Health Care Is Not A Right; and Socialized Medicine is Not Only Impractical, It's Also Immoral
Most people who oppose socialized medicine do so on the grounds that it is moral and well-intentioned, but impractical; i.e., it is a noble idea—which just somehow does not work. I do not agree that socialized medicine is moral and well-intentioned, but impractical. Of course, it is impractical—it does not work—but I hold that it is impractical because it is immoral.
Take the simplest case: you are born with a moral right to hair care, let us say, provided by a loving government free of charge to all who want or need it. What would happen under such a moral theory?
Haircuts are free, like the air we breathe, so some people show up every day for an expensive new styling, the government pays out more and more, barbers revel in their huge new incomes, and the profession starts to grow ravenously, bald men start to come in droves for free hair implantations, a school of fancy, specialized eyebrow pluckers develops—it's all free, the government pays. The dishonest barbers are having a field day, of course—but so are the honest ones; they are working and spending like mad, trying to give every customer his heart's desire, which is a millionaire's worth of special hair care and services—the government starts to scream, the budget is out of control.
Suddenly directives erupt: we must limit the number of barbers, we must limit the time spent on haircuts, we must limit the permissible type of hair styles; bureaucrats begin to split hairs about how many hairs a barber should be allowed to split. A new computerized office of records filled with inspectors and red tape shoots up; some barbers, it seems, are still getting too rich, they must be getting more than their fair share of the national hair, so barbers have to start applying for Certificates of Need in order to buy razors, while peer review boards are established to assess every stylist's work, both the dishonest and the overly honest alike, to make sure that no one is too bad or too good or too busy or too unbusy. In the end, there are lines of wretched customers waiting for their chance to be routinely scalped by bored, hog-tied haircutters, some of whom remember dreamily the old days when somehow everything was so much better.
Do you think the situation would be improved by having hair-care cooperatives organized by the government?—having them engage in managed competition, managed by the government, in order to buy haircut insurance from companies controlled by the government?
If this is what would happen under government-managed hair care, what else can possibly happen—it is already starting to happen—under the idea of health care as a right? Health care in the modern world is a complex, scientific, technological service. How can anybody be born with a right to such a thing?
~Leonard Peikoff speaking at a Town Hall Meeting on Health Care in Costa Mesa, California, on December 11, 1993.
Originally posted at Carpe Diem.
36 Comments:
This excerpt doesn't do the article justice.
The argument is along the lines of this excerpt:
"Observe that all legitimate rights have one thing in common: they are rights to action, not to rewards from other people. The American rights impose no obligations on other people, merely the negative obligation to leave you alone. The system guarantees you the chance to work for what you want—not to be given it without effort by somebody else."
Yep, you can make the argument that only those that are rich enough to afford it should have health care, and that those that are already sick should be sentenced to live in pain, or die.
You can, maybe even, win a "debate" with that argumet.
But, tell me, is that, really, the country you want to live in?
A guy in my area was having headaches that were robbing him of peace and happiness. They wouldn't stop. His story went out and people donated $80,000+ by giving out $1 - $5 at a time. He got the surgery and is doing better.
No government forced people to give money. A happy ending was had by all.
Government force is never the way to ensure prosperity or happiness of a people.
rufus says: "But, tell me, is that, really, the country you want to live in?"...
In the country I want to live in I don't want my money stolen by the federal government to finance someone else's constitutionally questionable if not outright stupid ideas...
BTW rufus, here's YOUR chance to step up and put YOUR where YOUR words are...
Yep, you can make the argument that rich people should have all their income taxed away, and that poor people should get everything for free.
You can, maybe even, win a 'debate' with that argumet (sic).
But, tell me, is that, really, the country you want to live in?
There is a right to health care. The problem comes in defining rights.
1) Rights are those things the government can't deny you and exist regardless of government actions.
2) Entitlements are those things the government must provide you and are created by government promises.
Healthcare is a right because government can't (or shouldn't) prevent you from getting healthcare from any willing provider.
