X-Message-Number: 32985
Date: Mon, 25 Oct 2010 14:42:27 -0700
Subject: communitarianism
From: Charles in Arizona <>

I have nothing against people helping each other--voluntarily.
Unfortunately the Alcor patient care trust (and perhaps the CI
equivalent, I don't know the details) is one big pool of money,
meaning that if you join Alcor and take the precaution of overfunding
yourself, and you die while your funding still exceeds the minimum,
everyone else in the pool will benefit from your surplus, including
people you have never heard of and even people you may not like very
much. Conversely, if you join Alcor and make arrangements for minimum
funding, and you die after the prices go up, you will be taking
advantage of the system whereby others, more prudent than yourself,
are helping to fund you. I especially dislike this second eventuality.

When we were laying the groundwork for CryoCare, someone associated
with the organization obtained financial advice from Bear Stearns and
from the IRS. Both agreed that if we wanted to set up a separate
account for each member who went into cryopreservation, we could not
be a tax-exempt nonprofit. This was a primary reason why we chose to
be for-profit: So that each person's financing could be kept separate.
Note that this does not preclude people from donating to each other if
they so wish. It just means that if it happens, it will be on a
strictly voluntary basis.

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