I noticed that suddenly the prices went up at our vet and I did some research. Every vet in town was now owned by a corporation. I looked up the corporation -- a national company that owns a lot of vet practices across the country. I got suspicious when the practice opened an emergency clinic for a few hours every night. My daughter took our dog there and to walk in the door cost $250, and that was not including any services the dog needed. It was just a free $250 charge!
Is that really evil and greedy, though? Sure it is. The money wasn't earned. The next closest emergency vet was a bit over an hour away. And the town was full of poor people. This was no upscale place, believe me. The people were poor because they lacked education past high school and the town was too small to require a bunch of businesses that paid over minimum wage. It didn't used to be that way, but factories closed.
And the people in that town were generous and friendly. If someone needed helped, the folks didn't look the other way. I remember when my husband was helped when he had a medical problem while walking down the street. The people who helped him were young, riding a motorcycle, were covered in tattoos, were poorly dressed, etc. And so friendly and helpful! These are the same people my husband used to look down on. Like motorcycles and tattoos and so forth were the province of criminals or something.
Same thing happened with physicians' practices and hospitals.
Same thing happened with affordable housing -- new landlords bought it and the rents went way up and so did the prices of housing real people can afford to buy. Lots of fees tacked onto the rent, which I recently found out about. OMG, my daughter rented a super expensive 1 bdrm apt in Chicago's West Loop Gate area and then found out there are several hundred $$ in fees she also has to pay every month -- and the landlord has no responsibility to prove that the fees were for services she used because she no choice.
Always the private equity people. Lots of corporate models forced on these services we the people need.
It's the evilness and greed that, sadly, no longer surprise me. These characteristics have infested everything, including the no longer trustworthy Supreme Court.
The vast majority of people in this country are getting screwed over in major ways. They don't have the power to stop it, and the government is one of the evildoers.
I am enraged about many issues, and I'm sure tons of other people are too.
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