If 2) defines rights, I want to know when the government is going to send me the arms that the second amendment says it must.
> But, tell me, is that, really, the country you want to live in?
What, the one where I can't turn someone else into my slave because they have a special skill I have a need of? Or because they get money for their skills which I can use?
Yeah, frankly. It is.
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It's amazing how simple the answers start becoming when you realize that anything done by the government is done with a gun to someone's head somewhere. Even if it's not an open threat, it's understood by all that, in the end, it's aimed right at their head.
P.J. O'Rourke summarized this two decades ago:
===========================
"One secret to balancing the budget is to remember that all tax revenue is the result of holding a gun to somebody's head. Not paying taxes is against the law. If you don't pay your taxes, you'll be fined. If you don't pay the fine, you'll be jailed. If you try to escape from jail, you''ll be shot. Thus I -- in my role as citizen and voter -- am going to shoot you -- in your role as taxpayer and ripe suck -- if you don't pay your share of the national tab.
Therefore, every time the government spends money on anything, you have to ask yourself, 'Would I kill my kindly, gray-haired mother for this?' In the case of defense spending, the argument is simple: 'Come on, Gramma, everybody's in this together. If those Canadian hordes come down over the border, we'll all be dead meat. Pony Up.'
In the case of helping cripples, orphans, and blind people, the argument is almost as persuasive: 'Granny, I know you don't know these people from Adam, but we've got five thousand years of Judeo-Christian-Muslim-Buddhist-Hindu-Confucian-animist-jungle-God morality going here. Fork over the dough.'
But Day Care doesn't fly: 'You're paying for the next-door neighbor's baby-sitter, or it's curtains for you, Lady."
- P. J. O'Rourke, 'Parliament of Whores' -
Whoo-hoo, alright! Did you hear that? Health care is not a right! Shame on you, Jonas Salk - you had no right curing the masses. Who cares if some of the people reading this post would either be dead, or never have been born if it weren't for your gregarious behavior? You were suppose to patent the sun!
Shame on you, Jesus Christ - those lepers had no right of being cured. And no premium, no co-pay? You socialist! At least smite the peaceniks who keep spouting, “Though shalt not kill” and “turn the other cheek.” Geesh
Common Sense
I don't believe that Jonas Salk or Jesus Christ were being forced to pay for other people by a government.
The difference isn't in the healing of masses, it is in who mandates it and how it is delivered. These two did it voluntarily and, quite frankly, with self interest.
I have given money to help a friend who needed medical attention. I don't want to give my money to somebody I don't know at the expense of not being able to buy something that I need, or possibly just want.
Anon 2:05PM,
Anytime fire fighters, police officers, the coast guard or any other entity responds to a life-threatening emergency, thus saving lives, it's done with the consideration that people do have a right to live; and yes, all of these are funded through means of taxation. This country a long time ago tried privatized fire fighting departments; that didn't turn out so good...
Anyways, don't discount the potential for well managed government programs with a good historical track record: you do realize Jonas's vaccine was distributed through government funding, correct, and thus tax payers paid for it? Now how do you suppose things would have turned out if, say, Jonas patented his drug, sold it to a large pharmaceutical, and that company in turn sold the vaccine for a high cost, thus making a large profit? What do you think would have become of many of the blog’s readers? Oh well, at least the tax payers would have saved money at the expense of higher vaccine costs.
Now the idea of charity is a noble one, but Henry Ford, a man who created a real middle class by distributing solid wages, once said "Charity is about as effective at solving the problem of poverty as the death penalty is at solving the problem of crime." Judging from Florida and Texas's crime rate, I couldn't agree with him more.
"I don't want to give my money to somebody I don't know at the expense of not being able to buy something that I need, or possibly just want."
Well isn't that just super Christ-like of you, sir! "Lord, I don't want to be a good samaritan for a bum I don't know. I don't care if he dies and 'sides, I gotta go shoppin'"
Of course the Lord understands that you don't have to be a good samaritan. You see the rich - who seem to greatly confuse the size on the eye of a needle - can afford to dole out more for people to live. They use to pay 91% back in the '50s under a Republican president! A three-percent increase!? Didn't folks learn anything from the '90s? It's going to cause a crash, just like Newt Gingrich said!
