The Conservatives have finally gotten around to doing what it is they do: slash public spending. It does not matter that the federal government is running a massive surplus - what matters is that they cut spending, then promptly position themselves as the champion of the working folks for doing so.
A department significantly hit was Canadian Heritage. The department's Status of Women Canada, an agency which promotes gender equality, stands to lose $5 million from its annual $23 million budget.Some pro-Conservative groups, such as REAL Women Canada, mounted a campaign over the summer to scrap the agency created under the Pierre Trudeau government.
Priority areas
But neither Finance Minister Jim Flaherty nor Treasury Board President John Baird are making apologies, saying the cuts reflect the priorities of "working families."
"I think we want today to look at the way government spends money and say, 'are we getting effective results, accountable spending and value for money?'" he said Tuesday on CTV's Canada AM.
"Does the money that we spend as a government reflect the priorities that Canadian families have for their federal government? Those were the base lines that we looked at."
Baird said "priority areas" such as health care, cancer control strategy, safer streets and greater tax cuts for senior citizens, for instance, will all benefit from the cuts.
As for the Court Challenges Program, Baird said it doesn't make sense for the federal government to "subsidize lawyers to challenge the government's own laws in court."
"We are investing more resources in programs that are important to ordinary Canadians such as child care and safer streets," Flaherty added. "We won't apologize for our capacity to say no to bad ideas."
When asked on Canada AM why an $11 million program meant to deal with B.C.'s pine beetle infestation is being cut, Baird said it was "unused spending" from the previous Liberal government's strategy.
"Prime Minister Stephen Harper has committed to spending literally hundreds of millions of dollars for a new strategy, a far more aggressive and effective strategy that will have greater results for combating the pine beetle problem in British Columbia," he said.
The Tories are also eliminating the $78-million Goods and Services Tax rebate program, which was intended to help foreign visitors to Canada by allowing them to recoup the GST they pay while in the country. Liberal finance critic John McCallum said the move will hurt tourism.
So they've chopped a billion, because they claim they want to "re-invest" it in priority areas. If that is the case, why not just spend less than one-thirteenth of the surplus and keep funding those same programs? The reason is that for dyed in the wool conservatives, any cuts to government are, by definition, good. The actual merits of the programs or services being eliminated are meaningless.
Meanwhile, the reaction to cuts has started to come, and it doesn't look good.
After Monday's announcement that Minister of Canadian Heritage Bev Oda would be making cuts to her department — $4.6-million of which would be coming from the Museums Assistance Program (MAP) over the next two years — panicked e-mails crisscrossed the country.Michael Robinson, director of Calgary's Glenbow Museum, called the announcement “an ill-advised cut [to] one of the best-run federal programs.” Earlier this month, his institution finally received word it would receive close to $100,000 from MAP to develop an exhibition for 2009 called Power, Politics and Patronage: Sir Cornelius William Van Horne and the Railway Artists. The money is being used to hire a senior curator and researchers for a book. “It's difficult to find private-sector support for those kinds of research costs. That's why MAP is so valuable.”
While national and flagship provincial museums pursue ambitious expansion plans, Canada's regional institutions have lobbied for three decades for increased funding for MAP to pay for everything from upgrading exhibitions and hiring curators to conserving artifacts. Launched in 1972, the program was originally worth $7.5-million; it's now around $10-million.
Whatever the fund's size, the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage last week passed a motion urging Ottawa to adopt a report calling for an increase in MAP funding to properly service the needs of Canada's 2,500 small and regional museums, which welcome more than 55 million visitors each year.
I was the recipient of one of those panicked e-mails yesterday. I am the treasurer of the board that runs our local museum, and yesterday received an e-mail from our manager saying that we will be hard pressed to maintain our current level of service, and that most of the plans we had laid out for this year are no longer viable. Our museum maintains an extensive collection, but the building is almost 40 years old and requires major upgrades to ensure artifacts are properly preserved. So in addition to having to cut back our hours of operation, we will not be able to preserve an important part of Northern Canadian history. Ah well, maybe we can fund the museum by selling off artifects on e-Bay. There's always a private sector solution, right?
