The only way to teach children right from wrong

“Right” and “wrong” are social conventions that differ among societies. Canibals think eating people is just fine. Aztecs supposedly enjoyed ripping out hearts. Slavery was de rigueur in America.

You were not born knowing right from wrong. You learned from your family and friends. You learned from your schools and other outside sources.

There is only one way to teach children right from wrong. Children must be taught what is right and taught what is wrong. They must be taught the truth.

So, for instance, if your family and friends were bigots — — i.e. intolerant of people because of their race, religion, or sexual orientation — and your schools said nothing about bigotry, you probably would have become a bigot.

Why would your family and friends teach you bigotry? Because their families and friends taught them bigotry, a chain extending down through the generations, families and friends teaching bigotry as a standing tradition.

Why would your schools say nothing? Perhaps because of laws that prevented them from teaching you right from wrong, for fear you would find such teaching “uncomfortable.”

Although you, like most people, probably harbor some forms of bigotry in your heart, you probably also agree that bigotry, in general, is a sin. How do we solve that dichotomy and break the historical chain?

I was reminded of that question when some years ago, on a visit to Germany, I toured the Dachau concentration camp.

Dachau’s commandant, Theodor Eicke, introduced a system of regulations which inflicted brutal punishments on prisoners for the slightest offenses, while scientists there conducted cruel experiments.

Prisoners were subjected to injections of malaria and tuberculosis, and the untold thousands that died from hard labor or torture were routinely burned in the on-site crematorium.

As Allied units approached, at least 25,000 prisoners from the Dachau camp system were force-marched south.

During these death marches, the Germans shot anyone who could no longer continue; many also died of starvation, hypothermia, or exhaustion.

When American forces liberated Dachau, they found more than 30 railroad cars filled with bodies.

I was able to tour the camp because the German government neither hid nor denied the existence of the horrors committed there. In fact, they use the camp as a reminder of the past, to help prevent a repeat.

A movie describing in detail, the horrors of the camp, is shown to daily busloads of German school children as a right-vs.-wrong lesson.

The German people, but for a small minority, do not celebrate the misdeeds of Naziism. There are no statues of Hitler in Germany. The Holocaust is revealed and decried.

The Germans do not fear admitting this dark period of their history. In fact, they actively teach it.

I think of that approach to the shameful parts of Germany’s heritage when I compare it to the American — or rather, the right-wing — approach to the horrors of our past and even of our present.

Slavery was an abomination that was celebrated by statues which, at long last, were pulled down despite claims of “Southern heritage.”

And today, in America, “well-meaning, good citizens,” protest against teaching the parts of our past that shame us. Their stated concern is that such reminders and revelations would make their children “uncomfortable.”

But ignorance is uncomfortable. Bigotry is uncomfortable. Denial does not change reality.

Today, our black families continue to undergo hardship. No, it isn’t of Holocaust levels, but still is terribly destructive and wholly unnecessary in our wealthy nation.

GOP advocated denial is the worst approach because it teaches no lessons. It condemns us to repeat the sins of the past.

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
George Santayana, The Life of Reason, 1905. From the series Great Ideas of Western Man.

We neither can, nor should try, to erase the blemishes of our past. Nor should anyone blame our children for our sins or for the sins of those who came before us. Leveling such blame would, in itself, be bigotry.

The purpose of teaching history is not to lay blame or to create guilt, but to help us know our own successes and foibles, and the circumstances that can move a nation to bigotry and hatred.

We are not pure. No nation is. Pretending purity is blindness and naivete. Let us be honest with ourselves. To some degree, we all receive mistreatment at times, but in America people of color have been, and still are, disproportionately mistreated.

We allow the teaching of the Holocaust, and even have museums dedicated to that education. Few object, because it was the Germans, and to a degree, the Poles, Austrians, French and others who committed those crimes.

But the teaching of racism in America is an anathema to some Americans, because it is we, or more correctly, some of us, who are the perpetrators. And to hide that historical fact, we countenance angry denial.

This brings us to something called “Critical Race Theory,” perhaps the most reviled yet least understood and least taught academic subject in education.

Critical race theory (CRT) is an academic concept that is more than 40 years old. The core idea is that race is a social construct, and that racism is not merely the product of individual bias or prejudice, but also something embedded in legal systems and policies.

One example: In the 1930s, government officials literally drew lines around areas deemed poor financial risks, often explicitly due to the racial composition of inhabitants. Banks subsequently refused to offer mortgages to Black people in those areas.

Scholars who study critical race theory in education look at how policies and practices in K-12 education contribute to persistent racial inequalities in education, and advocate for ways to change them.

Among the topics they’ve studied: racially segregated schools, the underfunding of majority-Black and Latino school districts, disproportionate disciplining of Black students, barriers to gifted programs and selective-admission high schools, and curricula that reinforce racist ideas.

Solving racial inequalities first requires admitting that they exist and then admitting that they should be solved.

And that requires study.