Europe doles out hefty taxes on the rich, and they have the gulags to prove it. Damn communists!
The man formerly known as Common Sense
I like helping people as much as the next person, but what gives you the right, the moral authority to take money out of my pocket and give it to somebody else?
As for Jonas Salk, do you think he got paid for being a medical researcher? and how about after the discovery of the Polio vaccine? There are other forms of remuneration than cash for a patent. In a capitalist system, do you think the American people would patronize a business that charged an enormous premium for the Polio vaccine? I don't.
How about River Blindness? It's a damn shame how Merck is charging out the nose for treatment of poor South Americans.
As for solving the problem of poverty, I think free markets are kind of like democracy - the worst economic system in the history of the world, except for all the other ones we've ever tried.
I haven't seen any evidence that Europe's poor have it any better than America's poor, and I think I've heard about a lot more riots by poor people in France than in the US.
anon @ 2:45 PM says: "Well isn't that just super Christ-like of you, sir! "Lord, I don't want to be a good samaritan for a bum I don't know. I don't care if he dies and 'sides, I gotta go shoppin'""...
How about just you being a good samaritan with YOUR money, then YOU can pander to the parasitic to your heart's content...
BTW what part of the Constitution of the United States mandates that the federal government should extort private wealth from the citizens in order satisfy someone else's idea of being a good samaritan?
"This country a long time ago tried privatized fire fighting departments; that didn't turn out so good..."
I live in an area with a volunteer fire department that works great.
"Well isn't that just super Christ-like of you, sir! "Lord, I don't want to be a good samaritan for a bum I don't know. I don't care if he dies and 'sides, I gotta go shoppin'"
I give about 12% of my income to my church, to clean water programs around the world, fund education for people in Central America, give money to orphans and tip 25% when I go to restaurants. And it is all by my choice.
The problem with big government is that it pisses off 48% of the country all the time. The liberals hated 8 years of Bush and 6 years of Bush/GOP Congress. Now the conservatives hate the current administration/Congress. When government gets big and powerful, and the pendulum swings back to the GOP, will liberals be even more unhappy than they were under Bush? Yes.
I am unhappy regardless of whether democrats or Republicans lead our country because both of them are making a bigger, more invasive, freedom-stripping government. When a bunch of people two time zones away get to make decisions on how to spend a large percentage of the money I earned, I don't care what party they are from... they suck.
The meat of this argument--the part that describes fundamentally, morally, why socialized medicine is immoral--deserves to be posted. Here is and excerpt of the end of Dr. Peikoff's speech:
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But the fact is: You don't abolish charity by calling it something else. If a person is getting health care for nothing, simply because he is breathing, he is still getting charity, whether or not any politician, lobbyist or activist calls it a "right." To call it a Right when the recipient did not earn it is merely to compound the evil. It is charity still—though now extorted by criminal tactics of force, while hiding under a dishonest name.
As with any good or service that is provided by some specific group of men, if you try to make its possession by all a right, you thereby enslave the providers of the service, wreck the service, and end up depriving the very consumers you are supposed to be helping. To call "medical care" a right will merely enslave the doctors and thus destroy the quality of medical care in this country, as socialized medicine has done around the world, wherever it has been tried, including Canada (I was born in Canada and I know a bit about that system first hand).
...
Any mandatory and comprehensive plan will finish off quality medicine in this country—because it will finish off the medical profession. It will deliver doctors bound hands and feet to the mercies of the bureaucracy.
The only hope—for the doctors, for their patients, for all of us—is for the doctors to assert a moral principle. I mean: to assert their own personal individual rights—their real rights in this issue—their right to their lives, their liberty, their property, their pursuit of happiness. The Declaration of Independence applies to the medical profession too. We must reject the idea that doctors are slaves destined to serve others at the behest of the state.
