thank god they're down to 5% in surveys.
I scorn this disgusting rampaging form of extreme capitalism which contradicts any form of solidarity between citizens. And all those neoliberals responsible for this only to critizise extreme moderate people such as Obama as communists. Bet those are people who didn't have any friends as childs, now flocking together in disgusting political parties.
User was warned for this post
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On October 05 2010 16:50 Condor wrote:
I can definitely follow the calculated risk line of thinking, the economics is simple enough. But doesn't it feel cold and inhuman to you? They were at his house, they were actually there before the fire started. They had the means and everything, and while the guy was standing in front of them telling them he would pay whatever, they just let his house catch fire and burn down? I mean, forget the economic viewpoint, what ever happened to human decency? Charge the guy afterwards or something, but help him out!
How do you walk down the street? Suppose something stupid happens, you trip, hurt yourself, can't get up. Does it really work this way that everybody will just pass you by thinking: he didn't pay me to help him out? Really, you will be there on the ground, and nobody will call anyone for you, because you know, it costs money?
Or are there several firefighting services in town, and they are not going to be able to balance their budget and will lose competitively?
Forget the economics, it just feels very morally wrong, either that, or there is more to the story that is not being told here. Call me a pampered European who has social services for everything, I don't care, it feels very wrong for them to be there and let a house burn down while they are watching it.
Municipal firefighters aren't just bystanders on the street. If they put out the fire, they would be doing it on the clock with work resources, that's not volunteering but it's grounds for termination.
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On October 05 2010 16:44 Sanders wrote:
Where did this happen? Kazakhstan? Somalia? Niger?
... the USA?
There is nothing that can justify this sort of action... or inaction. This is a basic public service that should be provided to everybody no questions asked. I cannot see why such an important service should be provided in this way. It is something everybody needs and therefore should be provided from tax money to ensure that everybody is protected and bullshit like this doesn't happen.
A few years back, here in NZ, a power company shut off power to the house of a lady who was on life support because they failed to pay their power bills. She died, public outrage ensued, law change happened and we made an important fix to our system. I can only hope this leads to a fix in America's clearly flawed system.
Well, couldn't you argue she should have planned her life better? What if the company is on the brink of bankruptcy and can't afford to give power to those who don't pay? I don't really see the "no questions asked" logic. I completely disagree.
It's circumstantial. As many have pointed out, it's very similar to insurance. Unfortunately if you don't pay for it you aren't entitled to anything.
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On October 05 2010 16:50 Condor wrote:
I can definitely follow the calculated risk line of thinking, the economics is simple enough. But doesn't it feel cold and inhuman to you? They were at his house, they were actually there before the fire started. They had the means and everything, and while the guy was standing in front of them telling them he would pay whatever, they just let his house catch fire and burn down? I mean, forget the economic viewpoint, what ever happened to human decency? Charge the guy afterwards or something, but help him out!
How do you walk down the street? Suppose something stupid happens, you trip, hurt yourself, can't get up. Does it really work this way that everybody will just pass you by thinking: he didn't pay me to help him out? Really, you will be there on the ground, and nobody will call anyone for you, because you know, it costs money?
Or are there several firefighting services in town, and they are not going to be able to balance their budget and will lose competitively?
Forget the economics, it just feels very morally wrong, either that, or there is more to the story that is not being told here. Call me a pampered European who has social services for everything, I don't care, it feels very wrong for them to be there and let a house burn down while they are watching it.
The thing is though, with your street example, you DO get something for helping people out even if it isn't money. You get a good feeling and perhaps some increased reputation/adoration from others as opposed to feeling guilty for not helping the person. In fact, if you really thought about it, you could probably put a money value on it. I'm sure there is some amount of cash you would take to walk by the person, hell you could even argue that by taking money that you could do MORE good by donating it somewhere.
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Isn't it kind of irresponsible to let your payments on something you throughly depend on lapse? I don't understand why everybody is up in arms over the firefighters seeming lack of morals // greed while glossing over the lack of personal responsibility that caused this whole issue in the first place.
Fires generally don't randomly start in barrels either.....
