# Bush Set to Veto Kids' Health Insurance **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 16, 2007, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998 "2007-07-16T16:49:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/81 "2007-07-17T18:21:52Z")
[QUOTE=Sam Stone] Isn’t that a good reason for leaving this kind of coverage up to the states? Why should the federal government be involved here? What is it about this problem that requires a federal government to solve it? [/QUOTE] Because the states were doing such a good job with it before SCHIP? If the Feds and the states were fighting to see who could be first to insure uninsured children, I’d have no objection to letting the states have first crack; I’m no Federal absolutist. But they weren’t. What we have here is a Federal-state partnership: both pony up some of the money, the Feds make some of the rules, but the states actually administer it. Seems to work pretty well. Can’t see a reason to undo that over some states’-rights purity principle. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/82 "2007-07-17T18:27:35Z")
[QUOTE=John Mace] Can you back that up with a cite? Especially the part about cigars. [/QUOTE] No. I’m in a car on my iphone (how’s that for an excuse) and I don’t know how to do links. If you google “ten dollar cigar tax” the sixth link down should show you today’s article in the St. Petersburg Times. Another part of this bill puts a 50% tax onwharehoused cigars that would have to ne paid before they go out to retail. This bill is an open attack on the cigar industry designed to be vetoed so the usual crowd can complain that Bush hates children. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/83 "2007-07-17T18:27:45Z")
[QUOTE=Scylla] I think it should be vetoed. The bill itself is fundamentally dishonest. It’s simply a legislative attack on tobacco cynically labelled as an attempt to “help children.” [/quote] This is a statement about the motivation of the bill’s proponents. Do you have a cite? > [@](#): > > the real target isn’t so much cigarettes as cigars. Ditto this. I’m having a hard time believing anyone really bothers with attacking cigars. I rarely see anyone smoke a cigar anymore. > [@](#): > > Most importantly, I hate the obvious cynical and dishonest tactic of linking these things this way so that when a bad and dishonest bill gets vetoed, the knee jerk Bush bashers can go crying about how Bush doesn’t care about the children, which, by the way, is probably the ultimate ppont of this whole stupid bill anyway. I’d be delighted to be proven wrong by seeing Bush sign this bill after all. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/84 "2007-07-17T18:36:51Z")
[QUOTE=Scylla] This bill is an open attack on the cigar industry designed to be vetoed so the usual crowd can complain that Bush hates children. [/QUOTE] Ain’t enough rolleyes. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/85 "2007-07-17T18:43:05Z")
**Martin Hyde:** Two problems with your argument: 1. It hasn’t been established that smoking creates a negative externality. The studies I keep being refered to seem dishonest in the extreme, counting only the costs of health care for smokers without considering the offsetting savings to the state when people die young. 2. It’s a dangerous slippery slope you go down when you use externalities to justify restrictions of freedom when those externalities only exist because of a mandatory government program in the first place. I’m fully in agreement that if I voluntarily trade with someone, I should pay for the external costs to 3rd parties of my actions. But if that trade is _imposed_ on me, then also making me pay for the externalities of that trade is not really fair. For example, let’s say that the government made univeristy education free. Well hey, now that the state is paying for my education, does it not have a right to ensure that students are studying properly? So now maybe we can justify mandatory curfews for college students and forced study times. If government suddenly went into the auto insurance business, and provided free auto insurance for all, a whole host of new externalities would be created that are now dealt with by sliding rate scales. Would you support a tax on the elderly to make up for their higher accident rates? Banning fast cars? Making the driving age 25, on the grounds that young people have a disproportionate number of accidents and therefore are burdening the rest of society? Mandating that everyone have to go through government driver training programs? Taking away the driver’s licenses of those who have poor driving records? All of these would correct the new externalities imposed on us by single-payer auto insurance. They’d also significantly reduce our freedoms. Forcing me into a government program, then making me pay for the ‘externalities’ of my lifestyle because I’m now in a government program, is not correcting any sort of market force. It’s simply restricting my freedom even more to save the government money. In a