Doctors, Ayn Rand wrote, are not servants of their patients. They are "traders, like everyone else in a free society, and they should bear that title proudly, considering the crucial importance of the services they offer."
The battle against socialized medicine depends on the doctors speaking out against it—not only on practical grounds, but, first of all, on moral grounds. The doctors must defend themselves and their own interests as a matter of solemn justice, upholding a moral principle, the first moral principle: self-preservation.
Great stuff...
Wow...did someone really just imply with their dropping the JC bomb, that universal Healthcare coming from the government is Christ-like? Relying on Christ and relying on the federal government are not one in the same... The government is not your friend...your politicians are not known for being Christlike...
I can tell you this, there would have been no feeding of the 5000 if Jesus had to rely on the federal government to do it...
No where in Jesus teaching, that I can find, did he ever promote government policies and government as the solutions to the world's problems. He promoted a change of heart in the individual. When the government takes over things that should be left to charity, he takes away man's opportunity to be Christ-like.
I voted for Obama, but commons sense, intuition, and analogies like this haircut one shout out the obvious... Universal healthcare WILL NOT work; more government involvement in healthcare WILL DO MORE HARM than good.
The reason that these government policies from on high don't work, is precisely because as a whole we are NOT Christ-like. Our nature is to be self-interested. The system that does work best, but not perfectly, pits our self-interests against each other...it makes us compete.
You need the government less involved to fix Healthcare. The solutions are obvious and simple, just not politically palatable. No more third party system; no more tax-deductions for businesses to provide Healthcare; remove a lot of the licensure barriers to entry (kill the AMA); and most important , start making cost and price a factor in consumer decisions.
August,
This is kind of a silly argument - are the doctors in the UK enslaved? No.
They might not be ecstatic, but they're not slaves.
misterjosh,
If docs in the UK want to practice medicine, they are essentially slaves to government force.
Luckily, they're free enough that they can quit and change careers, or move to the US. But in the context of their profession, the government enforced "right" to health care means that someone is required to provide it whether they want to or not. And they must provide it in the proscribed manner for the proscribed amount of money.
Rather than acting as free traders, exchanging value for value on an open market, there is an implied gun to their heads. (See OBloodyHell's P.J. O'Rourke quote above.)
You said earlier, "I like helping people as much as the next person, but what gives you the right, the moral authority to take money out of my pocket and give it to somebody else?"
Isn't that a form of partial enslavement to the whims of the government and needs of others? If they have the right to take your money and give it away, your individual rights to your property, the product of your effort, are being violated. They enforce a duty to provide for the needy against your will. They hold a gun to your head and force you to work for others. Isn't that the essence of slavery?
How is it any different for someone who spends much of their life studying and training to be a doctor, and then the state tells them how they can work and for how much because of the needs and supposed "rights" of others?
Whoo-hoo! Holy shit did the hornets' nest go into holy terror! COMMUNIST ALERT - ha-ha!
Hey, I wouldn't have any problem whatsoever if charity coupled with the private insurance system worked for Americans, and no it does not say anywhere in the Constitution that displaying gregarious behavior is divine. However, displaying a cavalier attitude towards the multitudes of uninsured, underinsured and those who suffer and even die as a result of our helter-skelter health coverage system is, by all means, not very Christ-like.
Anywho, if all of you guys are too lazy to do anything about helping your fellow man, I've got one suggestion for you, and it won’t cost you a dime: increase taxes on the wealthy a bit, but leave the middle- and lower-classes citizens alone. A smidgen increase back in the '90s didn't kill us, and nor will nudging it up a bit today. That way, you can keep your money and your caviler attitude and the world benefit’s the same. 'Sides, how does a health insurance CEO who walks away with $1 billion benefit society? He can pay a bit more and still purchase his ivory backscratcher.
From common sense to schizophrenic sense
I live in an area with a volunteer fire department that works great."
