[quote=flu]I don’t know why all the negativity about a private security or firefighting squad.
Maybe the answer is a for-profit fire department in which folks pay monthly dues (kinda like insurance)…Of course there should be an option to “opt-out” of paying a portion of taxes to fund the public version…
As far as “you get what you pay for” in terms of police. I wonder with the true costs of having beat police versus funding the pensions. (don’t know)…I don’t know but, seems to me that I wouldn’t mind hiring blackwater to be my private security guard if it was affordable….Shoot first ask questions later…How’s that any different from what SDPD does currently? :)[/quote]
Flu,
They DID have private fire departments, and they were operated by the insurance companies. That’s what those seals are on some of the old buildings back east — fire insurance seals which meant the fire department could put out fires and rescue people from that building (and ONLY the buildings with seals/insurance protection). This model failed for reasons that should be painfully obvious.
What people don’t seem to understand is the history of why we have public saftey services, and why they are paid well. I’ve been over this before, but fire and police departments spend a tremendous amount of money on hiring and training personnel. Unlike other industries where one might learn more from universities, in public safety, **experience in the field** is what counts the most. That’s why they don’t require college degrees (though some positions do). Because of the expense and resources put into hiring and training their employees, and because of the fact that EXPERIENCE is what matters most in these positions, fire/police departments cannot handle high turnover rates.
During the housing bubble, fire and police departments had a very difficult time finding qualified recruits. When people could make $80K in a couple of months, why would they work for a living? All of a sudden, as soon as the economy turns, the sheeple start looking for a new scapegoat, and public safety personnel bear the brunt of their anger. Why aren’t we directing this anger where it belongs — at the financial sector and the people who drove this country into the ground (and caused the pension crisis)?
