The Casino and the Insurance Company

I think the success of GoFundMe campaigns for medical expenses shows something about the state of our country, about our collective imagination, empathy, and generosity and about our sense of cohesion. People seem more than happy to help others when they have a face and story to go with the problem. When they can make it personal, they can connect with it and feel good about sharing. But only then. They do not want to share with anonymous strangers, because they don't feel they can trust those others are "deserving" of the help. Our base state for our fellow citizens is distrust. "They" are not "us" without evidence. The overriding sense of unity with our neighbors is missing.

The End Of Empathy

The new rule for empathy seems to be: reserve it, not for your "enemies," but for the people you believe are hurt, or you have decided need it the most. Empathy, but just for your own team. And empathizing with the other team? That's practically a taboo. . . .

If researchers set up a conflict, people get into automatic empathy overdrive, with their own team. This new research has scrambled notions of how empathy works as a force in the world. For example, we often think of terrorists as shockingly blind to the suffering of innocents. But Breithaupt and other researchers think of them as classic examples of people afflicted with an "excess of empathy. They feel the suffering of their people." . . .

There is a natural way that empathy gets triggered in the brain — your pain centers light up when you see another person suffering. But out in the world it starts to look more like tribalism, a way to keep reinforcing your own point of view and blocking out any others.

The funny thing is, all insurance--whether private or government--is a gamble and a redistribution of wealth. Everyone contributes to a pot, then when in need they can dip in and take some out to help cover their costs. Those who don't have a need end up covering the costs of those who do. Then, ideally, there is an eventual vice versa when individual situations have changed. Maybe I help you today and you help me tomorrow. We help each other.

Except. It is never an even exchange because we also have to pay for the administration and execution of the system. Think of a casino, because the system is the same. Everyone who gambles at a casino contributes to a pot, then those who win get to dip in and take some back out. The winnings are a redistribution of wealth. But not all that is contributed gets won, because some is set aside to pay for the casino itself, plus all the employees, plus those getting rich at the top. And they do get rich. From the money gambled. So while all those playing the game share their money back and forth, as a collective they come up short the amount kept by the casino.

Insurance works the same way. All those who pay in share their money back and forth, but as a collective they never take as much out as they put in because some is kept by the insurance company or government agency to cover costs.

So, I ask you, which do you think will take out more to cover costs, an insurance company or a government agency? Because I can guarantee you private companies set aside much more as profit than public non-profits do.

Yet we, as a collective citizen group, have decided we don't want our money shared with anonymous strangers unless it's done by companies trying to make as much money off of the exchange as possible. All because government universal health care is somehow worse. Sigh.