Politics of Fear – Page 41 – The Wrongologist

Monday Wake Up Call –November 10, 2014

OK, we just had our bi-annual vote to rearrange the deck chairs, and boy, people were angry. But what good will come of it is difficult to guess. This we do know: According to a CNN exit poll, 8 in 10 Americans disapprove of how Congress has been handling its job, while almost 6 in 10 are displeased with President Obama; 44% have a positive view of Democrats; 40% have a positive view of Republicans.

So, Americans elected the party they like the least to run the part of the government they trust the least.

There’s a lot of discussion of how and why Democrats did so badly, and much of it focuses on messaging. The litany of excuses is long: Democratic candidates were arrogant. The White House failed to transfer money, or stump effectively. The GOP caught up in the technology race, or the GOP recruited excellent, disciplined candidates.

Democrats ran on everything but?policy. Did the Democrats run the government well? Are the lives of voters better? Are Democrats as a political party credible when they say they’ll do something?

Their message was based on a group of poll-tested ideas that they thought would appeal to mainstream voters. But, the message, “vote for us, we’re not right-wing fanatics” didn’t cause the majority of us to turn out for the election. In fact, turn out was the lowest it had been in 40 years.

Liberal ballot propositions won in various parts of the country last Tuesday, from marijuana products (like https://www.cheapbudcanada.com/marijuana-products/vape-pens/fatboyz-disposable-thc-vape-pen/, for instance) to the minimum wage. Democrats didn’t. That should tell the Democratic Party something. Liberal policies can resonate with the public. It would be nice if there was a party which could embody and fight for those ideas.

So what would be a winning message? The economy. There’s infrastructure work to be done. The private sector could hire people to do it with government money. There are hungry people who need to be fed, and homeless people to be housed. And, ending our adventures in the Middle East would improve our lives.

“Vote for us, we bring peace, prosperity, and weed” – that slogan just might get you somewhere.

Keeping with the spirit of a new politics, here is your wake-up tune of the day. It is “Uprising” by Muse, released in 2009. So get upright and rock out:

Sample lyrics:
Rise up and take the power back
It’s time the fat cats had a heart attack
You know that their time’s coming to an end
We have to unify and watch our flag ascend
(so come on)

They will not force us
They will stop degrading us
They will not control us
We will be victorious

Here is your breakfast buffet of linkage:
Connecticut’s Democratic Governor was reelected, running as a progressive: It was close, but Dan Molloy won bigger this time against the same conservative opponent.

A case for treating health care and hospitals as utilities: Conservatives have won the battle to eliminate much of the government control in quasi-monopolistic markets like telecom and electric power. You be the judge about whether you are better off with de-regulation of those industries. Health care is a de facto monopoly, should it be treated as a utility?

Wikipedia is the sixth most popular website in the world, with 22.5 million contributors and 736 million edits in English. It’s as if the entire population of Australia (23.6 million) each contributed 30 times. 36 people run Wikipedia. Who are they?

Transparent solar panels could make solar power more competitive. CSEM, a Swiss technology company, have developed solar panels that you can see through and have no visible connections, which gives architects a lot of room to incorporate solar power into the walls of buildings without having to give up any aesthetic goals.

How often should you get dental x-rays? Dentists differ.

Many people believe that medical malpractice reform is the key to cutting cost from the health care system. But evidence shows that belief could be mistaken. However, if you have been affected by medical negligence, you’ll want to consider your options. Some people contact the hospital directly to complain about the medical professional who failed to take suitable care of them. A better alternative to this idea is actually to contact a personal injury lincoln ne service, or a lawyer more local to you. Seeking legal assistance can help you to strengthen your claim against the staff member in question.

The US currently has 30 declared presidential states of emergency. The University of Michigan explains why this is a bad idea. The National Emergencies Act requires the Congress to vote every six months on whether a declared national emergency should continue, Congress has done this only once in the nearly 40-year history of the Act.

Protect us from the media: CNBC’s “Squawk Box” anchor (Joe Kernan) shows complete ignorance of Ireland while talking to Martin Shanahan, head of the Irish Industrial Development Authority. Then he insists he is correct:
CNBC: You have pounds anyway don’t you still?
Shanahan: We have Euros.
CNBC: You have Euros in Ireland?
Shanahan: Yes. We have euros, which is eh…
CNBC: Why do you have euros in Ireland?
Shanahan: A strong recovery….
CNBC: Why do you use euros in Ireland?
Shanahan: Why wouldn’t we have euros in Ireland?
CNBC: Huh. I’d use the pound.
Shanahan: We use euro.
CNBC: What about Scotland? I was using Scottish eh…
Shanahan: They use Sterling.
CNBC: They use Sterling?
Shanahan: They use Sterling. But we use euro.
CNBC: What? Why would you do that?

