SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Jail is not top of most people's bucket list of places to visit, but for some it is becoming increasingly attractive. I had heard anecdotal stories of homeless in the UK committing petty crimes in the hope of being given a warm bed and a meal, but in Japan it seems that the elderly are taking things to a whole new level:
Japan is in the grip of an elderly crime wave - the proportion of crimes committed by people over the age of 65 has been steadily increasing for 20 years. The BBC's Ed Butler asks why.
At a halfway house in Hiroshima - for criminals who are being released from jail back into the community - 69-year-old Toshio Takata tells me he broke the law because he was poor. He wanted somewhere to live free of charge, even if it was behind bars.
"I reached pension age and then I ran out of money. So it occurred to me - perhaps I could live for free if I lived in jail," he says.
"So I took a bicycle and rode it to the police station and told the guy there: 'Look, I took this.'"
The plan worked. This was Toshio's first offence, committed when he was 62, but Japanese courts treat petty theft seriously, so it was enough to get him a one-year sentence.
Small, slender, and with a tendency to giggle, Toshio looks nothing like a habitual criminal, much less someone who'd threaten women with knives. But after he was released from his first sentence, that's exactly what he did.
"I went to a park and just threatened them. I wasn't intending to do any harm. I just showed the knife to them hoping one of them would call the police. One did."
Altogether, Toshio has spent half of the last eight years in jail.
I ask him if he likes being in prison, and he points out an additional financial upside - his pension continues to be paid even while he's inside.
"It's not that I like it but I can stay there for free," he says. "And when I get out I have saved some money. So it is not that painful."
Toshio represents a striking trend in Japanese crime. In a remarkably law-abiding society, a rapidly growing proportion of crimes is carried about by over-65s. In 1997 this age group accounted for about one in 20 convictions but 20 years later the figure had grown to more than one in five - a rate that far outstrips the growth of the over-65s as a proportion of the population (though they now make up more than a quarter of the total).
To my mind, there is something wrong with the way we take care of the elderly or those who are significantly poorer than the average when their most attractive option is jail.
(Score: 0, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @06:26PM (28 children)
When you coddle criminals and make prisons too comfortable. Increase the chance of rape, starvation and disease and I GUARANTEE this will cease to be a problem. Japan should look to the US' private prison model as a guideline for how to implement this.
(Score: 2, Troll) by bob_super on Thursday January 31 2019, @06:41PM (10 children)
The other solution is to remind them that criminals over 70 are irredeemable, and a social threat, and therefore should automatically get the death penalty.
That would stop the problem right there (except for the tiny minority who needs help with suicide, obviously).
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @06:46PM (9 children)
And then they can starve on the streets of big cities everywhere, which is the only reason they're doing any little thing they can to get a safe place to sleep when they're broke because they can't work and can't afford to support themselves on pensions that never had a chance of keeping pace with the cost of living in japan.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bob_super on Thursday January 31 2019, @06:58PM (8 children)
I'm pretty sure that the answer to that problem is not to keep the judicial and prison systems more attractive than the street.
How about some actual help for the (near-)homeless elderly ?
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Thursday January 31 2019, @10:11PM (6 children)
Shit, you should see Norwegian "prison" cells. Each one of them is a helluva lot nicer than my apartment, for damn sure. Motherfuckers have X-Boxes and Playstations and shit.
(Score: 3, Informative) by JoeMerchant on Thursday January 31 2019, @10:25PM (5 children)
There's the plan: if you can afford a plane ticket to Norway, alter your physical appearance as much as possible from your "norm", update your passport with the new photo, then go there and burn your passport. Return to your normal appearance, travel far from your entry point, learn some Norwegian, lay low as long as possible then do crime until you're charged.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0, Troll) by Ethanol-fueled on Thursday January 31 2019, @10:32PM (4 children)
Ahh, the ol' refugee strategy.
Suppose the only problem would be keeping the brown paint on my face, once it rolls off and they see my skin is lighter than a paper bag, and that have an education and can speak fluent English and actually be productive to society, I'll be deported.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Thursday January 31 2019, @11:02PM (3 children)
But, deported to where? America based on your accent? I doubt America is taking indigent refugees from Norway anymore. Canada? UK? Take a vacation in the Caribbean first, learn a bit about an island then claim you came from there.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Friday February 01 2019, @05:10PM (2 children)
I'm pretty sure that Orange Roughy said that we need more refugees from Norway (and more Eastern European Models, of course).
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday February 01 2019, @05:57PM (1 child)
Does anyone in government actually listen to Orange Roughy (great name, old fish that live out of touch with the rest of the world) when he's spouting non-sequitors like that?
How many refugees leave Norway every year?
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Friday February 01 2019, @10:42PM
TMYK: Before some marketing guy got involved, Orange Roughy was called Slimehead.
(Score: 3, Informative) by JoeMerchant on Thursday January 31 2019, @10:21PM
What we recently experienced while negotiating with lower cost elder-care homes' in the US was something like this:
How much does this cost?
Well, how much do you have?
Back and forth, but it finally comes down to "Not as much as you're asking."
There's a place over there that can probably help you... Go to place over there, prices are a tiny little bit better.
When the actual total bill really comes in it's about 50% more than we were quoted, first we'll be eroding savings, then when that's gone we'll vaguely threaten your parents with eviction unless you find a way for the family to make up the difference. Then one of the two parents in care died, which cut their monthly income in half, so savings eroded twice as fast as before...
A lot of what seems to go on there is slow billing, slow collections, and if the old people really don't have the money the place absorbs it as a write off, up to a point. They never asked the children to co-sign for anything.
It's a lot like healthcare in general in the U.S.: vague / high billing, and let those who can pay cover for those who default.
