Lol Mikko, you thought you'd slip a retort in ages later.
Mikko_Sandt, on 27 July 2012 - 01:34 PM, said:
And what exactly is the motivation of those bureaucrats running government institutions? Profit and growth are good for the "well-being of the people", better than blind faith in the goodwill of the almighty government that you seem to love so much. Howabout we nationalize grocery stores as well, seeing how they're run by evil profit-driven people instead of enlightened bureaucrats?
Because politicians are beholden to the public in a way that corporations are not. It's really very simple, and I know you understand even though you pretend not to.
Mikko_Sandt, on 27 July 2012 - 01:34 PM, said:
Nonsense. The only reason why some people are fat is because they take in more food than what their bodies can process. The excess is then stored as fat.
Yours is the nonsense, sir. You can easily find the research yourself. Genetics has an extremely large role in how your body captures and metabolises food.
Mikko_Sandt, on 27 July 2012 - 01:34 PM, said:
Seriously, the two posts of yours that I'm quoting are full of reprehensible self-righteous "oh look how progressive we here in Britain are" ramblings. Is the degree of indoctrination really so high in Britain?
You find it reprehensible, my statements are not reprehensible in and of themselves. Yes, we in Britain are all raised to salute Stalin and the hammer & sickle
Mikko_Sandt, on 27 July 2012 - 01:34 PM, said:
And yes, schools should be privatised as well. There's no reason (except positive externalities perhaps but they're extremely hard if not downright impossible to quantify and even if they could be quantified that'd merely call for subsidizing education, not providing it) why schools should be run by the government. You're talking as if education and health care wouldn't exist in a free society. Of course they would! In the Soviet Union there were actually generations of people who knew nothing but government-run grocery stores. If you had suggested to them that grocery stores and food production in general should be provided by the market, they'd have considered you insane. Your attitude is exactly the same. You've gotten so accustomed to the welfare state that you cannot imagine life without it. In reality the transition would be simple: the money people now use to pay taxes would be used to purchase health care and education services. In addition there'd be more competition and more growth because the government's influence wouldn't be so stifling.
I think grocery stores are rather more different. I could also make a totally equivalent throwaway comment about you being too used to everything being privately run to imagine life with out centrally run institutions. Ultimately, in Britain you
can send your children to private schools, and you
can use private healthcare. The idea behind public schools is that
everyone, regardless of income, can expect their children to receive a good education. Of course there are examples of where this fails (bad schools), but there are many where it succeeds.
Mikko_Sandt, on 27 July 2012 - 01:34 PM, said:
And then there's this. You keep talking about your welfare state as if it were free. Do you have any idea how much taxes you pay? At least in Finland you've got the income tax, the municipality tax and the sales tax. Out of every euro you make you get to spend less than fifty cents. My guess is that it's pretty much the same in the UK. The crazy part is that even such an incredible tax burden will not be enough in the long run!
Martin, on 25 July 2012 - 12:58 PM, said:
The NHS has always and will always be a huge drag. It's worth the downsides because of the considerable upsides.
and
Martin, on 26 July 2012 - 02:58 AM, said:
National Healthcare is expensive. That's all there is to it.
It's not like I haven't acknowledged the cost, Mikko. I hate being that guy that says "TRY ACTUALLY READIUNG MY POST BEFORE YOU REPLY!" but,um... yeah.
Mikko_Sandt, on 27 July 2012 - 01:34 PM, said:
Your prediction of the possible consequences of any attempt to abolish the NHS is probably correct. But it only goes to show how stupid people are. You give them something and they think they're entitled to it. Of course, in a way they are entitled since they're paying taxes but the point is that the taxes they're willing to pay is not enough to maintain the system. They want to have the cake and eat it too.
I highly doubt your knowledge of my country's finances goes that deep. Feel free to Google something.
Mikko_Sandt, on 27 July 2012 - 01:34 PM, said:
Oh goodie, now you're praising a state-run news channel, a practice that belongs to North Korea. I guess we now know the source of indoctrination.
It's not a news channel, lol. It stands for British Broadcasting
Corporation (used to be 'Channel'). It's programming schedule covers so many different things. Comedy, science, nature, drama. Everything. You don't know the source of anything, since you clearly come to big conclusions with little or no actual information on what you are speaking. The BBC comment was just a fun little fact. Americans genuinely are astounded when you show them television with minimal or zero advertisements.
It wasn't me going "Capitalist dogs! Your puny capitalist television is no as good as Russia, yes?". I'd appreciate it if you didn't make me out to be some communist scumbag. But then again in Britain, we do swear allegiance to the hammer & sickle, and we do pray to our paintings of Kim Jong-il all around our homes. Don't you have Kim Jong-il bed sheets? I do.