What caused the recession?

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Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

Just for the information of those who mentioned that it is the law that if you go to the emergency room you must be treated ..... stabilized is what it is. If you don't have insurance they will get rid of you as quickly as they can. I personally know people who were in this situation and one of them died because of the "treatment"..... rather the lack of it, received through hospitals in Palm Beach county.

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Yes very true. If you are low income you will be treated to completion at no cost to you after being shipped off to the county hospital. If you are not low income you will be stabilized, maybe some tests run and sent on your way. I had a friend who went to the emergency room in dire pain and after testing was told to see an oncologist and given pain meds. After he saw the MD he was told he needed surgery. During his preop visit to the hospital he was ushered into the business office and told his surgery along with chemo and radiation would cost him around 300 grand total and they wanted insurance info or 150 grand up front which he didn't have.They told him apply as indigent or go to county health. he qualified for neither. So, he went home and died months later. This is not an isolated instance. If this happened in Europe people would be rioting in the streets but in this country people are shamed by their situation and quietly go home and die.

The problem with anecdotal informational is that isolated events are hard to understand sometimes. How can you believe anything the liberal press prints.

I live in California county that has 25% unemployment. This county always has 20% unemployment in the winter. That is where I learned to save money and don't plan on anybody else to give me any. I worked for 10 years when I first started raising a family with no days off except the national holidays and some weekends. We don't have a nice car, we don't have nice furniture, we did not convert equity in our home to take Caribbean vacations and any of the other stupid things that people feel they are "entitled" to. The good part is that I almost have my home paid off and I am making a very good living working for a company that has the same values that I do. We are growing during this recession by 10% a year and my wife finally has some furniture that she should not be ashamed of. "Keep it simple stupid"


I have a daughter who worked as an engineer for 5 years and paid a butt load of taxes and got laid off just before the recession started. Fast forward...she needed a gallbladder operation. She did not qualify for one because she owned a car that was worth over $3000 and could not be considered indigent. She had to sell her car and then the operation was granted.

There is no doubt the health care system is America needs revamping. What a lot of people across this, and other nations, do not understand is that to pay for the system as it was passed is going to bankrupt us. Starting next year there is going to be a tax on a home that you sell...sounds outrageous? There are 2000 pages of these kind of taxes.

I have socialist friends that work in Berkley who think any individual should only be entitled to enough money for food, rent, and a bicycle. Extreme yes? There has to be middle ground. We in America are sick and tired of greedy people on both ends. People who think they are entitled to my paycheck and politicians who take my paycheck to pay everybody under the sun, for God knows what. Why is it that so many in Europe think that we should live like they do. Progressives are always telling conservatives what they should do because it is the "right" thing and we will burn you to the ground if you disagree.

This topic is huge and we are just going to have to agree to disagree. Every nation on the planet has their problems I am just glad I live in a country that has a document called the "United States Constitution" that outlines the clear fact that the government derives their power from ME and other people like me, not the other way around like so many other countries in the world.

This post was not meant to offend anyone and I hope it does not but we all have different points of views and I, for one, will no longer be silenced by the PC crowd that thinks they finally won the argument during the previous election in the US. I along with many people are just tired of it! The government is going to start behaving like they are spending real money from real citizens or they will be gone! Democrat, Republican or whoever else is in power!


Take Care,
Richard

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Originally Posted by riooso

The government is going to start behaving like they are spending real money from real citizens or they will be gone! Democrat, Republican or whoever else is in power!

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I tend to be rather cynical, so may be you should take it with a grain of salt, but I don't see it happening that way. Here's how I view the situation: (1) The government is already in big debt, so to pay that down they have to collect more taxes and/or provide less services, which means break promises they've already made. (2) The government gets voted out when people feel they give too much, and/or not get enough. (3) The government has the biggest military power in the world, so there's the possibility of defaulting on the debt and deal with the consequences. (4) The government seems more susceptible to lobbying than to voter dissent (which, given enough money is apparently rather easily manipulated), and the entities who can afford lobbying aren't interested in the government defaulting on the debt.
Yeah, civil war is a possible solution, but in my opinion if that actually becomes a real possibility most of the people would prefer to be poor rather than have their children dead.

Unfortunately this country is caught in a vortex and is being steered by forces it has little control over as are most other Western Nations. Defaulting is not an option. The country must raise funds through debt sales and if we default the interest we would be paying would eat up the entire treasury.

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Originally Posted by riooso

This topic is huge and we are just going to have to agree to disagree. Every nation on the planet has their problems I am just glad I live in a country that has a document called the "United States Constitution" that outlines the clear fact that the government derives their power from ME and other people like me, not the other way around like so many other countries in the world.

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Before you start spouting about other constitutions than your own you might want to read up on them first.

This "60 Minutes" episode is more bad news:
State Budgets: Day of Reckoning - 60 Minutes - CBS News

This might Get me in trouble with you guys, but in my opinion the OP question can,IMHO, be answered in one single word: Greed!

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Originally Posted by Birnando

This might Get me in trouble with you guys, but in my opinion the OP question can,IMHO, be answered in one single word: Greed!

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Yea, but never your own, always somebody else's.

We had bad economic recession here back in nineties. In short it was caused by general stupidity of both stock market and crowds as well when all seemed to live in an utopia where economic growth would go on forever.

People took oversized loans to buy whatever they ever imagined and banks where greed enough to give everyone what they ever dared to ask. When the bubble then broke chaos was ready. State had to use tax payers money to save the banks from falling because consequenses would have been much worse both to economics and individual citizens as well.

There were other reasons too, but i always thought that you shouldn't eat more than you earn with the money they haven't yet earned.

Somehow it looks like it is coming again. Now as many of our industrial jobs are sold abroad, general trend seems to be that we can go on living well washing each others feet. No, i'm not jumping into that wagon this time either.

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Originally Posted by Birnando

This might Get me in trouble with you guys, but in my opinion the OP question can,IMHO, be answered in one single word: Greed!

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The Irish perspective (not imbeded because of the profanity):

Interview Irish Man Financial Situation Ireland Michael Flatley | someecards.com