In a nice one-two punch, I am also the museum's representative on our community's tourism advisory board, which led me to receive a second despondent e-mail, when a board member forwarded me a press release from the Tourism Industry Association of Canada.
Unanticipated federal program cuts announced yesterday are a slap in the face to the Canadian tourism industry, says the group representing the interests of Canada’s 200,000-plus tourism-related businesses.“The cuts threaten the well-being of small and medium-sized enterprises in every province and territory—and the livelihood of 1.6 million Canadians,” said Randy Williams, President and CEO of the Tourism Industry Association of Canada (TIAC). “And they don’t even meet the government’s own spending test in terms of effectiveness, results and value for money.”
That is because measures to support tourism are an investment, not an expense, he noted, pointing out that they pay off exponentially in terms of increased tax revenues. Tourism-generated tax revenues total an estimated $15.3 billion a year, including a federal share of $7.7 billion.
Elimination of the Visitor Rebate Program, under which international business travellers and tourists are reimbursed for the GST and HST they pay on eligible goods and short-term accommodations, is the biggest cause for concern. The government tabled a notice of ways and means motion proposing amendments to the Excise Tax Act that would eliminate the $78.8 million program effective April 1, 2007.
Established in response to lobbying by TIAC and other industry stakeholders, the Visitor Rebate Program strengthens Canada’s competitiveness as a visitor-friendly nation and promotes spending by visitors—spending that supports Canadian jobs and tax revenues. Canadian duty-free stores located at the Canada-United States land border, which have the right to provide on-the-spot cash rebates to departing visitors, thus encouraging them to spend the rebates in Canada, will be hit especially hard by the program’s cancellation.
All other major destinations have visitor rebate programs and, given the increasingly competitive global environment, many are expanding the list of eligible goods and services and making it easier for travellers to access them.
“The elimination of the Visitor Rebate Program reflects a total failure on the part of the federal government to recognize today’s economic realities affecting Canadian tourism and Canada’s competitiveness as a destination,” Mr. Williams said.
The end of the GST rebate for visitors will severely impact tourism in Canada's north, where higher base prices mean higher GST costs. It is not a stretch to say that operators will be put out of business by ending this program. Guess it's a good thing we're cutting back the museum hours. It's not like we'll have all that many visitors anyway.
It is really quite amazing just how foolish the Conservatives' first round (there will be more) of spending cuts are: they are bad for business, bad for our history and heritage and appallingly shortsighted. In short, they are representative of the Harper government's approach to running the country.
I am the "working folks. The combined income of my wife and I is around 50k. I have 2 children, 3(happy birthday Ed) and 4 ( 5 next month). We live in Ontario. We are them family that the conservatives think they are targeting. I hate these cuts. All of them. The liberals cut social programs to the bone the balance the budget, then ever so slowly started to put small amounts back in. Now the conservatives say "heck, who needs bones anyway?". I Don't Want Another Tax Cut, I Want A Government Capable of Working On My Behalf.
As for the Court Challenges Program, Baird said it doesn't make sense for the federal government to "subsidize lawyers to challenge the government's own laws in court."
John Baird said this? That's pretty funny considering that the the Court Challenges Program funded a group that took part in the case leading to the Egan decision. Baird had better be careful or he'll tick off a whole bunch of people...
It is never cutting just for cutting sake. They are always moving forward on their quest for the Neocon nirvanna. In the case of the museums, let them get run down. In the end culture will be opened up on the next NAFTA negitiations, US private enterprise will move in to save our museums, by making them profit oriented organizations with mergers, cost cutting and eventual closures, Chapters will be able to sell to Barnes & Noble, Global can sell to Fox, the CBC will be privatised etc.