Medicare retirement benefits vary hugely depending on what kind of jobs the person worked. I think when you're at top end FICA deductions, your retirement benefit more than pays for the lower end full care (meals + in home medical) eldercare facilities. However, if the best you ever made was about 3x minimum wage, or you spent a lot of years not paying FICA for whatever reasons, your retirement check can be ridiculously small compared to actual cost of care.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @06:44PM
I say we toss you in first, get that insider info to let us know how to be most inhumane! Then we'll do the exact opposite and create a better society. Back to the dungeons Vlad.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday January 31 2019, @07:46PM (10 children)
I can go along with the sentiment, if not your apparent delight in prison rape, starvation and disease. Let's address the disease first: why do you want to incubate disease in prison, that will threaten the general population? Starvation? Not only is that inhumane, but conducive to disease. Prison rape? Not all of us are into your homoerotic fantasies.
Prison ought to be less pleasant than it is, I'll agree with that. It seems that most prisoners have little to nothing to do, other than sit around watching television, joining and promoting gangs and violence, and generally being useless. At least the younger, healthier prisoners should be make to work for their keep. Probably all the rest, as well. Ongoing education, more spiritual outreach programs, and all the other things that make us human. If you want to see prisons that are true hell holes, maybe you should go break the law in Mexico, or most other Latin American countries, or most of Asia. Then, of course, there is Africa. Go ahead, go see how your ideal prisons are run. Enjoy. Just don't whimper and whine when you find that one of those prison rapists is using a huge horse cock on you. Oh - sorry, your post indicates that you'll enjoy that horse cock.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by urza9814 on Thursday January 31 2019, @08:26PM (5 children)
Like in the US, where native-born non-criminal citizens are locked up in prison and told they have to work, paid $1 per day, until they earn enough money to purchase evidence of their innocence from their own government?
(see page 20: https://www.amnestyusa.org/pdfs/JailedWithoutJustice.pdf) [amnestyusa.org]
As far as I'm concerned, there is one and only one acceptable purpose for prison -- separating dangerous individuals from society so they cannot cause further harm. That's it. While they're in there, you should be doing everything feasible to rehabilitate them so that they can be released as soon as possible. Anything else is a waste of everyone's time and money on bullshit illogical desires for blood and revenge.
Under such a system, these people probably wouldn't be locked up because they're clearly not dangerous. But then someone would have to think for more than half a second to come up with an actual solution to the problem...so that's unlikely to happen any time soon...
(Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Thursday January 31 2019, @11:33PM (4 children)
We know a Harvard PhD psychologist who worked for some years in community based drug rehab programs - alternatives to incarceration. Her subjects' recidivism rate was less than 1/3 that of the subjects who went to prison instead, but the county only funded her to the minimum required by some federal program that supplied surplus funds to the county justice department in exchange for running the program.
All the data pointed to long term benefits to the community, lower prison costs, lower drug related crimes, etc. if they would expand the program, but they never even considered expanding it, and often were running afoul of the minimum enrollment requirements.
In that part of the South, at least, Judges want punishment, not a promise of a better future. Punishment they understand, punishment they can control, all this namby-pamby Harvard PhD scientist data crap is a bunch of hooey. Besides, as old as most of the judges around there are, they are locking up the criminals until after the Judges are likely to die of old age.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday February 01 2019, @02:12AM (3 children)
I think what judges really understand, are the contracts they signed to keep a for-profit prison filled to near capacity.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday February 01 2019, @03:30AM (2 children)
I think it's more insidious than that. They seem to want people who might fall prey to traps like drugs and crime to go ahead and fall, to get them into prison and out of society rather than trying to help them not fall prey in the first place. Sure, for profit prisons are a huge structural machine that wants to be fed, but the judges and many who enter law enforcement around those parts want that machine to grow and suck up all of "those people," even when some of "those people" are friends or family.
The whole "do as I say, not as I do" hypocritical double standard - the privilege of wealth to screw up and not pay the price of incarceration, but instead pay the price of a donation to the city councilmen... above all else, the maintenance of the status quo, and a "return to the good old days" MAGA - that one seems to resonate with the crowd.
Newsflash, folks - the good old days sucked even worse than the present; the people it sucked the worst for died and mostly didn't get to relate their stories about how bad it was for them. Go back to that way of doing things, and you just might find yourselves or your children on the unpleasant side of your chosen reality.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Friday February 01 2019, @02:12PM (1 child)
It's two sides of the same coin as they say...
Judges *have* been caught literally selling children to prisons (ie, the "kids for cash scandal": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kids_for_cash_scandal)...this [wikipedia.org] increases their own personal power by giving them more wealth. At the same time, *anybody* they send to prison increases their own personal power slightly by creating a larger lower class beneath them.
They want the slaves and plantations back, and prison is the socially acceptable way to do that in the modern era...prisoners are cheap labor for the government (and sold cheaply to private corporations), and cheaper goods for everyone...and the kickbacks let them take better advantage of that.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday February 01 2019, @02:19PM
The hick town I lived in from 2006 to 2013 has judges, police, commissioners, and school board officials who are the children and grandchildren of publicly outed KKK leaders from the early 1900s, when the KKK more or less ran the town openly hostile to catholics, jews, blacks, hispanics, asians, you name it.
In 2008 young punks in that town would go around at night with red paint graffiti-ing homes of asians with racial slurs, probably others too - I just personally worked with a Chinese man who had his house vandalized by them while they were sleeping inside.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bob_super on Thursday January 31 2019, @08:30PM (1 child)
> At least the younger, healthier prisoners should be make to work for their keep.
