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Why is Waulud's Bank empty? (Pre-History)
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Ishmael


In: Toronto
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Mick Harper wrote:
The USA has lagged behind in all this....


This is nonsense but you can't be dsabused of it.

I have lived under both systems. I know which I prefer -- which is most reliable and which is most secure.

The ideal health system exists today, however, only in the field of plastic surgery -- and in veterinary hospitals.
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Ishmael


In: Toronto
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nemesis8 wrote:
'Unequal' exchange. (Between individuals)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loan_shark
'Unequal' exchange (between states)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russia-Ukraine_gas_dispute


I'm sorry but I can't agree with any of this.

No one forces anyone to take a loan from a loan shark. No one forces the Ukrainians to purchase Russian gas.
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nemesis8


In: byrhfunt
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Mick I agree with the central thrust of the argument, that it was a "mixed bag" of politicians who introduced welfare reform through Europe.

This was most frustrating for your more "traditional" Liberals like Herbert Spencer, who, were convinced that Gladstone, for example, was introducing a form of "creeping socialism"

Mick says
The USA has lagged behind in all this because this is a states and not a national matter. So no welfare state. Because people can (and do) move between states, as they can't between Britain and Germany, it has proved both expensive and inefficient dealing with welfare claimants and the sick (not just the poor sick either). Canada is much more enlightened in these matters. As Ishmael will now confirm.


Not so sure about this though. Seems to me the "explanation" why the USA has "lagged" behind, (in the development of a welfare state) is that they simply have had, more ample access to capital, land, and labour. So have always been "more attached" to "free market" economics.

Why would Americans' want to risk what they see as "creeping communism/restriction of individual liberty" in that scenario?

Generally you only change things, when you need to, so the question is why did all the leading nations in Europe rush to introduce "national" welfare reform at the end of the nineteenth century?

I am not sure all this can be explained by political opportunism.
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Mick Harper
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In: London
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No one forces the Ukranians to purchase Russian gas.

No one forces the Ukrainians to keep on nicking Russian gas but they do. And we are currently negotiating with these criminals to offer them unequivocal NATO protection from the Russians! We must be mad.
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Hatty
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In: Berkshire
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Generally you only change things, when you need to, so the question is why did all the leading nations in Europe rush to introduce "national" welfare reform at the end of the nineteenth century?

I am not sure all this can be explained by political opportunism.

By the late nineteenth century any country that aspired to being A Great Power had to be industrialised. Prussia in the 1840's had a compulsory insurance contributions scheme run by local authorities financed by both employees and employers which under Bismarck became a compulsory state scheme as already noted.

Accidents in the workplace must surely have been costly and would require state legislation to impose compulsory insurance on employers to ensure that cost would be met. It may have been more of a pragmatic than a political programme mainly for the benefit of workers (sickness insurance was also incorporated and the scheme was quickly refined to include old age as well as accident insurance) with the aim of creating an industrial nation and consequently but not necessarily intentionally reinforcing state authority.
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Rocky



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Ishmael wrote:
The ideal health system exists today, however, only in the field of plastic surgery -- and in veterinary hospitals.


You can only have the ideal model if you get rid of emergency medicine. How do you suppose we get rid of emergencies?

Besides, if one can't pay for his cat's cancer treatment, one can merely put the cat to sleep. One cannot put one's child to sleep if there is no money to pay for cancer treatment.
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Mick Harper
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In: London
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No, no, you miss the point entirely. Once everything is nationalised, it is put under one roof, and everyone is protected against everything. Not only is this super-efficient in terms of administration it means the whole welfare question becomes 'political'. In other words, everything is constantly adjusted to make sure that things work and can be paid for in whatever situation prevails.

For instance, in Britain the whole 'insurance' aspect has essentially disappeared because it was found that there is a vast majority who virtually never need welfare and a small minoirty that need it all the time. So basically you just pay the second lot 'for life' out of general taxation, just as you do the permanently insane, or the grossly physically handicapped.

Similarly, pensions are adjusted downwards as more and more people stay alive longer. Now the basic state pension is just the minimum welfare provision and everyone is encouraged to take out work/private pensions if they want to live The Life of Reilly in old age. (Reilly, Ace of Spies begins tonite at ten on UKTV History, highly recommended).

