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How Much Does a Cremation Cost? Depends Who You Call

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Re: How Much Does a Cremation Cost? Depends Who You Call

#41

Post by sandworm101 »

refurb wrote: post #29
ergothus wrote: post #27

Somewhat topical story: A co-worker was part of a jogging group (this was in Virginia, USA), and one of their members died after a fight with cancer. He wanted his ashes to be spread in the Botanical Gardens, where they ran. But said Botanical Gardens had rules denying this (don't recall if it was hygiene, environmental, or just not wanting to open the door to piles of ash). So the group somberly gathered, took his a…

Turns out cremation doesn't result in ONLY ash You actually end up with large, intact bones after cremation. They actually take the bones and grind them up into finer particles. I've never seen cremation, ashes, but I've been told they look similar to gravel.

The process as I understand it:

(1) Prep the body by cutting out anything that will harm the cremator, specifically pacemakers with potentially explosive batteries. (2) Fire. (3) Sift through the ashes/bones for any metal (hips/metal screws) (4) Macerate remaining bits into homogeneous ash.

Re: How Much Does a Cremation Cost? Depends Who You Call

#42

Post by shostack »

dsp1234 wrote: post #19
stcredzero wrote: post #18

Even more troubling, in the Internet age, funeral parlors tend to make pricing hard to find. In fact, the Federal Trade Commission allows funeral homes to keep their rates hidden until someone actually writes or calls a funeral home representative -- leaning on regulations last updated in 1994 -- rather than pushing funeral homes to let the customer compare online. How about a company where you can subscribe to get s…

FTA: "This post is adapted from the blog of Parting, a Priceonomics customer." From http://www.parting.com : "Find trusted funeral homes near you to compare quality and prices"

This should really be higher. The entire post is a content marketing/native advertising placement.

But that's the only new publisher business model that seems to work these days.

Re: How Much Does a Cremation Cost? Depends Who You Call

#43

Post by stevesearer »

refurb wrote: post #29
ergothus wrote: post #27

Somewhat topical story: A co-worker was part of a jogging group (this was in Virginia, USA), and one of their members died after a fight with cancer. He wanted his ashes to be spread in the Botanical Gardens, where they ran. But said Botanical Gardens had rules denying this (don't recall if it was hygiene, environmental, or just not wanting to open the door to piles of ash). So the group somberly gathered, took his a…

Turns out cremation doesn't result in ONLY ash You actually end up with large, intact bones after cremation. They actually take the bones and grind them up into finer particles. I've never seen cremation, ashes, but I've been told they look similar to gravel.

They do look similar to gravel/sand. And something that was surprising to me (although probably shouldn't have been) is that the weight of the remains definitely differs depending on the size of the person.

Re: How Much Does a Cremation Cost? Depends Who You Call

#44

Post by [deleted] »

rpgmaker wrote: post #37
stevesearer wrote: post #2

I temped in a sales office for a cremation company a number of years ago and it was a very interesting experience. You can pre-buy cremations and issued a legally binding document which states that you are to be cremated. This can save your family the trouble and heartache of shopping around for a good deal as well as debate/drama over what to do with your remains. From what I understand, it is also easy to be upsold…

> You can pre-buy cremations and issued a legally binding document which states that you are to be cremated. Even if your next of kin disagree and want a traditional burial for your body? People can be assholes and disregard your final wishes if they think their upholding some kind of tradition/religious principle.

[deleted]

Re: How Much Does a Cremation Cost? Depends Who You Call

#45

Post by lawpoop »

stcredzero wrote: post #18

Even more troubling, in the Internet age, funeral parlors tend to make pricing hard to find. In fact, the Federal Trade Commission allows funeral homes to keep their rates hidden until someone actually writes or calls a funeral home representative -- leaning on regulations last updated in 1994 -- rather than pushing funeral homes to let the customer compare online. How about a company where you can subscribe to get s…

There is the Funerals Consumer Alliance. https://www.funerals.org/

I think the chapters are all locally run. I went to a local meeting when my mom had terminal cancer. They had a list of local funeral homes with guaranteed prices, and had some agreement with FCA to honor the prices.

Re: How Much Does a Cremation Cost? Depends Who You Call

#46

Post by vacri »

nsxwolf wrote: post #23
gambiting wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Burying in a coffin requires wood and precious land space. What else do you propose? Burial at sea? A boat that would take your body there would also burn oil. I mean, there's a million more wasteful things that you can complain about, other than how we dispose of our bodies after death.

Why not just liquify bodies with chemicals and then flush them down the drain?

"chemicals" also take energy to create, and you still have to deal with the environmental effects of the waste products from the process.

Re: How Much Does a Cremation Cost? Depends Who You Call

#47

Post by nsxwolf »

vacri wrote: post #46
nsxwolf wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why not just liquify bodies with chemicals and then flush them down the drain?

"chemicals" also take energy to create, and you still have to deal with the environmental effects of the waste products from the process.

How about composting?

Re: How Much Does a Cremation Cost? Depends Who You Call

#48

Post by MonadQueen »

One problem that can cause price differences is obesity. 2/3rs of Americans are overweight or obese, and it is much more difficult, expensive, and potentially dangerous, to cremate a person who has a bodyfat percentage of 40% or more.

See http://www.express.co.uk/news/world/520833/Cremation-obese-5...

Funeral Homes should only have to post rates for people with body fat percentages of 25 and below. And they should be allowed to charge more for the fat. Otherwise families of people who were not obese would be subsidizing obese lifestyle choices.

Re: How Much Does a Cremation Cost? Depends Who You Call

#49

Post by sandworm101 »

theophrastus wrote: post #30
jjoe wrote: post #3

I understand that the choice/decision to cremate the self is personal. But I think it stops where the personal starts affecting us all. Is cremation that negligible of an issue for the environment?

India, who's Hindu population require cremation as a death rite, and really needs to worry about deforestation, has been investigating direct focused solar cremations, ("Huge two parabolas of 32 m2 concentrate solar radiation"[1]). I always thought that might be an interesting way to do it, particularly if one's body could be placed so that you vaporize at sun-rise. [1] http://www.tss-india.com/crematorium [2] http:/…

I"ve seen some of that "cremation" by the Ganges river. They were not spreading the ashes on the river so much as dumping rather large blocks of cooked flesh. Ash shouldn't make a splashing noise. The practice needs to be modernized.

"Last week more than 80 bodies – mostly decomposed skeletons and half-burned corpses – surfaced in the river in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh after a drop in water levels. "

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jan/19/hindu-bodies-ga...

Re: How Much Does a Cremation Cost? Depends Who You Call

#50

Post by LordKano »

rpgmaker wrote: post #40
cglace wrote: post #20

Years back, there was a cremation place in Georgia that had its cremation machine break. It was too expensive to fix so the guy just kept accepting bodies. He would drive them to his property and just dump them. It was a pretty huge case. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tri-State_Crematory

"Between 1996 and the date of the discovery, more than 2,000 bodies had been sent to Tri-State. The search ultimately recovered 339 uncremated bodies. Of the 339 bodies that were discovered, 226 were identified." How long did they expect to keep that up? I could conceive of them doing it for maybe a year and then buying a machine but it seems that, at least to them, it became business as usual.

I remember when this was a breaking story.

At first, they claimed that some bodies had been improperly stored as they were awaiting repairs to the retort.

Then, when the scope of the issue became known, I wondered the same thing. How long did they think they could keep stacking bodies without anyone noticing them?

I don't believe they ever thought that far ahead.

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