private system, health insurers can charge more for smokers. I’m free then to either go uninsured, or to quit smoking, or to pony up the extra money as a consequence of my habit. Nothing wrong with that. If the government controls health care, I have no choice. If there’s an externality, it’s the government’s problem, not mine. Read Hayek’s “The Road to Serfdom”. He explains this well. Regulations create more regulations. State control of your private life suddenly gives the state an interest in your private affairs. Now there is rationale to control your behaviour. If the government guarantees your job, suddenly tardiness and absences become criminal offenses. If the government provides you a free home, suddently it has an interest in your maintenance schedules and your cleaning practices. This is a very dangerous road to go down. Public health care is one of the biggest ways in which we wind up ceding much of our freedom to the government for the sake of safety from financial loss. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/86 "2007-07-17T18:44:56Z")
[QUOTE=RTFirefly] Ain’t enough rolleyes. [/QUOTE] Yeaaaahhhh. I stand corrected. I didn’t notice how you mentioned tobacco in your OP, and presented the full story. It’s not as if you simply tried to make it out like Bush was against health care for children. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/87 "2007-07-17T18:50:51Z")
[QUOTE=Scylla] No. I’m in a car on my iphone (how’s that for an excuse) and I don’t know how to do links. If you google “ten dollar cigar tax” the sixth link down should show you today’s article in the St. Petersburg Times. Another part of this bill puts a 50% tax onwharehoused cigars that would have to ne paid before they go out to retail. This bill is an open attack on the cigar industry designed to be vetoed so the usual crowd can complain that Bush hates children. [/QUOTE] Didn’t work for me. I also went to the SPTimes website, and couldn’t find anything either. ---
**Author:** ![Renob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8c91f0/32.png) [@Renob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Renob)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/88 "2007-07-17T18:52:05Z")
It certainly seems that **Scylla** has a point about the cigars: [http://www.sptimes.com/2007/07/17/Business/Cigarmakers\_in\_a\_pani.shtml](http://www.sptimes.com/2007/07/17/Business/Cigarmakers_in_a_pani.shtml) I wouldn’t say that this bill is mainly targeting cigars. Instead, because of poorly written language, it seems that premium cigars may see their taxes go up by around 20,000%. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/89 "2007-07-17T18:56:23Z")
[QUOTE=John Mace] Didn’t work for me. I also went to the SPTimes website, and couldn’t find anything either. [/QUOTE] I’m sorry. How about I just promise you it’s true ? ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/90 "2007-07-17T18:59:05Z")
Thanks Renob! That’s the one. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/91 "2007-07-17T19:10:22Z")
[QUOTE=Scylla] Yeaaaahhhh. I stand corrected. I didn’t notice how you mentioned tobacco in your OP, and presented the full story. It’s not as if you simply tried to make it out like Bush was against health care for children. [/QUOTE] Ohmigoshgolli - I didn’t C&P the entire article. My bad, so sorry, how _could_ I have. Now, since you’ve done nothing to back this up: > [@Scylla](#): > > This bill is an open attack on the cigar industry designed to be vetoed so the usual crowd can complain that Bush hates children. There _still_ ain’t enough rolleyes. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/92 "2007-07-17T19:23:40Z")
[QUOTE=RTFirefly] Now, since you’ve done nothing to back this up: There _still_ ain’t enough rolleyes. [/QUOTe] I got some for you. Pink and hairy. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Moto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9de0a6/32.png) [@Mr.Moto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Moto)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/93 "2007-07-17T19:28:09Z")
What - you can’t accept the fact that nice sounding bills can be badly flawed? Remind me of that next time a “Patriot Act” comes up. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![PuppyEars](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a5b964/32.png) [@PuppyEars](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PuppyEars)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/94 "2007-07-17T19:37:52Z")
[QUOTE=Renob] A family of four making around $62,000 (three times the FPL) certainly isn’t poor. A family of four making almost $83,000 (four times the FPL) is without a doubt well into the middle class. Do these folks really deserve to have the government provide health insurance for them, paid for by taxes levied disproportionately on poor people? Look into that and then get back to us. [/QUOTE] Mmm, sounds like you know a lot about FPL. Thanks for your helpful comment. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/95 "2007-07-17T19:47:52Z")
