Free market or free for all market?
Offline I just saw a story on CNN about a medical bill which charged an insurance company $1,000 dollars for a toothbrush. Neither the hospital or the medical supply company or the insurance company would comment other than to say that it was "an oversight".
BULL FUCKING SHIT!
Big business has learned that it can make pick pocketing legal by putting everything in mice print. It is not just health care. But EVERYTHING, from car loans to home loans to phone and dish contracts. Big business has lead the public by the nose and gotten society used to singing paper work instead of one time cash transactions and flat prices. We are allowing ourselves to become indentured slaves because of their marketing scams.
Our market is not based on competition, but is based on how we are sold indentured slavery. They get away with charging us what they want because we are to busy to pay attention to what we are being charged and want us in the position of feeling like we have no choice.
No one in their right mind would shop at a super market if we got charged for each isle we walked down, or charged for each minute we were in the store. Nor would we put up with the clerk following us out of the store to our cars tapping us on the shoulder saying "That will be another 5 bucks for shopping during peak hours".
Whenever I see fine print in a TV add I picture a bum with a card table on a Vegas street inviting you to guess which cup the ball is under. That is what our market is. It isn't about a fair price, it is about convincing us we need them.
It is bullshit that 1lb of chicken wings costs 8 bucks. How far is this going to go? Do we want to wait untill 1 wing costs 5 bucks?
There is a huge difference between making a buck and raping the public. Big business only cares about what it can get away with.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
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I think this is the place where I tell you about my adventure with Sprint.
About ten years ago, I went to Radio Shack and asked to buy a cell phone. They sold me one. I made a few calls on my “free” time and everything seemed fine. Then it stopped working. I called Sprint to find out why and that is where the deal went south.
Apparently, I have not paid the bill in over a month. What bill would this be? I just got the phone a month ago. Apparently, that would be the bill that I got in the mail a couple of days later. A bill that was payable on the day that they started providing service. Not the normal 30 days after I get the bill but 30 days before they even bother to mail the damned thing out.
Whatever, I have the bill now and it is not for the $35 that a month of service is supposed to cost. It is for $70 because they get an extra moth of cash for granting me the privilege of using the service. This is called an “activation fee”.
By this point, I have not had phone service for a week now but I am beginning to get the picture. So I am now offering to send them a check for $105 so that I am paid up with them and they can send me the bill a month late from now to eternity and I will have uninterrupted service.
Sprint does not play that game. They guy on the phone will only accept a credit card. The game is on. I will happily send them a check if they will cash it. They refuse to accept a check on the ground that only a credit card is valid as payment on Sprint bills.
WTF is this? Well, the contract is clear on that matter. What contract is this? I paid cash for the phone and never filled out any paperwork apart from the credit check. However, I am bound by the terms of a contract. Well, I am not clear on this. Would you please fax me a copy of the contract so that I can see what you think the deal is? No, they don't have to, it is my responsibility to make myself aware of the contract.
Um, I never signed a contract. Which does not matter to them. According to the guy on the phone, I don't have to sign a contract or even be aware that they use one. All I have to do is agree to it. Since I did not object to the contract within 48 hours of the start of service, I automatically agreed to the damned thing.
I still want to know what this contract says, will they please send me a copy? No, it is my responsibility to find it. How shall I find it? Well, the person on the phone tells me that “there are lots of ways to get the contract” Apparently, asking for it is not one of those ways.
This saga has been going on for a month now and I still do not have phone service. Then I get the next month's bill. For what? The phone has not been active during that time. Now the people on the phone tell me that the contract says that Sprint gets paid whether they actually provide service or not.
OK, I dispute this. Except that I can't dispute it because the contract says that I have to dispute it within 48 hours or I have agreed that they can do this. Also, I have to dispute the matter in person at the dispute office. Which is in Minneapolis. How was I supposed to know that? Well, the contract is explicit on the matter. The contract that they still have not given me.
Then another month's bill comes in while I am still trying to get them to play ball. Same logic, they have the right to my money but they do not have the responsibility to do anything that would qualify them to get it. The contract says so. Somewhere. Possibly. I would not know. Apparently, my moth of valid service @ $35 is now supposed to cost me $140. But we are not done yet. I am still willing to pay them, all they have to do is agree to accept my check. Then I get yet another bill, this time for all that plus $350 for early termination of the contract. A contract that I still have never seen and they will not show me. At this point, they seem to feel that they have the right to $500. They can get bent.
Oh, we are not done yet. A couple of years later, I am in Old Navy trying to buy a few pairs of jeans and some shirts. According the the cashier, they have a deal that I can get 10% off if I get the store charge card. Which I tell them to hook me up with. Which I get denied. Because Sprint put a mark on my credit report. I ended up with bad credit for seven years and all over a stupid phone that only worked for 30 days.
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As long as you put things in print you can make the mafia legal. Just because something is legal, doesn't make it moral or ethical. Until consumers start demanding flat rates and keep the ability to pay cash, they will continue scams like this.
I pay cash for everything, including my bills. I don't have a credit card nor do I write checks. I don't have a good credit score I am sure. But what they want more than someone who pays a full amount on time, is someone who pays the minimum. I refuse to get caught up in that scam.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
Many, many years ago, after staying in the hospital for the birth of one of my sons (I forget which one
), I got an itemized bill in the mail. I had insurance and they had paid their share and I was not surprised at my share. What was surprising was a number of charges for procedures I didn't have! I called the hospital and asked, they said I must have had them because all new mothers had them. I distinctly recalled NOT having them. Oh, well. I called the insurance company. And I got told again, that I must have had them because all new mothers had them. I gave up. You want to know why medical costs are so high in this country? 
