If You Ain't in It to Win It, Then Stay the Hell Out.

Years ago, I worked as an automobile claims adjuster for State Farm, in the late years of the last century. The older claim that I remembered seeing during training concerned income-loss payments being made to a family in Mexico, on behalf of their dead father and husband.

What I learned on that job, was:  despite what you might think, claims adjusters are actually trained to find ways to pay out the coverages that our insured contracted for under their policy.

You'd think... they would have wanted us to try and save money, to pay only what was necessary and what we could not deny.  Nope.  On our end, if people had paid their premiums, and were part of our Family of insureds, we wanted to help them within coverage limits after their accident occured.

We wanted our clients to go away happy -- as as happy as possible after a loss -- and keep them paying in premiums, after we had paid out what they were owed.

In the case I referenced, a man from Mexico had come to the United States and worked for years, becoming a citizen, I believe, and pretty much living the American dream.  He insured with us.  A nice vehicle -- I don't recall what -- but a late model, and a smaller, faster one.  I think it was a sportscar.

When his brother came up for a visit from Mexico, he gave him the keys and let him drive it.  Here in America, on our roads in the fast car...

The brother crashed and died. Coverage goes with the vehicle, not the driver, and the brother had permission, so now he was our insured.  We owed "loss of income" in addition to the death benefits, and State Farm structured a plan to annually pay the widow and children in Mexico, for years until the policy limits ran out.

The younger brother likely would never have had the chance, on his own, to drive a car like that here.  He wasn't ready for the power, I suspect, and died as a result.

Many many times in my life, I've observed that being limited in money is a helpful thing in limiting your choices and opportunities in the moment.  The older brother had driven for years, lesser cars, to work, on our American roads. By the time he had earned enough to treat himself, he was ready to drive that car responsibly.  He earned it, and was ready for it.

No so the younger brother.

Think about drugs, and who most often dies from overdoses.  The rich kids using, who have the wealth to buy the more expensive "pills and thrills".  There is no lack of money limiting their choices or quantities, it seems.  Working-class kids are usually limited to what their wages can buy -- alcohol as well.

But if you don't have any money constraints, look at the damage you can do early.  Instead of scoring a six-pack, the rich kids can buy bottles.  Instead of not having money early on to develop cigarette habits, the rich kids who smoke were never without a pack.  Family money can be deadly in the wrong hands.  So can a lack of earning what you want, and being disciplined in having to get it...

Think of gender-reassignment surgery, and how many transwomen years ago used to "save up" for each step of the operation.  Want a boob job?  Work hard, often it was sex work, and over time, you could afford it or find a wealthy partner to invest in your transformation.  Maybe, those years of saving made a person really have to want it and work for it.  Not a spur of the moment thing.  Maybe, having insurance cover the procedures makes the decision-making too fast a policy?  If you can decide, and be done with the decision making, all within months or even a few years, there is no time built in to force a person to really take the time to decide if this is really what they want to prioritize spending on, to earn it.

With our wars, maybe we're too rich a country because it seems we can destroy, and before the countries we have helped in the past have even had time to recover from the damage done, we've off helping another.  What if we were limited... by funds?  Would we be less likely like fools to rush in every time we see injustice that needs fixing with our help?

What if, instead of pretending that America is NOT currently at war -- we certainly are! -- we didn't go in half-assed, and decided that yes, this fight is worth it.  We are ALL IN.  Sending soldiers, making sacrifices here at home (you too, wealthy folk), having some real skin in the game, not just cutting checks like we care, and shipping the latest military tools that need testing?

I suspect, if we actually asked Americans to sacrifice here at home (you too), we all might decide we had better priorities than destroying Ukraine to save it.  What if, we only budgeted X amount of dollars every 20-year cycle for our military needs, and had to prioritize what was really necessary, and had to find ways to avoid military engagements when the funds ran out?

Like people on a budget, we might learn that we can't always get what we want, but if we had to prioritize, and admit our military resources are indeed finite, we might be work ahead of time to take threats seriously, and work to avoid them, with wars as a last resort.

The rich I never understood, who seem to sacrifice life to keep up their lifestyles.  Life insurance policies, where nothing is ever lost except the policyholder's life, can never replace a human being, but sadly, it makes the need to avoid some deaths less a priority.  It's like when Shirley MacLaine lost it at the nurses' station, demanding her cancer-stricken daughter Debra Winger be given her pain medications.  Sometimes, you need to be passionate and break protocol, losing your cool and dignity, to demand your priorities are met.  Nobody likes screaming people, but sometimes, the people who are willing to fight for you, for your life or even your pain meds in the end when your life survival skills are lost, love you much more than those who are willing to cooly walk away and keep collected.

I think we have too many artificially diverse people who came from money making our policy decisions today.  True diversity shows.  In the experiences you've had and the lessons learned.  Nobody wants to be in a trench with an untested Second Lieutenant who went to the finest schools and knows the policy book from cover to cover, and is willing to sacrifice your life as he learns on the job that reality often differs from what's written on paper...

People value their own lives more than the wealthy who would sacrifice them to advance their own needs.

I often wondered if the older brother from Mexico struggled with guilt for having given his brother the keys to a car -- a treat! -- that the younger man just wasn't ready for yet.  I often wonder when life insurance policies are cashed if the beneficiaries ever realize that their deceased relative, with his skills and presence, was indeed worth more to them alive than dead, in the end, and if they might have survived if there wasn't the incentive to cash in the chips prematurely.

America and Americans, sometimes I think, have too much.  And without the budgetary limitations, and the sacrifices that would be costly to all of us, we never seem to really own our errors or suffer for choices easily made, and then remade, again and again.