Volunteer fire-fighting departments work well in small, less populated communities where fires are relatively infrequent, and where the crew can leave their homes/jobs/commitments and be at the department within a matter of minutes. Large cities, in contrast, require an ONSITE crew with considerable training that can leave in a moment's notice; waiting for volunteer crew members to navigate the streets of Chicago in the event of an emergency, from their home or jobs, is something that would not work. Also, professional fire-fighting, due to the danger and stress, has one of the lowest reported job satisfaction, comparable to police work. In large cities where fire-fighting is much more frequent, much more dangerous than that of a smaller town, keeping a good, reliable crew of volunteers - without the need of constant replacement/training - would be difficult to conjure.
Back in the 19th century, many large cities tried privatized fire-fighting. The way the system worked was this: any household that wanted fire-fighting protection would purchase it from a department of their liking, and place a sign in front of their home/building indicating the coverage. The problem: any building on fire absent of fire-fighting protection did not receive fire-fighting services; the fire-fighters would ride by the ablazed building, noticed it was not protected, thus would move on and allow it to burn - I'M NOT MAKING THIS UP.
Now one can imagine the problems that arose from this: a building allowed to burn was a threat to neighboring ones. From this came the realization that this was a community problem, not an individual one, and this is one of the reasons why privatized fire-fighting was done away with.
Now this of course is no reason to implement large government entities into every aspect of everyday life. Privatized companies who specialize in everyday consumer products/services - cars, computers, Ipods, etc. - have a proven track record in their respective specialties, thus should be left to their means. However, just as the government is not capable of handling every aspect of life, neither is the free market. Smart government planning has demonstrated a wonderful track record in areas such as infrastructure, utilities (private companies coupled with smart regulation) disease prevention, police protection and more. Private companies that have inserted themselves in traditional government functions - infrastructure, military logistics, utilities - actually have a proven track record of inefficiency and higher costs to that of comparable government-run ones; think Halliburton in Iraq, Backwater (now Xe), deregulated utilities, and roads and bridges under private ownership.
Hey Anon (the Christ-like gov't Healthcare supporter):
Your goal is laudible and sounds reasonable, BUT IT WILL NOT WORK. Shouldn't that be your goal? Something that will work? The only way that government run universal Healtchare will work is if politicians, government workers, Healthcare consumers, and Healthcare providers were all Christ-like. They are not, so the net result will (is) something very similar to the haircut analogy.
In addition to the free market solutions, I think something akin to a Healthcare voucher Healthcare-stamps would work for those of limited financial means or those who are confronted with costs that are exhorbitant or uninsurable...
These Healthcare vounchers would/could be similar to food stamps. Food stamps help the poor purchase the food that they need...we don't offer a universal grocery program to ensure that the poor have food to eat. Why, because it would be a disaster? We'd all end up with less food as a result. Sorry man, but it's a fact of human nature....which means your idea(s) would work in a vacuum but not in the real world.
"Your goal is laudible and sounds reasonable, BUT IT WILL NOT WORK."
Wow, I'm impressed with your worldliness. Man, you got me, you're right, universal health coverage will not work anywhere - except Japan, France, Sweden, Germany... oh wait.
Now are there shitty systems such as those found in Canada, Britain, Australia? Defiantly - they're all different. Would I trust America's cancer treatment over the rest of the world? Absolutely. And is it possible to deal with America's uninsured/underinsured plus high costs? Open your mouth, I'm all ears.
But demonstrating a caviler attitude towards the less fortunate - "They can't get treated? Oh well, the hell with them..." - is less than Christ-like.
Anyway, as been mentioned before, the road to improving health care can be achieved by nabbing a few pennies from those who can most afford them. What else would Joyce Myers need that extra sack of money laying around for - an extra marble commode?
Yup, man cannot serve both God and mammon.
Sick of the fruity monikers
Anon, absolutely no one is denying that there isn't a problem, and/or that they don't care about the problem. There is a problem, and it needs to be resolved. We just disagree on the solution. (And, I'm not arguing that everyone should have to fend for themselves.)
