Libertarian Fire Service

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http://www.wpsdlocal6.com/news/local...

OBION COUNTY, Tenn. - Imagine your home catches fire but the local fire department won't respond, then watches it burn. That's exactly what happened to a local family tonight.
A local neighborhood is furious after firefighters watched as an Obion County, Tennessee, home burned to the ground.
The homeowner, Gene Cranick, said he offered to pay whatever it would take for firefighters to put out the flames, but was told it was too late. They wouldn't do anything to stop his house from burning.
Each year, Obion County residents must pay $75 if they want fire protection from the city of South Fulton. But the Cranicks did not pay.
The mayor said if homeowners don't pay, they're out of luck.
This fire went on for hours because garden hoses just wouldn't put it out. It wasn't until that fire spread to a neighbor's property, that anyone would respond.
Turns out, the neighbor had paid the fee.
"I thought they'd come out and put it out, even if you hadn't paid your $75, but I was wrong," said Gene Cranick.
Because of that, not much is left of Cranick's house.
They called 911 several times, and initially the South Fulton Fire Department would not come.
The Cranicks told 9-1-1 they would pay firefighters, whatever the cost, to stop the fire before it spread to their house.

This story turns my gut and breaks my heart. I can only imagine the hopelessness felt by the home owner. 75$ bleepin dollars. Sigh, sad sign of the times.

I almost posted this story earlier, with the same idea that this is the Libertarian dream for America.

Laibach wrote:

This story turns my gut and breaks my heart. I can only imagine the hopelessness felt by the home owner. 75$ bleepin dollars. Sigh, sad sign of the times.

Which is a sad sign of the times?

That using the fire department costs $75 annually, or that someone who chose not to pay it had his house burn down?

This seems like a pretty clear-cut case of 'you pays your money, you takes your choice'. I choose not to pay for earthquake insurance. If my house falls down during an earthquake, I've got no-one but myself to blame for my homelessness.

Yeah, I don't see where anyone did anything wrong. What struck me when reading about it earlier is that this is exactly the type of service Libertarians would push for everywhere, not just in rural places. In the story, the firefighters eventually fought the fire, but on his neighbor's property once it had spread. Had there been a county tax that these residents were forced to pay, fire service could have been guaranteed. And it would have protected the neighbor's property.

Sometimes taxes we are forced to pay, at the end of a barrel of a gun, are a good thing.

Jonman wrote:
Laibach wrote:

This story turns my gut and breaks my heart. I can only imagine the hopelessness felt by the home owner. 75$ bleepin dollars. Sigh, sad sign of the times.

Which is a sad sign of the times?

That using the fire department costs $75 annually, or that someone who chose not to pay it had his house burn down?

This seems like a pretty clear-cut case of 'you pays your money, you takes your choice'. I choose not to pay for earthquake insurance. If my house falls down during an earthquake, I've got no-one but myself to blame for my homelessness.

...and while we're at it, let's monetize the police, too. Getting mugged? Hope you paid your monthly crime prevention insurance. Hell, hospitals are required to treat critical patients regardless of insurance, let's see if we can change that. Let them bleed out on the pavement. Of course, if the victim hasn't paid their predictive corpse collection fee the rest of us will just have to put up with their carcass rotting there until some animal drags it away. How thoughtless of them not to worry about our comfort.

Jonman wrote:
Laibach wrote:

This story turns my gut and breaks my heart. I can only imagine the hopelessness felt by the home owner. 75$ bleepin dollars. Sigh, sad sign of the times.

Which is a sad sign of the times?

That using the fire department costs $75 annually, or that someone who chose not to pay it had his house burn down?

This seems like a pretty clear-cut case of 'you pays your money, you takes your choice'. I choose not to pay for earthquake insurance. If my house falls down during an earthquake, I've got no-one but myself to blame for my homelessness.

If it has to be explained to you then I doubt you will understand. Pardon my snarkiness...