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On October 05 2010 16:44 Droodjerky wrote:Show nested quote +On October 05 2010 16:26 bbq ftw wrote:On October 05 2010 16:16 Droodjerky wrote:On October 05 2010 16:01 bbq ftw wrote:On October 05 2010 15:39 Droodjerky wrote:On October 05 2010 15:35 xbankx wrote:On October 05 2010 15:24 Droodjerky wrote:On October 05 2010 14:36 xbankx wrote:
Personal responsibility is important that guy choose not to pay the fee and he suffered the consequences. Same with health insurance of many young people in US. I don't care much. I mean as long as the fire department knew that there was no people trapped inside then its fine. The $75 fee was Insurance. So, they didn't have to do a damned thing to save his house. You should also know they would be under no obligation to save anyone/anything in the house. Basically, if they (and you) were to follow your logic to it's conclusions. You'd sit outside and watch people burn to death in the house as well. You see, the man didn't pay to have anyone rescued in case of a fire. Money doesn't give a crap about anything other than money. You see, it's not profit that helps people. It's people that help people. Watching someones house burn down is a douche thing to do. And you sir are a hypocrite for not standing with your logic all the way through. As I said as long as there is no people in the house then the fire department is under no obligation to help. The guy didn't pay his fee so he suffered the consequence by losing his monetary property. Life is another case though that is why I put in the clause that "as long as there are no people in the house". Look life is hard, nothing is free so you either pay the fees or suffer the consequences. People can be generous and help but don't expect it every time. So, you're a hypocrite. You're not following your logic to it's conclusion. You see, he didn't pay the bill. So, you should watch the people burn like you watch the house burn. It's analogous to health insurance. You don't/can't pay, you don't get your life saved. There E.R. circumstances that you do get saved (from immediate danger) and charged out the arse for it later. Which, is why I think they should have saved the house and charged a large fee. Since it's in line with other Insurance Industry Standards. Regarding the term hypocrite: I know its tempting, but its just a terrible idea to throw out terms you don't understand in the blood sport of internets debating. Its not like he's lying about his beliefs--you can argue that they're inconsistent, sure. Are they? Sometimes common sense isn't a terrible metric (see: search and seizure precedents), which Mr. xbankx seems to subscribe in this case. But if you want a more rigorous argument: one could argue that life has a value that transcends a mere monetary value. Its not as hokey as its sounds--its the same line of argument used in death penalty, abortion, healthcare, etc. debates. To pose a quick question, regarding your ER example: would you say that the ER shouldn't save someone who can't 'pay out the arse' for their life-saving treatment? His and a few other peoples argument in this thread is simple: Pay for service = Get service Don't pay for service = Don't get service What they don't understand is that part of that service in this case is saving people from that burning property. If you agree with their argument, the logic is exactly the same as Health Insurance. Pay for service = Get service Don't pay for service = Don't get service The arguments even more closely resemble one another when you take into account both Insurances have saving a life as part of them. He's a hypocrite, because he pretends to subscribe to a position he doesn't actually subscribe to. Then he uses an Ad Hoc argument to distance himself from my accusation. You see, saying Human life is worth more than the property has no bearing on the Insurance Policy. If anyone refuses to accept the logic above, they are at the very least cognitively dissident. To answer your question, I would say that Health Care should be universal and government provided (aka, from taxes). However, in the current state of the system. They should treat the person and charge them an appropriate sum. The E.R. should also give a detailed bill on what the person is being charged for. I think the position he claims to subscribe to is: Pay for service = Get service Don't pay for service = Don't get service UNLESS you will die in absence of said service Which I think is not necessary a flawed or even that much of a self-inconsistent argument. Seeing as normally you certainly wouldn't give away food to someone who hadn't paid for it...unless they were starving to death. Call it irrational or whatever (many human impulses are). I think this would be the normal pattern of human behavior nonetheless. By the way, I could easily flip your reductio ad absurdum argument using your claim that "Human life is worth more than the property has no bearing on the Insurance Policy." by casting your argument as: Pay for service = Get service Don't pay for service = Don't get service unless you get harmed by withholding that service And since you 99% of the time get harmed in some way by denial of service, that means get service if you don't pay in most cases. To summarize: using the equal statements one could think there are only 2 tenable positions to argue from. However, that's oversimplifying the situation. And there's a middle ground between rigidly holding to contractual agreement and forcing altruistic behavior all the time. I would say people would help other people out most of the time without compensation. Someone comes over to your house, you offer them food. They're not starving, it's just a nice thing to do. Hell offer a drink to go with that food and a bed if they'd like to stay the night. Perhaps I'm mad and this isn't how other people think... This mind set of letting money do all the talking is beyond my ability to accept. It also boggles my mind how people arbitrarily draw lines. Human life has no more intrinsic value than anything else when held up to the massive void that is our universe. But damn it, if they'res one thing we should be able to understand it's the plight of another one of our kind. No ones life or lively hood should be decided on because of a payment or lack there of. Other countries seems to grasp this concept and have single payer systems for the obvious needs. Yes, I understand it's about the here and now. That we must deal with what we have at this moment. But, what the hell people. How do you get to a better place/system if you just sit complacent and except that it's right because the contract said so?
I can only say you are very very idealistic. Life is not easy, people do not always help others. It would be nice that the world is ideal but it isn't that is why there is rule set. Running a fire station cost a lot of money from buying very expensive life insurance for the fire fighters to updating equipments. People must pay the fees. Is it sad that the guy lost his house? Yes. But you know what? This is life. Think about it logically, there are not that many fires. Heck my grandparents are 80 years old and they never had a single fire accident in their house and they could have gone 80 years without paying . House burning down is a very small percentage of all the houses in US. Now if all the people only pay when their house get burned down who is supporting the firemen? Money must come from somewhere. That is why there is a fee from everyone to help support these firemen.
You can say im a hypocrite but I personally don't think so. I believe life is above any monetary value. Life should not depend on money or fee. Its like abortion opponents sometimes agree that in case of rape or incest or danger to the mother's life abortions could be performed. However, I do not see life and monetary items such as clothing and house as the same. If you took a risky not paying a fee for firefighters then don't expect them to save your monetary items.
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America is pretty awesome... glad I not longer live there.
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pretty silly not to put it out even after he offered to pay whatever it took.
seems a bit of a harsh "teaching a lesson" approach
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EPT