I'm arguing that there is a lot of evidence to suggest that the government is already directly responsible for the assortment of problems with Healthcare and their over-reaching and direct involvement is the culprit. This will only get worse if the answer is now for the government to just try to over-reach a little more.
What part of this haircut analogy don't you agree with? How and why is it off the mark?
Your tax the wealthy a little more won't work either. They will find ways to shelter/hide the income. Your assumption that you have to have universal healthcare coverage to help the poor receive Healthcare is off mark.
Too many people turn to direct government involvement to solve the world's problems. I'm not sure how we got to that mindset, but it doesn't seem to be a good one. You should inherently distrust or be skeptical of any solutions offered by governments made up of men...for the same reason that you don't appear to trust men to provide Healthcare to the poor of their own free will. If anything, you should fear those men with power more than your selfish neighbor.
I'm convinced that many of the problems that you are concerned about could be solved, if you would just be willing to try something outside of government meddling and dictating from on high.
"I'm arguing that there is a lot of evidence to suggest that the government is already directly responsible for the assortment of problems with Healthcare and their over-reaching and direct involvement is the culprit."
Oh, absolutely. The most free market health care system in the world with highest health care costs around. Go ahead, let those drug companies charge what they want, let them plow more money into lobbying and PR over R&D.
"Your tax the wealthy a little more won't work either. They will find ways to shelter/hide the income."
Certainly, it didn't work in the '50s, '60s or '70s either, not with those exorbitant taxes. Let’s see… the world’s biggest lending nation in those decades vs. the biggest debter nation since the ’80s… oh, you got me. Nope, higher taxes on the rich doesn't work anywhere else in the developed world either. Stick up for the health care nobles' rights, won't you?
"Too many people turn to direct government involvement to solve the world's problems."
For once I actually agree with you. I think the government should have abandoned the TVA or the Interstate Highway System. Why? Because electrification and roads greatly sped up previously undeveloped hill billy enclaves to 1st world standards. And what did those neanderthals bring? The Southern cultural touch: NASCAR, country music, mega churches, impulsive urge to buy junk. Milton Friedman could have won a 2nd Nobel Peace Prize by looking into this...
"I'm convinced that many of the problems that you are concerned about could be solved, if you would just be willing to try something outside of government meddling"
I mentioned I'm all ears, I'm open to different solutions (if they work). Now what's your answer?
Anon: What part of this haircut analogy don't you agree with? How and why is it off the mark? How does what you are suggesting keep that scenario from unfolding? I'd argue it already describes our "free market" system pretty well...
Calling our Healthcare system a "free market system." That's more than a stretch. Being the "most" free market system does not equal free market system. It's like saying someone is sane because he is the "most" sane out of a group of insane...
I am skeptical that you are really interested in alternatives, but you might read Whole Foods CEO John Mackey's op-ed in the WSJ yesterday. (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204251404574342170072865070.html) It appears to be a good start. I would add to his list to get the government and the AMA out of the business of determining who and how many people get to practice medicine. Remove much of the regulation and stranglehold that groups like the AMA have put on scope of practice.
I never realized that there was a correlation between country music and Interstates... interesting.
Well hello! I announced my retirement on a previous post, but somebody is still shouting at the black hole voice mail. Oh well, don't want to disappoint loyal jabber-jaws...
Haircuts…? What place does this simpleton economic analogy have with - mullet, skin head or midwestern goatee-type? Well if you want the free market paradise, go move to Somalia - totally free market; no social spending, no government interference, total free market. You'd love it.
Anyway, I previously saw that article you gave me on MP's blog, read, and even left some praiseworthy comments on it. However, it seems that not only have you so far flunked in tax policy, foreign countries' social policies, plus maintain a 5-second memory retention of government social programs that do work, it's additionally disappointing that you fail to gander any original ideas: "Ohh... I don't know. Open up the markets more, I guess." BTW - know anybody on Blue Cross/Blue Shield? Their rates are jumping over 30% - ha-ha! Why don't you go check out one of those experimental sandboxes Milton Friedman and his Chicago Boys played with, such as Argentina; maybe you should help Paul Bremer, a total free market stud. Judging with how well he did with Iraq, maybe he should have tossed aside the Keynesian principles, and planned Europe's post-WWII development. Remember - communists at the back gate, so don't make any mistakes.