I think the real thing that outrages people is the idea that the fire crew was there on the scene, watching and doing nothing. While I can understand their point here (this is a municipal fire department, the county has no fire department, and the department cannot afford to provide service to county residents if they only receive payments on the scene when a fire occurs), this is still a vivid example of why the "let people pay for what services they want" model doesn't work very well for some very important services.

Consider that the fire crew moved in when the fire actually damaged a neighbor's property, and the neighbor had paid the fee. Imagine that the fire had spread to several neighboring unpaid properties before moving to one where someone had paid the fee. Now not only would several people in the area have lost their homes, but the fire might have been really serious and approached the "paid up" property from multiple directions, making protecting that property much more serious.

Honestly, I'd say the blame here is more on the county than on either the fire department or the people whose house burned down. Having no permanent fire department nor organizing a volunteer fire-fighting organization but depending on residents making optional payments to local municipalities is a very poor policy, because it endangers everyone in the county--it's not enough to pay for your own property, because if your neighbor choses not to because "Oh, we'll be careful" or "we can handle it ourselves", they're endangering your property as well. Far better to make payment of the local municipal fire departments mandatory. To make sure the residents do it, the county government can collect the payment and distribute it for them.

Oh hey, look. A tax.

If they're smart, they'd also take a bit more and use it to fund the development of a county volunteer fire department, eventually ending their dependence on the municipal departments. Or they might enter into agreements with local municipal and other county governments to organize a more permanent organization that covers the whole area efficiently.

And of course, this entire scenario is pretty parallel to the idea of mandatory health insurance, or a health care tax with socialized health care: this service is too important to leave to chance, and cannot be effectively funded by paying only when something critical happens. Better instead to spread the payments around across the entire populace and across time by instituting a tax and organizing an effective service organized across a wide area to take care of things. (And, of course, the parallel for "fire might spread" is vaccinations and such that are generally under the heading of "public health" and ought to be more mandatory than they are in some places.)

--

Edited to add: On the "let them bleed out" and such: the fire department did make the point that they *do* respond regardless of payment if a life is threatened. One might, however, make the argument that the business of a hospital is almost always lives, and the business of a fire department is almost always property, and critical danger to property (like "our house is on f*cking fire") maybe ought to be the equivalent of critical medical cases.

--

Edited to further add: Oh, and really, consider this case if it were located in a dense urban region or in a region where wildfires wreak real havoc. In both of those sorts of areas, the danger of a fire spreading and causing really serious damage to communities is magnified. This is among the reasons that there are almost always professional tax-funded fire departments tasked with dealing with such areas, and why it would be insane to have optional private fire protection in such areas: you cannot afford to allow any part of the area to be without fire protection, because the risks are far too great. If people cannot afford to pay to be protected, then the rest of the population must make up for that. If people can afford to pay but don't want to because they think they can get along without it, too bad, because it's something that has to be done.

Hypatian wrote:

Edited to add: On the "let them bleed out" and such: the fire department did make the point that they *do* respond regardless of payment if a life is threatened. One might, however, make the argument that the business of a hospital is almost always lives, and the business of a fire department is almost always property, and critical danger to property (like "our house is on f*cking fire") maybe ought to be the equivalent of critical medical cases.

I was making an argument via reductio ad absurdum- though I actually have heard similiar suggestions from a libertarian I have been unfortunate enough to formerly know. Not the corpse removal thing, but he did suggest hospitals could cut waste by treating only paying patients/those with insurance regardless of the severity of the patient's wounds/illness. His reasoning essentially boiled down to "if I make enough money to pay for it, there's no reason anyone else can't."

ruhk wrote:

...and while we're at it, let's monetize the police, too. Getting mugged? Hope you paid your monthly crime prevention insurance. Hell, hospitals are required to treat critical patients regardless of insurance, let's see if we can change that. Let them bleed out on the pavement. Of course, if the victim hasn't paid their predictive corpse collection fee the rest of us will just have to put up with their carcass rotting there until some animal drags it away. How thoughtless of them not to worry about our comfort.