Sadly, there are those who deny any study is necessary, deny such inequalities exist to be solved, and claim any such equalities are the fault of the Black students — a “blame-the-victim” rationalization.

The Catholic confessional begins, “Forgive me father for I have sinned.” The confession of sin is the first necessary step for absolution. Without realization and confession, the sin compounds.

The Germans seem to have understood that the denial of sin is in itself a sin.

“Forgive America, father, for we have sinned.” Those are the words of the truly moral, truly righteous.

An evil man, like Donald Trump, would have you deny the obvious. He would have you deny the clear fact that people of color have received worse treatment in America than white Christians. That denial compounds the evil.

For you who are religious, here is are reminders:

John 1:9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
James 5:16 Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed.
Proverbs 28:13 Whoever conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy.
Psalm 32:5 I acknowledged my sin to you, and I did not cover my iniquity; I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,” and you forgave the iniquity of my sin.
Romans 3:23 For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God
James 4:17 So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.

Perhaps you are one of those rare souls who has not sinned and has not felt bigotry in your heart. But to deny, or even to countenance the sins of others against strangers is in itself a sin.

Discomfort is not an excuse for denial.

Children must be taught about the existence of sin so they can recognize it and learn to avoid it. Without this teaching, the children can be sucked into sin by evil persons.

We are not born bigots. We learn to be bigots, unless we first learn about the evils of bigotry.

The people who object to the teaching of racism in America often blame their children’s sensitivity. But this is a false excuse. The real reason is, they are ashamed of our past, and want to bury it.

But the past has become the present, and it cannot be buried so long as it still lives. The only way to end the shame is to recognize it and to speak against it, else it will not only continue but multiply.

Perhaps, the real problem lies not in the reluctance to admit that bigotry exists but rather in the fear of the cures.

“Affirmative action” often has involved establishing racial quotas or preferences to “even out” representation in school admissions or job hiring. The problem here is that it invariably requires the less qualified to take precedence over the more qualified, and always will be seen as unfair.

Affirmative action” also stigmatizes the very people it is supposed to help — the “You got in only because you are black” appearance, which further adds to the bigotry rather than reducing it.

Once we recognize the bigotry problem itself, and once we determine to solve it, the solution lies not at the top but at its foundation: Money and poverty, i.e. the income/wealth/power Gap at the bottom of the financial scale.

Lacking money, such minorities as Blacks and Latins suffer poorer primary schools, more crime, less family stability, poorer housing, poorer nutrition, and a desperate culture, where immediate needs take precedence over future plans.

These all lead to poorer primary-school academic results which, in turn, lead to less-educated older students and less qualified job- and college applicants.

The solution lies not in taking from the top to give to the bottom (which always will be fought by America’s most powerful), or in giving solely to the bottom (which will be viewed as unfair by America’s middle).

Rather, the solution is to lift the lower levels far enough above subsistence so that the problems of poorer primary schools, more crime, less family stability, poorer housing, poorer nutrition, and desperation culture cease to impact even the least fortunate among us.

This would be a “rising tide” approach that lifts all boats. Examples can be found in the “Ten Steps to Prosperity” (below). For example:

Eliminate the FICA tax
Offer free Medicare to All who want it.
Offer Social Security to All who want it.
Offer free College to All who want it.

Offering the same money to everyone, regardless of current income or wealth, will not affect the lifestyles of the rich, but can lift the poor to levels where school and job achievements are seen as being in reach.

It will not evoke cries of “unfairness” and “discomfort” that currently plague the accurate teaching of America’s history.

———-///———-

[Why would any sane person take dollars from the economy and give them to a federal government that has the infinite ability to create dollars?]

Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
Monetary Sovereignty
Twitter: @rodgermitchell
Search #monetarysovereignty
Facebook: Rodger Malcolm Mitchell

……………………………………………………………………..

THE SOLE PURPOSE OF GOVERNMENT IS TO IMPROVE AND PROTECT THE LIVES OF THE PEOPLE.

The most important problems in economics involve:

Monetary Sovereignty describes money creation and destruction.
Gap Psychology describes the common desire to distance oneself from those “below” in any socio-economic ranking, and to come nearer those “above.” The socio-economic distance is referred to as “The Gap.”

Wide Gaps negatively affect poverty, health and longevity, education, housing, law and crime, war, leadership, ownership, bigotry, supply and demand, taxation, GDP, international relations, scientific advancement, the environment, human motivation and well-being, and virtually every other issue in economics. Implementation of Monetary Sovereignty and The Ten Steps To Prosperity can grow the economy and narrow the Gaps:

Ten Steps To Prosperity:

The Ten Steps will grow the economy and narrow the income/wealth/power Gap between the rich and the rest.

MONETARY SOVEREIGNTY

The intractable puzzle: Narrowing the Gap between the rich and the rest

The United States seemingly has puzzled with the problem of the growing Gaps between the rich and the rest of us. I say, “seemingly” because of the spectacular lack of success any remedial effort has had.