And some of you use CNBC for investment advice!

Here is your thought for the week. It is from George Orwell:

The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap between one’s real and one’s declared aims, one turns as it were instinctively to the long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish squirting out ink. In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible.

Thus political language has to consist largely of euphemisms, question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness. Political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable…

What Should We Do with Extra Firefighters?

A little known fact is that over the past 40 years, the number of fires in the US have dropped dramatically. Consider this chart from Vox, based on data from the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA):

The number of fires responded to by municipal fire departments in 2013, about 1.2 million, is roughly a third of the 3.3 million responses in 1977. Note that these numbers don’t include wildfires, which aren’t dealt with by local fire departments and as Vox reports, keep getting worse.

And since the US population has increased by 44% during that same period, this is a pretty remarkable trend. It seems that most of the improvement can be attributed to things we would expect: stricter fire codes, fireproof building materials, cars that catch on fire less often, and installation of protective devices like smoke alarms.

Yet, during the same period, the number of firefighters has increased:

Paid firefighters have increased by roughly 48%, from about 230k in 1986 to about 340k in 2012, in line with the population growth. The number of volunteer firefighters has remained the same. We now have more firefighters fighting fewer fires. So, what are all these firefighters doing?

Firefighters now respond to many more medical calls per year than actual fires. In fact, the chart below shows that fires and false alarms held steady or declined, while medical calls grew from 5 million to about 22 million by 2012. There is also a slightly better chance that the fire engine is responding to a false alarm than to a fire:

The decline in fires has put firefighters in a curious position. What should they be doing to justify their (in most cases) growing budgets? Vox quotes Libertarian economist Alex Tabarrock of George Mason University:

Firefighters face what I’ve called the ‘March of Dimes’ problem. After polio was cured, the March of Dimes looked around and said ‘what do we do now?’ Firefighters have been facing the same problem.

Now, there is little in city life that is more reassuring than walking past the neighborhood fire house. It reminds us that there are people in our employ who are ready to strap on equipment and head into danger to help out one of our neighbors. But it wasn’t always that way:

The Wrongologist may be one of the last persons who remembers when homeowners paid a fee to a for-profit fire department to protect your property. That was in Brooklyn, NY in the early 1950’s. The fire company placed a medallion on the homes of their “clients”, and didn’t protect any homes without medallions. There was no public FD service in that neighborhood until the late 1950’s.

The Boston Globe reports that the Boston FD accounts for 7.5% of the city’s total budget, while NYC spends $1.72 billion on its FD. It is difficult to tell people that fewer firefighters will keep them just as safe, and the political fall-out for any mayor who tries to dramatically reduce firefighter head count would almost certainly be gruesome. Talk about poking the bear.

But what is the highest and best use for idle firefighters? Could cities work to slowly transfer firefighters to EMT, Park Rangers, Inspection Services or other city jobs? What about the pay differences? There are always efficiencies to be gained in public jobs. It seems sensible to start reducing staffing levels and adjust the number of fire stations, given the occurrence of fires.

Efficiencies might be found by using better processes, such as integrating the dispatch services operated by EMT and Fire, or by using different tools. For example, if cities want to use firefighters as extra paramedics, maybe sending smaller trucks or motorcycles equipped with oxygen for cardiac situations, might be workable. The motorcycle would likely get on site sooner, and the crackerbox EMT truck could follow behind for transportation of a patient to hospital. There would always be some extra portly people who can’t be carried down 5 flights of stairs by 2-3 people, so they would have to wait for reinforcements. But there should be no need to dispatch a fire truck just to be sure more lifting power is available if needed.

Natalie Simpson, a SUNY Buffalo professor who studies the history of emergency response, says that because of the nature of the demands we put on fire departments, we can’t really shrink their ranks, and there are problems with putting them in different vehicles too:

If you say, ‘there’s very few fires, so we don’t need as many firefighters or fire engines,’ a fire is still eventually going to break out…And without the same response resources, you’re going to have the same number of very few fires, but some of them are going to become catastrophic.