We *do* monetize the police.

I pay for them in my property taxes. Where I live, I also pay for my fire department in my property taxes. I don't have an option to *not* pay for them.

This guy *did* have that choice, and he chose not to exercise it. I'm not saying that's a good solution, I'm just saying that he made his bed, and now he's lying in it's charred remains.

Hospitals only provide a bare minimum of emergency services to uninsured patients. Just like this fire department does - if there had been people in this house, they would have gone in - check the linked article.

Laibach wrote:

If it has to be explained to you then I doubt you will understand. Pardon my snarkiness..

Nope - I do not pardon your snarkiness. Don't assume I'm incapable of understanding your point of view, it's insulting and belittling.

I'll rephrase the question - what is it about this that you see as a sad sign of the times? I'm genuinely interested in your opinion.

Jonman wrote:
Laibach wrote:

This story turns my gut and breaks my heart. I can only imagine the hopelessness felt by the home owner. 75$ bleepin dollars. Sigh, sad sign of the times.

Which is a sad sign of the times?

That using the fire department costs $75 annually, or that someone who chose not to pay it had his house burn down?

This seems like a pretty clear-cut case of 'you pays your money, you takes your choice'. I choose not to pay for earthquake insurance. If my house falls down during an earthquake, I've got no-one but myself to blame for my homelessness.

Number one, I think there's a major difference between asking the government to intervene *before* something destroys your house because you didn't pay for that service far enough in advance, and asking them to reimburse you *afterwards* for insurance you didn't buy. If you've got earthquake protection policy that promises they'll respond and do something to keep your house from falling down, times must be tight if the X-Men have gotten into the insurance business! The article reads:

"It's like car insurance," Edmison said. "I wish I could wait until I have an accident until I pay my premium on my car insurance, but it doesn't work that way. So why should the fire service be looked at anything different?"

I don't know: maybe because there's a difference between a service and insurance? I mean, this is the county: it's not supposed to be run for profit. If they want to charge the person $75 plus some fee figured out by actuaries to take interest, opportunity cost, moral hazard, etc. into account, that's one thing. Is the point of charging the money to keep the county solvent, or is it to punish people?

Number two, is the fire service completely run off of those $75 as a separate entity? Or did some of this person's taxes go towards it in some way? Either be Libertarian or don't be Libertarian: this sounds like putting the barrel of a gun to someone's head for money, and then refusing to deliver services for that money unless you get even more money out of them. Even organized crime gives you a better package plan for your protection racket fees.

I am genuinely interested by this thread and what promises to be an interesting conversation.

Laibach wrote:

Sigh, sad sign of the times.

I am a pretty smart cookie - I too would like to know what you mean.

Reading that article, the guy whose house burned down is mad at the right people - the county that made the decision not to have it's own over-arching fire department or contract with those three cities. The mayor of his town. And himself, for not paying that $75 dollars and risking this.

I have never heard of a county being allowed to exist like this. How can they just not provide basic services and still be incorporated? I would have had their arse in court so fast when this got announced. This is not normal.

Even though I rent an apartment, I pay as part of my rent city and county fees that cover city water, fire coverage, police coverage, and the overarching contract with the local garbage/recycling service. It's all laid out in my lease that I sign every year.

CheezePavilion wrote:

Number two, is the fire service completely run off of those $75 as a separate entity? Or did some of this person's taxes go towards it in some way?

Maybe I'm wrong, but the way I read the article is that the guy lived out in the boonies, where there was no county fire department. He had the option to pay the closest city fire department an annual fee, for which they would provide fire service to him.

So, I'm assuming that that city fire department would be funded by taxes within the city, and given that he lived outside of the city, that fire department wouldn't have seen any tax revenue from him.