Who knows ending the GST rebates is possibly eliminating unfair trade practices in the eyes of our future US masters. Step by step we are moving towards becoming God fearing Americans.
Yeah
Just because we have money to spend on useless garbage doesn't mean we should. Individuals make these choices all the time. Not cutting an ineffective, inefficient program simply because we can afford to keep it is the stupidest reason for maintaining the staus quo.
The most wealthy people are also the most cautious about how they spend their incomes, that's how they get and stay wealthy. The government could learn a thing or two from the well-to-do.
Some of the groups and programs that got cut are because they have evolved into special interest lobby organizations living beyond their original purpose, SOW being the most obvious.
The reports I've heard is that only 5% of people even use that tourism GST rebate, and most I would guess without even knowing or requesting it due to the automatic systems in place at airports and duty-free shops. The other 95% don't seem to think it's a requirement to visit our country and I have a hard time putting a lot of stock in Randy Williams' doomsday scenario of lost jobs and closed shops.
The only people who will notice a difference after the cuts are put in place are those on the payrolls of the particular groups affected. You'd be hard pressed to find someone who knew what these groups were or what they did before they got eliminated, so who's going to notice that they're gone?
These programs were neither inefficeint nor ineffective. One helped keep our small regional museums viable. Small museums have tiny revenue bases compared to large museums, but they must maintain the same perservations standards as their large counterparts. The Conservatives have doomed some small museums to fail, while others will be forced to seel off or deaccession parts of their collection.
People get wealthy in all sorts of ways, some perfectly legitimate, some very unsavory. An example of a government emulating the wealthy is the Repbulican government of the United States. If you think that is a good example of public government, you and I will not bother exchanging comments again.
As fort he Stauts of Women Council, for which you use an unpleasant and sexist acronym, who the hell are you to say it has outlived its usefulness. Please tell me all about your tribulations as a woman prior to your sex change.
i don't know where you get that five percent figure, but I can tell you that tourists in the NWT definitely get their GST rebates, which can easily run into the thousand dollar range once you paid for a guided fly-in hunting trip or a few weeks of fishing at a lodge.
The only people who will notice a difference after the cuts are put in place are those on the payrolls of the particular groups affected.
Yes, those would be the working families the Cons claim they are supporting.
I expect it will be too much to expect you to follow your train of thought to its logical conclusion: if rebating sales taxes to visitors is good for our economy, then rebating sales taxes (ie. eliminating GST/HST/PST) domestically must be good for our economy.
The rise and fall of the value of the Canadian dollar will always have greater effect on the viability of tourist-based enterprises than a rebate of a 6% sales tax could ever do. If your business fails, be honest and blame yourself or the economy in general. Visitors go to destinations because they want to go there, not because they know the local sales tax will come out in the wash. In any event, next year the tax will only be 5%. Maybe we can make it even smaller.
There are a couple of items on the list of cuts that I support, including museums. I always throw a few extra bucks in the donation box, irrespective of whether there's an admission fee. However, there are a great many more items on the list that I don't care to fund. On balance, I'm very happy. I'll be certain to increase my voluntary support of those things I value. You should do the same.
>If that is the case, why not just spend less than one-thirteenth of the surplus and keep funding those same programs?
We're still paying off the "unsurplus" of prior years. Besides, what might be available to spend is irrelevant. Government has an obligation to spend and tax as little as possible and should stick to basics. But thanks for reinforcing my belief in the existence of a mentality which believes government - and by extension public agencies - should expand (and spend) to meet available resources. I don't think there's any danger of a challenge to my assumption that public health care agencies won't learn to spend efficiently.
I expect it will be too much to expect you to follow your train of thought to its logical conclusion: if rebating sales taxes to visitors is good for our economy, then rebating sales taxes (ie. eliminating GST/HST/PST) domestically must be good for our economy.