Private US prisons do that very well. Using the Constitutional exception for the convicted, pad their bottom lines, while underpaying workers and therefore driving non-slave companies out of business.
"Prevailing Wage" should apply inside prisons. It would also help convicts save up for the release (and/or pay their victims), while not screwing up the job market.
(Score: 2) by wisnoskij on Thursday January 31 2019, @09:41PM
> underpaying workers
They are literally allowed to enslave them. They are overpaid slaves that are being cuddled, not underpaid innocent victims. This is not an oversight, everyone always meant for them to be enslaved.
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Thursday January 31 2019, @09:25PM
Don't forget working out. And reading, maybe? Or sending notes to each other via the book cart.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 01 2019, @02:28AM
Good idea in theory. I've yet to see it put into practice in a way that doesn't incentivize incarceration for trivial and/or arbitrary reasons and depress wages for honest people.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @08:20PM (1 child)
This is a public service announcement provided for the benefit of SN's large autistic community in accordance with the ADA.
This is a troll. They may be paid or they may want to laugh at you.
But they don't believe what they posted!!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @08:55PM
I presume most everyone knows it is a likely troll, but we can never be sure these days. Who keeps modding it up? Probably the troll itself, pretty sad life where someone puts that much effort into being stupid.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @10:04PM (2 children)
That's a very good point. It's because I don't want to be raped five times a day by prison gangs that I've long since resolved to never be taken alive. I'm not a criminal, but lots of innocent people get accused all the time. If I'm ever accused of anything, then it's time to take as many of the arresting officers screaming down to hell with me as I can.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 01 2019, @04:44AM (1 child)
So instead of doing the honorable thing and just hanging yourself or bashing your head on the wall you prefer to kill the cops? Eeesh, most likely you'll just get an ass kicking before the ass .. umm. ya you know
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 01 2019, @04:12PM
you know that "protect and serve" slogan from the police?
well you can either "protect and serve the regular guy" -> that makes you a peace officer
... OR ...
you can " protect and serve the powers t that be" -> that makes you an enforcement officer
most police officers these days are the latter,
they chose to be that, and that choice is an inherently dangerous one once the powers that be loose popular support... as they increasingly have
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @06:40PM
Good fish?
(Score: 5, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Thursday January 31 2019, @06:46PM (13 children)
Public perception built around Jack Nicholson's performance in "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" not withstanding, government services for the mentally ill and infirm have been steadily and rapidly declining over the last several decades - leaving four basic options for these people:
1. Impose upon family/friends to keep them. Not always an option, and not at all optimal calling upon random otherwise productive members of the community to become impromptu full-time mental healthcare workers.
2. Circulate them through the court/jail systems. Again, terribly inefficient to clog the courts with these cases, and jail time rarely brings about positive change in their futures - leading to more need for services.
3. Street life. In many ways more challenging than holding down a job and paying rent, often cycles with option 2.
4. Hurry up and die, already, won't you? The only logical outcome of government cutbacks in services for those who can't participate in mainstream society without support.
I suppose if you're of pension (i.e. unemployable) age and haven't saved enough money to afford to live, that puts you in the same boat as younger people who can't stay employed for whatever reason.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @06:57PM (1 child)
The problem is fake inflation numbers, making the pensions worth a third of what they were supposed to be worth.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday January 31 2019, @08:39PM
CPI definitely didn't keep up with the cost of housing, that's for sure - and what do pensioners need?
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by Magic Oddball on Thursday January 31 2019, @08:40PM (3 children)
I agree that services have eroded terribly, but FWIW public perception of the institutions (which also housed physically & developmentally disabled people of all types) was also based on an avalanche of lawsuits and undercover exposé journalistic coverage of what was really going on inside them. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest itself was based on Ken Kesey's experiences working the grave shift as an orderly at a mental institutions, not made up.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday January 31 2019, @10:08PM (2 children)
I totally agree, however... just because some of the institutions were "doing it wrong" is no reason to shut them all down. Also, strangling funding isn't how you get good employees into the places. If employees aren't there for the pay, they're looking for other perks...
Replace "mentally/physically handicapped" with "elderly" and all the same things apply, except that they haven't shut down the high-cost elder care homes, but abuse is just as prevalent and horrifying as it was in mental institutions.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Thursday January 31 2019, @10:14PM (1 child)
Either way, you have pretty damn good excuses for sitting on the steps of the public square and orating to the passers-by, "Now let me tell you about the Jews..."
Retards and old people can also get away with slapping strangers' butts in public. Only Italians can get away with that one without being senile or retarded, and with their recent actions towards migrants, I now understand why Thomas Harris fetishizes them.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday January 31 2019, @10:30PM
I worked on Miami Beach for about 10 years, there were a couple of apartments on our work parking lot and in one of them was a little old lady at least 85 years old... She made her way to the grocery store and back almost every day, as did we to buy lunch sandwiches from the deli.
One day, little old lady starts acting Touretty - I think it was just something she did to get attention, she didn't seem triggered quite the same way as the actual Tourettes people I've met, but... one of her go-to curse words was "Pussy Galore" - I guess she watched Goldfinger (opening scenes shot down the street) too many times.
Her "Tourettes" went into remission, I never saw a sign that she got taken away or evaluated for it, maybe she did...
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by Pslytely Psycho on Friday February 01 2019, @01:41AM (6 children)
Well, we could just make it a law you have to be productive, and if you aren't we ship you off to wonderful New Eden where you have a second chance at productivity......as fertilizer.
Or, alternatively, go old school with green crackers....