Jonman wrote:
CheezePavilion wrote:

Number two, is the fire service completely run off of those $75 as a separate entity? Or did some of this person's taxes go towards it in some way?

Maybe I'm wrong, but the way I read the article is that the guy lived out in the boonies, where there was no county fire department. He had the option to pay the closest city fire department an annual fee, for which they would provide fire service to him.

So, I'm assuming that that city fire department would be funded by taxes within the city, and given that he lived outside of the city, that fire department wouldn't have seen any tax revenue from him.

Does the city get money from the county or the state? How about the Federal government? Unless this is a completely self-sufficient municipality where all the tax dollars flow out and none flow in, at some level you're going to find his tax dollars in the pool that funds these municipalities.

Jonman wrote:

We *do* monetize the police.

I pay for them in my property taxes. Where I live, I also pay for my fire department in my property taxes. I don't have an option to *not* pay for them.

No, we have a socially-funded police force. Very different than a monetized/privatized police force. For one, Police are considered a "social good" ("good" as in commodity), an inasmuch are required to assist someone regardless of whether they pay taxes, or are even a citizen of the city, state or country. In most places all emergency services are treated this way. Clearly the linked story is an exception, as even though these people didn't pay the fee, and there was no one in the building, allowing it to continue burning unimpeded put the community at large in danger. The fire had the potential to spread to multiple adjacent houses rather than just the one it did spread to, and the firefighters could quickly have found themselves unable to control it.

ruhk wrote:
Jonman wrote:

We *do* monetize the police.

I pay for them in my property taxes. Where I live, I also pay for my fire department in my property taxes. I don't have an option to *not* pay for them.

No, we have a socially-funded police force. Very different than a monetized/privatized police force. For one, Police are considered a "social good" ("good" as in commodity), an inasmuch are required to assist someone regardless of whether they pay taxes, or are even a citizen of the city, state or country. In most places all emergency services are treated this way. Clearly the linked story is an exception, as even though these people didn't pay the fee, and there was no one in the building, allowing it to continue burning unimpeded put the community at large in danger. The fire had the potential to spread to multiple adjacent houses rather than just the one it did spread to, and the firefighters could quickly have found themselves unable to control it.

Good points.

So what do you propose *should* have happened in this instance?

That the city fire department respond to any fire outside of their jurisdiction for free? Who's going to pay for that? The city itself? Can't see the residents swallowing that.

That they respond to fires outside of their jurisdiction, even for people who didn't pay the annual fee? You think anyone's going to pay that fee next year?

My take is that this is just ethically disgusting. I would be completely ashamed of myself if I was one of those firefighters or if I personally knew one of those firefighters. Has human decency completely been overshadowed by monetary gain? I mean really?

PAR

par wrote:

My take is that this is just ethically disgusting. I would be completely ashamed of myself if I was one of those firefighters or if I personally knew one of those firefighters. Has human decency completely been overshadowed by monetary gain? I mean really?

PAR

Monetary gain? For who? This is a case of someone outside of the city, and its tax zones, wanting to benefit from the services paid for by others within said zones. I think this is a pretty good scenario of risk vs. reward for life in general. This guy took the risk of living outside of zones where you get certain services readily in return for not paying certain taxes. He gambled, and ended up losing a lot financially in this.

Note that the FD did show up to save lives if need be. This isn't a case of telling people to go burn because they live on the other side of an imaginary line. This is an expensive service that people go in together to buy, like insurance. With respect to some of the previous posts comparing this to police services, the FD acted the same way the police would have. If this guy was in physical danger, the police and FD would have both helped out. If someone stole his car, it would not be the local town police department that investigated it. It would be the State police or County sheriff, who he actually pays taxes to support.

Further note, this guy was on Olbermann's show the other day. His homeowner's insurance, which he did pay, is compensating him.

You would think that they would have simply put out the fire and billed him for services if they were so bent on collecting a fee. I can't fathom the degree of callousness it takes to simply watch someones home burn down knowing you have the capacity to stop it.