Her view is that we need to have a surge capability to respond in any given area to make sure that the few fires that do occur can be put out quickly. We can model those issues as we ALWAYS do in the private sector, to determine optimal staffing and equipment for the required level of response.

No one should be saying that firefighters aren’t heroes, or that they didn’t show amazing teamwork and bravery when on the scene of a fire. But all that bravery should not by itself, justify inefficient numbers. Every dollar we can save is a dollar that can be better used elsewhere.

Vote Today, if Only for Yourself

Today is Election Day, and it seems even the Main Stream Media circus has limited interest.

And if you look to the left, we finally have a proven case of voter fraud. Its certain that this little Havanese didn’t vote using its own ID.

Whatever the results, progressive ideas and politics will continue to decline because today’s Democrats have moved to the right from where they were 40 years ago.

Based on the content of the 2014 mid-terms, Democrats are seeking to “conserve” society as a 20th century education, an 18th century government, a neoliberal economic ideology, and contradictory policies in foreign affairs.

There is no energy in the mid-terms behind real reform, even well-protected Senators and Congresspersons are only willing to preserve watered-down versions of marriage rights for all, Social Security/Medicare, some semblance of a non-military expense category in the federal budget. And no one is for healthcare for all or addressing climate change. The Republicans mainly want to preserve wealth, protect large business and continue to go through the motions of appeasing their social conservative base and the gun lobby.

The tactics of both parties more or less “work”, if by that we mean to build long, lucrative political careers. There is no sense that any policy means much to America’s politicians who mostly speak in platitudes and rarely say what they mean.

They’ve fooled us for decades and “the people” seemingly never tire of the BS. The Republicans have a closing argument that the Rude Pundit paraphrases thusly:

The Republican National Committee is up with an ad that throws every scary thing in the world at you. “ISIS gaining ground. Terrorists committing mass murder. Ebola inside the US, Americans alarmed about national security,” says the ominous voice ominously. “What’s President Obama doing? Making plans to bring terrorists from Guantanamo to our country. Ignoring the Constitution, the Congress, and the American people. November 4th, Obama’s policies are on the ballot. Vote to keep terrorists off U.S. soil. Vote Republican.

The Democrats have no closing argument. The great tragedy of the Democrats is that they still believe politics is about competing sermons.

That is a nice fantasy, but that isn’t how politics works today. Any attempt by Democrats to engage in a policy struggle with Republicans that fails to understand how powerful people on the right use a multitude of sophisticated techniques that would make Machiavelli faint, is doomed to failure, and the proof of this is right in front of us today.

We live in the mess these people are making. We have to vote, organize, and persuade others to vote if we are to make safe, secure lives for ourselves and for our families.

Here is Tuesday linkage:

Election officials in 27 states have launched a program that threatens a huge purge of voters from the rolls. The Interstate Crosscheck program has generated a list of 7 million names that state officials say represent people who are not only registered, but have actually voted in two or more states in the same election. You be the judge.

On the campaign trail, an Ohio Republican Supreme Court Judge says: (emphasis by the Wrongologist)

Whatever the governor does, whatever your state representative, your state senator does, whatever they do, we are the ones that will decide whether it is constitutional; we decide whether it’s lawful. We decide what it means, and we decide how to implement it in a given case. So, forget all those other votes if you don’t keep the Ohio Supreme Court conservative.

The Small Business Majority, an organization of 30,000 small business owners, released the results of a September 2014 Internet survey of 900 small business owners that showed that 78% of their group believe we should change our current election system to one that allows for multiparty representation, a system that could lead to election of parties other than the Republicans and Democrats.

More lucky duckies living with their moms for free: A Pew Research analysis shows that the number of Americans living in multi-generational households has doubled since 1980. The figure spiked during the 2007-2009 recession and has moved even higher since then.

Signs of the times department: Washington’s Hirshhorn Museum has disbanded its docent program and replaced the largely retired staff with interns.

A follow-up to last week’s link about F-35, is this disturbing article that says the F-35 is a second-rate warplane. Consider the source, but the article quotes some recognized warplane experts.

Inequality Watch: Oxfam reports that the number of billionaires has doubled since the financial crisis. In fact, they say that the top 85 most wealthy saw their collective wealth increase by $668 million every day last year. That’s almost half a million dollars every minute.

Bradblog reports that the problems with Diebold voting machines have not gone away, at least not in Maryland, Texas, Illinois, and Tennessee.