There is nothing logical in your conlusion whatsoever. We live here, and use everyday the services that those sales taxes pay for. Someone from out of the country does not put any stress on oru national infrastructure, nor do they use public services. Why should they pay for them?
The rise and fall of the value of the Canadian dollar will always have greater effect on the viability of tourist-based enterprises than a rebate of a 6% sales tax could ever do.
Maybe, but since the value of the dollar is not the topic of this post, it is not really relevant here. There are probably other factors that affect visitation more than the GST rebate, but they are not under discussion here either. However, an additional six or seven hundred dollars on your tourism bill is a big deal. And it will affect operators, many of whom run their businesses with fairly narrow profit margins.
But thanks for reinforcing my belief in the existence of a mentality which believes government - and by extension public agencies - should expand (and spend) to meet available resources.
Since when is less than one thirteenth of the surplus "available resources"? Hyperbole works as a humourous device, not as an analytical tool.
So lrC, why didn't he cut the subsidies to the oil and gas industry? That industry is making record profits and certainly doesn't need public money. They get about $1.3 billion per year from the feds.
You see, if it were really about fiscal responsibility, that would be the first thing on the block. It isn't. It is a mean spirited, cheeseparing attempte to get thier angry social-conservative agenda enforce via the back door, because hey are too cowardly to bring it up in Parliament, where it belongs.
Not a single organization that had their funding cut or eliminated was consulted or asked to justify the need for the funds. So much for 'Accountability'.
There's the hidden agenda, right there.
Get the bastards out. Before they ruin this country.
>Someone from out of the country does not put any stress on oru national infrastructure, nor do they use public services.
Most of the things our government provides for "free" - including various tourist attractions and recreational areas - are accessible without showing proof of citizenship. Care to try again?
>Maybe, but since the value of the dollar is not the topic of this post, it is not really relevant here.
Sure it is. If the GST isn't a significant factor, then your alarmism has no foundation whatsoever.
>So lrC, why didn't he cut the subsidies to the oil and gas industry?
If that's supposed to scare me into supporting a reinstatement of cancelled funding, you've failed miserably. It just reminds me of all the commercial and industry subsidies that should be cut. I expect you'll try to find reasons to defend those too, or would you like to take this opportunity to declare your opposition to those subsidies?
>You see, if it were really about fiscal responsibility, that would be the first thing on the block.
Ah, you're trying the old "You must deal with the worst problem first to demonstrate your intentions!" tack. Sorry. There's no such obligation. You're just stating your own priorities.
>Not a single organization...was consulted or asked to justify the need for the funds.
Gee. How many do you think would've responded, "Oh, we can cut this and this" or "You know, we've really outlived our usefulness and have just become a self-perpetuating lobby group"?
>Get the bastards out. Before they ruin this country.
Are you in danger of losing taxpayer-funded employment? Tsk.
I love how conservatives always assume that anyone who opposes a cut must be opposing it because they benefit from it directly. That says a lot about the every dog for himself attitude of right wingers. They can't imagine anyone caring about anyone or anything other than themselves.
Baird: "greater tax cuts for senior citizens".
Holy crap. I can't believe he actually said that. The again, maybe his grandma is really rich.
Funny, I just read through the Globe&Mail comments on this same topic and it struck me how many Americans seem to have views which would make Harper look and sound like a milquetoast in comparison. Americans are expressing great interest in the doings of Canada, with very few of said Americans standing up for the little guy.
You see a little of it here as well. I'd like to know, what about these cuts to the social programs that have been effected makes the Americans like them so much (they had these cuts for years, and are still tanking). Also, why do the Canadians on G&M and here sound so much like their American counterparts?
Is this the little run-up to deep integration at play? A levelling of the playing field? An unconscious desire to bring all thinking down to a certain level, all the better for vaunted "leaders" to make a splash for themselves?
