All Entries Tagged With: "nonprofit"
Habitat Volunteers Build a Home, Live in It
There’s a certain sort of construction project underway in Pacoima. One that isn’t powered by a corporation, but by the nonprofit ministry Habitat for Humanity. One that doesn’t pay its workers in currency, but with a home in the community he or she has spent 500 hours building.
Twenty miles north of Los Angeles is Pacoima, California — the site of a project that will give a three- or four-bedroom home to volunteers who have helped build it, according to Shelter. Though they don’t yet know which house will be theirs, the families moving into the community will have completed their down payment in the form of man power, and will receive a nonprofit, interest-free loan. In addition to the house, families receive access to health and dental care, as well as a free computer. A community garden provides them with fruits and vegetables.
“You bring a family in and give them an opportunity to change their lives, and it’s them as the catalyst,” Donna Deutchman, CEO of Habitat for Humanity San Fernando/Santa Clarita Valley, told the site.
And working together to create a better future has undoubtedly enhanced their sense of selves. Jessica Woywode, a Community Development and Planning Associate for the organization, told Shelter that the community has seen significantly higher graduation rates, no divorces and zero teen pregnancies. Thirty-seven of the 61 Habitat homes in Pacoima are occupied, and 24 more houses will be completed in 2010.
The project will include the San Fernando/Santa Clarita Valley in the five percent of communities with more than 100 Habitat-built homes. It’s an honor and a privilege, and the community’s (future) residents are proud to have helped achieve it.
A Simple Solution – What We Should Do To Fix Health Care
In order to truly fix our health care problem, it’s important that we understand how we got into this mess in the first place. On the premise that “those that don’t know history are doomed to repeat it”, in the previous article I tried to explain just that, going back nearly 70 years to give a brief history of our health care woes.
I noted that a viable alternative should drive down costs, improve overall efficiency and effectiveness, and stimulate healthier individuals. To do this we must first acknowledge the lunacy of our current insurance system and understand their appropriate role. We must also consider, whether or not the government option would truly cut costs. The idea is what I call “the Walmart effect.” Because places like Walmart (or Costco) are such large retail providers, they have the power to influence production costs. The threat of not being able to sell your product in the largest chain in the world will drive down any cost. Similar to Walmart, if the government is providing most of the health coverage, in theory, medical costs go down.
I don’t think that will work though. If you’re in the medical field and you’ve seen your wages sharply cut, and then to receive compensation you have to go through government- an entity with the (unconstitutional) power to simply print money, problems are gonna come in heaps. Quite obviously sensitivity to cost and cost-effectiveness will go down. To avoid having people “game” the system the government would have to bog the system down with regulations. We’ll have what amounts to “price-fixing”. We’ve tried that before, most notably under Richard Nixon; it didn’t work very well.
