By Tom Kando
(originally written on 7/17/08)
On July 16, the Sacramento Bee printed an article about Susan Atkins - a member of the Charles Manson family who had participated in the horrendous mass murder 40 years ago. Atkins has spent the past 40 years in prison. She is now sixty, and she is dying of cancer. The article was basically about the fact that she had just once again been denied “compassionate” parole by the parole board, even though she is expected to die within a few months. In view of her crime - slashing her victims dozens of times, carving out a baby from Sharon Tate’s belly, drinking the victims’ blood, etc. - the denial is okay by me. That’s not what I want to talk about.
What I want to focus on is a detail in the article which struck me as indicative of our society’s descent into madness: Since March 18, i.e. in four months, the State of California has spent $1.461,724 to treat and guard this inmate. That’s right: nearly a million and a half dollars. This is not a typo, not a decimal error by the Bee proofreader. The figure is quite accurate. In fact, it’s $1.461,724.17. Don’t forget that last 17 cents!
Think about this for a moment: That’s $12,284 per day. $370,000 per month. Maybe the value of my house (yes - the subprime crisis has devalued my house a lot) every month.
What is the State doing with our money? What can possibly cost 1.4 million in four months?
Medical treatment? Surgery, Chemotherapy? Rehabilitation? Social and Psychological services? Security? (Atkins has been treated at an “outside” hospital).
I had cancer surgery a few years ago. They used the expensive new-fangled Da Vinci
method. It probably cost over $100,000. But Susan Atkins cost the State, the Insurance Company, whoever, fourteen times more than I did.
If this is what one high-profile inmate costs the State, we can expect that it is multiplied manifold, because the State houses two hundred thousand inmates, many of whom are also very expensive.
But what on earth does the money pay for? The answer is, first and foremost: (1) salaries/fees paid to individuals and (2) fees paid to institutions. This means (1) paychecks of hundreds of thousands of dollars to physicians, anesthesiologists, surgeons, psychiatrists and lawyers, and (2) hundreds of thousands spent in fees to hospitals, labs and other firms. Thus, one inmate such as Susan Atkins drives a significant portion of the California economy. She is single-handedly responsible for sustaining the opulent lifestyle of dozens of upper-middle-class professionals who live lives of comfort in California’s suburbs.
Now don’t misunderstand me: I am not singling out the public sector for being scandalously frivolous in its spending practices. I am sure that private corporations are just as bad. The current failures of dozens of banks, airlines and other companies attest to this.
But my general point is this: the reason why our society and its economy are going to hell in a handbasket is that we have totally and absolutely lost track of accountability. Our bureaucratized social structure has become so large and so complex that nobody as any idea of what’s going on.
As a result, the economy is hemorrhaging and, when it comes to services, there is no inkling of the meaning of the word productivity. That is, concepts such cost-benefit and “bang for your buck” are utterly alien to agencies which see no problem in spending $12,000 per day to maintain one sick prison inmate.
Meanwhile, the little guy is still in touch with reality. Even the millions of Americans who lost their homes due to imprudent borrowing, and the dozens of millions who are deeply indebted on their credit cards and otherwise - they know what’s happening: They know that they are broke and that they are in trouble.
But the leadership, the bureaucrats, the CEO’s, they have lost touch with reality. Maybe we shouldn’t blame them either. Maybe the problem is systemic. Maybe the outflow of money is uncontrollable - whether in the California Department of Corrections, at the Pentagon or at General Motors.
Is there a better way to run a railroad? And does anyone know what that is? I am not sure. Sometimes a newcomer thinks he can fix things, but he, too, fails miserably. Look at Schwartzenegger.
So what’s the answer? Well, if the social system’s failure is an organic phenomenon that is not amenable to any individual’s intervention, then it follows that the recovery will be likewise: Things will straighten themselves out not because of wonderful new laws and policies, but just because the collapse will lead to a natural turn-around (or not).
The moral, then? Let things take their course. After a while, there wont be any money left, and people will simply have to walk away from the counter, empty-handed. There’ll be pain, but most people will manage, somehow.
© Tom Kando 2014
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