What I cannot fathom is a city willing to run the risk of a bankrupting lawsuit by having services do this. I will be shocked if the insurance company does not sue the city.

Kraint wrote:
par wrote:

My take is that this is just ethically disgusting. I would be completely ashamed of myself if I was one of those firefighters or if I personally knew one of those firefighters. Has human decency completely been overshadowed by monetary gain? I mean really?

PAR

Monetary gain? For who? This is a case of someone outside of the city, and its tax zones, wanting to benefit from the services paid for by others within said zones. I think this is a pretty good scenario of risk vs. reward for life in general. This guy took the risk of living outside of zones where you get certain services readily in return for not paying certain taxes. He gambled, and ended up losing a lot financially in this.

Why should any government have an interest in people who gamble losing a lot financially? Even government-run casinos don't want to profit at the cost of ruining people.

Note that the FD did show up to save lives if need be. This isn't a case of telling people to go burn because they live on the other side of an imaginary line.

What difference would that make, though? If "risk vs. reward" is so important it speaks for itself even in the case of a person's home burning down, why distinguish the cases?

This is an expensive service that people go in together to buy, like insurance. With respect to some of the previous posts comparing this to police services, the FD acted the same way the police would have. If this guy was in physical danger, the police and FD would have both helped out. If someone stole his car, it would not be the local town police department that investigated it.

But this wasn't investigation OR insurance: it was response to an emergency. An investigation tries to find who is responsible for a loss; insurance reimburses you for a loss; this would be *preventing* a loss in the first place.

It would be the State police or County sheriff, who he actually pays taxes to support.

What if the municipality gets his tax dollars from the county/state/Federal government aid?

Further note, this guy was on Olbermann's show the other day. His homeowner's insurance, which he did pay, is compensating him.

Does that make any sense from a social policy standpoint though? Instead of these firefighters maybe putting out the fire at that cost to the pool of taxpayers, now we've got everyone in his insurance pool--most of whom are probably also taxpayers--footing the bill for the possibly much greater cost of a house burning to the ground.

Shouldn't the government have an interest in preventing the destruction of wealth even if it doesn't have to pay for the loss? If government is a business, the people aren't just the customers: they are also the shareholders.

This story is like a triumph of Tea Party ideology on all levels -- a homeowner who doesn't want to pay what is essentially another evil tax, and a fire department that elegantly punishes a deadbeat. The fact that both these components have combined into one story is bitterly ironic.

Seriously, though, I am reluctantly agreeing with Kraint on this one. EDIT: Except for the fact that he's breaking the thread with unbalanced quote tags. That, I find completely irreconcilable.

CheezePavilion wrote:

Why should any government have an interest in people who gamble losing a lot financially? Even government-run casinos don't want to profit at the cost of ruining people.

Why should the city government have an interest in socializing the losses of this person while allowing the privatization of his gains? What is the incentive to pay any taxes if let people get services without paying for them? Do you think you should be paying for fire protection for people in another state because they have elected to not pay for their own firemen?

Note that the FD did show up to save lives if need be. This isn't a case of telling people to go burn because they live on the other side of an imaginary line.

What difference would that make, though? If "risk vs. reward" is so important it speaks for itself even in the case of a person's home burning down, why distinguish the cases?

People are different, and more important, than houses. Danger to life != danger to property.

This is an expensive service that people go in together to buy, like insurance. With respect to some of the previous posts comparing this to police services, the FD acted the same way the police would have. If this guy was in physical danger, the police and FD would have both helped out. If someone stole his car, it would not be the local town police department that investigated it.

But this wasn't investigation OR insurance: it was response to an emergency. An investigation tries to find who is responsible for a loss; insurance reimburses you for a loss; this would be *preventing* a loss in the first place.

