Interesting Story in Post About Outsourcing Mental Health Care
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch has a very interesting story (link via Combest) on the state’s plan to send the casework on developmentally disabled citizens to local and county boards, and outside groups. I don’t yet know enough about this plan to talk with certainty about it, although it sounds good to me in theory. I think that some of the cost savings that would be realized by outsourcing should be put back into very solid oversight of the program. The Legislature has yet to approve this plan, and I look forward to hearing more about it. I hope both its pluses and minuses get a fair examination.
The real point of this post, though, is yet more examples of how the welfare state has become a permanent part of some people’s mindsets, and the belief many have — which I will never comprehend — that government bureaucrats are somehow more kindly and fair than employees in the private sector. Trust me on this, people — there is nobody more cold than a bureaucrat following orders and a budget. Here is a quote from one state rep whose worldview never fails to astound me:
Details aside, one legislator said the plan suffers from a core flaw. Rep. Margaret Donnelly, D-Richmond Heights, said the state, not outside groups, has the duty of looking after the care of the developmentally disabled. "The real issue is that those clients are our responsibility," she said.
How about including the family in this issue, first and foremost? Isn’t it the responsibility of the families, rather than the state, to look after their own family members? Here is another quote demonstrating welfare-state creep:
Woodruff, of Poplar Bluff, fears those changes will spell the end of an arrangement that has allowed her son to live at home, with the help of round-the-clock care. "It’s all about the money, and it shouldn’t be about the money," she said.
Of course it is not about the money when everybody else is paying for it. I really don’t mean to sound cruel, but the assumption so many people have that other people should pay for their needs is something that always amazes me. As I said, I don’t know whether this proposal is a good one or not, but it sounds promising as a way to both improve service and make sure more of the money goes to the people who need it, rather than to the layers of bureaucracy that oversee it.