**In 20 years, the share of American Net Worth held by the top 1% has risen from above 22% to above 32%.**

Not only have the Gaps widened dramatically in the past 40 years, but there has been a stunning increase in just the past year.

To combat the economy-crushing effects of COVID, the government has pumped trillions into the private sector. An inordinate share seems to have benefited the upper 1%.

Although virtually all politicians pretend to bemoan the growing income/wealth/power Gap, the Democrats seem unable to enact a solution and the Republicans actively oppose one.

We are not alone in this conundrum. Japan faces a similar problem, as excerpts from the following article show:

Big tax break not enough for Japan’s employers to hike pay
Japan’s government wants employers to raise wages.
By Ben Dooley and Hisako Ueno The New York Times

TOKYO — Over the past two years, Masataka Yoshimura has poured money into the custom-suit business his family founded over 100 years ago. He has upgraded his factory, installed automated inventory management systems and retrained workers who have been replaced by software and robots.

Japan’s prime minister wants him to do one more thing: Give his employees a substantial raise.

Wage growth has been stagnant for decades in Japan, the wealth gap is widening and the quickest fix is nudging people like Yoshimura to pay their employees more.

Higher wages, the thinking goes, will jump-start consumer spending and lift Japan’s sputtering economy. But raises are a nonstarter for Yoshimura. Increasing wages would be “truly fatal,” he said last month from his office at Yoshimura & Sons in Tokyo.

And he is far from alone in his thinking. Business groups, union leaders and others have questioned the feasibility of a plan by Prime Minister Fumio Kishida to offer sizable tax deductions to companies that raise pay.

That businesses would resist increasing wages even when essentially paid to do so shows just how intractable the problem is. Years of weak growth and moribund inflation rates have left companies little room to raise prices.

The prime minister is calling on employers to increase pay as much as 4% in 2022. Companies that comply will be allowed to increase their overall corporate tax deductions up to 40%.

Japan has many differences from the U.S. — cultural, economic, historical — but both nations seem to agree that the growing Gaps are a bad thing. They are bad, morally. They are bad, economically. They lead to oligarchy.

From Wikipedia:

Oligarchy is a form of power structure in which power rests with a small number of people. These people may or may not be distinguished by one or several characteristics, such as nobility, fame, wealth, education, or corporate, religious, political, or military control.

Throughout history, oligarchies have often been tyrannical, relying on public obedience or oppression to exist.

Aristotle pioneered the use of the term as meaning rule by the rich, for which another term commonly used today is plutocracy.

In the early 20th century Robert Michels developed the theory that democracies, like all large organizations, have a tendency to turn into oligarchies.

In his “Iron law of oligarchy” he suggests that the necessary division of labor in large organizations leads to the establishment of a ruling class mostly concerned with protecting their own power.

Thus, we have a problem (the Gaps), as viewed by the nation as a whole, divorced from those who seemingly can solve the problem (businesses), who don’t see it as a problem at all.

Leaving the solution to a problem in the hands of those who don’t view it as a problem, or even who benefit from the problem, can lead only to today’s outcome: The problem grows worse.

It’s like telling a woman the “problem” is that her sexy dress attracts too many men, when that is exactly what she wants. She is unlikely to solve the “problem.”

Business is unlikely to solve the problem of the widening Gaps when that is exactly what business leaders want.

Gap Psychology dictates that people generally wish to widen the Gap below them. How the rich avoid taxes? --- Revealed by Paradise Paper — Steemit

Reality dictates that the rich wish to become richer, and the term “richer” implies a growing difference vs. “poorer.”

Without the Gaps, no one would be rich, and the wider the Gaps, the richer they are.

So both the motivation and the power to narrow the Gaps lies not with business, but with government, the sole question being how government should accomplish the narrowing process.

Some economists have suggested minimum wage laws, but clearly, these have failed even to approach the goal. The main problem is that wages are a business expense, and successful businesses devote themselves to minimizing expenses.

The undeniable fact that wage increases cut profits, stands as a concrete barrier to a business solution.

THE SOLUTION

The one entity that needn’t worry about profits is the federal government, and it has the perfect Gap-narrowing tool: Tax policy.

We must remember that unlike state/local taxes, which fund state/local government spending. federal taxes do not fund federal spending. In fact, the federal government destroys all tax dollars it receives.

The federal government pays all of its bills with newly created dollars, ad hoc. It can do this endlessly. No limits.

Why then does the federal government collect taxes? The primary purpose of federal tax collection is to control the economy. The federal government taxes what it wishes to discourage and gives tax breaks to what it wishes to encourage.

Example: The federal government long has wished to encourage home building and ownership, so it provides to homeowners, many tax breaks that are not available to renters. (The rich mostly are owners, not renters.)

Think of tax breaks for: Property taxes, mortgage interest, certain home improvements, mortgage insurance, and deductions from capital gains when you sell your house.

The government’s use of tax laws to benefit those the government favors is the primary reason why the rich benefit from tax breaks not available to you.