Of course the government has to pay the small price of having this a constant political football but they're pretty adept by now at working-the-system. For instance, every party threatens to force the unemployed to take a job but thus far (after forty years) they still haven't got round to doing it. But if the slump gets big and the Poles go home...who knows? As I say, it's a political question. We are after all a Welfare State.
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Ishmael


In: Toronto
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Mick Harper wrote:
Once everything is nationalised, it is put under one roof, and everyone is protected against everything

Mick. This is your religion.

And it is the popular faith among those in your socio-economic bracket.
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Ishmael


In: Toronto
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Rocky wrote:
You can only have the ideal model if you get rid of emergency medicine.

How do you figure that?

How do you suppose we get rid of emergencies?

A valid question only if one grants the premise. Do you want an economy of abundance or of scarcity? Surgery is already cheap. It is so cheap that people indulge in it merely to decorate their bodies. But why is it only one kind of surgery that costs so little?
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Ishmael


In: Toronto
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Rocky wrote:
Here's an incident from earlier in the decade regarding the premier of Alberta, Ralph Klein:

My hero.
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nemesis8


In: byrhfunt
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I think I've got it....Rocky has posted some sort of "biblical" type allegory.

First of all this guy Klein abuses the poor and the needy, then he gives them his worldly goods, then he offers to help them travel to the land of milk and honey.
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Mick Harper
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In: London
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Mick. This is your religion. And it is the popular faith among those in your socio-economic bracket.

You are forgetting an important point of Applied Epistemology when dealing with politics. It is impossible to avoid being either left or right on certain issues. You will only be an Applied Epistemologist if you are unpredictable as to whether you will be left or right on any particular issue. Of course you know my view on this issue, we've been round this block often enough.

You keep on making the mistake that so long as you utter views that most people you know would frown on, you are being an Applied Epistemologist. You are not. You are merely being a contrarian. Or, worse, just being right-wing in a left-wing milieu. When you find yourself disagreeing with and agreeing with everyone on a completely unpredictable basis, then you know you are being an Applied Epistemologist.
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Ishmael


In: Toronto
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Mick Harper wrote:
You keep on making the mistake that so long as you utter views that most people you know would frown on, you are being an Applied Epistemologist.

Millions of people the world over enjoy a good cup of tea. I agree with them. This does not affect my intellectual status.

When was the last time you questioned your conclusions regarding public health?

This does affect yours. Some time ago, I offered you a defence of market forces you had not heard before. In fact, I provided you with a rebuttal to an argument you were accustomed to making without fear of opposition. Did this prompt you to re-examine your views?

I thought not.
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DPCrisp


In: Bedfordshire
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Rational economic exchange. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rational_economic_exchange

'Unequal' exchange. (Between individuals) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loan_shark

'Unequal' exchange (between states) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russia-Ukraine_gas_dispute

Sis, please tell us in words of one syllable what unequal economic exchange means and how it can be the ordinary situation.

Don't remember using the word "(para)military".....so you might need to rethink that.

Indeed not, so on rethinking
...a fortified outpost... used to force unequal exchange... the very real threat... easy domination... and therefore easy expropriation... real domination over a wide territory...
"(para)military" still seems to paint the right picture.
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nemesis8


In: byrhfunt
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"There you go again" Dan

If you are not misquoting me, you are inviting me to explain things in one syllable, whilst you for some reason, are allowed four.

It is simple, if you are not interested in the "trench" I have opened (and you clearly are not) you can just move on, and dig your own.

Your "Posh Celtic folks on hills" thesis might have merit, and if you dug a little deeper the rest of us might see it.

If you want to stand at the top of my trench, (as you are) shouting "dirt" "dirt" that's fine by me also, (to see you at the top of the trench, behaving like Lope de Aguirre, is keeping me mightily entertained, whilst I do the initial spade work ).

So there you have it, an offer to exchange viewpoints on an "unequal basis" is hereby declined, exchange is suspended until the "rules of the game" are normalised.
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