The WaPo reports that US-backed Syria rebels have been routed by fighters linked to al-Qaeda. Half measures don’t work. Either we decide to go all-in with Assad, or let’s go home. His is the only force in the area capable of crushing ISIS. At the same time, we should remove the PKK and any other Kurdish forces from the terror list and supply them with the best weaponry. That is, if we really want to win.

Sunday Cartoon Blogging – November 2, 2014

When people decide not to vote because the parties are not different from each other, candidates with strong ideological commitments win. That elected person then tries to move the country in the direction of an ideology supported by a minority of voters.

For the past 20 years, that direction has been a death warrant for the American middle class. If you think that the middle class is really what made America “exceptional,” then those political leaders elected to implement and sustain a corporatist agenda have worked to destroy the American Dream, while they hypocritically endorsed and exploited it in order to get elected.

The US is in the middle of a course of corporate political imperialism that has savaged average Americans, while it enriched plutocrats. Wealth has been consolidated, the means-of-production have been concentrated in the hands of a few corporations, and big business has effectively purchased our governments, both state and federal. Mostly because not enough of us take the time to bone up on the issues, or to vote in the off-year elections.

Two things need to change: First, more people need to vote. Second, we must throw off our corporate political masters. As long as we have a situation where corporations have all of the rights, but none of the liabilities of the people, they always have a competitive advantage over the public.

For both your Halloween hangover and your pre-election headache:

Jeb Bush floats idea of continuing the family dynasty:

Ebola Volunteers are heroes and potential disease vectors. Some politicians can’t hold both thoughts:

Other epidemics caused by not voting:

Texas has apparently “solved” the voter fraud problem:

Texas GOP "encouraged" by reports of students & disabled citizens being denied right to vote http://t.co/lqlsbgOyJ1 pic.twitter.com/1acKK1r9Wh

— The Daily Edge (@TheDailyEdge) October 31, 2014

Wednesday Linkage

What’s Wrong Today:

We have the methods, materials, and expertise to handle any of our major problems, be it with economic growth, war/peace, income inequality, social malaise or, outbreaks of serious infectious disease. Our problem is that in all of these areas, we have chosen not to use our abilities to solve any problems that involve use of the commons because the Congress won’t agree that the commons can be used for these things, except in an academic sense.

In America, when push comes to shove, it is you and the people you feel are part of your clan or tribe that count–never mind that we live on a finite planet with finite resources and carrying capacity–that is irrelevant to the vast majority of us.

Now, along comes Ebola, and, collectively, we have chosen to ignore the problem, to slow roll vaccines that could treat it, because, capitalism.

Are we going to realize that simply following our own self-interest may not be in our self-interest? That maybe the culture of narcissism may not be all it’s cracked up to be? The Ebola diversion from real election issues will not stop, however. If it does, the media will simply find a new shiny object.

Could our leadership class be motivated enough to actually be responsible, and not just to APPEAR to be responsible?

Here is some Wednesday linkage:

Music playlists for Euro soccer teams: a few surprising choices for 20 & 30-something profession athletes.

Tokyo has way fewer homeless than NYC. Why? The Japanese Constitution guarantees its citizens “the right to maintain the minimum standards of wholesome and cultured living.” That document was drawn up by Gen. MacArthur during our occupation after WW II. So, because of the US, the Japanese have a stronger safety net for their citizens than we do in our own country. Ironic, or what?

Palestinian women are protecting the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound from Israelis who want to take it over: There are attempts on most days by Israelis to enter this mosque and lay claim to it. Older Palestinian women work to keep control of it. This will not end well.

Reuters reports that the US Army is quarantining soldiers who provided Ebola support in West Africa for 21 days: Despite the fact that current Defense Department policy allows troops with no known exposure to the virus to return to work and interact with their families after coming home, as long as they have their temperature checked twice daily for 21 days.

Baby Boomers are seeing a tsunami of products aimed at “helping” with problems of aging: Check out Depends in designer colors and the cane made from bull penis. Corporations are bringing sexy back to the 60-somethings.

Health Watch:

Corporate Wellness programs are ineffective: The Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) survey found that 36% of firms with more than 200 workers, and 18% of firms overall, have wellness programs. The Upshot says they rarely work. Quelle surprise!

States that have expanded Medicaid as part of health reform expect their share of Medicaid spending to grow more slowly than states that have not expanded, a new KFF report finds.