If the government really wanted to narrow the income Gap between the rich and the rest, it first would eliminate the FICA tax. This ultimately regressive tax applies only to the first $137.7K of salary, and not to anything above that level.

The person have a salary of $150,000 pays exactly the same amount of FICA as does the person whose salary is $1 million. Half of FICA is deducted directly from paychecks and half ostensibly is paid by the employer.

In reality, however, all of FICA comes out of paychecks, because employers figure this cost when deciding what to pay workers.

The elimination of FICA (which contrary to popular wisdom, does not fund Social Security or Medicare), immediately would help narrow some of the income and wealth Gaps, particularly the Gaps between lower and middle-income salaried workers vs. upper income workers.

Second, the government could provide free, no-deductible Medicare for All. This is an expense ostensibly borne by those companies that provide health care insurance to workers. I say “ostensibly,” because it is a cost that companies consider when determining salaries.

Some other Gap-narrowing steps the federal government could take include:

Free college for All.
Social Security for All
Tax deductions for renters
Federally paid salary for attending school, grades K+
Eliminate income tax for all those earning less than $500K per year, adjusted annually for inflation
A reverse sales tax on food and clothing.
Free life insurance policies for all
A wealth tax
Tax the annual value appreciation of stocks and other capital
No-exception tax on inheritance.

In short, there are many steps the federal government easily could take, to narrow the Gap between the rich and the rest.

The sole problem is the rich. They don’t want the Gaps narrowed. The Gaps are what makes them rich. Without the Gaps, no one would be rich; we all would be the same. And the wider the Gaps, the richer they are and the poorer we are.

So, they use their massive financial power to bribe the politicians and to convince the populace, that these steps would be “unaffordable,” “unsustainable,” “socialism,” “undeserved” by the underclasses, and/or “inflationary.”

In truth, the federal government, being Monetarily Sovereign is unique in that it can afford and sustain any financial obligation. It never unintentionally can run short of dollars.

None of the above-mentioned steps are socialism, which involves government ownership and control, not just spending. Sadly, the people who cry loudest about “socialism” have the least idea about what socialism is.

The less-than-rich deserve the same kind of federal help as do the rich, who like Donald Trump, have found ways to pay zero taxes despite massive earnings.

And inflation always is caused by shortages of key goods and services, never by government spending.

The currently wide and widening Gaps are not inevitable. They are a choice, an insidious and harmful choice foisted on us by the rich.

The sole cure is to find, then elect, someone who understands the problem and the solutions, and who is not under the thumb of the rich — if such people actually exist.

Rodger Malcolm Mitchell Monetary Sovereignty Twitter: @rodgermitchell Search #monetarysovereignty Facebook: Rodger Malcolm Mitchell

……………………………………………………………………..

THE SOLE PURPOSE OF GOVERNMENT IS TO IMPROVE AND PROTECT THE LIVES OF THE PEOPLE.

The most important problems in economics involve:

Monetary Sovereignty describes money creation and destruction.
Gap Psychology describes the common desire to distance oneself from those “below” in any socio-economic ranking, and to come nearer those “above.” The socio-economic distance is referred to as “The Gap.”

The Ten Steps will grow the economy and narrow the income/wealth/power Gap between the rich and the rest.

MONETARY SOVEREIGNTY

Why is Medicare the way it is?

The purpose of government is to improve and protect the lives of the governed.

Is the Medicare Advantage plan an admission that Medicare itself is unnecessarily incomplete?

Rolls-Royce Phantom Prices, Reviews and New Model Information — **Free, but with strings.**

A story: You receive a call from the wealthiest man on earth. He owns an infinite amount of money.

He tells you he’s in the mood to do a good deed.

He has picked your name randomly, not based on anything but the luck of the draw, and he is giving you a free, no-strings-attached, Rolls Royce automobile.

Well, actually, there are two small strings. You must choose between two Rolls.

One has no heater. The other has no air conditioning.

And you must wait until you are 65 years old before you pick your car.

This puzzles you, so you ask him, “Why would someone having infinite money decide that when does his good deed, he gifts you a car that is missing either a heater or air conditioner?”

And why must you wait until you’re 65?

What’s his purpose?

While you ponder that question, consider this: The federal government, being uniquely Monetarily Sovereign, has infinite dollars. It never can run short of its own sovereign currency.

The government provides you with Medicare, which comes in two basic “models,” Original Medicare and Medicare Advantage.

And you typically must wait until you are 65 to join (with certain exceptions).

But Medicare and Medicare Advantage have different options depending on many of your personal factors.

WHY? Why doesn’t Original Medicare simply cover all medical conditions for everyone?

The American Association of Retired People (AARP) published “8 Reasons to Change Medicare:

1. My prescription costs have jumped.
That happens usually due to one of two scenarios: You’ve been prescribed a new drug your Plan D policy doesn’t cover, or your current medicines have fallen off your Plan D’s formulary (list of covered medicines), Neuman says.