Alex Jones lawyer inspires new TV series: CSI Moron Division.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Friday February 01 2019, @03:20AM (5 children)
So, this really needs to be brought into the conversations about social programs more often - because it's the message behind the "budget cuts:" we really don't care if you live or die, and, in-fact, since you're not doing anything for us at the moment, why don't you go ahead and die? It would make our lives so much simpler if you were just gone.
I can get behind Hospice services, if you're elderly, too infirm to stand up for yourself and say: "no, I don't want those painkillers, get the hell out of my house" and your family is o.k. with it, then, sure - it's a kindness to be more comfortable and peaceful in your last few days, instead of suffering in pain and anxiety for much longer. Go ahead, crush up that morphine atavan cocktail and syringe it to the back of the mouth to get past the reflexes to spit it out. It really is better for all involved. On the other hand, if a person can stand up on their own, can tell you "no, I don't want that" then they deserve the respect to not be fed a cocktail of drugs that, in addition to relieving pain and reducing anxiety, also reduce respiratory function and hasten death.
Now, when we're talking about those people who haven't been signed off by a physician as having less than 2 weeks to live, who have not signed DNR orders for themselves... it really is cheaper to take care of their basic animal needs (food, shelter, basic medical) than it is to let them get into crisis after crisis that they cannot afford. If they're healthy and in crisis, it is a strong incentive to criminal behavior, and when that happens it's all kinds of destructive and expensive for everybody involved.
Then the whole conversation can turn to "right to reproduce" - with world population well past 7B and virtually guaranteed to exceed 10B soon, I can only think of one thing for that: reproduction, an inalienable right and even moral duty when human population was 500M, needs to become less of a right and more of a privilege. How do we go about that? It's going to be a mess, but it's a mess that the whole world should have actively engaged with even before China toyed with a "one child" policy that still failed to stop their population growth.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 3, Funny) by Pslytely Psycho on Friday February 01 2019, @04:13AM (4 children)
Uh, wow, didn't expect such an in-depth analysis of a joke post referencing The Humanity Bureau and Soylent Green.
I shall mod you interesting.
Alex Jones lawyer inspires new TV series: CSI Moron Division.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday February 01 2019, @02:15PM (3 children)
I've got 2 kids who are going to be dependent (in differing degrees) on the social support systems when we die - all else being equal, they're going to have 40 years or so where we can't directly support them, and 30 years or so when we're just dead... There's no way in hell (barring a large lottery win) that I will ever be able to leave a trust with enough funding in it to provide for their care for 30 years, and so far there's not any parallel path family (cousins, etc.) who are going to do anything for them when we're gone.
We deal with school administrators, policies, etc. that basically try to shove them in a corner and ignore them (taking a bad situation and making it worse) until they age out of the school system (at 21/22) and either live with us, or ultimately in jail if we won't keep them - and the older (now 17) just might have to navigate that system sooner than later on his own if he continues to physically challenge us - we're just two people, and not physically able to provide 24-7-365 support for him - not to mention handling the more challenging one while trying to help his younger brother grow to a state where he might be independent in the future.
Oh, as for our own retirement - my wife will never retire, her full time job now and forever is the kids, and I'm trying to plan the next 20 years or so such that I can continue earning good income through my early 70s. With only 10-20 years of post retirement to fund, I may actually be able to save enough to keep us out of social services until we're physically unable to handle life and the kids.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Pslytely Psycho on Friday February 01 2019, @05:54PM (2 children)
Ah yes, as for me, my wife is disabled and has been for 15 years, I will likely die at work.
An uncovered emergency surgery for me a few years ago means I'm still several years from paid off on it. So that pretty well wiped out my savings. Like you I hope to be able to save enough to retire for a few years before the ol' ticker winds down. Maybe another 15 and semi-retire at 75 if I make it.
Fortunately all my kids are out of the house.
Of my 3 children 1 died at 26 of a drug overdose, 1 was ADD and the 3rd was thankfully without any major problems. We had run-ins with the school administrators ourselves for similar reasons, the policy seemed to be dope 'em up stick 'em in the corner and pass 'em without teaching them anything. I never had quite the problems you have currently, but enough of a taste to know how fucked up the system is.
Of 5 grandchildren, 1 is severely Autistic with body morphology problems, 1 is ADD and a 3rd has Aspergers. So my children are closer to your situation than I ever was.
Yeah, ain't what I envisioned either.
I wish you the very best, and may we both win the lottery...(:
(sorry if that rambled a bit, tough day at work, my boss is out for 10 months for a shoulder surgery so the C level bowl tech and I (B level tech but computer hardware nerd that my boss just can't do) are trying to fill our roles and I'm trying to fill in for the A tech.
*note* Bowl techs are pinsetter mechanics at a bowling center, we have to be mechanics, electricians and computer hardware techs and fabricators with a smattering of HVAC all rolled into one. True 'jack of all trades.' Without us, your favorite bowling center would be closed in about a week.
Alex Jones lawyer inspires new TV series: CSI Moron Division.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Saturday February 02 2019, @02:02AM (1 child)
I'm pretty convinced that we were expelled from one school (2nd grade) specifically because we would not dope our kids up, and denied entry to several others for the same. Tried Rispordal on the older one when he turned 15, made him worse - now we're using Marinol "as needed" maybe 3 doses a month, it de-escalates him when you can see a problem coming, and things don't get bad if you miss a dose, because we're not giving it on a continuous basis.
As for "not teaching them anything" - yeah, the older one who demonstrated some 3 digit addition back in 2nd grade, but basically hasn't done more than counting since then, barely verbal, all but illegible handwriting... yeah, he's getting a 3.8 GPA in the standard high school courses like Pre-Algebra, History, English, etc. He got As in art without ever entering the art classroom and never doing any artwork.
