Ashful
Minister of Fire
... and here we are in a wood burning forum. [emoji14]
Have we reached a tipping point?
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... and here we are in a wood burning forum. [emoji14]
Ashful
Minister of Fire
“Educating girls” set me back a few seconds, then I remembered previously published stats about the relationship between education and age at birth of first child. My own diverse circle of childhood friends reflect those stats pretty well, with the most educated having kids the latest in life. That’s one way to slow down population growth.
If you want your head to really spin, check world population estimates at the beginning and end of the great plague. This wasn’t all that long ago, in the grand scale of humanity, but my how we’ve grown.
Also the world population before and after some of the big volcanic events. (toba) ect. And the yrs of cold and famine that followed.
SpaceBus
Minister of Fire
Fine, replace free with universal, same difference in the end. I don't know why you blame Al Gore for being born rich. Good for him for trying to wake people up to the issues looming over all of us despite that very thing hurting his bottom line.
You can't possibly say that grants and scholarships have caused the escalating cost of education. Healthcare has been expensive for decades, so don't blame poor people that need to see the doctor. You are at the same time saying rich people and poor people are the problem. I guess we can both agree that humans are the issue.
SpaceBus
Minister of Fire
I think if you burn this way your carbon footprint is pretty minimal. It's considered sustainable to cut one cord per acre per year for cutting living trees. From my understanding burning a dead tree is carbon neutral since it would just be releasing that carbon if it were to rot in the woods.
Govt involvement is where things seem go off the rails. Very few Govt takeovers result in a better product at a reasonable cost.
Its just that trees seem to be dying at a faster rate. Iv lost about 15 to 20% of my entire woodlot in the last few years. Some very heathy looking trees in the middle of the growth cycle too. Different species. All deciduous trees. Not sure why.
If that was the case then per capita healthcare costs where they have national healthcare, (almost the entire rest of the world), should be much higher than ours, but just the opposite is true. Why, because all of the middlemen skimming off bucks are eliminated. We are the only industrialized nation without national healthcare. The only one. And we pay for this privilege. Bigly.
Then were doing something very wrong because the more this Govt gets involved the worse it gets. The middlemen now are the insurance companies and they are skimming plenty. That got a lot worse with ACA. Our local "nonprofit" HC provider will soon have bought out and monopolized the whole state ,so we can forget about any type of competition in the future. I had high hopes for ACA but it seems to have made things worse. If we ever go national,the ACA model, IMO is not going to be the best vehicle.
You have to leave private enterprise out of it, everyone trying to make a profit drives the cost up. Here in Canada the hospitals and health system are managed by the provinces with funding being provided from the federal government. Is it the best system? Probably not, but every citizen is entitled to care regardless of wealth. The downfall of this is we have the best doctors leave Canada to work stateside because they can make 2-3 times the money if they start their own practice. The average doctor here makes $300k a year, so I've got a good idea as to why healthcare in the US is so expensive.
Education is much the same way. K-12 is free to attend and post secondary is mostly paid for by the government with tuition and books for the average program being $6-7k per year, and can easily be paid for by a part time job or a government issued student loan. This allows someone to become an Engineer, Accountant, Teacher, etc for about $25k, which by my understanding is still less than a single year at many American institutions.
Most other countries with universal HC, canada included are not ponying up $700 Billion a year policing the world like the US is and another few trillion in ongoing expendatures for needless wars. Which is a one of the reason why comparing Govt expenses in the US with everyone else is not possible dollar for dollar. Id gladly trade a big chunk of the 700B and most of those wars for better HC and let the world manage it own affairs with less intervention. So getting back to the cost of climate change,we seem to have other priorities.
SpaceBus
Minister of Fire
This is exactly the case. It cost $1,000 to get a few vials of blood tested. Thankfully my insurance is pretty good and covers $750. A bag of salt water costs over $100 when administered by the hospital. There are thousands of examples.
SpaceBus
Minister of Fire
Nobody asked us to police the world, and we do a chit job anyway. Also, it would cost pennies (compared to the budget) to provide universal Healthcare when profits aren't the priority.
SpaceBus
Minister of Fire
It's also only been instituted for a short period of time. I doubt the Great New Deal went over very well either at first.
All those big expense cost a whole lot less in Canada and abroad. Actually your out of pocket costs would likely be zero.
When your spending more $ than the next 7 highest spending countries China , Russia, UK , France , Japan, Saudi Arabia and India combined, for war machines and armies, its hard to cover everything else that matters. Looks like no money for not just HC but climate change too.
Got that right. And lots of middlemen there too, skimming off th he cream.
I'm convinced that the best way to clean the air, make people healthier, reduce CO2, etc is actually really cheap, and easy. It doesnt require us to change our life style or even sign onto the Paris agreement.
Start blowing insulation into the walls and ceilings of houses. In my area I'd bet 3/4 of the houses built before 1970 dont have wall insulation. Many dont even have attic insulation. Cellulose can be blown into the walls cheaply. It will improve health, tie up carbon, use less energy in the summer and winter. There arent any real downsides.
