Wednesday, February 27, 2013

What is Insurance?


Insurance:
Writing from the USA:

 What is insurance intended to accomplish?  What is insurance actually doing?

Purpose of insurance:  Pay the insured for losses incurred as specified in the contract.  This prevents loss of assets and possible impoverishment of the family incurring the losses.  The idea is to have a 'pool' of people who pay into it and who then take turns using the fund as losses occur.  The theory is that the fund will remain solvent.  Originally, insurance purchase was voluntary. 

Problems with this voluntary insurance design:

Insurance funds do go bankrupt due to thievery or stupidity. 

Thievery can come from many directions, from bogus medical claims, through the denial of legitimate claims and gambling clients' money while calling their activities 'investments'.  Medical personnel have been known to bill for no visits, or to milk the number of visits like an overripe cow.  The biggest problem is that these insurance schemes 'insure' more value than they have, so if there is a flood of claims, money is lacking to pay the claims.  I know of one 'insurance' scheme that was drained while paying for a political campaign.

The voluntary insurance plans were competitive in the marketplace, which tended to bring costs down.  The unions pushed for 'benefits' and employers were forced to buy insurance for their workers, again without any mechanism to keep costs down.   

And this was before even more insurance schemes became mandatory.   When insurance became mandatory, several more problems surfaced like pond scum.

Mandatory auto insurance was instated in Arizona by one of the most crooked legislatures on record.  The prices for insurance immediately rose and the insurance people went out and bought new Cadillacs.  Their income is so secure, the police are even notified if a driver does not buy insurance.  The state takes away your license to drive if you do not pay these insurance people.  It was suggested that this insurance be voluntary, that individuals insure themselves if they so desire, but we were told that these insurance brokers are the best people to handle our money, and if you were lucky enough never to use it, you just lost the money.  You are not permitted to save this money in a special account so if you do not use it, you could have it.  These insurance people get richer and richer because actual price controls were never instituted.  Insurance prices are so high, people struggle to make the payments. 

I see a huge new problem when mandatory health insurance is instituted.  The medical profession protests low government payments for services for the insured while they pad the bills.  Exorbitant charges are foisted off on the uninsured and 'costs' are out of control.  They say that about 60-70% of all personal bankruptcies are caused by medical bills while the patient has insurance.  Thus the insurance is expensive, does not cover the hospital costs  yet the patient is forced to buy it while the medical costs rise unchecked.  The cost of the insurance has few controls, so people must pay more and more every year.  Some attempts have been made to cut administrative costs of the insurance companies, forcing them to spend on the insured instead of their second yacht.

The main gripe with mandatory insurance is that the free market is not working when individuals are forced to buy anything.  The lack of controls on charges while forcing individuals to buy creates inflation in the health care market and a further drain on other sectors of the economy.  Anybody who calls this capitalism is foolish.  The politicians have merged the indigent care problem with the private market and then expanded it to include more people, displacing church and traditional family based care systems, while subsidizing some private businesses paying CEOs huge sums . 

My second question:  What is insurance actually accomplishing? 

Medical care was already available for the indigent but is expensive for the ordinary individual needing specialty treatment.  Express medical care clinics are located all over town and are reasonable in cost.  So the question was never if medical care is available.  The real question is who could be forced to buy insurance, which would then increase the size of the insurance pool money.  So now the IRS is leading the charge to punish those who do not buy insurance, whether or not they make a claim on the health care system.  They will be charged whether they use it or not and they will never see their money again.  I think it is a function of individual rights not to be forced to buy.  The insurance companies and the government are now taking a sizeable chunk of income from consumers, who cannot now spend it on the economy.  More and more money is tied up in insurance every year, which drains the rest of the economy.  Unions have negotiated exorbitant benefit plans that are bankrupting local governments and more and more money is controlled by the insurance brokers.

So the majority of the people in the USA have good medical care but at exorbitant escalating costs to themselves now mandated by the government.  Indigent care has always been freely given.  The health care charge forced by the IRS is justly called a tax by the Supreme Court.   All this is not the quality of the health care, but is about the scramble to collect and hold the money mandated from the taxpayers.  Current insurance systems are larded with bureaucracy, high operating costs and administrative perks, all at the expense of the insured.  Our health care money is being spent on expensive administration costs and resort vacations.  I think the system needs reform.

Health care goals are being met but the financial cost is crippling other segments of the economy as the people struggle under the burdens of mandatory auto and health insurance costs, high fuel prices, and guaranteed inflation of at least 2% a year, which devalues the money and raises consumer prices. 
                                              Washington D.C. Grand Central Station

 

 

 

 

 

 

          

 

 

 

 

 

Saturday, February 16, 2013

Asteroid Aftermath


Unite the world in an effort to ward off future threats from asteroids.  I think all the effort and expense now spent on war, vengeance, turf battles and other violent activities should be spent on the space effort, which would include an elaborate setup designed to protect the planet from future asteroid hits. 

Financial enticements from possible mining strikes on other planets or asteroids could result in huge profits for entrepreneurs, working out there with national government sponsored businesses.  A new source of metals and minerals could transform the economy.  Freefall businesses like the molecular construction of new compounds, hydroponics, aquaculture and other life support could aid the construction of the watching stations and the interception equipment.  We are not so primitive that we do not have the capability to stand watch over our home.

