by stego-tech | 2026-03-05 20:06:36+00:00
> Most state-run workers compensation and Medicaid funds are already insolvent. Until that gets resolved, no attempt at creating a single payer fund is possible.

Because the government handcuffs itself willingly by prohibiting negotiations with providers and companies on costs at all levels. Which I point out multiple times in the comment. But you're right, solvency is an issue, and a fixable one: stop giving employers tax breaks on such a critical benefit as healthcare, raise taxes on those most able to pay them, and allow the government to set rates and care standards as a baseline that employers and private insurers must compete against.

These problems aren't hard to solve, it just requires accepting such controversial thoughts as, "y'know, maybe shareholder value should come last as a matter of public health".

> Utilities are using data centers as a scapegoat - the reality is most are stuck with fiscal liabilities due to COVID along with insurance and raising prices as a result.

Got evidence of this? Because there's mounting evidence from co-ops, private utilities, and public utilities that actually, no, new DC builds are not only not paying their fair share, but also employing (sometimes illicit) power generators on-site due to being unable to acquire enough power at affordable (to them) rates.

>The big issue is the COVID pandemic era liabilities that continue to require to be paid out to this day.

You keep saying this, but my counter-point - nay, my original point - is that this existed before COVID. What might be happening in this precise moment still have ties to COVID, sure, but the fundamental systems, incentives, and structures existed long before COVID and have not been addressed.

> Becuase that's not something that dramatically impacts the bottom line in most industries - most businesses can afford increasing salaries a couple dollars an hour by reducing capex next year, reducing hours for existing employees, or moving employees to the salaried bucket.

Payroll is one of - if not the - single biggest expense in business; it's why they're all wet at the prospect of AI replacing all labor, even if it's a fever dream. Workers are already squeezed to the bone, and companies - or more specifically, corporate leaders - have decades of history of refusing to pay wages commensurate with productivity gains or cost of living adjustments. Payroll also has knock-on effects on insurance (the more workers make, the higher insurance rates need to be to cover potential insurable losses), so yeah, there's a bit of a cycle here where wages go up, making workmen's comp go up, making wages go up, etc. You can already see this in unemployment benefit caps that haven't kept pace with wage increases since the 2008 recession (MA still caps benefits at such a low amount that they can only barely cover a month of average rent - if you qualify for the maximum amount).

> The pandemic was brutal and we're still facing feeling it's reverberations to this day.

The pandemic was a blip on par with the 2008 recession; yes, there are tails to it (just like 2008), but those tails only evolved because of the underlying systems and structures that allowed the problem to escalate in the first place. Simply handwashing everything as "oopsie, pandemic happened" is dangerously ignorant of the machinations still underpinning everything going on, and represents a refusal to accept that long-term problems require long-term solutions - which in turn requires acknowledging that these problems didn't just spontaneously evolve overnight, or during a single crisis.