Would it benefit deep integration greatly if Canada was solvent and the US was still deeply in the hole? Would it be better for deep integration if whole swathes of society (elders, women, aboriginals, youth, immigrants, the poor and sick, etc.) were made helpless?
Is that the vision and tactic of these Cons?
http://www.vivelecanada.ca/article.php/20060919132553106
also, Alison at Creekside, also The Crag & Canyon News in Banff, Alberta.
Who do the American troops look to as "home" when they are sent overseas to fight? In the past, Canadian troops KNEW where their home was; let's keep it that way.
Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, LE. Sometimes turning off the tap to a lobbyist is just turning off the tap.
Government has an obligation to spend and tax as little as possible
No, actually, they don't. Government has no particular, universal obligation when it comes to taxes and spending; individual governments have individual tax and spend obligations. And given that the majority of Canadians voted against the CPC in the last federal election, supporting either the high-spending Liberal Party or the even higher-spending NDP and PQ, I would say that the federal government of the Dominion of Canada has an obligation to spend and tax rather more than Conservative supporters would like to claim as a natural law.
"They can't imagine anyone caring about anyone or anything other than themselves"
You know, it's not that right wingers don't care about anyone else, it's just that in this country, they often feel their money is wasted. For example: how the Canadian public is forced to pay for art and music that only a small percentage of the population care about. To bring up a comparison, I'm all for separation of church and state, but why should we pay for so-called "high culture" (and I say that very loosely from an anthropological perspective) and not pay for a religion practiced by a far larger percentage of people?
Most pro-conseratives are just tired of paying for things that cost more money than they should (ala long gun registry) and things that are pretty useless. Being able to drink clean water is far more important than some large white painting with a red line down the middle.
I don't feel at home in this country anymore. We've lost our identity to "multi-culturalism" (another way of saying that is "divided and conflicting cultures") and "bilingualism" (read: french). Everyone whines about how the minorities are getting along, but I really think we should re-examine that. I think the born and bred anglophone Canadians are the ones who are getting the short end of the stick. But I guess more than 1 left winger will quickly call me racist... *sigh* I like learning about other cultures (why else would I study anthropology?) but I will not stand for having another culture enforced on me.
Okay, Al, how much "high culture" is actually supported? It's not as if our symphonies are raking in the government cash, after all. Just what do you think you're being forced to pay for? Do you think we should shut down the National Gallery? Mothball the Royal Ontario Museum?
I don't feel at home in this country anymore. We've lost our identity to "multi-culturalism" (another way of saying that is "divided and conflicting cultures") and "bilingualism" (read: french). Everyone whines about how the minorities are getting along, but I really think we should re-examine that. I think the born and bred anglophone Canadians are the ones who are getting the short end of the stick. But I guess more than 1 left winger will quickly call me racist... *sigh* I like learning about other cultures (why else would I study anthropology?) but I will not stand for having another culture enforced on me.
Get real, official bilingualism has been a fact of life for 40 years, and for most people extends no further than having to flip over a cereal box to read the English side. Just whose culture is being "enforced" on you?
>No, actually, they don't. Government has no particular, universal obligation when it comes to taxes and spending;
Yes, governments do. Every person has an inherent right to his property. Government has a particular, universal obligation to minimize takings in order to minimize its infringement of that right. People who want to pay more taxes should pay more taxes without conscripting those who don't want to pay more taxes. It's easy - just write it in as "Gifts to Canada".
Right, IrC. Maybe in your libertarian utopia there's some kind of great universal law that says democractically elected government have an obligation not to listen to the will of the electorate (when, to pre-empt your no-doubt forthcoming response, said will does not conflict with the basic freedoms and protections guaranteed under the state's charter or constitution). In the real world, however, individuals have no particular right to pay the absolute minimum amount of legally collected taxes, and governments do have an obligation to listen to the electorate when they ask for government spending on social programs.