Each September, Part D prescription plans will send out a list of changes to drug coverage, giving you time to make sure your medicines are still covered.

If not, you can shop around for another plan or ask your doctor to apply for an exception in covering your favored medicine.

WHY? Why must a person pay extra for Part D, and why must that person shop around for a plan that covers all his medicines?

2. I’ve decided to spend my winters (or summers) in a different state.
Advantage plans typically charge more to go to doctors outside of their networks; in some cases they won’t cover any charges if it’s not an emergency.

So a Midwesterner might have to pay more to see out-of-network doctors while in Florida.

You need to read the details of your plan, or talk with a representative, to know where you stand. If you’ll be living a dual-residence existence for years to come, you might consider a switch to original Medicare, with the usual caveats.

WHY? Why the “in-network, out-of-network” rigamarole?

3. I need surgery and prefer a specific doctor.
Original Medicare allows patients to choose any doctor or hospital that accepts Medicare.

But if you’re in a Medicare Advantage plan and its surgeons don’t meet your needs, you may need a different MA plan or to switch to OM.

The people who really need to focus on whether doctors are in network are those who’ve suffered major problems like cancer and heart attack, says Joseph Antos, health care expert at the American Enterprise Institute.

“A specialist may be key to their treatment,” he says.

WHY? Why does one Medicare plan cover any doctors or hospitals that accept Medicare and the other plan doesn’t?

4. I’m super healthy and rarely need a doctor.
If you’re in original Medicare, all should be well: As a “pay-for-service” arrangement, not seeing the doctor isn’t costing you anything extra beyond your mandatory parts B and D monthly insurance premiums.

If you’re in an MA plan in which you’re paying a monthly premium on top of your standard Part B premium, that may be for a plan that offers lots of extras , such as gym memberships.

Consider switching to a lower-cost MA plan that doesn’t offer services you don’t plan to use in the coming year.

WHY? Why are there any premiums, and why does one plan not cover the “extras?

5. I’ve been diagnosed with a chronic condition.
A serious medical change should trigger a full review of your Medicare coverage. Make sure your Plan D policy pays for new prescriptions.

Consider the care you’ll need . If you want disease-specific programs, find an MA plan that offers them.

But if you will need lots of specialists, there’s an argument for OM. Making critical changes early can “really affect your pocketbook and save you money,” says Gretchen Jacobson, a vice president with the Commonwealth Fund.

WHY? Why the difference in plans? Why doesn’t one plan cover everything?

6. My income has dropped sharply.
If you are in original Medicare, your Part B monthly premium is locked in, but your Part D drug plan isn’t.

And there’s a chance you can find a lower-cost policy that covers the medicines you are on.

If you’re in an Advantage plan, consider a switch to a plan in which there is no extra payment on top of the mandatory Part B premium.

And you might qualify for help. Ask your state Medicaid office about Medicare Savings Programs. Find the state offices here or call 800-MEDICARE (800-633-4227).

WHY? Why is there a monthly premium? Why does one plan not even lock in premiums? Why the difference in costs?

7. My former employer is changing its retiree health benefits.
Some companies provide retirees with Medigap supplemental insurance, which covers many health costs not covered by OM.

If you have changes to your retiree benefit coverage, or for some reason that coverage no longer is offered, contact Medicare’s Benefits Coordination & Recovery Center (855-798-2627).

Someone can tell you whether you fall in the window in which Medigap insurers cannot deny you coverage based on preexisting conditions.

WHY? Why are some retirees not covered by Medigap supplemental? Why is there even a need for supplemental?

8. My regular doctor is no longer in network for my plan.
If you deeply want to stay with a doctor, ask directly whether he or she is moving to a different MA plan, accepting OM patients or dropping out of Medicare completely.

If you decide to make a change, make sure a short-term decision won’t affect your long-term coverage (for example, switching to original Medicare to temporarily stay with one doctor but sacrificing Medigap coveragefor the long term).

It might be safer to ask your doctor to recommend a colleague in your current plan.

I’m in need of serious dental care. Original Medicare doesn’t cover routine dental care costs, but many Medicare Advantage plans do.

If you don’t have your own dental insurance and can’t afford dentistry costs out of pocket, consider finding an MA plan that will cover a portion of the costs of your needed work.

Antos warns that figuring out what portion of your dental bills an MA plan will cover is complicated, so it helps to know what services you will use in the coming year.

WHY? Why does a person need to consult a crystal ball to guess what medical coverage will be needed at some unknown time in the future?

WHY?

HERE IS WHY: Our Monetarily Sovereign government has infinite funds. It can afford any expense, even without collecting a single dollar in taxes. It has ultimate control over the value of the dollar, i.e. inflation.

Thus, the federal government has the unlimited ability to fund comprehensive, no-deductible Medicare for every man, woman, and child in America. There is no financial reason why you, your family and everyone you know does not have free, total healthcare protection.

But . . .