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
The reason they treat customers like shit is because they can.
The antidote to this is information. The Internet has enabled places like EBay where sellers and buyers must gain social capital by treating each other correct. Those that say get the government to solve the problem see don't have a leg to stand on. Look at how they get ripped off with defence spending and then there is medicare/medicaid.
Stop thinking that anyone cares about you. They only care about themselves. Systems and procedures must be in place to make everyone accountable and make everyone accountable for ripoffs and incompetence. If Radio shack and sprint rip you off, they must pay a price for this. This is the only thing that will change the behavior.
Taxation is the price we pay for failing to build a civilized society. The higher the tax level, the greater the failure. A centrally planned totalitarian state represents a complete defeat for the civilized world, while a totally voluntary society represents its ultimate success. --Mark Skousen
Read the fine print on any credit card app. This has been around for quite some time ><. No one ever actually reads that or they would not have a credit card.
Well, I have read it and do not have a credit card, so maybe I'm not alone =) I have never understood why so many people are willing to pay interest and fee's like that. I guess we live in a world of "I want it right now and I don't want to wait even if it costs me more money in the long run"
I have cash money, I use a debit card to pay a few bills online and thats it. One of my friends wants to brag about having 5 different credit cards, I pull my wallet out and he still tries to brag about cards...what has happened to the system? As long as we can stay entertained and get the little things we want right now, it's oooook I guess.
Anyway, I have a bit of the conspiracy bug in me, I do think the big companies are reaming us, because they can, just like the government.
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
It is not a conspiracy as much as it is a climate. The only way to bring the cost of living down is to do what you and I do. If enough people would make the wallets of big business hurt, they wouldn't do what they do. But it is marketing and big business has done an effective job in selling society indentured slavery.
BUT it is not a conspiracy to say that the deck is stacked in favor of big business.
We are now paying sit down restaurant prices for meat at the super market. Everything is shrinking in size and the price of everything is outrageous.
I can remember growing up that a bag of chips was full. The "king size" Snickers bars are now split in two and much smaller than the original "King size". I can rember getting a 5lb bag of chicken wings for 6 bucks just 5 years ago. NOW it is 8 bucks for barely over a pound.
How far is this gouging going to go? Are we going to get to the point where you pay 5 bucks for a Snickers bar or 1 buck for one chicken wing?
I don't give a shit what the fans of the right say, when prices are this lopsided to the cost of living, there is something wrong with this.
What people are paying for now, is not the actual product, but paying for the marketing, lining the pockets of the CEOs and shareholders. It is basically a climate of hording.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
Agreed. The reason why people do this is because they can get away with that. And the reason why they get away with that is that there is zero transparency in the system.
The cartoon above with the woman trying to get bids from emergency rooms while her husband lays dying seems ironically funny but there is a level on which it can be taken to make a very different point. If providers of services were forced to publicly disclose ho they do business, then I suspect that they would not be so likely to try and rip people off.
Actually, I saw an article on google news the other day that is relevant to medical pricing in the USA. It had numbers for what different types of people pay for identical medical procedures. Really, those numbers should be the same for everyone in a proper fee for service model. They are not.
From the article, it seems that Medicare can buy a colonoscopy for like $400. Private insurance gets the same service for $2,000 and the uninsured can get billed to the tune of $10,000. All for the exact same service.
Now I am all for reforming health care so that everyone can afford it but if the numbers in that article are real, then it should not be too damned hard to get there. Figure out what the actual cost of the service is and have everyone pay the same amount. Eliminate the idea that the price is inversely proportional to your ability to pay and see just how much the service really costs.
Even if the numbers from the article were badly researched and need to be corrected, I know for a fact that there is much fraud going on in the system from personal experience. A little over a year ago, I was walking down the street chilling to some music and not looking where I was going. I tripped on a frost heaved sidewalk and landed jawbone first. Damn that hurt! I decided to get checked out just in case.
The bills that I got? Like $125 to walk into the emergency room. $150 for half a dozen x-rays. Over $800 for the ambulance. Wait! What? The city must think that I am some kind of idiot who will just pass that bill on to my insurance company and that my insurance company will pay it without looking at it (they probably would).
I was in the damned ambulance just long enough for them to drive me like 1.5 miles. And for that they want more than 3 times what the hospital did to tell me that I really was just fine? If they want to get anywhere, they are simply going to have to itemize that bill. I want to know what the driver and tech guy get paid and just what the cost of the diesel fuel was for that mighty short trip. When they are forced to admit that they incurred less than $50 of actual expenses and they want to give me a bill for the real cost of the service, then and only then will I let my insurance company see it.
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Well I mentioned conspiracy, but I don't mean people are making deal's and stuff to up pricing. I mean the big man, usually cares next to none about the little man. If little man wants it, he will pay, if not he simply does not get it. I mean, look at what the oil companies have done, our gas prices went sky high all at once, then the same companies are reporting record profits, dur. Now, gas prices effect everything else, transporting other products takes..gas.
So they have in effect made the entire cost of living go up and up.
I'll tell a little story, a co-worker signed a note on a new expedition last week. Yesterday he drove his other car to work and they came and picked it up, yes it got reposessed. Just TODAY he had his new expedition at the stereo shop getting a "system" put in, and at the end of the day he had some shiny new 20" wheels on it.
What the fux is going on? This guy is 35 years old and has 7 kids... I see this type of thing going on all the time and this guy and many others will tell you people who do these things are foolish, the country is full of fools and the big guy takes full advantage of it.
I guess what I am saying is, it is not JUST the big guy...
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin