Healthcare is NOT a right.

Tommy Jefferson wrote:

The failure of industry to moderate their profit taking, and the inability of previous administrations

You realize it's illegal for industry to moderate their profit taking?

It'd be foolish to claim that we have a great system now. I would just rather try to make a great system (actually, to allow a great system to develop) rather than settle for a mediocre one, which is what the health plan will give us.

The only proven way to constrain costs is through a competitive market. There isn't much of one now, and there will be even less of one if the health plan passes.

Ways to make the market more competitive and to lower costs:

1. Standardize the insurance products. People can't comparison shop if they don't know what they're looking at. Have a set number of plans, type A-J (or something like that). Allow people to add riders for just about anything that they specifically want that's not in the plan.

2. Open up state borders so people can shop anywhere. This is problematic without standardized plans, because nobody knows what they're getting. If real comparisons are easy to make, then the competitive pressure to lower costs will be far greater.

3. Change health plans to insurance plans. Cover basic preventative medicine, and then have a deductible. People will actually pay attention to whether they're using the health system in an efficient way. Nowadays, if you ask how much a procedure costs, people simply assume that you don't have insurance. If it's considered weird to ask what something costs, then you know there's very little market pressure on prices.

4. We need more NPs. Ultimately, people should be getting a lot of their basic care at Walmart or CVS. For much of what we do, we don't actually need doctors.

5. We do need medical malpractice reform, whatever the Congressional Budget Office says. Their report was attacking a straw man. The real problem isn't that doctors shouldn't be liable for negligence, but that the system is too expensive. Contingency fees and big jury awards make our malpractice compensation system too systematically expensive. Every state should have damage caps. We can also reduce defensive medicine by carving out a lot of per se rules about certain discretionary choices that cannot count as malpractice.

6. Outside of reforms like these, there's room for government at the margins. Some people are simply not capable of doing work that would pay for their medical expenses. They lack the skills, or their condition is serious, or it's some combination of the two. I have no problem with government programs to help these people.

joe mcblow wrote:

Read the Hippocratic Oath lately?

Yeah. It says not to give abortions.

Healthcare is NOT a right (yet)

If Obama has his way, it will be a right. Just like education and police protection is a right in America.

Actually, police protection is not a right.

What kind of beaten down ingrained slave mentality is that?

Pay the govt 1/2 your income in taxes (which we do when all taxes are considered) and expect nothing for it. No health care, no education, no retirement income?

WE cannot afford to have suckers like you in our society any longer

uncleB wrote:

What kind of beaten down ingrained slave mentality is that?

Pay the govt 1/2 your income in taxes (which we do when all taxes are considered) and expect nothing for it. No health care, no education, no retirement income?

WE cannot afford to have suckers like you in our society any longer

Solution: lower our taxes AND our expectations about government :)

It's not a right, but it is "correct"

I am getting very weary of people always out for themselves. Ants have more social conscience than many humans. No one is guaranteed anything but isn't there room for some humanism, even amongst letsrun posters?

I envision that many of you that post health care is not a right are the same college kids or recent grads that think an iPhone and a BMW are a right.

Once Healthcare becomes a right, where does it stop? The law now is that hospitals cannot refuse treatment for someone who comes in to the emergency room, whether they can pay or not. Once we say that healthcare is a right, perhaps we should also say that good housing is a right, a reliable car is a right, a college education is a right, and on and on.

To pay for all of these "rights", we'll have to tax the rich... who already pay the vast bulk of the taxes in the USA and create most of the jobs... Exessive taxes on those who are the job creators is a bad idea if you want a vibrant, healthy economy.

What part of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" don't you understand? How is medical care equal to pork bellies?

DIIXC wrote: I envision that many of you that post health care is not a right are the same college kids or recent grads that think an iPhone and a BMW are a right.

Only because college kids are overrepresented on this site.

But if we want to go down this road, I'll see your empty speculation and raise you an anecdote: the most spoiled young people I know are the ones who think we should have universal healthcare. They're either very rich, or they're wasting their 20s partying and working crap jobs instead of starting a career, and they resent that they have to pay for health insurance or take the risk of not having it. The most responsible young people I know, who paid their own way through college, do not want the health plan.

DougC wrote:

Once Healthcare becomes a right, where does it stop? The law now is that hospitals cannot refuse treatment for someone who comes in to the emergency room, whether they can pay or not. Once we say that healthcare is a right, perhaps we should also say that good housing is a right, a reliable car is a right, a college education is a right, and on and on.

To pay for all of these "rights", we'll have to tax the rich... who already pay the vast bulk of the taxes in the USA and create most of the jobs... Exessive taxes on those who are the job creators is a bad idea if you want a vibrant, healthy economy.

Poor rich!

Top 1% have more wealth than the bottom 92%. Yeah, even including taxes. Poor babies.

Would you rather be in the 1% or in the bottom 92%? I thought so.

When the percentage of those without healthcare reaches where you are in the spectrum of income levels, then you'll care. The percentage is drifting up every year.

800 dude wrote:

The most responsible young people I know, who paid their own way through college, do not want the health plan.

I paid my own way through university and I support a strong public option.

Red Glare wrote:

What part of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" don't you understand? How is medical care equal to pork bellies?

I really wish I knew what the hell it is you're talking about.

DIIXC wrote:

Poor rich!

Top 1% have more wealth than the bottom 92%. Yeah, even including taxes. Poor babies.

Would you rather be in the 1% or in the bottom 92%? I thought so.

When the percentage of those without healthcare reaches where you are in the spectrum of income levels, then you'll care. The percentage is drifting up every year.

This is one of the vilest posts yet, amd it betrays the real intentions of the socialists. They despise the rich and want to take their money for themselves. They believe that rich people are morally inferior because they are rich and that the rich should have no rights, only social responsibilities. Their worldview is one of sheer malevolence, not humanitarianism.

Maybe the government should stop funding medical schools and medical studies then. Should doctors pay a million dollars to go to school and then charge $2,000 for a physical exam?

There are only three rights in this country.

1. Life

2. Liberty

3. Pursuit of Happiness

Anything else is not a right, and must be earned. This has not changed for over 200 years, despite what some of you are saying. Moreover, healthcare will never be a right in this country, whether this healthcare plan passes or not.

I believe you will find all the major entitlement programs will come crashing down in the next 25 years no matter how hard they are propped up. Demographics alone will handle that. It is not a matter of wanting or wishing for a different outcome. There won't be enough producers to support the non-producers. It is that simple. This healthcare plan will only accelerate the inevitable by a few years. At some point, there will be a run on Social Security and on the healthcare system, and just like a run on banks, there won't be enough money or resources to handle the giant sucking sound you will hear.

Those in favor of these entitlement programs have always counted on there being enough producers of wealth to sustain the system through their lifetimes. But we are nearing the point where producers of wealth are overburdened and will take their businesses and jobs elsewhere, or simply give up. When this happens, that reliable assumption will finally not hold true, and the utterly dependent public will be looking around for someone to blame, never figuring out in time that they should be blaming themselves.

In Japanese, there is no word for "rights". The closest word is "duty". And people in Japan have universal health care.

Carnivore 69 wrote:

This has not changed for over 200 years, despite what some of you are saying.

Tell that to women and non-whites.

The Japanese also eat live fish, think suicide is honorable, enjoy sniffing schoolgirl's panties, and had an 11 year stock market decline. Maybe we should do those things too.