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Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

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Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#141

Post by qikInNdOutReply »

legitster wrote: post #75

This reminds me of when I learned there was no such thing as "The Children's Crusade". As my history professor put it, "going to the Holy Land was an incredibly expensive endeavour reserved for a very few. There's no way anyone was going to waste it on young, inexperienced children". Nearly every source we had saying that the crusade involved children came much later, after a few writers referred to the same source w…

? The whole of medieval europe swarms with stories of surplus children send to fend for themselves as servants and workers abroad. https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schwabenkinder

Whole areas exported there population as soldiers, mercenaries and mining people. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_Guard Most of them were like the taliban in afghanistan, interlocked in eternal holy wars. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thirty_Years%27_War

Well obviously the taliban aint real either. A mountainous area, in eternal intertribal warfare.. not actually accepting the nation state.. ridiculous thought.

The english soldiers fighting in the independence war against the americans, were partially germans, sold by in debted aristoctrats. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junker_(Prussia)

This was the reality on the ground, even up until the 2nd worldwar. The only escape for the peasants and althose 2nd,3rd sons who were bound to the land, was to go on pilgrimages. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pilgrimage or to flee to the "new world" were the nicer frontier awaited them.

I find the idea of a children crusadd very plausible. The crusader knights surely promised the conquered lands to peasants who would follow them. And pre-pestilence europe was certainly crowded.

Idealism is nice. Success self hypnosis is nice. But not believing in the brutality of bygone reality, while some parts of it are still around you, is foolish, and spreading that foolishness, is preparing for it to repeat itself. Work hard and meaningful, if not for yourselves, then to prevent the return of the olden times.

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#142

Post by [deleted] »

fakedang wrote: post #43
LarryMullins wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I mean, yes, but doctors will still save your life even if you declined to buy any insurance all life long or pay taxes or whatever So will firefighters. They'll save your life to the best of their ability, no matter any contracts, payments, taxes, etc. Saving your house is another matter.

[flagged]

[deleted]

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#143

Post by that_guy_iain »

Even with this information included. I think the moral of the story is America has some very serious third-world problems. The reason things like this go on in America and not in any other developed country is that Americans just accept it. "They didn't pay, so they die." Here is how much they accept it, firefighters literally stood and watched a building burn down instead of playing with their toys. Not only that, the fire department refused to accept money to put it out.

This whole "unincorporated land" execuse is a sad state of affairs. The whole "You're not with us, so it's not our problem" mindset is really why America is so low down on every single ranking in the world, except for military might. It seems like a constant battle to make sure you're doing ok at the expense of others. School kids getting shot? It's ok, I can still have my gun. Unarmed people getting shot by police? It's ok, they haven't shot me. Corrupt police officer hired a town over? It's ok, he's their problem now. People dying because they can't afford to visit a doctor? That's ok, I can.

Instead of grouping together the US has decided to constantly separate it self among itself. Other countries have orginisations that deal with entire areas. The US each town has to have it's own. It results in a lower quality of service. Not every town can afford x,y,z fire equipment that is only going to be used once a month but an biradge that deals with 10 towns and would be using it two times a week can.

The thing is, the solution to most of the US' problems aren't hard. They're already figured out by everyone else. We all just have to put up with hearing about the craziness that comes from the country that thinks it's great while their ass is on fire.

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#144

Post by Eleison23 »

legitster wrote: post #75

This reminds me of when I learned there was no such thing as "The Children's Crusade". As my history professor put it, "going to the Holy Land was an incredibly expensive endeavour reserved for a very few. There's no way anyone was going to waste it on young, inexperienced children". Nearly every source we had saying that the crusade involved children came much later, after a few writers referred to the same source w…

I wrote a research paper in college on the Children's Crusade, and the question I posed to be answered was "how many children participated in it?"

It turns out that it was a real phenomenon, and many children did leave home, but being children, practically none of them made it to the Holy Land. The journey for many was much, much shorter. And likewise, for many it was merely a spiritual crusade and they went nowhere but "TO GOD!" as they were heard to shout.

There were eyewitnesses and contemporary accounts, and I compiled an impressive list of sources to document what could be gleaned from those accounts from a modern perspective.

