What? The rich can hire private investigators. Banks and the rich hire extra security. Are you interested in paying for all the extra security needed for a rich bank that has lot of cash on hand? And how is a grociery store any different?

And no they are not dependable. Police unions go on strike. The police ran away after Katrina and the LA riots, can the citizens sue for thier money back as they would a business? California and many cities are broke now because of economics, so they cut way back on police and investigations.

The other think I don't get is you want the police to lock up people that don't obey the rules of society, fine. So if paying for the police is one of the rules of society, why do you support a system that allows the poor or those that fake being poor to continually not pay their share? You say if you can't pay that's OK, someone else can be force to pay your share, while you still get to be a member of society. If they refuse job training, rehab or birth control and they continue being a burden to the rest of society, aren't they acting like criiminals and not rule following members of society? So either pay your share, get into a training program so you can pay or just have society leave you alone.

So the problem was really the logistics of collecting the bill. So it's just easier to collect the fees this way. The gov. can cut off your electricity if you don't pay. Not a perfect system, but maybe that's the best they can do.

And why are there so many people in Queensland that can afford to buy ambulance insurance? Does the education and job training services fail to get people into jobs so they can afford this?

Those are private services, and in those cases the individual gets to pick and choose the service they receive in detailed form.

You will have to rephrase this, I can't make out what you're trying to say.

Yep there are problems with the system in your country, and sometimes in mine too, but we were speaking inprinciple, if you recall. You asked what in principle was different between private protection/security and a public police force, and I gave you the difference.

A separate principle speaks to the issue of an under-performing public police force ie the one where the Police force is managed by representatives periodically elected by the people who depend on the service. A failure to properly equip, train, hire... et al management responsibilities, that results in a problem for the public is in principle, soluble via changing the management in elections. Again there are problems in practice, but if you're asking for the difference in principle between this and a change of management in private business it's pretty clear what that is, don't you think?

Because it makes perfect sense if you're not totally hung up on money being the only and primary thing of any value in a society, but you are so I guess you may never get it.

EXC there are a lot of reasons people are poor, and laziness is not even a major one so just give it up and do some deeper reading into the sociology that you are trying to use to make this argument. You're just using some insidious propaganda here, do you know that?

No, the reasons were

1. The old system had been chronically underfunded for years and was operating skeletally;

2. Migration from the south exponentiated the demand on the old system and it needed a massive upgrade;

3. People from the south were long accustomed to paying for their ambulance service in state taxes and asked for it to be changed.

That's not the reason for it being on the Electricity Bill. It's there so that the fee is collected per household, and because the electricity companies already have means to extend concessions to those who need it.

Queensland was a country state and most of the people in it lived happily and cpomfortably on fairly meagre means for decades. Recently a massive influx of people from the southern states changed that reality drastically and quickly. Prices of almost everything tripled in less than 10 years due to the massive increase of demand and wages lagged behind for a good while as this was happening.  Basically all services started failing due to the speedy rise in population here and all people found their pockets emptier very quickly.  The state is still in the process of adjusting to it's new, much larger, population.

There would be a small security management group that would be directly accountable to the citizens/voters. So these managers would be hired and fired at will. They would certify private companies that could be hired by an individual or business for security or investigation. They would put a bounty on catching criminals. You could either pay these companies like insurance or after the fact. To visit public place, one would pay a user fee part of which would go to security. We already do this in our state and national parks, public roads. Just extend this to all public areas.

"Imagine if the post office ~ would that encourage?"

Lets just say the results would not be pretty.

"There often is very little correlation between income and natural resource usage. For example software development, sure you need an office and some utilities, but that's about it. But socialist don't seem to mind taxing their income at 60% or more. We want to encourage businesses with low resource usage and and low impact on the environment. Pay as you go is the most efficient system. The poor can be dealt with through social programs, education and charity. We don't need to have an insane economic system to accommodate them."

But I don't want to accomodate the poor. I'd much rather see the lowest rungs of the ladder be jumped so that the only way you can even be poor is by refusing to lift a finger. By necessity, some allowances must be made. For perfect example, children. I can't ethically support child labour for mulitple reasons. Yet they would still be afforded basic necessities at the least.

Not individually. Individuals do not get to decide what is right and wrong that a police force should pursue, that is decided by a relatively constant and concise set of laws that apply , in principle, to the entire state, not a select few determined by whether they have bought their idea of security from the police guard. 

Put it this way, a private security guard which you might hire to protect your interests still must act at all times within the state law, enforced by the public police. There is your major difference illustrated EXC, the public police force is entrusted with the will of the entire state and it trumps the will of a private hirer.

No, it's designed with the intent of enforcing the collective will of the citizens uniformly across the area. Paying more if you have more is not a matter of supplementing for the sake of others who can't pay, it's a matter of supplementing for the sake of yourself because a uniformly enforced laws across your state give you comfort and make you more secure.