But they found no one was at risk. Someone's house was on fire, but all of the people got out before the FD arrived. I am heavily in favor of preventing losses in the first place, but why is the city government responsible for the property of someone who is not in the city? Emotionally, it is a great idea, but someone is going to have to foot the bill.

It would be the State police or County sheriff, who he actually pays taxes to support.

What if the municipality gets his tax dollars from the county/state/Federal government aid?

Any money that comes in is earmarked for specific things. It could be the roads he uses, it could be the hospital that he has equal access to, or any number of things. What that money was apparently not earmarked for is extending the coverage of the fire department. That isn't a call that any of the firemen on the scene made.

Further note, this guy was on Olbermann's show the other day. His homeowner's insurance, which he did pay, is compensating him.

Does that make any sense from a social policy standpoint though? Instead of these firefighters maybe putting out the fire at that cost to the pool of taxpayers, now we've got everyone in his insurance pool--most of whom are probably also taxpayers--footing the bill for the possibly much greater cost of a house burning to the ground.

Shouldn't the government have an interest in preventing the destruction of wealth even if it doesn't have to pay for the loss? If government is a business, the people aren't just the customers: they are also the shareholders.

You keep directing your statements at 'the government,' which needs to be defined in this case. This is a city government, which is exclusively responsible for people who reside within the city. This guy does not. Governments have an interest in protecting their residents, and that is the legal end of their powers. The government of New York City has no right or responsibility to take care of the fine people in Bismark, ND.

Edit: The formatting had it coming.

Sorry Kraint, we can agree to disagree. From everything you said, it sounds as if pedestrians, government workers... anyone who has absolutely nothing to gain by helping some little old lady getting mugged are perfectly, ethically and lawfully supposed to look the other way while the old lady gets the crap kicked out of her and her lunch money stolen.

There *might* be an argument if they didnt show up to watch the spectacle... its like paramedics showing up to an auto accident where a person is just bleeding to death but because he doesnt have insurance (and they might not get paid) they just watch him die and clean up the mess.

Disgusting.

PAR

Kraint wrote:
CheezePavilion wrote:

Why should any government have an interest in people who gamble losing a lot financially? Even government-run casinos don't want to profit at the cost of ruining people.

Why should the city government have an interest in socializing the losses of this person while allowing the privatization of his gains?

If the city government was operating on that ideology, they wouldn't have a tax-supported fire department in the first place!

What is the incentive to pay any taxes if let people get services without paying for them?

Many services work on a 'sign up early for a reduced fee' principle to deal with that moral hazard: why couldn't this one?

What difference would that make, though? If "risk vs. reward" is so important it speaks for itself even in the case of a person's home burning down, why distinguish the cases?

People are different, and more important, than houses. Danger to life != danger to property.

Just because it's more important doesn't mean that's the only dividing line--there are many dividing lines we can draw. Why isn't 'life and house/toolshed' the dividing line instead of 'life/property'? In criminal law there are greater penalties for breaking into a home than for breaking into other pieces of property; the government has to respect your right to privacy more in your home than in other pieces of property. Why shouldn't a similar principle apply here?

But this wasn't investigation OR insurance: it was response to an emergency. An investigation tries to find who is responsible for a loss; insurance reimburses you for a loss; this would be *preventing* a loss in the first place.

But they found no one was at risk. Someone's house was on fire, but all of the people got out before the FD arrived. I am heavily in favor of preventing losses in the first place, but why is the city government responsible for the property of someone who is not in the city?

Why is the city government responsible for the life of someone who is not in the city?

Emotionally, it is a great idea, but someone is going to have to foot the bill.

So? Why isn't this a bill worth footing?

What if the municipality gets his tax dollars from the county/state/Federal government aid?

Any money that comes in is earmarked for specific things. It could be the roads he uses, it could be the hospital that he has equal access to, or any number of things. What that money was apparently not earmarked for is extending the coverage of the fire department. That isn't a call that any of the firemen on the scene made.