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#145

Post by legitster »

vlovich123 wrote: post #132
legitster wrote: post #75

This reminds me of when I learned there was no such thing as "The Children's Crusade". As my history professor put it, "going to the Holy Land was an incredibly expensive endeavour reserved for a very few. There's no way anyone was going to waste it on young, inexperienced children". Nearly every source we had saying that the crusade involved children came much later, after a few writers referred to the same source w…

Wouldn’t children be useful in terms of doing a bunch of tasks that aren’t worth the time of your soldiers? Ie what was the age of the squires for the soldiers?

Sure, but to that extent the "children" that would have been sent would have been considered normal working age.

Funnily enough, the word "infantry" comes from the same word as "infant". IE, the young guys on the battle field.

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#146

Post by bee_rider »

pifm_guy wrote: post #10
nerdponx wrote: post #5

I didn't realize this was even an assertion that people made at all. It doesn't make a lot of sense to me. People at the time must have known that fires in cities were extremely dangerous because they could spread over a great area. It's logical that insurers would want to work together to prevent all fires, purely out of self-interest to protect their insured properties, and then sue the pants off negligent and/or u…

But then what is the incentive for anyone to get coverage if they know that any fires will be put out regardless...? Unless the fire service is paired with insurance covering the cost of a rebuild? But I don't think the original fire services offered that.

It is covered in the article; the free-rider problem was a problem, in London eventually the fire-brigades appear to have basically convinced the city to buy them because they couldn’t solve it.

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#147

Post by mytailorisrich »

munificent wrote: post #70
fakedang wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

I suspect you would find services limited in the middle of the Arabian desert as well. The United States is enormous and many parts of it are incredibly sparsely populated. For example, Niobrara County in Wyoming has a population of 2,467 and an area of 6,810 km^2, or a population density of 0.36/km^2. For comparison, the Northern Borders province, the least dense province in Saudi Arabia, has as population density o…

I think there is a difference between a remote place that is difficult to access and a place that is not entitled to use public firefighters' service. IMHO the former has no bearing on the latter.

I am not judging the way things work in the US, just commenting that I don't think that population density is relevant here as the issue is one of right.

Now, of course, if you live 100 miles from the nearest town it may well take hours for the police or firefighters to show up when you call them. That's another issue.

Edit: I must have written something offensive without realising it...

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#148

Post by cies »

that_guy_iain wrote: post #143

Even with this information included. I think the moral of the story is America has some very serious third-world problems. The reason things like this go on in America and not in any other developed country is that Americans just accept it. "They didn't pay, so they die." Here is how much they accept it, firefighters literally stood and watched a building burn down instead of playing with their toys. Not only that, t…

No post body was provided.

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#149

Post by PeterisP »

vlovich123 wrote: post #132
legitster wrote: post #75

This reminds me of when I learned there was no such thing as "The Children's Crusade". As my history professor put it, "going to the Holy Land was an incredibly expensive endeavour reserved for a very few. There's no way anyone was going to waste it on young, inexperienced children". Nearly every source we had saying that the crusade involved children came much later, after a few writers referred to the same source w…

Wouldn’t children be useful in terms of doing a bunch of tasks that aren’t worth the time of your soldiers? Ie what was the age of the squires for the soldiers?

A squire would generally be between the ages of 14 to 21. A pre-teen boy wouldn't be useful for the core duties of a squire because of a lack of strength for the physical labor involved in handling arms, armor and horses.

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#150

Post by bluGill »

frosted-flakes wrote: post #100
bluedino wrote: post #79

We have a ~$200 fee for trash pickup in our municipality. You get the bill every year. If you don't pay it, a 10% penalty is added. The next step, a lien is placed on the property. They never stop picking up the trash, though. The next purchaser of your property has to pay the existing trash bill! This same council raised water rates so they could reduce the penalties for late water bill payments.

Why is trash pickup not bundled with property taxes? It's seems ridiculous to charge for it separately when every occupied home will generate a similar amount of trash.

Why should it be part of taxes at all? I've lived in places with city trash pickup, and places where you choose your own private company to get your trash (in the later some cheap people just drove their trash to the dump every couple months). The costs were about the same in the best case so long as the private people shopped around, and in the worst cases the city didn't shop around and so costs were a lot more.
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