Yes, what it really all boils down to are morals. It takes a lot to drive by a car accident and say to yourself, “serves them right.” It tends to be easier when you’re at a distance, when stopping isn’t an option. Or when you’re on a message board and nothing really matters.
The moral debate is very deep and very complex, and at this point I just don’t have the energy to put together a sufficient essay about the importance of member contribution to society, and how each member can contribute slightly different amounts but still be okay.
Without meaning to sound condescending, it feels a bit like I have to go back and explain we using fire was a good idea, in order to get everyone up to speed on using electricity. Said another way, I have survived life in a socialist country, and so have you.
What he said was an absolute - it is wrong to tax him (or anyone) to pay for someone else’s health care. I don’t believe that, nor do any liberals I know of. I think it is wrong to pay 0, but it is also wrong to force someone to pay 100%. The right level between those two is going to differ among people. But it is not the same thing.
Progressive taxation is all about getting those who can afford it to pay more. I think the Bank CEOs can afford to pay a few percent more without freezing to death. In any case, the argument that because it is possible to tax someone to the point of pain taxing anyone anything is wrong is immoral and dishonest. If you find a society that does what you claim we can both be outraged, until then the argument is morally bankrupt.
So, you’re saying that because we can’t afford to post guards at safe suburban schools we shouldn’t post them at dangerous urban schools with a record of problems?
It would be lovely if we could all take up a big collection and pay for healthcare for the poor. But since that doesn’t seem to be happening for any number of reasons, I’d just as soon not have people die. And you guys seemed happy to force me to pay for Iraq - though I must admit that to keep costs down you didn’t provide the armor the soldiers needed for quite some time. Poor people dying because of not enough support, soldiers dying because of not enough support, at least you’re consistent.
Thanks for posting the links on Medicaid fraud. The sheer waste of that program if trimmed could help pay for the poor that don’t have Medicaid. To get Medicaid you have to bring home less then 800 a month.
Medicare is much better managed. Medicare is for seniors and the disabled that worked and paid in.
Medicaid is for the poor who have less then 800 dollars a month income or the disabled that did not pay in. Medicaid is free. Medicare is not.
On Medicare you have a monthly premium and copays on medical treatment. You also have to pay a premium for Part D if you want prescription coverage and then copays at the pharmacy.
On Medicaid, where the most waste is seen, is because it is totally free. Mothers using emergency rooms for routine medical care because they don’t have a primary care physician. My friend I told you about that took an ambulance to the ER for gas is also exploited by the ER. Everytime she goes to the ER which is often as she has Hypochondria she gets an IV put in. That is an 800 dollar procedure paid in full by Medicaid. Do they need to put an IV in everyone that goes to the ER? No, but if you let them they will and it helps to build that new Cardiac wing.
I called the fraud line and reported when they wanted to do a spinal tap on her when all she had was a head cold. Luckily she said no but she has had every test known to man done to her to jack up the bill. Shame on the hospital for exploiting her.
So the hospitals need to stop taking advantage of Medicaid and Medicaid patients need to pay partially for extra services. They should not use ambulances as taxi’s. They need to go to a GP for a head cold, etc.
Medicare Fraud needs to be cut also but because people on Medicare have co-pays they don’t abuse the system as badly. I won’t pay a 50 dollar copay to go to the ER when I can see my GP for 25.
My Mom is in Medical billing and I have learned a lot through her. She gets disgusted by the sheer waste. The waste alone could take care of the people that fall between the cracks.
It also takes a lot of nerve to barge into someone’s home at gunpoint and confiscate their money. It tends to be a lot easier to do it from the comfortable distance afforded by the government monopoly of force.
Medicare fraud is a construction of doctors and labs doing false billing… It is not about a patient going to a doctor. There are billions stolen through pharmacies and doctors in cahoots. Add in the equipment manufacturers overcharging Medicare by multiiples for equipment ,then you are finding big time fraud. . Congress has made a start at stopping it but the equiipment lobbyists were successful in keeping a measure from being pqssed.
Eureka! Now I understand what the big issue is at our local hospitals. It is Medicare and Medicaid fraud. In the last 5 years they have been doing non stop building. The two hospitals nearest me have doubled in size. I was wondering where the money was coming from. Even with the local economy as bad as it is both hospitals are both doing massive construction of all new wings and parking lots. It looks like the Taj Mahal.
The hospital also took over most of the medical billing for all the local doctors under the hospital. My GP and most of the specialists just moved into a huge brand new facility paid for by the hospital. It is huge and ultra modern. Now my PC doctor bills come through the hospital.
Now that I think of it Wentworth Douglass has been in the paper a lot lately. Some big security breach where they fired the lab that was doing their blood work for years. The lab reported the hospital for doing something illegal?
My little town is embroiled in Hospital Gate! Well now I know a little bit more of the story…
This is a brilliant analogy. I used one similar recently during an e-mail debate with a fraternity brother who is of the same mind as you. I bragged that I was fiscally smarter than him, because I don’t pay a cent towards healthcare; while he pays quite a bit. I am (relatively) young and (relatively) healthy, so I figure “why pay for insurance that’s just going to deny me if something catastrophic happens?”. So I don’t have insurance. If I get sick I’ll buy Robitussin. If that doesn’t fix it, I’ll go to the ER. And it turns out to be something like cancer or a brain tumor, and the hospital costs get to be too much for me to pay, then I’ll declare bankruptcy.
He accused me of being a mooch. I used analogies similar to yours (The Saints onside kick to start the half was one that I recall) to explain that I was just playing with the system that we have.
BTW, thank you for paying for my healthcare… if I should ever need it.
How about people who will suffer in agony because they can’t afford the treatment? It may not be a matter of life and death, but the condition could sure make them wish for death.