Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

tomscott.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

211–220 of 440 posts

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#211

Post by ianmcgowan »

that_guy_iain wrote: post #190
zpthree wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want the benefits of society you can't ignore the costs. Every home that is protected by fire departments pays taxes in the developed world, this family chose to live in unincorporated land. Btw - The fire was started by the homeowners grandson who was lighting trash on fire and afterwards the homeowners son assaulted the fire chief.

Quoted post unavailable.

Not saying this is right, but many Americans disagree with the very concept, and want to maintain their freedom to opt-out of everything that goes along with "society". Gault's Gulch and all that. And I think it was that famous British voice of reason Maggie Thatcher that said "there's no such thing as society".

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#212

Post by ThunderSizzle »

bluGill wrote: post #150
frosted-flakes wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

You don't want your neighbor to not have trash pickup if they live within smelling distance. You want their trashed to be picked up. If you live in an area where that can easily become a problem, it becomes important to make it regular and "included".

If you have more space/land in between, it doesn't matter nearly as much.

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#213

Post by pkaye »

frosted-flakes wrote: post #164
bluGill wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Because with the information I was given above: - every household gets trash collection service, no matter what - every household must pay a flat fee for trash collection service, no matter what Why charge it as a separate fee?

Smaller households can generate less trash. In our area you can pick between 3 sizes of trash/recycling/green bins. The trash bin size determines the service cost but there is no additional cost for the recycling and green bins.

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#214

Post by jakear »

that_guy_iain wrote: post #206
LarryMullins wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And the fire department didn't go out. Again, more misinformation! They did go out, and made sure the fire didn't spread off the property. If anybody had been imperiled, the firefighters would have helped. FFS, it's right in that article: > They put water out on the fence line out here. They never said nothing to me. Never acknowledged. They stood out here and watched it burn," Cranick said. And if the firefighters…

>Again, more misinformation! No, they went out after the neighbour phoned up because of a fire on their property. Anyone who has fully read the article will know that. So stop your nonsense. "Firefighters did eventually show up, but only to fight the fire on the neighboring property, whose owner had paid the fee."

So the fire department was contacted, did not hear of any lives at risk, and did not show up. What an entirely reasonable response to getting a service request from someone who has not established a SLA with your company.

Do you personally work at a company? If so, I demand you to help me fix a problem I'm having. I haven't paid you, but that shouldn't matter. What's that? You won't help me? But you helped my competitor who did establish a contract with you in which they paid you a monthly fee in exchange for a guarantee you'd help them when the needed it.

The horror. The absolute travesty. Society has failed.

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#215

Post by cafard »

vlovich123 wrote: post #193
LarryMullins wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Prior to the modern era, the Royal Navy and others had boys sometimes 12 or younger on ships as servants, sometimes (those boys with higher ranks) being trained to be officers. The age for this sort of thing was gradually raised with time, but even during WW2 there were still minors serving on combat vessels. 134 boy seamen died when the HMS Royal Oak was sunk in 1939.

Yeah. I’m not sure where this certainty is coming from considering how youngsters couldn’t be part of the crusades considering they’ve historically always been involved in conflict: > In 1814, for example, Napoleon conscripted many teenagers for his armies.[28] Thousands of children participated on all sides of the First World War and the Second World War.[29][30][31][32] Children continued to be used throughout the…

As far as I know, the draft in the US has always had a minimum age of 18, and one could volunteer at 17, but only with a parent's consent. Most young men grow considerably between 13 and 17.

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#216

Post by cryptonector »

yardie wrote: post #7
leetrout wrote: post #6

And here we are in modern times where we do, indeed, let buildings burn. > No pay, no spray: Firefighters let home burn > Firefighters in rural Tennessee let a home burn to the ground because the homeowner hadn't paid a $75 fee. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/wbna39516346

This story still makes the rounds, and the result is still the same. The family chose to live in unincorporated land. They turned down fire protection when the county offered it to them. They turned down fire protection when their insurer offered it to them. The fire department did what was required to save lives. Insurance can take care of the rest...oh, that's right.