Anyways, why is it so imperative to ensure adequate (didn’t say equal) health care for citizens, just as the government ensured higher safety standards in cars in the '70s and '80s. Because just as seat belts, padded dash boards and sturdier windshields have saved lives, so does good health care; and without either present, there would be a lot of ripples throughout human life. Some of the people you know would not exist; you may not exist. Gets deep, doesn’t it?
Billy Mayes from the after-life
"I never realized that there was a correlation between country music and Interstates... interesting."
Thank you once again for demonstrating to the world that not only are Americans dead ignorant of worldly matters, they ain't got a feint clue of their own history. "Ohhh-hooo... I'm too stupid to know the South was an undeveloped backwater before the 1950s. Our founding fathers built our freeways with the blood of the Brits.; Tennessee got her God-given dams and electricity from the good graces of the Du Ponts and JP Morgan. Don’t tell me about that crap of the Interstate Highway System benefiting Wal-Mart - she delivered her goods to her crappy stores via flying semis powered by pixie powder long before.”
“You stupid commie, the government can’t build shit. We’d all have roads built from discarded Tinker Toys, we’d be driving down them in Soviet-built big wheels if they got their hands on concrete.”
I won't get into the morality of whether humans "deserve" health care. But given that this is an economics site...
What would be the rationale of providing affordable and (probably) subsidized healthcare to a given citizen? Revenue.
The citizen is a profit center. Would it not make sense to protect the investment, lest the profit center die. Or worse-- become a cash OUTFLOW for the state, falling into SS/Medicaid due to incapacitation/disability.
Perhaps other countries are smarter on this point, and understand it inately.
Lastly, if the author doesn't state unequivacally that Medicare/Medicaid/SS should all be eliminated, he has no credibility. (on this point of what a human does or does not deserve, vis-a-vis state-provided protections)
One day a poor pregnant woman came to A conservative republican.
“Oh, wise one” cried the woman. “My husband was killed in an auto accident. I cannot support this child in my belly. I want to have an abortion. ”
The Conservative gazed upon the poor woman and replied “No. Woman. All human beings have a right to life. Go and have your baby and forget about an abortion”
So the woman had her baby.
The baby was born gravely sick.
It needed a doctor and expensive medical care.
So the woman returned to the Conservative Republican
“Oh wise one. My baby is sick. My child needs expensive medical care. Can you help me.”
The Conservative lectured the woman sternly:
“Heath care is not a right. It is no ones fault but your own if you can’t afford the pay”
The newborn child died after much suffering
One day a poor pregnant woman came to A conservative republican.
“Oh, wise one” cried the woman. “My husband was killed in an auto accident. I cannot support this child in my belly. I want to have an abortion. ”
The Conservative gazed upon the poor woman and replied “No. Woman. All human beings have a right to life. Go and have your baby and forget about an abortion”
So the woman had her baby.
The baby was born gravely sick.
It needed a doctor and expensive medical care.
So the woman returned to the Conservative Republican
“Oh wise one. My baby is sick. My child needs expensive medical care. Can you help me.”
The Conservative lectured the woman sternly:
“Health care is not a right. It is no ones fault but your own if you can’t afford the pay”
The newborn child died after much suffering
There is one flaw in the whole argument in favor of for-profit "healthcare."
Health is not a market. Unlike the market for hats, coats, haircuts, and the like, there is no market for health. There is a market for sick-care, but it is a desperate market. In fact, if you fail to provide healthcare for your kids, you go to jail. A market has to have choice.
