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In America, the consumer is supposed to be king. So why can't I find things I want to buy?
· Beater Insurance. Like many households, we keep an old pickup around for trips to the lumberyard, firewood hauling, helping friends move, errands when the family car is in the shop, etc.
The beater might get driven 1,000 miles in a busy year. Yet every insurer charges about $250 for me to comply with state law and insure the little-used vehicle for a year -- the same as it costs to insure a vehicle driven 10,000 miles a year.
A sensible state legislator once proposed providing insurance to all Colorado drivers by raising the gasoline tax; this would automatically provide a reasonable rate to low-mileage vehicles.
But like most ideas which would improve life in Colorado, it didn't get through the General Assembly. And the insurance industry -- which contributes to many more campaign funds than beater drivers do -- consequently thrives by extorting an outrageous 25 cents a mile for insuring thousands of seldom-driven old pickups.
· Personal Warrants. A warrant looks just like a check, with one important difference. If there's no money in your account to cover the check, it bounces and you could face criminal charges. But a warrant can't bounce; it's merely an order to pay if there happens to be money in the account.
Naturally, governments keep these useful financial instruments to themselves. When the California state government ran out of money last month, it still continued to issue warrants. Toward the end of every month, I'd like to issue warrants, too -- but my banker says that is illegal for mere citizens.
· Orphan Quotation Collection. Vice-President Dan
Quayle recently quoted Mark Twain to the effect that
it's a mighty poor man who can find only one way to
spell a word.
I've also seen that attributed to Andrew
Jackson and Thomas Jefferson. Search as I might through
various references, I can't find who said it.
There are many other clever sayings which do not appear
in references. Who first wrote that No man's life,
liberty or property is safe when the legislature is in
session
?
Was it George Bernard Shaw who observed that America
is the first nation in history to go from barbarism to
decadence without passing through civilization
? It
certainly sounds Shavian, but I've not found it in
Bartlett's or like works, nor in any of Shaw's essays or
plays. Who said it, and where?
The American publishing, financial and insurance industries are all supposed to be competing for our dollars. Yet they often fail to offer goods and services that many of us would gladly buy.
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