Sick And Tired Of The “Free” Argument!

As a seasoned customer, I like many others (certainly of my generation) know that nothing is free.  Sure, we have all seen the signs, free car wash, free oil change, free soda and on and on.  The word free has always gotten your attention even in a driving snowstorm or in a tornado.  Free is what everyone in life seems to strive for, as well as free-dom.  Maybe we do take freedom for granted sometimes but never something for free, it is a small victory in the lives of all Americans.

Recently, the word free has taken on a new meaning, one of political importance to the point where we are all arguing, even screaming at each other about it.  There is a political movement in this country referred to as “progressive”, where its subscribers (of which I am becoming one) believe in things such as Medicare-for-all and tuition-free college.   Can you really blame them?  The cost of healthcare has skyrocketed out of the reach of many Americans and it is impossible to get a good college education without taking a loan.  Salaries continue to stagnate (as pointed out in this blog many times), and the cost of essential life items are rising as well.

So today, while reading a blog that I regularly follow, written by a man of reasonable intelligence (although he sometimes comes off as an elitist with the use of advanced and obscure words), he brought up the notion that everyone wants everything for free.  Included in his writing were the usual subjects, healthcare, and education, in fact, he stated that everyone wants a “free Ph.D.”.  He also criticized taxation of the wealthy as “wealth redistribution”, a popular expression of those who are conservative or right leaning.  He added to his writing that many expect “free insulin”, which really pissed me off, have you seen the cost of that shit lately?

But let’s discuss the concept of “free” a little bit and see if we can find reality in all of this. First of all, as stated earlier, I realize that nothing is free.  In fact, that free oil change mentioned above is only possible after you purchase something of greater value that more than covers the cost of the free offering.  And that soda is only free when you buy an over-priced, stale hotdog and fries.  Sometimes free stuff is used as a marketing gimmick to promote a new offering (service or product) and if you like it you will buy more, it is well worth the risk of the cost to corporations.

When we look at other developed nations who have been able to provide healthcare and education to all of its citizens, none of it was free.  Most were accomplished through socialist-capitalist agreements which are partnerships between governments and the private sector.  These partnerships have created good paying jobs giving everyone the means to make a decent living.  In most of these arrangements, government-managed funding pools are created that everyone of any means or able body pay into.  These pools are created to support education, healthcare, pensions, unemployment, and other essential societal needs.  And yes, corporations and the wealthy pay a large sum of the pool (more about the wealthy later).

Now, this is a complex issue that would require a lot of re-engineering to make it work, especially in this country.  Healthcare costs are out of control, education needs to be overhauled and many citizens need to stop living on a fast food diet.  But the system of access and paying for all of these needs must be addressed soon or we will find ourselves in a severe crisis.  We certainly need to clean our government house and rid it of the nepotism-ineptitude, but that also is an argument for another day.  We constantly criticize other nations that use a single-payer system for their needs as inefficient, seriously, have you taken a close look at ours lately?

I think the confusion here centers around the concept of not having to pay cash at the time of the service but rather paying into the fund annually, quarterly, or, whatever.  When we talk about how our system works in relation to healthcare what is private insurance?  Private insurance is a pool of money that is disbursed if and when there is a need.  The major difference is that private insurance is managed by wealthy corporate pricks who extract a profit from the pool not to mention the fees incurred in managing it.  The reduction in greedy profits taken alone would seriously reduce the cost of healthcare itself.  Please don’t tell me that it wouldn’t be as efficient, do you know that many claims that are supposedly covered are still denied by private insurance?  For that matter have you seen the number of unneeded tests and procedures that happen daily, many of which are denied coverage (blog forthcoming on that topic)?

Then there is the bitch about wealth redistribution.  How many billionaires in this country made their money whether inherited or earned on the backs of the everyday citizens?  There are many!  Even if they are wealthy by virtue of investments, it was the worker who made it all happen.  While I have deep admiration for the entrepreneur, they could not build their wealth without good people (workers) around them.  I fail to understand why the wealthy do not view the alleged redistribution of money as investment or reinvestment.  It was in this country that they became billionaires and they should put back into the community to ensure that it continually grows and improves and makes them more riches.  Someday, if we do not change this current situation, the gated communities will not be able to hold back the angry villagers with pitchforks and torches—mark my words on this!

Most of these arguments are for a different day, but it continually jerks my frog that pundits, politicians and talking heads use that word free as if we are all that naive or just plain stupid enough to believe it is possible.  If there are progressive pundits out there who believe that anything is free, then they need to do some serious soul searching or just get a life.  We reasonable people (customers) realize that nothing is for free and that we must bust our arses every day to make things work.  We realize that there is no true utopia out there, but we would at least like to try to get closer to it, even if we fall short it will still be better than things are now!

And for those of you, especially right-wingers who think you hold some intellectual or moral superiority in your constant attacks on progressives like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Prof. Richard Wolff —–piss off.  Even if what Cortez proposes doesn’t work at least she has introduced new discussions looking at other ways of doing things instead of following the same path of collapse that you simpleton, corporate worshipers have promoted for over 50 years.  Dr. Wolff envisions a world of worker coops similar to what has been developed in other countries who have a capitalist-socialist agreement, which includes decent living wages, everyone having a voice in the company and all pay into the pool for the benefits. No, nothing is for free, but surely we can build a better system than we have!

Talk to Ya Later

The Grumpy Old Fart Customer @2019 All Rights Reserved