But that's not relevant: the question here is whether this fire department took money from a pool that had his tax dollars in it. If the city really wants to be that independent, it should put its money where its mouth is and refuse funding from outside sources.

Do you think you should be paying for fire protection for people in another state because they have elected to not pay for their own firemen?
You keep directing your statements at 'the government,' which needs to be defined in this case. This is a city government, which is exclusively responsible for people who reside within the city. This guy does not. Governments have an interest in protecting their residents, and that is the legal end of their powers. The government of New York City has no right or responsibility to take care of the fine people in Bismark, ND.

Well first off, you're crossing state lines with your example. A city is 'emancipated' from the power of the county by the state--that's basically why they're called 'municipalities'. The residents of the county are citizens of the same sovereign--the state--as that which created the city in the first place. Why wouldn't a city have an interest in protecting all the interests of its sovereign that it can in an emergency situation?

Second, a city has a responsibility to anyone in the city, not just residents. By entering into this contract the city *did* extend its rights and responsibilities into the county.

It still strikes me as odd that despite offering to pay the fee and any other expenses the fire department still refused to put out the fire. It seems that make the FD's actions punitive and would throw this into shaky legal ground. From the report a similar incident happened in 2008 so perhaps not or it just went unchallenged.

'Round here it's widely known that if you get injured skiing the backcountry, a Forest Service chopper will fly your ass to the hospital...

...but you're damn sure paying for it afterward. Why wasn't that system employed here? The system that was isn't exactly new--it's how firefighting worked back in the day. At some point we decided "Hmmm...maybe there is some value to stopping fires before they build into unstoppable tempests of flame."

Well, as tempting as it is to yell and scream about the dangers of Libertarian ideals I think this is a pretty tough situation for the firefighters. Damned if they do, damned if they don't.

As pointed out already the guy wasn't paying for the service so he had no right to expect it. If the firefighters did put the fire out then no-one would pay in future for the service they would get anyway.

SpacePPoliceman wrote:

'Round here it's widely known that if you get injured skiing the backcountry, a Forest Service chopper will fly your ass to the hospital...

...but you're damn sure paying for it afterward. Why wasn't that system employed here? The system that was isn't exactly new--it's how firefighting worked back in the day. At some point we decided "Hmmm...maybe there is some value to stopping fires before they build into unstoppable tempests of flame."

This would probably be the best solution anyway. The firefighters were there already, so putting the fire out and billing would make sense. And if he defaults, come back and burn the house down in a safe and controlled manner.

This thread makes me sad. It's like a collective case of "not getting it."

The firefighters did nothing wrong. There is no "shaky ground." In fact, if they had fought the fire, and someone had been injured, they risked not being covered by their own insurance. Or, if the victim had homeowners insurance, he may be on the hook for not carrying out his due diligence.

This isn't a "sad sign of the times." This is a common manner in which many rural areas try to find affordable services. As many of you noted, this does seem like a poor way to provide fire department service.

You can't let the guy pay the $75, or even $75 for every year missed at the time of a fire. There would be no incentive to pay the fee. If there were 1000 homes, the fire department would be counting on $75,000 coming to in to prepared for fires in a rural community. If they let people pay as they went, and there were 10 fires, they might only see $300. It doesn't work. Letting him pay is unfair to everyone else that is paying year after year when they don't have a fire.

That's where the Libertarian comparison comes in. It would make sense for the county the victim was a resident of to have a tax that was required by any property owner to cover the expense of having the city cover their fires. Instead, they were free to pay on their own, which leads to snafus. the victim claims he merely forgot to make his payment. But even if he just didn't have the cash, his home could have been saved, while the country used legal means to collect whatever taxes he owed.

That's why a few of us have noted that this was an unfortunate example of what a Libertarian policies would bring to the rest of us. They way to avoid these kinds of issues is not to be afraid of paying taxes. Social services are a good thing.

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