At the behest of the very rich, who run America, our information leaders promulgate the Big Lie that taxpayers fund federal spending, and that the federal government is in danger of running short of dollars if spending increases without tax increases.

You have been sold the bill of goods that “there is no such thing as a free lunch,” and that federal spending causes inflation, and that the phony Medicare “trust fund” is running short of money.

The rich do this to widen the Gap between the rich and the rest, for it is the Gap that makes them rich. The wider the Gap, the richer they are.

Better “Medicare for All” plans have been proposed, but they have been rejected supposedly because tax dollars are needed to pay for it.

They aren’t. It’s the Big Lie, the sole purpose of which is to make the rich richer.

There is no other purpose.

Rodger Malcolm Mitchell Monetary Sovereignty Twitter: @rodgermitchell Search #monetarysovereignty Facebook: Rodger Malcolm Mitchell

……………………………………………………………………..

THE SOLE PURPOSE OF GOVERNMENT IS TO IMPROVE AND PROTECT THE LIVES OF THE PEOPLE.

The most important problems in economics involve:

Monetary Sovereignty describes money creation and destruction.
Gap Psychology describes the common desire to distance oneself from those “below” in any socio-economic ranking, and to come nearer those “above.” The socio-economic distance is referred to as “The Gap.”

The Ten Steps will grow the economy and narrow the income/wealth/power Gap between the rich and the rest.

MONETARY SOVEREIGNTY

There are some things only the government should do.

Liberals think the purpose of government is to protect the poor and powerless from the rich and powerful. Conservatives think the purpose of government is to protect the rich and powerful from the poor and powerless.

—————————-

We are social animals. Rules, laws, codes, and mores are the natural consequence of that shared life. We establish governments to organize and formalize those rules.

The fundamental purpose of governments is to improve and protect the lives of the governed.

Those of a libertarian bent decry government as being intrusive upon their freedoms. Yet, the very purpose of laws is to limit any individual’s freedom to do harm to society. For humans, anarchy tends to devolve into chaos.

For arch Libertarians, every law (or at least every law they dislike, today) is pejoratively defined as “Socialism,” and that supposedly ends the argument. They opt for “small government” which tends to translate into, less taxing of the rich and fewer benefits for the poor.

But Socialism, like most “isms,” neither is bad nor good, in of itself. The assessment depends on conditions and how the “ism” is applied.

When Ronald Reagan famously declared, “Government is the problem,” he was President of one of the more successful governments on this planet — successful in the sense that it oversaw one of the freest, wealthiest, most powerful nations in history. Clearly, Reagen was not a Libertarian when he uttered those words, which in any event have been misconstrued and twisted over time.

And as it turned out, Reagan was not a small-business President.

Today’s Libertarianism leans heavily toward a form of Conservatism that favors the rich over the poor, to the point where virtually any benefit for the poor is denounced as encroaching on “our” (meaning the rich’s) freedoms.

Despite the “Socialism!” howls of today’s Republicans, and the “Big Government!” screams of the Libertarians, some things truly are better left to the federal government. Three of these things are discussed at: The military, the nation’s banks, and healthcare.

**Sure you paid us insurance premiums, but do you really expect us to pay for your healthcare?**

When deciding what should be done by government and what should be done in the private sector, here are five of the key issues:

Coordination:
America is a huge nation, huge in area, huge in population, with huge demographic and legal diversity. Very few businesses are able to coordinate nationwide projects. National coordination is best handled by a national government.

Labor supply
Even the federal government doesn’t employ sufficient labor to handle large projects. Example: The National Highway System. But the federal government has the means and political power to hire, set the rules for, and supervise private contractors nationwide.

Expertise
Some projects require a wide range of technical expertise. The federal government, far more than any single business, benefits from the extensive military and non-military research projects it funds.

Affordability and financial risk
Here is where the federal government really shines. It literally can afford anything and when speculative projects don’t work, the government can afford to absorb the loss.

Profit motive
This may be the most important reason for the government, rather than the private sector, handling a project: The profit motive. The federal government doesn’t have one.

It can go “where no man has gone before.” It can try experiments. It can fail and try again. It can focus on the mission rather than on the profit.

When NASA was instructed to send a man to the moon, all its attention was on that mission, not on whether moon flights might be profitable. Subsequently, it has sent missions all over the solar system.

Now, fifty years later, private industry has decided there might be money to be made in sending a few rich people briefly into space, though not even yet to the moon. That is the difference between the federal government’s efforts and private industry’s.

Left to its own devices, private industry might never travel to the moon. The financial risk too great; the profit, too uncertain.

And in that vein, I give you the following article:

Major Insurers Running Billions of Dollars Behind on Payments to Hospitals and Doctors

Posted on October 10, 2021 by Lambert Strether: “We should bail them out. Obviously.”

Jay Hancock, of Kaiser Health News.

Anthem Blue Cross, the country’s second-biggest health insurance company, is behind on billions of dollars in payments owed to hospitals and doctorsbecause of onerous new reimbursement rules, computer problems and mishandled claims, say hospital officials in multiple states.