Oh, I see. I'm not saying state funded policing is necessarily the best idea and I never did say that, and I've said there are problems with it. But you're straying from the point again, EXC. You posed your original question as what in principle is different between private and public policing. We are talking about differences in principle, not practice.

If you want to have a discussion about differences in practice then introduce it properly and we'll discuss it. At the moment you're just conflating principle and practice in an attempt to trap me with an argument I never made.

Well, yeah, you do have the choice, at least in principle. but your citizens need to make it a priority on the political agenda to retract the union powers at the root of the problem. I don't know what you're talking about, first hand, cause I'm not a US citizen. However if there is really the problem you're talking about, political action is possible if you have a democracy.

Wow, well you really could've fooled me.

EXC, I live in a country with socialised health, workers unions and quite a substantial welfare system, it doesn't bother us like that.

You make it sound so.... cheap! LOL. Social work is generally only effective if it is ongoing for quite a substantial length of time. You seem to be entertaining the ludicrous idea that one social worker, one visit and one referral will solve a poor persons problems, I just can't laugh loud enough at that, honestly.

I'm afraid that is what it takes to lift people with the usual compound issues of long term poverty out of them, they will stay in poverty and continually take more than they can give back for quite an extended period of time. Some people are poor because of short lived personal issues, but most of the poor are poor because of long entrenched and difficult to change cultural, race and gender issues. If your system is not willing to commit to generations of supporting gradual adaptation then it's not equipped to deal with poverty.

I don't see how. Australia's population is quite small and was in decline at the time that this migration began.

Er, no. Actually it was more a result of a massive rush on property investment in the southern states pricing people out of them.

No life was better because the rents and property prices were approximately a third the size of the southern states, and holding stable. In Sydney and Melbourne prices were increasing by the day.

Or... alternately, if you offer hungry people an affordable lunch, they'll tell their friends to come eat there.

Huh? No the electricity wasn't free.

Anyhow, if you want to know which people moved to Qld they were mostly families and investors, not poor. And there were a lot of reasons, but the property price bubbles in NSW and VIC were major ones. Not everyone moved to QLD, just the majority, and it was most likely for the climate and beaches, not for a free lunch from the state government (well.. except for the investors). Some families otherwise, moved to Tasmania, (a difficult move since you have to cross an ocean strait to get there so not many did this), and some moved to SA (probably way fewer and the reason for that is that SA has a very uncomfortable climate in most places).

And that's why the current system is unsustainable, one's "will" counts just as much if you pay tons of tax or no tax. The only thing that can fix this is a social system that gets people out of poverty and mandates birth control and forces the rich to pay for what they use as well.

But in practice, people just don't go to places that don't have good security. A lot of people then just want to stay in their gated communities and secured homes. This kill the economy where it's needed most. If you charged visitors to an area a security fee, like we do a parking fee, we could see previously dangerous areas with little legal business begin to flourish economically.

You're not stating a standard for when a security matter should be handled by the public police and when it should be paid for by the business or individual receiving the benefit. Banks with cash on hand attract criminals, so lets just have lots of public cops protecting them. Why not just make the need for private security unnecessary altogether? Should a poor neighborhood that is ravaged by drive-by shootings hire private patrols or should the public police make this unnecessary.

I don't understand your standard for when a security matter should be private or public. Is it just if they're a rich corporation or poor and can't pay?

Please explain the difference, when should a security matter be paid for with private money vs. public money.

By making health-care, police, welfare and other entitlements a right, you make money the most important thing since all these "rights" cost money. I'm for letting people decide not to live a high stress life that requires a lot of money to have good health-care, police, etc... I'm for letting people be poor and happy as long as the don't bother other people. You on the other hand want to work everyone like slaves to pay off the police unions and health-care industry.

But now you're going broke and people are wondering what happened to their birthright to live in paradise.

I didn't claim it was easy. But the problem is now social workers have no stick. They can't mandate birth control, they can't threaten to cut off benefits, they can't tell people they'll go to a work camp or jail if they don't start paying for what they use. I'd only have social workers work with people that want to cooperate. Otherwise they are on their own and if they break laws it's work camp and jail. No compassion, just cold hard facts of life for people.

If you want to be compassionate, give to a charity.

I agree in many cases, that's why you give them an evaluation of the problem and a solution to follow. Just handing out food stamps and free electricity is just treating the symptoms, they may need rehab, counseling or education.

So the population grows rapidly until resources and infrastructure limitations cause harsh misery. So the specter of Malthus is at work here. People increase in population until hardships are the only limiting factor on further growth.

Ah, yes. The competition for limited natural resources(i.e. land), and the system was set up to allow the rich to take advantage of a monopoly and get richer without work or risky investment. This is where I'm a leftist, don't let people get rich by taking advantage of our limited natural resources.