You want to pay less taxes? Work to elect a government that will gut the social safety net, eliminate cultural funding, withdraw from all but the absolute most basic roles and just generally be completely useless to the vast majority of the population. Don't bother appealing to some kind of libertarian doctrine, though; I think you'll find most people don't actually care.
Garnet, I'm responding to the moral dimension of the issue. People can (meaning it is possible) vote themselves benefits at the expense of others, but it's also amoral in the strictest sense. I don't think that bothers most people, but they need not enjoy the delusion that what they are doing is "good".
You're right, IrC. Following a libertarian system would be much better, since it's very, very 'good' to either leave people to die from treatable, but costly, illnesses and injuries, or saddle them with tens of thousands of dollars in debt for a day or two of treatment. That's much more moral.
Garnet, I'm responding to the moral dimension of the issue. People can (meaning it is possible) vote themselves benefits at the expense of others, but it's also amoral in the strictest sense.
Amoral - meaning without positive or negative moral connotation - is exactly what it is.
People "voting themselves benefits at the expense of others" (a nonsensical notion, since it is we the people who ultimately provide the benefits as well as we who ultimately consume them) carries no moral weight whatsoever, for or against it; it is only the results that matter. In the most reductionist possible terms, the benefit to us as a society must outweigh its cost to us. This, of course, is temepered by the need for societies or more accurately, governments not to violate (or to minimally violate) the human rights of its citizens.
Garnet, you've used one of the oldest anti-libertarian saws in the book: the supposition that because a libertarian objects to the state doing it, he must object to doing it at all. That isn't necessarily the case. You're correct that altruism can be good. You're incorrect that altruism can be morally compelled. Once that happens, it ceases to be altruism and has no moral value.
You're right, Craigers - "amoral" should have been "immoral".
There is no monolithic "us" who can presume to speak for the benefits and costs of others. In the most reductionist possible terms, the only way for one or more people to make decisions on behalf of others is if there is some inherent moral authority granted to the former - and tyranny of the majority isn't it, in case you are wondering. People who believe in the equality of persons must, in the absence of self-serving hypocrisy, believe that there are no arch-equals. So which is it for you? Are people created equal, or are some granted an intangible superiority over others?
the only way for one or more people to make decisions on behalf of others is if there is some inherent moral authority granted to the former
That's the theory of responsible government and democracy at its root, IrC. That we are governed by our own consent, and those who represent us have authority (not just moral, but temporal) only through that agency.
I think you're pointing to the problem of he who withholds his consent - in what sense, you ask, does he grant anyone else the moral/temporal authority over him, since he withholds his consent? The answer won't satisfy you, I know... it's purely one of expediency. The unconsenting person who will not agree to to abandon the state (pack up and move to Russia, in the immortal phrase) is simply coerced because it is expedient to do so; his lack of consent caused by his intransigence (the six-year old having a tantrum is an undying metaphor for the self-described libertarian fulminating against the latest satanism prepatuated by the "gummint") causes him pain, but the benefits provided by the orderly working of the state outweigh it. If you like, the lonely libertarian, red-faced and puffing about his "inalienable rights", is crushed under the wheels of society - all the more ironic as he doesn't even believe in it.
People who believe in the equality of persons must, in the absence of self-serving hypocrisy, believe that there are no arch-equals
There is no inconsistency. It is true that the person who withholds his consent to be governed has a claim that the state has not legitimated itself against him; even though the state may treat him with scrupulously fairness, just as it does with the other 9,999 of 10,000. There are no "Arch-equals" because all are treated equally, even though there is a lingering legitimation problem vis-a-vis that one lone individual. Our little freedom fighter, if you will.
That person, however, draws benefits from the existence of the state and impairs the functioning of the state if he remains outside the rule of law. Quite seriously impairs it, in fact; we can see this lesson from our history, that once someone is placed outside the law it impairs its functioning in rapid order. Therefore, purely on expedient grounds, that person who does not consent to be governed is forced to submit to the rule of law - but in a legitimate state, ONLY to the degree that his fellows are expected to do.