Anthem, like other big insurers, is using the covid-19 crisis as cover to institute “egregious” policies that harm patients and pinch hospital finances, said Molly Smith, group vice president at the American Hospital Association.

Hospitals are also dealing with a spike in retroactive claims denials by UnitedHealthcare, the biggest health insurer, for emergency department care, AHA says.

What is the underlying problem? Money, or more specifically, the profit motive.

While the primary mission of Medicare and Medicaid is to pay for medical expenses, the primary mission of private-sector health care insurance companies is to make a profit.

A government agency can be inefficient, uncaring, and downright ignorant. So can private insurance companies. The single biggest difference is the profit motive, or the lack thereof.

Disputes between insurers and hospitals are nothing new. But this fight sticks more patients in the middle, worried they’ll have to pay unresolved claims.

Hospitals say it is hurting their finances as many cope with covid surges — even after the industry has received tens of billions of dollars in emergency assistance from the federal government.

“We recognize there have been some challenges” to prompt payments caused by claims-processing changes and “a new set of dynamics” amid the pandemic, Anthem spokesperson Colin Manning said in an email. “We apologize for any delays or inconvenience this may have caused.”

“Any delays or inconvenience” sounds benign, but it is a serious, often existential problem. Nurses rely on their salaries. Doctors, too. Hospitals have creditors who rely on repayment. And patients suffer emotionally and medically from those delays and inconveniences.

When an insurer reneges on its payment responsibilities, a falling domino effect occurs, where thousands of people are injured, some permanently.

Virginia law requires insurers to pay claims within 40 days. In a Sept. 24 letter to state insurance regulators, VCU Health, a system that operates a large teaching hospital in Richmond associated with Virginia Commonwealth University, said Anthem owes it $385 million. More than 40% of the claims are more than 90 days old, VCU said.

For all Virginia hospitals, Anthem’s late, unpaid claims amount to “hundreds of millions of dollars,” the Virginia Hospital and Healthcare Association said in a June 23 letter to state regulators.

Clearly, Anthem values its own finances above the finances and health of many thousands of people.

Nationwide, the payment delays “are creating an untenable situation,” the American Hospital Association said in a Sept. 9 letter to Anthem CEO Gail Boudreaux. “Patients are facing greater hurdles to accessing care; clinicians are burning out on unnecessary administrative tasks; and the system is straining to finance the personnel and supplies” needed to fight covid.

Complaints about Anthem extend “from sea to shining sea, from New Hampshire to California,” AHA CEO Rick Pollack told KHN.

Substantial payment delays can be seen on Anthem’s books. On June 30, 2019, before the pandemic, 43% of the insurer’s medical bills for that quarter were unpaid, according to regulatory filings. Two years later that figure had risen to 53% — a difference of $2.5 billion.

Anthem profits were $4.6 billion in 2020 and $3.5 billion in the first half of 2021.

While Anthem thrives, everyone else suffers. The villain all of this is not just Anthem, but the profit motive. That is where the problem begins.

If Anthem were like the federal government and wasn’t concerned about profits, everyone would have been paid, and those payment dollars would have benefitted the entire economy.

Alexis Thurber, who lives near Seattle, was insured by Anthem when she got an $18,192 hospital bill in May for radiation therapy that doctors said was essential to treat her breast cancer.

The treatments were “experimental” and “not medically necessary,” Anthem said, according to Thurber. She spent much of the summer trying to get the insurer to pay up — placing two dozen phone calls, spending hours on hold, sending multiple emails and enduring unmeasurable stress and worry.

It finally covered the claim months later.

Apparently, the claim was a good one. Anthem paid it, not out of the goodness of their hearts, but because the claim should have been paid. The delay was unwarranted. The fundamental purpose of the delay was the profit motive.

“It’s so egregious. It’s a game they’re playing,” said Thurber, 51, whose cancer was diagnosed in November. “Trying to get true help was impossible.”

Privacy rules prevent Anthem from commenting on Thurber’s case, said Anthem spokesperson Colin Manning.

When insurers fail to promptly pay medical bills, patients are left in the lurch. They might first get a notice saying payment is pending or denied. A hospital might bill them for treatment they thought would be covered. Hospitals and doctors often sue patients whose insurance didn’t pay up.

Yes, there are times when Medicare refuses to pay, but those have to do with disagreements about the rules and coverages. The federal bureaucrats making those decisions are not constrained by profits or affordability.

They simply interpret the rules. They have no m oneyreason to lean away from the creditor.

Hospitals point to a variety of Anthem practices contributing to payment delays or denials, including new layers of document requirements, prior-authorization hurdles for routine procedures and requirements that doctors themselves— not support staffers — speak to insurance gatekeepers.

“This requires providers to literally leave the patient[’s] bedside to get on the phone with Anthem,” AHA said in its letter.

Ah, the old “prior authorization” insurance scam. How many millions of patients have been tripped up by that one?