Hospitals are now taking their cues from the airlines and the auto industry. Now your healthcare price comes unbundled, with additional fees and options. At least auto salesmen negotiate with you while you are conscious and not impacted by meds and pain.

Your Business Trip:

Legal marijuana is a growth industry, with annual revenues forecasted to be $35 billion by 2020.

Business Insider says maximizing shareholder value is bad. OMG, what would Mitt say? James Montier, a behavioral finance writer, believes that companies should be required to focus on running their businesses, producing quality goods and services, treating customers and workers fairly, and creating shareholder value as a by-product, not as an objective.

Blinded by Science:

Genome study shows humans bred with Neanderthals. And not just on Saturday night in college!

The new Afghanistan President gets violent reception from the Taliban. According to an AP tally, there have been at least 10 incidents in Kabul (including inside the Green Zone) since Ghani Ahmadzai’s inauguration on Sept. 29th, killing 27 people.

Your music moment:

The Rolling Stones were filmed by Martin Scorsese at NY’s Beacon Theater in 2006. The entire documentary was released in 2008. The film’s title, “Shine a Light” is from a Stones song by the same name. Here are a few minutes behind the scenes with Scorsese, the Stones and Bill Clinton:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QO9fXphmuGk

The Big Picture – An Editorial

“To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom” – Bertrand Russell

Today, we are going to take a short course in The Big Picture. For starters, here is a quote from Digby:

…we are a primitive country. We’ve got idiots on TV screaming about a religion of 1.6 billion people being the toxic cause of violence even as our All American, non-religious school-kids are taking the deadly weapons their parents give them as presents to shoot their schoolmates and themselves. And we have the most sophisticated city on earth acting like a bunch of authoritarian creeps toward people who are doing serious work to stop the spread of an outbreak of a deadly disease — for PR purposes.

Since the Great Recession in 2008-9, we have seen the Federal Reserve move the economy slowly forward while leaving most people behind. Yet, few complain about growing income inequality. People know it and feel it, but don’t vote, or try to do anything else to change things.

• Why doesn’t income inequality upset the average American?
• Why are we more aware of how plastic surgery has changed the looks of an actress than we are about Gen. John Allen’s crazy ideas about winning the war against ISIS?
• How can more Americans be afraid of contracting Ebola than being killed in a car wreck?

What are we afraid will happen if we really dig deeply into an idea or a strategy that is proposed as a “solution” for some problem or other? Why can’t we resist re-tweeting some piece of snark that is the short version of something we believe, or thought we believed?

One visible trend is our increasing distrust of public institutions. We have seen how government, corporations, “charitable” organizations, media, and law-enforcement and the Justice system, all seem to exist for the benefit of those who manage them and not for the public.

This capturing of our institutions is a scary thing, but it is true everywhere in America. You might think that realizing this would spur interest in reform, but in fact, it has just increased our denial. People say in spite of it all, we’ll just soldier on as best as we can, making sure that we and our kids learn to navigate this rigged system.

This is why there is very little interest in politics by young voters.

Another trend is that America’s young know there is no possibility for real growth in personal income. They know that there are policies to promote and stimulate the economy, policies that might work. But, they have no faith in the ability of public officials to implement such policies, so they hang back, hoping somebody comes forward with a better answer. This, from the most connected, most media-savvy, most sophisticated generation in our history.

Voters show no interest in the 2014 mid-term elections. The media asks the same questions of the same Sabbath pundits each week: “Who will win the Senate?” But people don’t care. They watch the media whip up class warfare, cultural warfare and real warfare together into a big stew of propaganda that becomes mind-numbing. So they Facebook, and Tweet.

Most people are both stuck and scared–wanting things to change, but not knowing how. People might get upset, but big change requires commitment and action, and it is hard to get Millennials to change their minds, or to do much.

Political activism succeeds with a clear vision and a solid game plan. Neither Democrats nor Republicans have a list of good ideas about what will work to move us forward. It is possible to attribute political apathy to this lack of ideas, but the destruction of public trust in government is also a big problem.

Changing the future requires getting hold of the levers of government and then using them to do good. That is much more difficult when people don’t vote, and have no faith in their government. Trust in an institution takes a long time to build, but not to destroy. The first step is to take back our captured government.

A basic principle of martial arts is that you use your opponent’s strengths against them. In typical political contests, both sides work to out-raise and out-spend the other. And third parties try to get in the game using the same strategies as the legacy parties.

Today, each candidate is challenging the other’s strength using their own similar strength: It becomes a Sumo-style shoving match.