Don't play politics and do the rich/poor/owner occupied/rental thing. Somebody owns it. Dollar for dollar tax credit.
You'll see energy usage plummet.
The savings will give every family more to spend on whatever they want. Can you imagine the boost to the economy if a family's heating bill for the winter is cut in half? The average heating bill in my area is probably between 2 and 4k/ household. Median income for a family of 4 is $44k. That is money a family can feel!
Start blowing insulation into the walls and ceilings of houses. In my area I'd bet 3/4 of the houses built before 1970 dont have wall insulation. Many dont even have attic insulation. Cellulose can be blown into the walls cheaply. It will improve health, tie up carbon, use less energy in the summer and winter. There arent any real downsides.
Don't play politics and do the rich/poor/owner occupied/rental thing. Somebody owns it. Dollar for dollar tax credit.
You'll see energy usage plummet.
The savings will give every family more to spend on whatever they want. Can you imagine the boost to the economy if a family's heating bill for the winter is cut in half? The average heating bill in my area is probably between 2 and 4k/ household. Median income for a family of 4 is $44k. That is money a family can feel!
Ashful
Minister of Fire
Well, yes... home heating is one of the single largest sectors of our national energy usage, so it makes an easy target to pick if you want to single out one thing.
But a look at the actual numbers is a good demonstration of how no one thing is going to get us to where many say we need to be. Home heating makes up approximately 11% of national energy usage. Home cooling makes up an additional 5%. If we suppose that 50% of the homes are deficient, and could improve the energy loss of those homes by 25% on average, you could cut national energy usage by 2%. That's not nothing, but I wouldn't call it "plummeting", either.
The National Academies presents: What You Need to Know About Energy
Want to understand the basics of America's current energy situation? The National Academies, advisers to the nation on science, engineering, and medicine, provides objective information about the United States' current energy sources and uses, as well as a look forward to the future of energy.
(broken link removed to http://eyeonhousing.org/2014/02/the-age-of-the-housing-stock-by-state/)
What's surprising to me, in the NAS link above, is that global shipping of product isn't really singled out as an isolated factor. Maybe the data is just to difficult to obtain and condense, but between shipping nearly every consumer good in every one of our houses here from China, shipping our raw materials back to those manufacturing sites, the movement of crude and refined petroleum products, and the behemoth of Amazon.com, I'm really surprised that "shipping" isn't our number one single highest consumption of energy.
SpaceBus
Minister of Fire
It probably is, just look at all of the pushes towards alternatives in trucking and even planes. Boats are just a matter of time. I think a big part of the problem is the way maritime laws are written. Even just converting boats and ships to silent propulsion will be much appreciated by all marine life. I think we forget that the planet isn't only being ruined for humans, most living things are threatened as well. I guess the jellyfish will be ok.Well, yes... home heating is one of the single largest sectors of our national energy usage, so it makes an easy target to pick if you want to single out one thing.
But a look at the actual numbers is a good demonstration of how no one thing is going to get us to where many say we need to be. Home heating makes up approximately 11% of national energy usage. Home cooling makes up an additional 5%. If we suppose that 50% of the homes are deficient, and could improve the energy loss of those homes by 25% on average, you could cut national energy usage by 2%. That's not nothing, but I wouldn't call it "plummeting", either.
The National Academies presents: What You Need to Know About Energy
Want to understand the basics of America's current energy situation? The National Academies, advisers to the nation on science, engineering, and medicine, provides objective information about the United States' current energy sources and uses, as well as a look forward to the future of energy.needtoknow.nas.edu
(broken link removed to http://eyeonhousing.org/2014/02/the-age-of-the-housing-stock-by-state/)
What's surprising to me, in the NAS link above, is that global shipping of product isn't really singled out as an isolated factor. Maybe the data is just to difficult to obtain and condense, but between shipping nearly every consumer good in every one of our houses here from China, shipping our raw materials back to those manufacturing sites, the movement of crude and refined petroleum products, and the behemoth of Amazon.com, I'm really surprised that "shipping" isn't our number one single highest consumption of energy.
If i were looking for low cost quality HC abroad, id be in the philippines. I remember spending 3 days in a private room in a 1st class hospital in Cebu City in 2010 and the entire bill was less than $200. That included Meds, Meals and 24 hr care and 9 bags of IV for dehydration. In the countryside its even more affordable. I witnessed a doctor treat a patient in a rural clinic in 2002 for about an hour for 90 pesos . About $1.80 US. Conversion rate is @ 50 pesos to $1.
I think it would snowball. How many older cars would get replaced with a "raise" like that? Etc
Ashful
Minister of Fire
People having more disposable income could have a negative impact on energy usage, travel always goes way up.
That hits the nail on the head.
We live in a more affluent area than most of Canada, many people drive pickups, have bigger houses, own jet boats, sleds, quads, take winter vacations to Mexico or the Caribbean. Very rarely have I ever seen people use their extra cash to reduce their carbon footprint.
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