A frightened, inexperienced patient is told he/she needs a procedure. In a panic about her health, her personal life, and the future, she neglects to tell the insurance company in advance. Payment is denied, not because the procedure isn’t proper, but simply because she didn’t go through the formality of prior authorization.

Gotcha!

Medicare seldom requires prior authorization.

Anthem often hinders coverage for outpatient surgery, specialty pharmacy and other services in health systems listed as in-network, amounting to a “bait and switch” on Anthem members, AHA officials said.

“Demanding that patients be treated outside of the hospital setting, against the advice of the patient’s in-network treating physician, appears to be motivated by a desire to drive up Empire’s profits,” the Greater New York Hospital Association wrote in an April letter to Empire Blue Cross, which is owned by Anthem.

Original Medicare aMedicare and Medigap do not use provider networks. With Original Medicare and Medigap you can use any healthcare provider that accepts Medicare-assignment.

With Original Medicare, you do not have to wander through the “in-network, out-of-network” jungle.

Anthem officials pushed back in a recent letter to the AHA, saying the insurer’s changing rules are intended partly to control excessive prices charged by hospitals for specialty drugs and nonemergency surgery, screening and diagnostic procedures.

A for-profit organization has to worry about “excessive prices. For the government, “excessive” prices merely mean that the federal agency will pump more stimulus dollars into the economy.

Claims have gotten lost in Anthem’s computers, and in some cases VCU Health has had to print medical records and mail them to get paid, VCU said in its letter. The cash slowdown imposes “an unmanageable disruption that threatens to undermine our financial footing,” VCU said.

“Lost” is the way a for-profit organization increases its profits.

United denied $31,557 in claims for Emily Long’s care after she was struck in June by a motorcycle in New York City. She needed surgery to repair a fractured cheekbone. United said there was a lack of documentation for “medical necessity” — an “incredibly aggravating” response on top of the distress of the accident, Long said.

The Brooklyn hospital that treated Long was “paid appropriately under her plan and within the required time frame,” said United spokesperson Maria Gordon Shydlo. “The facility has the right to appeal the decision.”

United’s unpaid claims came to 54% as of June 30, about the same level as two years previously.

When more than half of all claims are not paid, something is terribly wrong. There simply cannot be that many false claims.

When Erin Conlisk initially had trouble gaining approval for a piece of medical equipment for her elderly father this summer, United employees told her the insurer’s entire prior-authorization database had gone down for weeks, said Conlisk, who lives in California.

“There was a brief issue with our prior-authorization process in mid-July, which was resolved quickly,” Gordon Shydlo said.

“Brief issue” is private insurance-speak for “the longer you have to wait, the more money we make. Maybe you’ll just give up, altogether.”

When asked by Wall Street analysts about the payment backups, Anthem executives said it partly reflects their decision to increase financial reserves amid the health crisis.

“Decision to increase financial reserves” is insurance-speak for “decision to make more profits.”

“Really a ton of uncertainty associated with this environment,” John Gallina, the company’s chief financial officer, said on a conference call in July. “We’ve tried to be extremely prudent and conservative in our approach.”

Translation: “To be really prudent and conservative, we’ve decided not to pay claims. You’d be amazed at how that reduces our costs. But you better send in your premiums on time.”

Several health systems declined to comment about claims-payment delays or didn’t respond to a reporter’s queries. Among individual hospitals “there is a deep fear of talking on the record about your largest business partner,” AHA’s Smith said.

“Business partner” is a synonym for “the guy who is squeezing my reproductive organs in his fist.”

Alexis Thurber worried she might have to pay her $18,192 radiation bill herself, and she’s not confident her Anthem policy will do a better job next time of covering the cost of her care.

“It makes me not want to go to the doctor anymore,” she said. “I’m scared to get another mammogram because you can’t rely on it.”

And that is exactly what your insurance company wants. Plenty of premiums with no costs. An excellent business model.

That is where the profit motive can devolve in the health care business.

Health should be a recognized basic human right. In a Monetarily Sovereign nation, federal support of healthcare costs taxpayers nothing. Comprehensive, no-deductible Medicare for All is the correct solution.

But, until the public realizes it, it won’t happen. The politicians are too well-bribed by the insurance industry.
Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
Monetary Sovereignty
Twitter: @rodgermitchell
Search #monetarysovereignty
Facebook: Rodger Malcolm Mitchell

……………………………………………………………………..

THE SOLE PURPOSE OF GOVERNMENT IS TO IMPROVE AND PROTECT THE LIVES OF THE PEOPLE.

The most important problems in economics involve:

Monetary Sovereignty describes money creation and destruction.
Gap Psychology describes the common desire to distance oneself from those “below” in any socio-economic ranking, and to come nearer those “above.” The socio-economic distance is referred to as “The Gap.”

Ten Steps To Prosperity:

The Ten Steps will grow the economy and narrow the income/wealth/power Gap between the rich and the rest.

MONETARY SOVEREIGNTY

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this: