George,
Entitlement at the Wall Street level or CEO level would be if the brokers and other major financial people didn't go to work and still got paid these millions of dollars.
I don't see much of a difference with someone earning 25 million dollars for 3 months of work with a company that lost money. For 25 million even a welfare queen would show up every day!
I do not want to guess what reimbursements your wife gets, but here not everyone sees Medicaid and Medicare. I do, and most Medicaid patients are doing the best they can, but there are some who do not. It is very difficult to be reimbursed 1/3 of what the supposedly terrible 3rd party payers are paying and still watch as those on government insurance go to the ER with an ear infection.
Why do my privately insured patients not go to the ER? Because their copay at my office is $20 while at the ER is more than $100. That is incentive for the patient to take responsibility and wait until the next day to see the doctor. Do you know how many times I see a patient and there are actually three, "because I was bringing patient A in, so I may as well bring in patients B and C.
Yes, the insurance companies are a problem, but when we fight back, the DOJ strikes us down. And, what happened on Wall Street is an entirely different thing than the overwhelming amount of welfare in this country.
We are moving each day closer to be a socialist country. That is fine if that is what we want in this country.
Socialism is when the government owns the means of production. There is a greater danger of socialism when the government owns banks and auto companies.
If I lost my job today, my friends and family would take me in until I got back on my feet. Then I would go back out and earn my way. That is what we should be doing with social programs.
I apologize for my very simple minded approach to the problem. I am sure I am way off base.
Look at these numbers?
U.S. private employers shed 693,000 jobs in December, up sharply from the revised 476,000 jobs lost in November and far more than economists estimated, a report by ADP Employer Services said on Wednesday
I guess these 1.1 million people most of whom in the shrinking job market, and who will REQUIRE GOVERNMENT ASSISTANCE can all at some point be classified as lazy.
We happen to see the world differently.