[QUOTE=Scylla] I got some for you. Pink and hairy. [/QUOTE] Well, _that_ certainly substantiates your claim. [QUOTE=Mr. Moto] What - you can’t accept the fact that nice sounding bills can be badly flawed? Remind me of that next time a “Patriot Act” comes up. 😉 [/QUOTE] Not only that, but I can even accept that their ostensible and real purposes differ by light-years. I grew up in the shadow of the Beltway, after all. Here, friend **Scylla** has claimed multiple layers of ostensible and real purposes of this bill. On one level, he says, it’s ostensibly about helping children, but its real purpose is to harm the cigar industry. And on the next, it’s only ostensibly about that (“designed to be vetoed”), and its real purpose is to get Bush to veto it so that everyone can scream about what a meanie Bush is. I’m eager to see how he backs this up. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Renob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8c91f0/32.png) [@Renob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Renob)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/96 "2007-07-17T19:52:06Z")
[QUOTE=PuppyEars] Mmm, sounds like you know a lot about FPL. Thanks for your helpful comment. [/QUOTE] So you think a family making $80,000 should get government health care, paid for by raising taxes disproportionately paid by poor people? ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/97 "2007-07-17T21:59:29Z")
[QUOTE=Renob] It certainly seems that **Scylla** has a point about the cigars: [http://www.sptimes.com/2007/07/17/Business/Cigarmakers\_in\_a\_pani.shtml](http://www.sptimes.com/2007/07/17/Business/Cigarmakers_in_a_pani.shtml) I wouldn’t say that this bill is mainly targeting cigars. Instead, because of poorly written language, it seems that premium cigars may see their taxes go up by around 20,000%. [/QUOTE] Yes, but is it because of poorly written language? Sounds like the lawmakers knew exactly what they were doing. I do hope Bush vetoes this bill. If we, as a society, decide we need to fund more healthcare “for children” then we, as a society, should pay for it just like we pay for most things-- everyone chips in. I absolutely hate these so-called sin taxes or taxes that are targeted at one group of people. An exception I would make is a use tax, like a gasoline tax, which can be a good proxy for road usage. ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/98 "2007-07-17T22:21:56Z")
[QUOTE=Renob] Again, people at 300%, 400%, or 500% of the federal poverty level are not on “the lower end off the income scale.” Those are the people whom the Democrats want to make eligible for SCHIP. [/quote] Whatever gave you the idea that I slavishly support what you claim is the Democrat’s position on this? > [@](#): > > No, he doesn’t want them to get essentially free government health care. He has always promoted plans that would help folks better afford health insurance. You dragged the 300-400% number in, I didn’t. I am speaking of the many who pay like $2000 in income tax. That’s a taxable income of $18300. Counting the standard deduction and exemptions for a family of, say, 4 that comes to about $45000 gross. Do you really think that tax credits equaling maybe $250 to $400 are going to be an incentive for that person to rush out and buy health insurance costing a couple hundred dollars a month? ---
**Author:** ![MsRobyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/90ced4/32.png) [@MsRobyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsRobyn)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/99 "2007-07-17T22:57:35Z")
[QUOTE=Renob] So you think a family making $80,000 should get government health care, paid for by raising taxes disproportionately paid by poor people? [/QUOTE] I’ve been stewing on this for two days now, and it’s becoming obvious that you don’t know what you’re talking about. Families who make up to 200% of the poverty line are eligible for free coverage. Families that make more than that _pay for the insurance_. They don’t get it for free. At the highest levels, the premiums are $150 per month per child, with co-pays that are roughly in line with private insurance. BTW, the $150 per month per child is what it costs the state. (This is for Pennsylvania; the information is [here](http://www.chipcoverspakids.com/upload/admin/File/CAK_Premiums_2007.pdf), and it’s a PDF file.) The whole point of the CHIP program is to insure children whose parents don’t have access to other coverage. This includes the self-employed those whose group coverage premiums are otherwise unaffordable. If you live in an area where the cost of living is very high, paying even $150 per month per child is a hell of a lot more attractive than paying more than that for group coverage that may still have a high deductible and high co-pays that still keep adequate care out of reach. But hey, you can believe what you want. Robin ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2007, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998/100 "2007-07-17T22:59:59Z")
