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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Tom B1" data-source="post: 7828594" data-attributes="member: 6879023">Also Canadian.I've had family that have went through horrible, expensive medical regimes here and I know some friends who have faced comparable scenarios in the US. In my family's case, dual mastectomies, then a catastrophic car accident plus bones almost invisible on scans on the one hand and heart attacks, stents, stroke, loss of limb, prosthetics, and cancer treatment on the other. I compare that with my cousin's wife's son who got married, had a kid arrive, and then passed from while waiting for dual lung and heart transplant and another friend whose wife has a chronic and expensive conditions who lost coverage when she changed jobs. My folks weren't out of pocket too much (some meds, a few bits of equipment, a few co-pays) and my cousin and his wife are still paying for $100K US they put in trying to save her son and my other friends have debt now because their 'pre-existing condition' isn't covered now. Scenarios vary a lot by where you live. The US simply does not, as a whole (some states do more than others) provide much of a safety net for the less wealthy members of society for health or retirement.Interesting fact: The friend with a condition no longer covered used to work for the state gov't in Louisianna in reconciling State - HMO billings. Louisiana did a study and determined that 42% of the state's medical budget was going to the legal/arbitration processes with the HMOs. You have to have a vastly, epically inefficient single payer to consume 50% of the pool of a state or province's budget for health. You can be 20% less efficient and it still ends up looking much more cost-effective.</blockquote>Other trades, such as plumbing or factory work, have seen a significant increase in salaries and work conditions. Why is that? Because those skilled trades are an absolute legal requirement - plumbing especially - anytime you touch a pipe of any sort for any reason, you require a plumber, a permit and an inspection. That helps their business a lot. ...and perhaps justly so. Most other highly paid groups (doctors, lawyers, nurses, engineers, and skilled trades) all have extensive education and professional certification requirements as well as dues and upgrading requirements. Where's that in the art world? It's not a necessity and art is not covered by acts of parliament as are professionals and skilled trades - they have colleges that they must answer to and if they don't, they can lose their ability to work in the field. Never seen that in art or most other creative endeavors. Perhaps more pertinently, most of these trades fall into:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">shelter and infrastructure creation</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">keeping people alive and bringing new ones into the world</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">helping deal with the law (or with the tax man)</li> </ul>The first two seem like foundational blocks in the pyramid of needs. Art is more up the pyramid and its urgent day to day survival aspect is almost non-existent. Societies need it, but they don't tend to need it with the urgency of doctors or builders. I am friends with a fair few game developers - some that make a living at it, some that have it as a side hobby that sometimes generates a bit of revenue. Those who dabble at it and don't have a full time company they own where they are publishing and producing all the time, those casuals tend to roll a project every so often and it takes years to recoup costs and make profits for a print run. Any creative endeavour will always be subject to tastes, to competition and to the varying amounts of excess wealth to be spent in a society. That limited amount of luxury wealth comes after all the spending for critical things (professions and skilled trades). Then it gets split between different products and producers in ways that vary over time. To succeed in that environment, you have to frequently roll out new product which is compelling and in line with current tastes. And even then, you are still subject to overall economic situations. I know people talk about paying X or Y for games - video, board, card. I can't anymore afford to buy $150 game orders every two months or $400 of miniatures 1/year. I can't even justify $30 books or $40 Blu-Ray seasons anymore. I've probably spent no more than $120 in an entire year for RPG products now, vs. doing that every 1-2 months years back when my circumstances were better. More calls on a much smaller pool of money and more dependents now. And everything is going up - fresh vegetables went up 11% year to year here. Salaries didn't. So when I see producers cranking out $60-100 hardcovers, there's no way I'll get them unless I see a clearance for $30 someday or see a PDF for $25 one day. And even then, not more than 1 a quarter. And I don't have $5/month to contribute to patreons of web artists and authors I highly respect. I can't even afford the $13 softcover book price. Things are that much harder and I'm not alone. So the overall economic situation also impacts RPG authors. And expecting those of us with little or no money to kick out $50 for an adventure path book or $30 for 6 minis.... well, won't be doing much of that, sorry. It's not disagreeing the artists' work should be worth that, it's not having it to spend. So now I update old modules, use old minis, and free maps, and design my own adventures. Works for my folks and lets me play even when I can't support hardly anybody like I'd like to. It's not just the 'I want it free' culture, it's the 'things aren't as easy as they once were financially' for an awful lot of people.[/QUOTE]

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