Warrior General Games

Originally posted by Cuivienen
The USA can't afford it while it simultaneously subsidizes the defense of the entire first world.

Conversely, it's no surprise that other first world countries have socialized healthcare when they have subsidized defense. And most of them still struggle to afford socialized healthcare...

If the USA stopped defending its allies, perhaps things would be different. But I'm sure people in Denmark are pretty happy with their self funded socialized healthcare and mostly American taxpayer funded security, so they might not appreciate such a fundamental geopolitical change.

Cuiv you would probably know if anyone has ever attempted to put actual numbers to defense spending. I don't know how to phrase it properly but I am talking about market fluctuations due to unrest in certain regions. For example, we all have a limited understanding of how different crisis situations in the middle east can impact energy prices. I know a lot of our fertilizer comes out of regions of Africa, shipped through the Med out of Israel and up the Gulf/Mississippi. You obviously can't perfectly say what a market will do because you can't perfectly anticipate the what if's in a scenario where we stop flexing military muscle in certain areas but I know that if the supply line was slowed in fertilizer, it would cost billions.

Originally posted by krisdaschwab912

That school of thought would be wrong. Why would it be more expensive to have a test or two run on you than it would be to remove malignant tumors that could have been prevented or caught much earlier in the game?

Originally posted by seths99
no no no, you see, since there have been individuals who have gone to a doctor every year for a check up and never had anything wrong, that proves that, as a whole, preventative care is more expensive

kris, despite seths facetious response, that's not fundamentally impossible. You would have to run the numbers to tell for sure.

Cost of treatment x number of people with a case
compared to:
Cost of preventative care x number of people + cost of treatment x number of people who still get disease despite preventative care

Preventative care is not magically guaranteed to be cheaper. It depends on costs and efficacy. If preventative care is almost as expense as just treatment, it is clearly not going to be cheaper. If preventative care isn't very good at preventing the disease, again, it is clearly not going to be cheaper. If it is a bit of both, you have to do the analysis to tell where it is a good investment or not.

Originally posted by Cowpoker
I get that but if you are going to reject a plan as ill conceived as it is, as a state you had better have plan B to cover the problem.

My favorite analogy (my favorite because it is mine and it makes sense in my head and applies to many political situations) is having a neighborhood that is in danger of flooding. Some want every home owner to own an emergency boat, some want to buy helicopters and some want to kick money in to a fund to rent boats as needed. If the majority decides to buy helicopters and you are against it because it costs to much and is inefficient, you had better have your own plan when the water rises instead of allowing your family to drown because "dammit, I don't want to ride on that helicopter"

I'm on record in GLB for saying the ACA will be the most devastating piece of legislation that I have seen in my lifetime.

Yeah, but your analogy is not what is happening here. The States didn't reject the helicopter and then not propose an alternative. They rejected bath toys and haven't figured out their own helicopter/boat, which the hadn't figured out before the bath toys showed up either.

Originally posted by Corndog
There's not much difference between pre-ACA and post-ACA. There's a tiny bit of good and a tiny bit of bad.

lol, really?

Originally posted by Cowpoker
Can someone explain the part of the story where he earns too little to qualify for federal subsidy for private insurance ?

That seems bassackwards to me.

Originally posted by Lurchy
If he earns too little, he is supposed to automatically qualify for medicaid (state and/or fed). And that's a much better deal for him.

That's not correct. The way the ACA was set up, there are certain gaps that exist when States do not expand Medicaid. He earns too much to be on traditional Medicaid. He does not earn enough to be on ACA. He is in that window that the authors of the ACA intended would be covered by expanded Medicaid and they did not create a back up.

Everyone on Medicaid technically earns too little to qualify for ACA (they did not want people to have the option of Medicaid or ACA, either you qualify for one or the other). He just earns too much for Medicaid in his State too.

Originally posted by Lurchy
Kind of true.
...
Again, partially true.

Nope, those statement were completely true.


Originally posted by Lurchy
The ACA is about reducing the size of the notch group, increasing preventative care, reducing overutilization of the ER, reducing overutilization of healthcare in general, preventing insurance companies from dumping high-risk/high-cost patients onto society (see pre-existing conditions), and keeping future increases in medicare costs to a minimum. These are just a few points off the top of my head.