[QUOTE=Sam Stone] **Martin Hyde:** Two problems with your argument: 1. It hasn’t been established that smoking creates a negative externality. The studies I keep being refered to seem dishonest in the extreme, counting only the costs of health care for smokers without considering the offsetting savings to the state when people die young. [/quote] I don’t rule out the _possibility_ that smoking might be a net positive from a strictly dollars and cents view. However, I think the reason studies clearly link costs and not positives is, the costs _can_ be clearly linked. The positives can’t. You can’t clearly demonstrate that someone who dies earlier from tobacco related lung cancer ends up costing society less because we have no idea when they would have died otherwise or any idea how many resources they would consume (or how many they would produce.) Some people who smoke don’t get lung cancer, instead they get more chronic conditions such as emphysema which they live with for years and years, sometimes into their 70s and beyond, constantly draining resources and lighting up. > [@](#): > > 1. It’s a dangerous slippery slope you go down when you use externalities to justify restrictions of freedom when those externalities only exist because of a mandatory government program in the first place. I’m fully in agreement that if I voluntarily trade with someone, I should pay for the external costs to 3rd parties of my actions. But if that trade is _imposed_ on me, then also making me pay for the externalities of that trade is not really fair. It’s an excise tax on tobacco products, the trade that is creating the externality is the money for tobacco product trade. If you don’t want to engage in that trade, you don’t have to do so, no one forces you to buy tobacco products. > [@](#): > > For example, let’s say that the government made univeristy education free. Well hey, now that the state is paying for my education, does it not have a right to ensure that students are studying properly? So now maybe we can justify mandatory curfews for college students and forced study times. I’ve asserted we have to strive for what is reasonable and what is desirable in addition to what is simply fair (ie associating all negative externality costs with all transactions that create them.) > [@](#): > > If government suddenly went into the auto insurance business, and provided free auto insurance for all, a whole host of new externalities would be created that are now dealt with by sliding rate scales. Would you support a tax on the elderly to make up for their higher accident rates? Banning fast cars? Making the driving age 25, on the grounds that young people have a disproportionate number of accidents and therefore are burdening the rest of society? Mandating that everyone have to go through government driver training programs? Taking away the driver’s licenses of those who have poor driving records? I don’t think I’d support any of those things, no. None of which are analogous to an excise tax. An excise tax doesn’t remove your freedom to do anything, it just makes you pay more for a given product. > [@](#): > > Forcing me into a government program, then making me pay for the ‘externalities’ of my lifestyle because I’m now in a government program, is not correcting any sort of market force. It’s simply restricting my freedom even more to save the government money. > > In a private system, health insurers can charge more for smokers. I’m free then to either go uninsured, or to quit smoking, or to pony up the extra money as a consequence of my habit. Nothing wrong with that. > > If the government controls health care, I have no choice. If there’s an externality, it’s the government’s problem, not mine. > > Read Hayek’s “The Road to Serfdom”. He explains this well. Regulations create more regulations. State control of your private life suddenly gives the state an interest in your private affairs. Now there is rationale to control your behaviour. If the government guarantees your job, suddenly tardiness and absences become criminal offenses. If the government provides you a free home, suddently it has an interest in your maintenance schedules and your cleaning practices. This is a very dangerous road to go down. Public health care is one of the biggest ways in which we wind up ceding much of our freedom to the government for the sake of safety from financial loss. I’ve quite clearly stated in several recent threads I’m no fan of publicly funded health care. I think private health care is a better system. However there is a strong bit of the realist in me and I realize that certain government welfare programs are here to stay, at least for the foreseeable future, and within that future I’d rather people like smokers are paying for them out of their discretionary spending money than workers out of their income or property owners out of their property. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-set-to-veto-kids-health-insurance/411998.md?page=6)