My sympathies to you and your family. My wife's mother passed away recently and we discovered a flock of cousins who she never spoke with/about - 4/5 of their families have kids with autism, mostly in their 20s and 30s now. We thought it came down our male family lines, but her mother's family is much more full of it than her father's, and my mother's side is hard to judge since we're the only ones to have children down her side since my younger brother was born in the early 70s.
I've done a lot of work with smaller companies, so when you say "C level" I immediately think: CEO, CFO, CIO....
My first job saw me rise to VP of R&D (in a company of 6 employees, total) and still do programming work in C++. Then after 12 years with that place, it finally cratered financially and I was sitting in a park, unemployed, with my wife 6 months pregnant and a toddler - met another couple with a toddler, he just had a 2 year college degree and works for Johnson Controls doing PLC setups. Maybe I was paid better when I had work, but he had the more stable job, and didn't waste an additional 4+ years getting a MS degree. I finally "got bought" along with one of the small companies I was working for and the big company gave me a nice raise, better benefits, bonus, etc. so I've been hanging with them for 5+ years now, and plan to ride this bus as long as I can.
Best of luck to you and your kids especially. No matter where you are, it can always be worse. If "significant autism" is a 1% of the population incidence, our oldest is in the top 1% of that 1% for most severely challenging/impaired that we've met; but a friend of ours has a son just about his age who's even worse + has seizures - they're about 10 years younger than us, but you can tell it's taking a huge toll on them. And, then, neither of our families is trying to handle this as a single parent, but we know several that are - some by divorce, some by absence/neglect, and one by early death of a parent...
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by Pslytely Psycho on Saturday February 02 2019, @01:58PM
The Autistic granddaughter with the body morphology problems has improved by leaps and bounds in a new school where she's more than the teachers 'problem child.' The change is so stunning as the new school actually works with her!
I in turn wish you the best as well and may we both see at least a few years of actual retirement!
Alex Jones lawyer inspires new TV series: CSI Moron Division.
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @07:10PM (4 children)
Nothing more to say really
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @07:38PM
More like late ponzi scheme.
(Score: 3, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @07:41PM
Monopoly confirms it. Late in the game it's often preferable to spend time in jail than to move around the board.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @10:04PM (1 child)
Trendy meme based on that tired old 19th century philosophy called Marxism. It's sad to see this up-voted here. Where are we? A lefty reddit sub?
Yeah. "late capitalism", because socialism doesn't send people to prison. Sheesh!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @10:26PM
Some people use capitalism to refer to various government run/supported scams these days. Seems pretty dumb to me but I guess that is language.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @07:14PM (21 children)
Guess this is what happens when you decide to either not have kids or allow your family to degenerate to a point where you have nobody to take care of you when you are older. This is going to be America for all those childless Gen Xers and Millennials.
(Score: 5, Touché) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday January 31 2019, @07:59PM (15 children)
Oh sure, THAT'S what's behind this, not growing wealth inequality and breakdown of the social safety net. Right. Not *enough* kids. Were you born this stupid and evil, or was it a lifestyle choice?
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @08:16PM (4 children)
Once again Azuma Hazuki sacrifices her own mental health to argue with a paid shill.
Good work.👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏
(Score: 3, Touché) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday February 01 2019, @06:45AM (3 children)
Aww, you care about me :) Don't worry, that didn't abuse my SAN score hardly at all; I've seen such awful things that some random pissant on the intertubes doesn't even register. Again, my flaming retorts are for the benefit of anyone who might come by, see that giant floating Baby Ruth in the meme pool, and think "ya know he's got a point, I should take a bite of that..."
Think of it as a profane, area-of-effect noetic vaccination program if that helps.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by Pslytely Psycho on Saturday February 02 2019, @02:08PM (2 children)
Ok, it's driving me nuts and Googly Goggles ain't helping.
What is a "SAN Score?"
Being old as dirt, it's likely yet another modern term I'm unfamiliar with, groovy man.
We have SPODIE's on my lawn, all are welcome!
Alex Jones lawyer inspires new TV series: CSI Moron Division.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday February 02 2019, @05:22PM (1 child)
Short for Sanity, in the vein of INT, WIS, and so on from tabletop games. I've never actually played any of them, but this one is from Call of Cthulhu, where having a separate Sanity variable makes a certain kind of sense.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by Pslytely Psycho on Saturday February 02 2019, @08:37PM
Ah, in my youth I played a lot of D&D and Axis and Allies, but never Call of Cthulhu.
Thanks, it seems obvious in retrospect.
Peace out!!
Alex Jones lawyer inspires new TV series: CSI Moron Division.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @08:29PM (7 children)
In nature, over the long term, the species will bear more children so that the chances of one surviving is higher if there is no "safety net". Survival to adulthood is damn near guaranteed in the well developed "white" countries, so the birthrate is much lower, and mom can go out and her hair and nails done.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday February 01 2019, @07:16AM (6 children)
Oh, this again. Yeah, yeah, "the $RACIAL_SLURS are outbreedin' us!" Has it occurred to you yet that a proper economic model, not even a post-scarcity one, would do an easy end-run around this whole problem?
No, of course it didn't; you're marinated in zero-sum thinking because it justifies your no doubt "scientific" racism. God, why are all the trolls so bloody predictable and transparent? There really must be fewer ideas in the hate-o-sphere than most people think.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 01 2019, @07:56AM (5 children)
Wow! You are so easily triggered!
