I knew a guy in the late 90s who checked himself into jail every winter. He just didn’t have enough money to heat his home and buy food at the same time, and he was disabled and couldn’t land a job in construction no more, so that’s the only thing he found to stay alive.
When the snow started to come down, he’d go to our local minimart with a plastic gun. You know, like the really cheesy ones with a red cap at the muzzle, to make sure nobody would think it was real and gun him down my mistake, and to avoid getting a harsh sentence. He knew the store owner, since it was a small town and everybody knew each other.
He’d say hello, point the gun at him and gently say “Could you please call the police like last year?” The store owner used to try to talk him out of it, but he’d say “Don’t force me to make it real because I don’t wanna.”
Then the sheriff would show up - they knew each other too of course - and he would try to convince him this wasn’t a good idea. And the guy would say “Look, will you book me or not? Because if you don’t, you’ll come back next week to my place but with the coroner this time.”
So the sheriff would book him. And the judge, who knew exactly why he was there at the trial, would sentence him to 5 months - time enough to get out in spring.
After I left town, I heard he kept doing that for many years, until he got tired of being poor and committed suicide.
What about the ER? Get yourself checked in for a mental breakdown or the like, stay the night. It’s not like they will be able to collect on the bill if your income is measured in cents per day and your address is “under the overpass near that one busy intersection.”
My mother-in-law was in the US visiting us when she got appendicitis. Took her to the doctor and had to get surgery the same day, her appendix was close to bursting and we were told she wouldn’t have made it another day. My wife overheard the nurse yelling at the doctor for accepting a patient with no insurance. So apparently even in life and death situations, sending you back is an option if you don’t have insurance.
This reminds me of a news story from a few years ago. An elderly man had robbed a bank and only asked for $1. When he was arrested he said he couldn’t afford to get the various medical treatments he needed so he wanted to go to jail so he could get the healthcare they would provide him as a prisoner
I think its funny (incredibly depressing) how disability doesnt scale with cost of living in your local area. Like my disabled mother makes about $1K a month off SSI and she lives in CA luckily with family.
She would be in this same situation if she had to move tomorrow. I aint doing much better but even working a job I dont make enough to rent here so we will have to find a way out together.
We have to focus on mutual aid. Identity politics of either major party seems very much designed to be this way, and maybe of any party that makes it onto a ballot.
Yeah my bad I was just trying to articulate that stuck feeling that most people have if they cant really afford to leave or stay. She would lose pretty much everything she ever owned if she had to leave.