But how did they respond, probably with higher business and income taxes to discourage investment, innovation and work, right? Not with a tax on natural resource usage. And QL responds with free electricity, healthcare and other benefits to encourage more migration.

So, the problem is both greedy rich and greedy poor and few people willing to pay for what they actually use. The rich are entitled to land, the poor to welfare while the ship begins to sink more and more.

You wrote it was subsidized, in my book that means part of it was free.

I don't know..I'd like to see him in charge of a daycare..

:3

I predict high entertainment value. That is enough for me. 

:3

Equipping them all with guns would be a logical first step. Hiring toddlers as a security force then to keep the infants in line, and guarantee naptime for the more influential crawlers seems to follow.

Also, food availability should be rationed through free market overinflation of prices after monopolization created by the free market guarantees no competition. The impoverished babies deserve not to eat snacks, or have diapers replaced. They have to pull themselves up by their diaperstraps and stop being so lazy to not be born into prosperity.

Toys will only be usable by those that can afford to get to them first, which the toddler security force (TSF) will enforce to make sure the correct group aquires all toys before and after all available naptimes. Attempt to use toys without correct authorization will result in heavy fines from the TSF, since they only represent the influential crawlers.

Then the babies all shoot eachother because they are babies with guns.

What is the lesson to be learned here?

True, many people who want security don't go to areas that have greater crime incidence. It's also true that many people who want security and are law-abiding hard-working and respectable citizens don't have this option*, and furthermore it's true that you can't just ignore a problem such as criminal behaviour in the hope that it will go away, if crime is unchecked in the unsecured neighbourhoods it will grow and eventually spill over borders anyway.

*your model appears to be assuming that this group are all 'small business owners' - that is unlikely. What about employees? How do they figure in your equation?

I believe the distinction has traditionally been made between protecting the public and protecting private interests. The difference between people and property. Our private property such as banked money is primarily our own responsibility in the absence of an immediate threat thus it is not a matter for the public security force to guard it.

So the line is drawn between public and private security as to the immediacy of the threat. An immediate, ongoing threat to any persons security is a matter for the police*, pre-emptive security is a matter for the private interest.

The drive-by shooting example is a poor one, by the time there has been multiple shootings targeting a single area it would be remiss to call the threat anything but immediate/ongoing. Police patrols are called for.

*If a bank is in the process of being robbed public police will provide their services.

I strongly object EXC, you couldn't possibly have that more backward. If a politic stands to put rights above money isn't it by design the very antithesis of making money important?

And how, pray tell, do rights "cost money" if not for those who hold money dear and want it in return for services and provision? Rights don't cost money, they cost resources and labour we've had this discussion already in this thread. Money only enters the equation because we want to use it as a great big societal abacus for distribution, it's supposed to be a counting tool, not a means unto itself (the main, central and most pervading problem I have with capitalism is that it institutes otherwise).

Then why FFS! are you calling yourself a capitalist. What do you think increased profit is if it's not requiring a lot of money to have things? You don't honestly believe capitalism will stop being driven by the pursuit of greater and greater amounts of money from the consumer at some point do you? You have to be joking, right?

I'm just gonna pretend you didn't just make a statement that contends strongly for the title of most bigoted arrogance I have ever read.

No, I want essential services and resources held in trust by the community. I want that when you work and get paid, even in essential services, your paycheque is for you. For your reward and for your personal pursuits. You really need to think harder about the model I am describing to you.

Que?

Australia is doing rather well actually, we're not broke, we've actually recorded our first quarter of growth since the GFC already. And yes thanks does go to some socialist policies which helped the country stave of the worst.

A little draconian don't you think? How do you propose they enforce it?

Who says they can't? And what good does it do to starve people anyway?

There are good reasons why doing that would be nothing short of a seamless return to imperialism and race oppression, EXC. We are both settled in countries with spotty histories that haven't properly made amends yet, now's not the time to resurrect the old crimes of history's religious supremacists.

Besides, gaols are just another type of expensive welfare.... unless.... hmmm..... I don't know whether to put it past you, frankly.

Now lets get this straight EXC, OK.  Hunger is not a symptom of being poor. Why oh why do you believe all this outrageous propaganda? Please, pick up a book of biology, discover the cause of hunger from a real objective source. Feeding a hungry person is not treating a symptom of poverty issues.

Having to hand out tickets in order that people to be able to access the most basic and essential needs of life OTOH, that's symptomatic of something sick, I'll give you that.  

EXC, western populations have been declining because of a cultural shift, for decades. Where do you get this lack of infrastructure problem from?

And moreover, capitalism does not provide universal infrastructure, so if you think it's important then I think you are starting to sway left with me.

You must be mistaken EXC. I never wrote anything about electricity being subsidised or free in Queensland. Show me where.

CC, Doomy and the other socialist want government to treat them like they're a helpless bunch of babies.