You see poor white trash with huge families also. High birth rates during hardship is perfectly natural. And prosperous countries are suffering low birth rates. Nothing "racial" about it. But since you brought it up, show me one non-white prosperous country! You should get off the internet. It's filling your head full of garbage.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday February 01 2019, @08:21AM (4 children)
Some parts of it are attempting to, but they're not succeeding, hence the pushback :)
So let me get this straight: your new strategy to stop me from calling out straining, steaming, grunting, stenching bullshit is to...what exactly? Feign concern for my health? Lie through your teeth about your incredibly transparent, obvious motives? This doesn't seem very effective. Perhaps you might want to "git gud," as the children say these days.
Oh, would heaven I could see the hashes of the AC's IP addresses. Seems I've got myself a new fanboi~
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 01 2019, @08:35PM (3 children)
Seems I've got myself a new fanboi~
You do! I like you a lot! You're really funny, and so contradictory! You hate the truth for its presentation, a pair of brown shoes in a world of tuxedos.
(Score: 2, Offtopic) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday February 01 2019, @08:51PM (2 children)
Except none of that is true...? Aside from the funny part; I've inherited my mother's sarcasm. Now, you can keep trying to troll me, and I can just ignore you and/or keep dropping -1s on you, if you like. Orrrr you can go find like, literally anything else more productive to do, but who am I kidding?
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 01 2019, @10:40PM (1 child)
Well, see, that's the thing, you came to me, not the other way around, You could have ignored me, but you didn't, so who's the "fanboi"? Did the rant make you feel better?
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday February 02 2019, @12:05AM
'K, bye.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @08:50PM (1 child)
Nature has one safety net - children. Because you decided not to have any, you are demanding that everyone else provide you with a safety net.
(Score: 5, Informative) by acid andy on Thursday January 31 2019, @09:03PM
Pretty sure in most other species, the offspring don't take care of their parents in old age. More often than not, they come into direct competition with them. But I guess all you know how to do is fuck up the planet.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @08:01PM
Well thankfully the boomers got pensions, full social security, and they seem pretty casual about imposing on any of their children who are lucky enough to own their own home.
We live in a new era of personal responsibility, I have a 401k and an IRA, VA benefits, HSA account, and a handful of other investments so I'll be just fine. Most of the unimpoverished gen-x and millennials are well equipped to retire actually. You just never hear about us way out in Russia.
It's not fair that our parents have stolen from us but thankfully they're pampered pricks and anyone still build a comfortable life even if it won't be nearly as easy as it was for our fat mcmansion buying plastic crap collecting parents.
Anyhow I can tell you're not from the US because we've been dumping our elderly into homes for at least 3 generations. Back when you guys were still standing in bread lines and getting drunk off methanol.
You need to grow up and stop expecting other people to take care of you kiddo. Come on john galt I thought you were made of balls and grit. Where are your bootstraps?
The rugged libertarian family values shill cries about the decay of the american family from the bleakness of his tiny St Pete studio apartment. ; ;
(Score: 3, Insightful) by urza9814 on Thursday January 31 2019, @08:28PM (1 child)
Even with a stable nuclear family the only way that works is if employers are paying enough that the elder's children can either hire a caretaker or one of them doesn't have to work and can sit at home taking care of the relatives.
Also, SCREW THAT! I don't want to be a caretaker just like I don't want to be a farmer. Some people do want to do those jobs. Let's pay them and let them do it. My adopted sister does work like that, she loves the job, but personally I'd much rather be writing code. And I really don't see why that's supposed to be some kind of crisis.
Much like having children...when there's ten thousand humans in the world and the species needs every survival chance it can get, then everyone having kids is a great thing. These days...certain people just shouldn't be reproducing. And even the good parents aren't always the best. Leave that stuff to the experts who can (and want to) dedicate their life to doing it as best they can instead of dumping that responsibility on ever single one of us overworked underpaid unintelligent peons out there.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Thursday January 31 2019, @10:39PM
My mom's parents took care of just one of their four parents in old age - it forced them both into early retirement (about 5 years before plan), and was a terrible taxing experience for both of them for the seven years she was bedridden. The last several years they also had to bring in outside nursing help because they simply weren't up to the task. Both of them made (and executed) clear and effective plans to make sure they never visited that living hell on their children. Of course, it mostly worked because they had enough money in retirement, even with retiring early, to make it happen, and that was a result of the freak economy they lived in - born in the mid 1910s, he served in WWII, school teacher and night watchman in later life, passed away in the 1990s/2000s. I don't think any generation born after the 1950s could hope to achieve independent self sufficient retirement like they did with those kinds of jobs.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 01 2019, @01:14AM
You have it exactly flipped, a lot of grown children have moved back in with the parents
The aging parents are STILL taking care of their kids
https://aeon.co/videos/i-thought-i-was-gonna-be-a-teenager-forever-moving-back-in-with-the-parents-at-23 [aeon.co]
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 01 2019, @08:43AM
Yeah, you should have children so they can (maybe, but probably not) become your future servants. But childfree people are the selfish ones!
Well, I've got bad news for you. Not only is that little plan profoundly selfish, but it's also a huge gamble because there is nowhere close to a guarantee that your children will actually care for you when you're older. All the old people whose children never or rarely visit them are a testament to that fact.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Thursday January 31 2019, @07:33PM (2 children)
This because defendants are questioned endlessly without defense attorneys present and are subjected to as long as a year of solitary confinement before trial, both of the clear human rights abuse
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 01 2019, @02:06AM (1 child)
...are generously extended up to one year's free room, board, and healthcare.*
FTFY.
And remember, we're talking accomdations more comfortable than many Americans can afford. Probably even nicer than your government-issue crazy hobo shack.
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Friday February 01 2019, @06:42AM
The other day I read an article about the CEO of Mt. Gox.
He was in solitary for I think a year. The article didn't say whether his cell was lit 24/7, but it did say that he was forced to sit up in a specific spot. If he fell asleep, the guards would always wake him back up.