Just FYI for all those in the thread who don't know, unincorporated doesn't mean "no taxes, no fees". Generally the county provides services (Sheriffs and Constables, fire dept.), and ambulances tend to all be private anyways. If you're in the middle of nowhere then you may have to join a co-op for helicopter medical, and the nearest fire station may be too far to save your house in a fire.

If you're in the middle of nowhere you're probably also on unincorporated land, but the challenges of being in the middle of nowhere have nothing to do with the land being unincorporated.

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#217

Post by cryptonector »

rayiner wrote: post #163
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…

> 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 accep…

Yes, fighting fires is dangerous. Can't blame the firefighters for not fighting a fire that they weren't legally or contractually required to fight, though fire departments can and do often volunteer to fight fires in other jurisdictions, so they could have (and perhaps should have, but that depends on the details of the fire).

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#218

Post by mbg721 »

that_guy_iain wrote: post #204
pdonis wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are egregiously misinformed about the US.

How so? Do they have a public healthcare system? Nope. What sort of society doesn't look after it's own? Do they have police who have a duty to save you? Nope. That alone is just an absolute shit show. What sort of country says the police have no obligation to protect you? Only to show up and solve the crime once it's happened? What sort of society doesn't look after it's own? I could carry on but it's a bit pointles…

The US is built on a fundamental distrust of mainstream authority. Our founders were religious radicals who thrived as long as they were exiled someplace where they couldn't affect anybody who mattered. Our folk heroes are dimwitted-but-clever rebels who defeat all the experts with old-fashioned know-how. The Russians sent men to space essentially as cargo for the mathematicians back on Earth to work out; we sent seat-of-your-pants pilots, and arguably our most memorable space mission was the one that got screwed up until our team improvised their way to victory. We proudly pay cash to lawn-mowers and restaurant servers we like so they can hide it from the taxman. So given all that, why would we ever meekly hand our humanity, our free will, to the bureaucrats in the police department or hospitals, just so that they can abuse it more efficiently?

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#219

Post by pdonis »

that_guy_iain wrote: post #204
pdonis wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are egregiously misinformed about the US.

How so? Do they have a public healthcare system? Nope. What sort of society doesn't look after it's own? Do they have police who have a duty to save you? Nope. That alone is just an absolute shit show. What sort of country says the police have no obligation to protect you? Only to show up and solve the crime once it's happened? What sort of society doesn't look after it's own? I could carry on but it's a bit pointles…

You don't get to declare by fiat what constitutes a society, or what counts as "taking care of its own". Nor do you get to just help yourself to the assumption that other countries, which claim to have things like "a public healthcare system" and "police who have a duty to save you", actually have those things.

As for "well documented", if you believe what the media tells you about anything, let alone the US, you are in no position to judge anyone else.

As for "confirmed and defended", since it's impossible to have a government that actually does the things you claim, of course I can "confirm" that the US doesn't. And of course I'll defend freedom, particularly when that means explaining what freedom actually means to people who don't understand it.

Re: Did insurance fire brigades let uninsured buildings burn?

#220

Post by generj »

colechristensen wrote: post #200
jjeaff wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The plaintiffs in the case were several gop attorney generals. Related cases were also carried out by the Trump admin. And several courts had previously upheld that the ACA was constitutional because it does not force you to buy health insurance. It actually just imposed a fine if you didn't and that fine was considered a tax, which Congress has constitutional authority to levy. The GOP forum shopped to get in front…

I likewise do not approve of the Feds expanding their powers arbitrarily by declaring the punishment for whatever they wouldn’t otherwise be allowed to enforce “a tax”. Calling the insurance mandate constitutional because the punishment was a “tax” was abusing the intent of the law.

If you worried about fines being used to deter activities society doesn’t want, and that fine money being collected as tax revenue, you are at least 200 years too late.
Post reply on HN