I have worse luck with people who insist that the only reason poor people are poor is because they "refuse to work." For reals.

Could you explain that firefighters used to be a subscription service, and if your house was on fire and you hadn't paid them, they'd let it burn?

There was a recent This American Life about that coming back -- not with firefighters, but streetlights and park maintenance and stuff.

The who-works-harder debate is just a no-win, because anyone who wants to play the game thinks they work harder than anyone else. It's a distraction used by a ruling class that doesn't have to work much if at all, to take the attention of the "masses" away from the unfairness and inequity between the 99% and the 1%. The wealthy always seem to fear a French-revolution sort of uprising with guillotines. The anger of the poor and the brown is frightening when directed at them, but very useful when directed at each other. The masses won't notice the huge chasm between the wealthy and themselves if they're too busy fighting amongst themselves. America is primed for this sort of thing, with our Puritan-and-pioneer heritage. We strongly value hard work, strict moral behavior, and self-reliance (even when we ourselves don't practice it). The easiest thing to do is get Americans snarling at each other for not working hard enough, not behaving correctly, and relying on help outside the family. The precise ideal value of how hard to work, how to behave, and from whom to accept assistance (and who should give it) differs among different groups, of course, which just adds fuel to the fire. The hardest thing to do is to get angry people to realize they're being played, and their anger is being used to harm them and protect the ones who are manipulating and harming them.

Could you explain that firefighters used to be a subscription service, and if your house was on fire and you hadn't paid them, they'd let it burn?

That actually happened last year in Tennessee. The homeowner was behind on his payment to the fire department by $75. So the firefighters stood there and let his house burn down.

FTR, I do not work harder than most people and I do not I even come close. I am fine with that.

It's still like that in some parts of Tennessee. Twice houses burned down because fees weren't paid by the owners. The fire fighters showed up and then didn't stop it, but did make sure the fire didn't spread to other houses.

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happened more than once in TN.

that kind of thing makes me really angry.

there is some sort of subscription service here for city ambulances.

the wrong people have not responded yet.

OMG Cheney's insurance is government provided, right?!?

Oh, yeah, I'm sure of it, as a former VP. All of Congress gets better health-care than most US citizens, and I think it's single-payer, like an HMO.

Planet Money had a podcast last year about the definition of "public good" and what sorts of things are appropriate for government to provide. What it came down to was things that cost too much to be implemented on a private model, and that don't have any added cost if someone who doesn't pay into the service uses it.

So, like, a bridge costs too much to be built privately, but that cost isn't increased if someone uses it without paying for it. Freeloaders, in essence, don't add to the cost of the bridge, because there's no unit cost for bridge use.

Same goes for police, defense, lighthouses, or parks--what's the unit cost of the benefit to me of the local PD?

But health care, for instance, I can see an argument that it's not a public good in the same way, because the unit cost of a non-subscriber using the system is something that can be calculated. Same goes for public education, I guess.

On the other side, the benefits to the society as a whole of having everyone get good health care or an education are measureable, and enormous. So the argument doesn't really hold up, although it's an interesting exercise.