The accommodations might actually be more comfortable in the prisons than the jails. The distinction between the two is mostly that prisons are for those who have been sentenced. In the US specifically, jails generally hold those who have been sentenced to a year or less.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @07:51PM
Not to mention very expensive...
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 31 2019, @08:41PM
Hmmm, I think it was some kind of Soapy [gutenberg.org] opera tale or something.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by turgid on Thursday January 31 2019, @08:50PM (10 children)
Basically, the more wealthy are going to have to pay a little bit more tax to keep society functioning rather than continually coming up with excuses why every last penny should be hoarded.
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday January 31 2019, @10:45PM (9 children)
If you're talking about the top half of society paying more taxes, that might work. If you're talking about those making $300K+/yr and more, there just aren't enough of them for a little bit more tax to make any difference.
The reason the ultra-wealthy get these political tax breaks is because their numbers are small enough that it minimizes the impact of the tax breaks, and, importantly, the ultra-wealthy are in a position to kick-back to the politicians who "take care" of them. With only 535 critters in congress, it's not much surprise when tax breaks go to the Forbes wealthiest 1000 list and not many others.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by turgid on Thursday January 31 2019, @10:58PM (4 children)
Most people understand that civilisation costs money, and I'd certainly be willing to pay a little more tax
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Thursday January 31 2019, @11:27PM (3 children)
I don't mind paying more tax, but I really think that tax should be based on disposable income rather than total income.
Folks who aren't making enough money on their own to pay for food, clothing, shelter, transportation and medical care... really shouldn't be paying any tax, particularly because that tax just gets circulated back to them in inefficient social support programs.
Above whatever that arbitrary "tax floor" is, I'm all for flat-tax. I'm also "for" FICA deductions, even from the working poor, to fund future retirement benefits - but not to fund the massive social security programs that it currently does.
Unfortunately, in today's system, Warren Buffet's effective tax rate is lower than his secretary's - and that's just upside-down.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by Gault.Drakkor on Friday February 01 2019, @09:57PM (2 children)
That is what progressive income tax systems are designed to do. Especially when they have a base tax credit. I know the Canadian tax system is set up that way.
In my opinion this is contradictory to your other statements. ie "tax based upon disposable income", and your comment about Warren Buffet.
I want a system where people support the country/society proportional to their ability to pay. From your other statements you seem to want that. A flat income tax all but guarantees rich getting richer. Because the higher the income, the higher absolute disposable income and more critically the higher relative disposable income. Cost of living is not proportional to income.
For an example flat tax with mostly butt pulled numbers living in same region: Household with 100k income 30k house 30k tax 20k food transport health so 20k disposable. vs 1000k income 300k house(easily could be less) 300k tax 60k food transport health so 340k disposable. I know i am wrong on some of those numbers(mostly health). But I am hoping it illustrate my point that wealthy people have more then proportionally more disposable income.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday February 02 2019, @01:35AM (1 child)
Then you misunderstand what I mean by flat tax. Warren Buffet's income is so large compared to the disposable income threshold that he would effectively pay near the flat tax rate. His secretary might have only 50% of her income above the threshold, so her effective overall tax rate would be 50% of the flat tax rate.
Still, government tries to shape the behavior of the wealthy by providing tax incentives for certain activities, and these programs end up lowering their effective tax rates, rather dramatically as compared to the average citizen.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by Gault.Drakkor on Thursday February 07 2019, @01:28AM
It reads like you are arguing an income tax setup with two brackets. The low bracket of say 0% tax below and say 20% above .
It is the equivalent of saying flat tax of 20% for everybody and non-refundable tax credit of for everybody. That to me, that is close enough to flat tax to call it so.
Under that setup as income approaches infinity the marginal tax rate and effective tax rate converge on the flat rate. Which you did not say in the post I replied to. But do in your reply to me.
But you also say: "tax based upon disposable income." So I am am saying that flat tax even with a large 0% tax threshold is not a tax based upon disposable income. Mostly because cost of living is not proportional to income. People like Warren Buffet have a more then proportional disposable income.
Or ignoring income tax: a person with 30K income pays all to living expenses person with 60k is pretty similar. 100k they could have 100k-80k of disposable income 1M they could have 1M-100kof disposable income. 1G income could have 1G-200k of disposable income. If you want a flat income tax of 20% after 50k income; the people above 200k income have potentially greater and greater disposable incomes.
In my opinion if you want to tax based upon disposable income, progressive tax system is the way to go. So as long as the system ensures that for each marginal income dollar earned, the net after tax is a positive value along the whole tax function, people will have incentive to earn more income. Progressive income tax is the easiest approximation of being able to do a fixed tax of disposable income.
(Score: 3, Informative) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Thursday January 31 2019, @11:37PM (3 children)
Trump's tax cuts for the rich results in the US deficit having hit one trillion dollars.
A survey or corporate and trade association economists made it resoundingly clear that the tax cut did _not_ affect hiring decisions in any way.
If we had a marginal - that is, an incremental - tax cut on Capital Gains that was only paid by those who earned one million or more on such gains, that all by itself could house every American homeless person within a year or two. That marginal rate would only need to be a few percent.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday January 31 2019, @11:49PM (2 children)
I'd like to see the math on this. The number of people earning $1M or more on capital gains per year is quite small, but, then, so is the number of homeless, by some forms of accounting.
2% tax on $1M is $20K/yr, and if your idea of housing the homeless is 4+ people per low-rent house, that only costs maybe $3000 per year per homeless housed - just for the roof (still gotta eat, etc. and that actually costs more.)
