I don't have car payments. I'd move to somewhere cheaper. I don't have school loans. I don't have children. Again, I live in Massachusetts, so I'd make the food stuff work. Besides, it's not about how many hours I work. It's about how much money I make in those hours. Work smarter, not harder.

(February 5, 2018 at 4:44 pm)Shell B Wrote: I don't have car payments. I'd move to somewhere cheaper. I don't have school loans. I don't have children. Again, I live in Massachusetts, so I'd make the food stuff work. Besides, it's not about how many hours I work. It's about how much money I make in those hours. Work smarter, not harder.

So by prioritizing your spending and working smarter, you could still afford health insurance.

Seeing as I noted that working harder as I  was using it includes working smarter...looks like we're in agreement.

Could cut mine to zero and I'd still be insured.  Peace of mind is priceless...now, if only I didn't have to worry about my kids, and watching all of my hard work just pizzle away when they get hurt.

I've been there before, when the big girl was born.  The wife and I put in a combined 120-140ish hrs a week, neither of us anywhere near min wage..and then spent about 10 more every week just driving to the hospital for tests, treatment, physical.  Took..oh, idk, 3 months to completely exhaust our insurance, savings, sanity.  Got a car repoed, had to move into a shithole, she lost her job, then we had to move in with friends out of state, sold everything we owned that we could sell, had to move back to FL, ended up on wic and snap.  Probably about one flat tire away from divorce.  All of this during the recession, mind you.  OFC, when we ran out of insurance, and couldn't come out of pocket anymore, we were informed that..hey, you know, there really wasn't anything else that could be done.  Not that anything had been done, mind you.   Info we could have used much earlier I imagine..but there was money to be made!   

It was a real fucking blast,  I can totally see how some poor fucker with no service benefits, property, college, connections or extended family and friends could bootstrap up and out on minimum wage by "spending and working smarter".

It's not about me.

Well, Alpha’s entire argument rests precipitously on, ‘all other factors equal’, but we all know that that, ofc., is not the case.

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(February 5, 2018 at 3:51 pm)alpha male Wrote: See above - it's supported now. It doesn't take much extra effort to afford insurance.

I’m not just talking about insurance in what you quoted above.  I’m talking about your more general narrative that poor people are poor because they’re lazy; one that, again, you have provided zero evidence for.

I don’t know where you live, but in my state, most of Silver plans still have outrageous deductibles, and literally everything is subject to it, including prescriptions.  That’s hardly affordable, even if the monthly premiums are reasonable.

Quote:The point of the penalties, if I’m not mistaken, was to ensure there would be enough money in the system  to cover the older, and sicker of our population.  It wasn’t ever about threatening people into being healthier.

Quote:The point of the penalties is to make people buy the insurance.

Yes...for the purpose I stated above.

Quote:Fiat? I explained my thought process and offered clarification. That's just discussion.

You’re asserting, as though it’s obvious truth, that poor people are poor because their lazy.  I’m just wondering if you’re ever going to demonstrate that assertion with evidence.

(February 5, 2018 at 5:41 pm)LadyForCamus Wrote: Well, Alpha’s entire argument rests precipitously on, ‘all other factors equal’, but we all know that that, ofc., is not the case.

Yet, it's an accepted method of analyzing economic questions:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ceteris_pa...rpretation

Quote:Ceteris paribus or caeteris paribus is a Latin phrase meaning "other things equal". English translations of the phrase include "all other things being equal" or "other things held constant" or "all else unchanged". 
...
A ceteris paribus assumption is often key to scientific inquiry, as scientists seek to screen out factors that perturb a relation of interest. 
...
One of the disciplines in which ceteris paribus clauses are most widely used is economics, in which they are employed to simplify the formulation and description of economic outcomes.

(February 5, 2018 at 4:51 pm)alpha male Wrote:

(February 5, 2018 at 4:44 pm)Shell B Wrote: I don't have car payments. I'd move to somewhere cheaper. I don't have school loans. I don't have children. Again, I live in Massachusetts, so I'd make the food stuff work. Besides, it's not about how many hours I work. It's about how much money I make in those hours. Work smarter, not harder.