Conventional wisdom says that it’s expensive to run a campaign (even for local elections, much less national) and so everyone starts their campaign with a fundraising strategy and continues it incessantly even after Election Day. Conventional wisdom says you win with a charismatic candidate, so each party tries to find the best actor they can come up with. Conventional wisdom says candidates should “triangulate” their political views so that they are neither left nor right, just as Democrats are trying to do without success, in Red States this fall.

Instead, insurgent campaigns could be run on social media and the Internet, on as little money as possible—crowdsourcing both dollars and ideas from supporters. They should build constituencies for ideas and for a common future. They should select candidates who can tell the story of a united, desirable future, not some Ken or Barbie cypher for the moneyed interests who run our politics today.

The Big Picture is that we react more strongly to fear than to rationality. We used to fear Hitler. We feared the Communists. We feared al-Qaeda. We fear ISIS. We fear Ebola. We fear for our kids walking to school. We fear that America will let too many brown people across our borders. But we don’t fear climate change, or obesity, or a Congress that can’t enact an agenda to move the country forward.

There should be no mystery about how much corporate power and money drives the culture of fear. Think of it as a 4-step program:

1. Mass media hammers on events that builds general concern and possibly, panic from a few isolated incidents
2. Anecdotal evidence takes the place of hard scientific proof
3. Experts that the media trots out to make comments really don’t have the credentials to be considered experts
4. Entire categories of people (Muslims, West Africans) are labeled as “innately dangerous”

Can a cohesive group with a better way of dealing with the rest of us, gain traction in today’s connected world? Can they help America conquer the long laundry list of fears that constrict and in some cases, stop us from acting on much of anything?

It would take brains, ideas, commitment and energy.

Where are the leaders who have those qualities? How can we support them?

Sunday Cartoon Blogging – October 26, 2014

It’s that time of year, scary monsters in your email and on your TV. That means it’s the mad combo of the election season and Halloween. Be very afraid.

Some celebrate Halloween all year:

Fear is in the air around Halloween:

Really, Fox? Ben Bradlee must be turning over in his grave:

The reason Democrats will lose the Senate, Part I:

The reason Democrats will lose the Senate, Part II:

The House of Fear is open 24 hours a day:

It’s Just A Suggestion, But…

Would Gun Insurance Help?

Not insurance that pays to replace stolen firearms, but liability insurance for the damage that is done by firearms. Over the past few days, there have been many suggestions about mandating such insurance as a way of:

Paying for the damages done by people irresponsibly using (storing, playing with, or loaning) their guns

Reducing gun ownership by increasing the costs associated with it

Can we agree that guns as weapons are inherently dangerous to society? Can we agree that gun owners should bear the risk and true social costs of gun ownership?

Suggestion: Require both owners and sellers to purchase liability
insurance that is underwritten by private insurance companies according to the relative risk of the gun or the buyer. As John Wasik writes in Forbes:

When you buy a car, your insurer underwrites the risk according to your age, driving/arrest/ticket record, type of car, amount of use and other factors. A teenage driver behind the wheel of a Porsche is going to pay a lot more than a 50-year-old house wife. A driver with DUI convictions may not get insurance at all. Like vehicles, you should be required to have a policy before you even applied for a gun permit. Every seller would have to follow this rule before making a transaction.

This is where we take social economics beyond theory. Actuaries would work to understand which buyers/guns are most at risk to commit a gun crime, or to be used in a gun crime. Gun owners/buyers would then be underwritten according to age, mental health and place of residence, credit/bankruptcy record and/or marital status, whatever causal criteria turn out to be the most relevant.

Insurance companies have mountains of data and know how to use it to price policies, or in industry parlance, to reduce the risk/loss ratio. Wasik continues:

Who pays the least for gun insurance would be least likely to commit a crime with it. An 80-year-old married woman in Fort Lauderdale would get a great rate. A 20-year-old in inner-city Chicago wouldn’t be able to afford it. A 32-year-old man with a record of drunk driving and domestic violence would have a similar problem.

Moreover, the market would over time, become very efficient at weighing these risks, since insurers specialize in figuring out the odds of something going wrong and charging the appropriate amount for the risk.

And there’s a good argument that the damage caused by firearms gives the government a “compelling interest” to require insurance, the basic test for infringing the constitutional rights of our 2nd Amendment lovers.