The problem with the US medical model is that it is perfectly designed to have ever-increasing costs. Hospitals and doctors are motivated to keep people sick longer, keep them in hospital beds longer, so that they can bill more. They are motivated to double the price of everything to off-set all the people who fail to pay or go bankrupt. They are also motivated to ration services by ensuring that there is not enough doctors and hospitals to serve the entire population, thereby keeping prices up. Nobody anywhere in this system will be motivated to pay for pro-active healthcare -- education, community health, free vaccination clinics, etc. -- which is where the real savings are.
Meanwhile, the insurance companies are motivated to charge the highest rates possible while providing the least services possible.
A public system, as virtually all other western countries have, has a natural downward pressure on costs. The taxpayer wants low taxes but also good health. This translates into pressure to keep costs down, while providing both health-care and sick-care services at the highest quality possible. Since the politicians making the decisions about the medical system also have to use this system, they are motivated to make good decisions.
This is why the US ranks 50th in the world for the health of its people. Japan, which spends less than half per person than the US, ranks first. Canada, the UK, Germany, France, and other "socialized" countries always rank in the top 10.
Americans tend to use grand philosophical statements more than real statistics. The stance against socialized medicine strikes me as something akin to a religious tenet, rather than a rational argument.
The bald truth is that socialized medicine is much, much more cost effective and health effective than for-profit healthcare. Since health is not a market, there is really no other way to do it. That is why countries with socialized medicine don't lobby for a for-profit system.
In countries with socialized medicine, healthcare *is* a right. It's part of what you Americans call "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." It's like habeas corpus and the right to vote. It is a right because we as a people decided it was a right. Like any right, it is coupled with responsibilities, which are pro-active healthy lifestyles promoted through the public health education system. And like any right, it is carefully monitored for abuse, from above or below.
I'm glad I live in a country with a real healthcare system, one without escalating costs, overpriced medicine, self-satisfied doctors, and strangling insurance systems. That is real freedom.
So the world is watching. Will the US stand up for its people and make itself a better country, one that we who are not American would feel good about working with? Or will it give in to the rich and self-centered lobbies that strangle its democracy?
Stay tuned.
I also live in a country with a real health-care system. But you can talk to Americans until you're blue in the face, show them statistics that prove people are better off in the European countries and Canada, and they will only search desperately for any anecdotal evidence that they can find to disprove this. They haven't got the maturity to understand that yes, a society is responsible for all its members' well-being in areas such as health. They all think they're John Waynes tough enough to take care of themselves. Their selfishness is scary. The United States will soon find out, however, that its inefficient, poorly run health-care system is going to bankrupt it.
I'd be very suspicious of the studies that supposedly show Americans have better cancer survivor rates than anyone else.
International organizations rank the U.S. pretty far down the list in terms of outcomes.
Socialized Medicine? Our system is already socialized, that is part of the problem. What we have is third party payment system in our country from either government (50%) or insurance (40%)with a small amount private payments. Our payment system is all ready the example presented in this article. Whats immoral is is how some people are paying and not getting care and others are getting care subsidized by others.
When you think of it there really is no way that health care can be anything other than a socialized system. Individuals can not make financial choices as to what health care they will need and heath care also is also something that is needed for society. Think elevators and TB. So what is needed a system where everybody pays according to their ability and receives according to their needs. Kind of pinkco but it's what we are stuck with.
The trick is getting the socialized system to work as best it can with human nature being what it is. The truth is that our system can be much better and it will take Government to do it.
If Socialized Medicine is immoral it's certainly been around for quite awhile. If I remember right, the bones of the Neanderthal show evidence of Socialized Health Care. Check this link http://factsanddetails.com/world.php?itemid=1475&catid=56&subcatid=361
It seems that when these guys got injured they would be nursed back to heath and if disable they would be taken care of by their compatriots.
I think what's going on here is resentment that, somehow, something is being taken from one person and given to someone undeserving. This is kind of ironic, since in our present system, working people without health insurance are being forced to subsidizing the premiums for the people with health insurance.
Then again, maybe this is the point of all the upset. The people with insurance don't want to loose their free ride, forced payments to themselves, from all the illegals and others without health insurance.
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