I’m a rather Lapsed, or at least Reform, Libertarian; formerly Orthodox. But I’m not much good at Orthodoxy of any sort. Although I’m more in favor of limited government than most (and I’ve noticed the Right is not any more in favor of limited gov’t than the Left, just different extravagances), I find that governments do some things better. Or perhaps I should say that it’s better to have them do some things. Or both.
Example: once upon a time, if your house was on fire, you had to put it out yourself, or with the help of sympathetic neighbors. That didn’t work all that well, so fire companies came into being, but they weren’t gov’t run, they were in fact, fee-for-service, with insurance companies paying them. Well, that didn’t work all that well either, so eventually (local) governments organized fire departments. Even where the firefighters themselves are volunteers, the organization is gov’t mandated, run, and paid for (infrastructure, equipment, training, and usually dispatchers all have to be paid for). I’ve taken the leap to parallel that with health care. I’m very much a bottom-line kind of guy. Despite the flaws in Canadian medicare, bottom line is that Canadians now live 2-3 years longer than Americans, whereas pre-medicare, the life expectancies were the same.
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2021-04-26 12:25 am (UTC)I’m a rather Lapsed, or at least Reform, Libertarian; formerly Orthodox. But I’m not much good at Orthodoxy of any sort. Although I’m more in favor of limited government than most (and I’ve noticed the Right is not any more in favor of limited gov’t than the Left, just different extravagances), I find that governments do some things better. Or perhaps I should say that it’s better to have them do some things. Or both.
Example: once upon a time, if your house was on fire, you had to put it out yourself, or with the help of sympathetic neighbors. That didn’t work all that well, so fire companies came into being, but they weren’t gov’t run, they were in fact, fee-for-service, with insurance companies paying them. Well, that didn’t work all that well either, so eventually (local) governments organized fire departments. Even where the firefighters themselves are volunteers, the organization is gov’t mandated, run, and paid for (infrastructure, equipment, training, and usually dispatchers all have to be paid for). I’ve taken the leap to parallel that with health care. I’m very much a bottom-line kind of guy. Despite the flaws in Canadian medicare, bottom line is that Canadians now live 2-3 years longer than Americans, whereas pre-medicare, the life expectancies were the same.