If it seems like requiring insurance might be too expensive, remember that the social cost is already expensive: We pay a huge cost for firearms injuries, says the National Center for Biotechnology Information, a part of NIH. According to their study, most injuries are paid for with public funds. Mandatory insurance would shift that cost from a public tax burden to a private insurance burden borne by gunowners. Quoting from the conclusion of the referenced study:

96 % of the patients in this report had their costs of care covered by the government, because they had no primary insurance coverage.

There could be a possibility of lower taxes down the road, if medical costs paid by the government come down; the taxes needed to pay those medical costs could come down too.

Given that gun violence kills more than 30,000 Americans annually, it is harmful not only to our well being, but our economy, so using economic disincentives to moderate their use makes sense.

If you think that the idea of mandatory insurance is onerous, think again:

You can’t finance a home mortgage without homeowner’s and title insurance. If you haven’t got title insurance and are interested in getting some advice about it, you could contact an insurer like Bay Title Company for example to see what help they could give you. Insurance is needed for just about anything. Want to own a car? Most states require liability insurance. You can’t employ someone in most states without worker’s compensation or unemployment insurance.

The advantages of mandatory gun insurance include the following:

Responsibility is placed on the gun owner: The law would require firearm owners to take responsibility for their firearms. Insurance separates responsible firearm owners from irresponsible ones

Control remains in the private sector: Private firms will vet the buyer for proper acquisition of firearms, not the Government

2nd Amendment rights are protected: Anyone can purchase firearms as long as they can get insured

Promotes registering of existing weapons: Unregistered weapons will not be insured so the owners will not be able to buy ammo for those guns

Those who are injured: Will receive some recompense for their injury

What about the economic burden on gun owners?

If the insurance is required by the gun, the cost may prevent some people from buying them. A buyer in the middle class or higher could easily afford insurance on multiple weapons. If insurance was required for each gun registered, it might discourage multiple purchases by high risk owners. It may make people more responsible when they store their guns: Stolen guns had better be from a broken-into gun safe or your policy renewal will be a lot more expensive; the same would probably happen to your rates if little Billy finds a loaded gun in the desk drawer and shoots his friend with it.

It probably means that poorer people won’t be able to afford the insurance, so it probably will not dramatically affect gun violence (or coverage for same) in inner cities. We know that people take the chance of driving without insurance all the time and it’s a lot easier for someone to hide an uninsured gun than to drive an uninsured automobile.

But, will it work?

Insurers underwrite risk: casualty loss, liability, health, auto, home and life insurance. If you’re looking into life insurance you’ll want to make sure you research as much as possible or get expert advice so you know the policy you’re going with is the best suited one for you. For those of you in Canada, the most trusted comparison site is arguably PolicyMe.com so that might be the place to start. For American citizens, there are similar comparison sites that you could use. I always think these are the best way to view prices. One thing to remember is that Affordable Life USA offers great Mortage Life Insurance. Just make sure you do your research before accepting the first quote. With gun insurance, instead of charging the highest premiums for overweight smokers, alcoholics with bad driving records and dangerous hobbies, the most expensive gun policies will be priced for those who are younger with histories of mental illness, divorce, criminal records or severe financial difficulties. Or, the highest prices will be for the kinds of weapons that kill the most people the quickest: A shotgun owner who has hunted for years without incident would pay far less than a first-time owner purchasing a semi-automatic.

People would have a financial disincentive to purchase the most risky firearms. They would have a financial incentive to attend gun safety classes and use trigger locks. Using insurance to drive outcomes instead of attempting to enforce widespread bans and confiscation may result in much of the behavior we seek, without another festering, divisive issue draining our society.

Requiring insurance will simply add the already known social costs to the actual manufacturing costs of a weapon. If the social costs go higher, price of owning a weapon will be higher; if the social costs go down, so will insurance costs.

The market will decide what the fair price will be.

Insurance can be used to effectively price the risk and costs of social harm. This idea falls short of immediately getting rid of the most dangerous weapons and it will not prevent the next Newtown, but we have to start somewhere.

The Constitution was ratified in 1789. We are the Founders now. These are our problems and we must come up with our own solutions. The 2nd Amendment does not fit perfectly with current circumstances. Gun ownership has become a bigger problem than any of the problems it was meant to solve. The British are NOT coming; Indians no longer threaten your little fort.

Buy insurance for each gun, or turn the gun in.

The Wrongologist

Geopolitics, Power and Political Economy

Category: Politics of Fear