So by prioritizing your spending and working smarter, you could still afford health insurance.

Seeing as I noted that working harder as I  was using it includes working smarter...looks like we're in agreement.

Where did you note that?

Working smarter is not working harder. Those words mean different things, but yes, I do believe that being able to work smarter when it's to your advantage will help you keep up with the cost of medical insurance. I'm not sure how it does against medical costs insurance doesn't cover. Probably not much unless you're in the 1%.

(February 5, 2018 at 5:41 pm)LadyForCamus Wrote: Well, Alpha’s entire argument rests precipitously on, ‘all other factors equal’, but we all know that that, ofc., is not the case.

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(February 5, 2018 at 3:51 pm)alpha male Wrote: See above - it's supported now. It doesn't take much extra effort to afford insurance.

I’m not just talking about insurance in what you quoted above.  I’m talking about your more general narrative that poor people are poor because they’re lazy; one that, again, you have provided zero evidence for.

I don’t know where you live, but in my state, most of Silver plans still have outrageous deductibles, and literally everything is subject to it, including prescriptions.  That’s hardly affordable, even if the monthly premiums are reasonable.

Quote:The point of the penalties, if I’m not mistaken, was to ensure there would be enough money in the system  to cover the older, and sicker of our population.  It wasn’t ever about threatening people into being healthier.

Quote:The point of the penalties is to make people buy the insurance.

Yes...for the purpose I stated above.

Quote:Fiat? I explained my thought process and offered clarification. That's just discussion.

You’re asserting, as though it’s obvious truth, that poor people are poor because their lazy.  I’m just wondering if you’re ever going to demonstrate that assertion with evidence.

Because right wing dogma demands . If the poor can be blamed for their poverty they be ignored. Or relegated to "charity " . And they rich have an excuse to hoard all the wealth .

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(February 5, 2018 at 6:15 pm)Shell B Wrote:

(February 5, 2018 at 4:51 pm)alpha male Wrote: So by prioritizing your spending and working smarter, you could still afford health insurance.

Seeing as I noted that working harder as I  was using it includes working smarter...looks like we're in agreement.

Where did you note that?

Working smarter is not working harder. Those words mean different things, but yes, I do believe that being able to work smarter when it's to your advantage will help you keep up with the cost of medical insurance. I'm not sure how it does against medical costs insurance doesn't cover. Probably not much unless you're in the 1%.

The difference is lost on him.

(February 5, 2018 at 6:15 pm)Shell B Wrote: Where did you note that?

Post 89 - "This is a discussion forum and I'm speaking in very general terms. For instance, working smarter - choosing the correct skill sets to develop - is also a big factor, but I'm just lumping it all into one term."

Quote:Working smarter is not working harder. Those words mean different things, but yes, I do believe that being able to work smarter when it's to your advantage will help you keep up with the cost of medical insurance.

So will working more hours. Poor people can get ACA coverage for 2% - 9.5% of their income, depending on income and family size. That's not a Herculean task.

Quote:I'm not sure how it does against medical costs insurance doesn't cover. Probably not much unless you're in the 1%.

And that's an argument for single-payer, which I don't oppose.

You get that you can buy health insurance if you work and prioritize your spending. That was my main point about the guy in the article.

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(February 5, 2018 at 5:41 pm)LadyForCamus Wrote: You’re asserting, as though it’s obvious truth, that poor people are poor because their lazy.  I’m just wondering if you’re ever going to demonstrate that assertion with evidence.

No, I'm saying that someone who can't afford insurance now could do so if they worked harder, or smarter, or whatever is going to get them some more money - 2 to 9% more.

Poor people can be poor for lots of reasons. Laziness is just one of them.

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Really folks, this isn't that difficult. The guy wasn't starving. He had a truck, and work, and ten bucks to buy a lottery ticket. If he had either found a way to cut his expenditures by 2 - 9%, or earned that much more money, or a combination of the two, he could have had health insurance. That isn't some impossible task.

Would his insurance definitely have covered the tests he needed? It isn't that difficult. Can you guarantee that cutting his expenditures would have resulted in insurance that would have stopped this from happening? Nope.