You are confusing the marketing of the ACA with the content of the ACA.


Originally posted by Lurchy
The implementation and outcomes are certainly still in question, as I'm in full agreement with CP and others that it is too early to tell. The one thing I will say on this issue is that the ACA, to this point, has actually cost the public less than expected.

They are not still in question. It is not too early to tell. It has not actually cost the public less than expected, unless you had poor, unreasonable expectations, in which case, that is a meaningless statement.

Originally posted by Cuivienen
Murder is already heavily criminalized. How's that working out for us?

Clearly, murders still happen and over a third of murderers are never caught. I suppose we should just make it legal and stop fighting a losing battle.

Two completely different things. But sure, go fish!

Originally posted by Cowpoker
Cuiv you would probably know if anyone has ever attempted to put actual numbers to defense spending. I don't know how to phrase it properly but I am talking about market fluctuations due to unrest in certain regions. For example, we all have a limited understanding of how different crisis situations in the middle east can impact energy prices. I know a lot of our fertilizer comes out of regions of Africa, shipped through the Med out of Israel and up the Gulf/Mississippi. You obviously can't perfectly say what a market will do because you can't perfectly anticipate the what if's in a scenario where we stop flexing military muscle in certain areas but I know that if the supply line was slowed in fertilizer, it would cost billions.

I'm not sure exactly what the question is, but you have pretty clearly described why the US spends so much on defense and why we defend our allies.

Our economy benefits from the investment. Big time. Could be used as a justification for taxing business tbqh. But the thing is, French businesses get it for free, so why punish American businesses to make up the difference? We need to do a better job of getting our allies to contribute something closer to their fair share of global security.

Originally posted by krisdaschwab912
Two completely different things. But sure, go fish!

lolno

Two laws that aren't perfect, like all laws! But yes, you are right, any law that is not perfect should be repealed. Yay anarchy!

Originally posted by foofighter24
A lifetime of drugs can be prevented by never starting.

I would argue that such programs only foster a more accepting environment where more people experiment and become users and abusers.

Preventative care like criminalizing drug activity?

not everyone is perfect like you Foo. sometimes people get sucked into horrible lives and they need a little help to get out. will everyone get out? no. but sometimes people who YOU think are unredeemable, really arent. they can become valuable tax paying food truck visiting citizens.

reminder that some people are born addicted

sad face

Originally posted by Cuivienen
I'm not sure exactly what the question is, but you have pretty clearly described why the US spends so much on defense and why we defend our allies. Our economy benefits from the investment. Big time.
Iraq notwithstanding, the vast majority of defense spending isn't about intervention anywhere. It's about expensive projects that usually go nowhere along with ridiculous administrative waste. It's insane that cuts usually hit personnel when that's the only area that doesn't need to be cut drastically.

jd, what makes you think intervention is the only way to achieve security? Ever heard of deterrence?

How many times have we used our nuclear arsenal since 1945? Was spending money on one at all a waste of money (you may argue that we spent too much, but I am asking if spending anything on nukes was a waste)?

BTW, I'm certainly not claiming that the government is doing a great job on defense spending and is super efficient about it or any other kind of spending.

Originally posted by Cuivienen
I'm not sure exactly what the question is, but you have pretty clearly described why the US spends so much on defense and why we defend our allies.

Our economy benefits from the investment. Big time. Could be used as a justification for taxing business tbqh. But the thing is, French businesses get it for free, so why punish American businesses to make up the difference? We need to do a better job of getting our allies to contribute something closer to their fair share of global security.

I know there are too many variables and unknowns to clearly say that this $1 spent in this shit hole on the globe prevents $1.30 worth of loss in slowed supply or limited supply. I know that large companies do risk assessments on investing money in certain areas of the globe and while I have not been included in the actual discussions or presented the numbers, their forecasters have explained how they attempt to assess that risk in financial terms. Ukraine being a good example, is the reward worth the risk to invest company capital in developing facilities in that region to capture the market. Those things are obviously above my pay grade but does the US government ever do similar analysis on where to fly a drone, park a battleship and what it costs to have those capabilities in that area vs what it does to stabilize certain markets or economies ?

Maybe we need to adopt a movie mafia mentality. France and every other country for that matter, needs to pay us X amount for "protection" and if you are slow paying, we break their legs.