Now that we know the danger is real, it is imperative that we get started on the project now.  I suggest a symposium of politicians and scientists to discuss the feasibility of ideas, project costs and location of the major assemblage and launch areas.  I believe that all nations must be involved, even the 'renegade' nations.  This has to be a worldwide project designed to protect the whole world. 

Project costs must be shared and the resultant employment should reflect the portion of the project costs contributed.  If the USA contributes x of the cost of the project, then the USA gets that much employment.  This would encourage the nations to contribute.  Private entrepreneurship is needed on the supply side, the mining interests, and other commercial possibilities. 

We as a species can protect our world.  Scientists think an asteroid exterminated the dinosaurs but I know we have more sense than to allow it to happen to us.  Let us unite in the face of adversity and create a web of early warning protection around our planet.  Just think of all the positive outcomes from an investment in outer space infrastructure:

·         employment

·         investment opportunities

·         development of new technologies

·         satellite maintenance programs

·         protection of the planet

·         cooperation among nations

·         national investment

·         new mineral resources

I call for an international meeting to discuss the need for an early warning system and asteroid deflection mechanism to protect the Earth.   

     

Wednesday, February 13, 2013

Sentence Structure

 
 To All My ESL Friends
I see you way far away,
dreaming under a pink sky.
English learners many word order patterns for sentences.
Here is one basic pattern:
 
'What the sentence is about' or 'subject' is first
then 'what action' is happening (verb)
then the action is happening 'to what or when or who'?
 
Create simple sentences like:
I am here.
You are there.
China is 'in the southern latitudes.'
USA is 'in the northern latitudes.'
I drive to Mexico.
Asteroid 2012DA14 comes close Friday.
I write 'novels and essays'.
You write a blog.
You are a blogger. 
You enjoy blogging.
It is high noon.
I hear a rooster.
He crows all day.
Eastern Europeans sell crystals here.
Iranian rugs are beautiful.
German schnitzel is good.
Gobekli Tepe is the oldest. 
Homo Erectus bones were found in China.
Homo Erectus bones were lost at sea during World War II.
You could find them.
 
Much can be expressed using this elemental sentence pattern.  The punctuation marks are not necessary, and are only there to illustrate that these parts may consist of more than one word.   This pattern limits the thoughts that can be developed, so one must learn other patterns.......
Sorry about the deviation from the usual topics but I wanted to talk ESL for a few minutes.  Sentence diagramming in English is a good source for sentence patterns.
 
                                               Eclipse of the Sun 2012
 

Friday, January 25, 2013

Gun Control


So we are an armed nation with a tradition of freedom to go how we want, where we want, carrying what we want.  The recent social engineering talk indicates a willingness to tinker with the basic social structure by further controlling what can be purchased by individuals.  Limiting the size of sodas that can be purchased is futile unless the numbers purchased per day are also controlled, which also requires identification and recordkeeping and punishments for violating the law and so on.  When does it end?  When will people consider that the society already has a basis and that basis is important to preserve?  Changing society is no small thing and any change has far reaching consequences.  I prefer education to blatant control.   

I was a child when the civil rights demands began to be heard in the 1950s.  I can remember the black and white TV and the images of the small black girl walking up the school steps while being taunted by white men.  My father said it was wrong for those men to be there and that they were probably hypocrites who went to church every Sunday.  It took 60 years for true civil rights to manifest, exemplified by the election of President Obama.  Our society is much more homogeneous than it used to be. 

Those who advocate for the cessation of 2nd Amendment rights do not realize that an insurrection would result if confiscation were attempted.  A congresswoman has introduced a bill banning over a hundred types of firearms, all while saying this control over your choices is good for you.  If they control that, what else will they try to control?  Some liberals want the people to have no firearms, which would reduce them to subjects rather than citizens, to paraphrase a friend. 

Power mad city councilmen want the power to control gun ownership within the city limits.  As a first step they want to control gun sales within the city.   Being disarmed in the city of Tucson is like being naked on a city bus.  This attempted power grab by city councilmen should be thwarted.  Petty city officials should not attempt to breach constitutional rights.  What's next?  A computer check of every beer you drink with dinner?  A limit on salsa servings because it might cause heartburn?  A limit on the amount of candy you can buy?  These council people should get back to doing their jobs, which is to keep the city maintained and solvent, neither of which they are doing. 

 If their liberal goal is social engineering, perhaps a longer perspective is needed before attempting to destroy self reliance in our society, of which the possession of personal firearms is the most important manifestation.   Since the liberals feel free to design a future based on restrictions imposed on the populace now, perhaps an alternative vision is imperative.  How about a future where people are held accountable for their actions and possessions?  Swift accountability and punishment.  Remember McVeigh?  He didn't hang around long.  The delay in punishment creates a perception of no punishment but restraint, which seems a relief to these punks and failures who now are cared for at public expense.   

Rather than try to change the interpretation of the 2nd Amendment, it would be better to deal with the practical problems of gun ownership by the citizenry.  That could be done now without opposition.  Try and think of how to address the physical problem of guns being used by juveniles and lunatics to kill people.   The gun owner should be held libel for crimes committed by household members using the firearm.   In plain terms, adults who own firearms are responsible for securing them.  Punish adults who let juveniles and lunatics access firearms.  A minor should not own a gun.  Autistics, retarded people, suicidal people, people who have been convicted of assault and so on should not be allowed to legally own a gun.  It's already a crime to buy a gun for a criminal.  Let the behavior of the individual dictate gun accessability.  Don't punish the many for the sins of a few.