So, sure - it doesn't cost much just to provide roofs, but, ask yourself: would you take that roof if it was offered? Would you have taken it two years ago?
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Friday February 01 2019, @12:43AM (1 child)
... who did not know how to sleep on the street. Consider that there's been a blind man, who when he wins the lottery about one of out three nights, sleeps at The Portland Rescue Mission.
Some homeless people flatly refuse housing or even shelter. "Jesus did it, I can too!", "I CAN'T SLEEP INDOORS!"
Some homeless people when actually placed in housing return to the streets. One such was a woman who slept on a certain LA bus stop bench for decades. She _often_ got housing, then right back to her bench.
Putting them all aside: consider Utah's discovery, now supported by some other US States like Washington that it is tens of thousands of dollars cheaper to house _everybody_ then to provide services to the homeless or to keep them in jail.
Consider also that forty percent of US jail inmates are mentally ill; most US jails therefore _also_ contain $$$ mental hospitals with psychiatrists and everything.
Now, how many US residents get one million or more from capital gains? If I can't just turn that up in a few searches, I'll research it more diligently, write up an article for my site then post its link in a reply...
... and there is so much _other_ info about Capital Gains online that I'm unable to found how how many people pay how much.
However, some of my very best friends are ardent leftists; Jimmy Carter reads Dave's Blog [seeingtheforest.com].
I'll ask Dave then link my article in a reply, likely this weekend.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday February 01 2019, @03:04AM
This is true of so many neglected social programs - see the successful social programs in other countries for some solid evidence to back up the studies...
If I were homeless, I think I would prefer the "predictability" of always being able to sleep on the street as compared to the insult of waiting for hours in a line for the chance of maybe getting an inside room for a night or two. If I could get _reliable_ housing that was better than being on the street (and some house-mates I've had in the past could drive one to prefer sleeping outside), I do think I would prefer that, particularly if I didn't have to waste my life waiting to talk to a social worker to secure it.
I've been unemployed a few times, and one of the lasting impressions from that experience is having to show up and interview with the social worker to keep the unemployment benefits flowing while looking for actual work. On the one hand, it's a ridiculous waste of time... on the other, the 3-4 hours required to jump that hoop unleashes thousands of dollars in benefits before the next waste of time interview is required, so, with the right attitude/perspective, that's better hourly pay than anything I've made working "real jobs."
Still, at what point is interviewing with social workers too costly as compared to the benefit of free housing? A couple of hours every couple of months would seem to be a no brainer, worth it... but several hours of queueing for a chance of a single night's sleep indoors? - hell no, that's no way to live.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by wisnoskij on Thursday January 31 2019, @09:49PM (1 child)
How can a country suffer from both a wave of young Neets, and a wave of seniors so desperate for a place to sleep that they turn to living in jail? Why would a pensioner have significantly less money on average than a young adult who just never left his room after university? Are these pensioners providing their young relatives with living expenses?
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Thursday January 31 2019, @11:33PM
"NEET": Not in Education, Employment or Training.
Strictly speaking I'm not a NEET, as I'm training to be a professional musician. Just last night I was a huge hit when for the first time I sang at an Open Mic.
What got me down about that particular open mic is that some of the guitarists were very poor singers. What gets me down about my own music as that I can't sing and play keyboard at the same time. This presents an opportunity: a Vocal/Guitar Duo, but I'll wait until I've gotten to know my new friends quite a lot better than I did last night.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 3, Informative) by Mykl on Thursday January 31 2019, @10:49PM
This is due to a breakdown of the traditional social contract in Japan (for good or bad).
The way it traditionally worked was:
Problems arise when people don't have kids - there is either nobody around to support them in their old age, or "no reason" to look after the parents because they are doing nothing to support the next generation and are a "drain" on resources
Japan's lowering birth rate is creating massive upheavals.
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Thursday January 31 2019, @11:30PM (5 children)
I want to download perfectly legitimate sequences of numbers while hanging at a wifi spot.
I've found that the site from which I obtain their hashes from time to time plays me a video.
My every attempt to find out how to disable video in Tor Browser is met with advice - often written for Trump and other ill-mannered children - as to how to enable it.
You'll be happy to know that at this juncture, I won't be downloading any videos or still images.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 01 2019, @02:05AM (1 child)
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Friday February 01 2019, @05:25AM
Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 01 2019, @02:21AM (2 children)
Install uBlock Origin in Tor Browser. This will make you slightly easier to deanonymize, but you won't get v& for downloading most kinds of number sequences.
Remember: if two people across from you in the library start fighting, they're crisis actors trying to bait you into getting up to help while a third guy takes your unencrypted laptop.
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Friday February 01 2019, @05:27AM (1 child)
-ts.
Thanks!
When I worked for Absolute Software in Vancouver BC - they make Lojack For Laptops, I expect they also made "Where's My iPhone" for Apple - they told me that THIRTY PERCENT OF LAPTOPS WIND UP STOLEN.
However, that was in 2007. I expect it's a lot less, but I expect it's quite a lot _more_ for Mac laptops.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 01 2019, @05:54AM
AC was referring to how Dread Pirate Roberts (the silkroad founder) got busted.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 01 2019, @12:15AM
Just ask yourself why someone would want to do this. Are they financially strapped? Alone? Sick, and can't get medical treatment? The person in this story did this out of some type of desperation. Here in the U.S. we are no better. My company is requesting volunteers leave the company if your time there and age meets a specific number. A lot of us those that have been targeted by the offer can't take it, because they are the one in the family who has the medical benefits. Socialized medicine is the end result of for profit everything. When it is cheaper to let you die than fund your surgery or expensive medication, we have hit rock bottom as a society.