Of the billionaires I have known, money just brings out the basic traits in them. If they were jerks before they had money, they are simply jerks with a billion dollars.
We right now give $15 billion every year as subsidies to private insurers under the Medicare system. Doesn't work any better through the private insurers. They just skim off $15 billion.
When it comes to the budget, we know that we shouldn't be cutting more on core investments, like education, that are going to help us grow in the future. And we've already seen the deficit cut in half. It's going down faster than any time in the last 60 years. So why would we make more cuts in education, more cuts in basic research? Nobody thinks that's a good idea.
Don't be too much concerned about money, because that is the greatest distraction against happiness. And the irony of ironies is that people think they will be happy when they have money. Money has nothing to do with happiness. If you are happy and you have money, you can use it for happiness. If you are unhappy and you have money, you will use that money for more unhappiness. Because money is simply a neutral force.
To the eyes of a miser a guinea is more beautiful than the sun, and a bag worn with the use of money has more beautiful proportions than a vine filled with grapes.