Incidentally, IrC, your argument that "there is no us" is begging the question. Starting by assuming that there's no such thing as society and ending with the argument that therefore there should be no such thing as society ain't much of a logical parlor trick.
Garnet, you've used one of the oldest anti-libertarian saws in the book: the supposition that because a libertarian objects to the state doing it, he must object to doing it at all. That isn't necessarily the case.
On the contrary, I conceded that the government is not the only group capable of providing this service; notice the reference to tens of thousands of dollars in private health care costs? And no, that's not hyperbole. I have a friend in America who went in for a stomach infection, spent one night there, and came out with literally ten grand worth of hospital bills. That's your private sector alternative to single-payer healthcare, IrC; embrace it.
In the most reductionist possible terms, the only way for one or more people to make decisions on behalf of others is if there is some inherent moral authority granted to the former
Congratulations, you've just described representative democracy. In a democracy, we, as a people, all agree to allow the majority to make decisions on subjects like military and foreign policy, economic and monetary policy, and, yes, taxation and government expenditures. It's flippant, yes, but the alternative to accepting the duly-constituted democratic will of those self-same people you don't believe exists is, frankly, to leave.
>Incidentally, IrC, your argument that "there is no us" is begging the question.
No, it's a simple statement that no person or group of people holds any inherent moral authority over any competent person or ability to know that person's mind. Don't read more into it than it is.
>That's the theory of responsible government and democracy at its root, IrC.
Temporal powers can be delegated, but moral authority can not (as a moral issue, not a practical one). People governed by their consent are still responsible for their governments. To be libertarian isn't to object to government; rather, it is to deprecate and remove the powers of government which tend to infringe rather than protect inherent liberties and powers. By the fact of the existence of people who will use powers of government to further their own gain, it's necessarily an ongoing effort.
>but in a legitimate state, ONLY to the degree that his fellows are expected to do.
How droll. That everyone might be treated equally unjustly does not render the state legitimate.
>That's your private sector alternative to single-payer healthcare, IrC; embrace it.
You disagree with my support for catastrophic public insurance on a compassionate principle, I take it?
I disagree with your belief, based apparently on zero evidence, that the private sector is suited, either practically or philosophically, to providing meaningful health care to the populace as a whole. Partly this is based on a compassionate principle, yes; forcing people to choose between not getting a medical procedure that has been hugely inflated by the private sector and going into debt as a result of a single illness is grossly immoral, and wholly and totally lacking in compassion and basic human decency. I disagree with you on a compassionate principle, on moral grounds, on practical grounds nads on ideological grounds. I disagree with you, IrC, and all other libertarians, in the most basic and fundamental respect possible.
To be libertarian isn't to object to government
You're right; apparently, it's just to object to all the parts of it that help the lower and middle classes.
The private sector has shown itself to be remarkably adept at providing what people want and can afford. It doesn't provide what people want at less than cost. That's basically what's at the root of your complaint. Since I have to pay for some services which have never been listed and some which have been de-listed, your plea that I should pay for non-catastrophic care for you or anyone else is just selfishness on your part.
You're reading comprehension is weak, BTW. I stated that I support public insurance for catastrophic care on the basis of compassion. That means I don't embrace your straw man.
Since I have to pay for some services which have never been listed and some which have been de-listed, your plea that I should pay for non-catastrophic care for you or anyone else is just selfishness on your part.
Now whose reading comprehension is weak? You're the one pushing for increased privitization, the one who'd like it if more and more was de-listed until everything but the absolute most basic services were bank-breakers. You wan't to complain about how unfair it is that you have to pay out of pocket for unlisted and de-listed services? Complain to all your ideologically like-minded buddies. I honestly couldn't care less about what you have to say on that subject.
I stated that I support public insurance for catastrophic care on the basis of compassion. That means I don't embrace your straw man.
Oh please. Because you're willing to throw the poor and working classes the littlest, tiniest bone you think you've demonstrated meaningful compassion? Think again.
I desire increased privatization because I desired increased capacity in the system. If everyone paid for what they needed there'd be more "public good" gained from the system overall instead of some good for one set of people and none for others.
Since you are indifferent to my measures of utility and need, you've conveniently erased any moral ground you thought to occupy.
Public care in the face of the overwhelmingly unaffordable costs of major illness or injury is the "littlest, tiniest bone"? I didn't realize you were innumerate.
If everyone paid for what they needed there'd be more "public good" gained from the system overall instead of some good for one set of people and none for others.
It's like you take actual logic, and you run it through some kind of crazy opposite-generator. Pricing health care out of the range of the working class and poor will increase the amount of 'public good'? Universally accessible health care denies some groups access in total? It sounds to me more like for-profit private health care you're describing there, rather than single-payer public health care.
Since you are indifferent to my measures of utility and need, you've conveniently erased any moral ground you thought to occupy.
Nice try, but I'm only indifferent to you, in particular. And frankly, my morality doesn't extend to naivety; listening to you, who would like nothing more than to tear down a working publically-funded system and replace it with an antiquated t heory that has never functioned well in practice, complain about how more services you want aren't available at taxpayer expense is just... insulting is the only publically exceptable word I can think of.
Public care in the face of the overwhelmingly unaffordable costs of major illness or injury is the "littlest, tiniest bone"?
Yes, it is, because the privatised health sector can wipe you out with a lot less than a major illness or injury. And don't forget, it would be a business; it'd be in their best interests to talk every customer, I mean, 'patient', who walks in to undergo the most unnecessarily detailed examination possible. So unless you're willing to define 'major illness or injury' on a sliding scale, starting with 'needing stitches or Tylenol 3's' for the working poor and going up to 'cancer and nothing less' for the upper classes, it's nothing more than a sop to the conscience.
Utility is defined by what people want for themselves, not what you think they need, Garnet. So, yes, there'd be more public good. And the universally accessible health care you cherish ultimately reduces care (access) for people who need service outside the public system but have paid into the public system. The problem is that the public insurance must be separated from delivery regardless whether the latter is public or private so that once we have paid for our insurance (through taxes), our insurance covers us for what we need, not what the insurance company (government) has decided it will cover. Isn't that one of the evils of private insurance that defenders of the public system play up?
You can go on making up straw men about how you think the private system will oversell everything, but they'll just be figments of your imagination.
Utility is defined by what people want for themselves, not what you think they need, Garnet. So, yes, there'd be more public good.
I'm very well aware of what utility means, but thanks for the patronising, IrC. And frankly, utility and public good are only loosely related; lots of people want, say, cigarettes and hard drugs and powerful firearms, but these don't exactly serve the public good, now do they? Hard as it is for a libertarian to believe, there's more to human life than economics.
You can go on making up straw men about how you think the private system will oversell everything, but they'll just be figments of your imagination.
Right. Because we don't have evidence, actual, hard evidence, of the private system doing that very thing immediately south of our border. Apparently, the entire American HMO system is nothing more than a figment of my imagination.
You're going to have to co-ordinate your crib notes with the other public system fanatics. On the one hand, I have you telling me the evil private enterprisers will oversell. On the other, people tell me the evil private enterprisers will refuse to provide coverage. You might be partially correct in that the providers have an incentive to sell and the insurers an incentive to deny, but the HMOs tend to sit on the denial incentive side. Meanwhile with a predominantly public system we just have the incentive to deny and there's no counterbalancing incentive to sell at all.
You're going to have to co-ordinate your crib notes with the other public system fanatics.
So, you're saying I can't even have my own views, then?
I will admit, however, to having gone wrong on 'oversell'. I was thinking of 'overcharge'. My bad.