"The US spends more per capita on military spending than other NATO countries. This means that the US protects NATO countries. Therefore the other NATO countries can spend more on their healthcare, since they don’t have to spend it on their military.
In conclusion, this means that the US is subsidizing the health care of other NATO countries"
And now you can honestly argue that claim. Thank you for doing that. I know you didn’t have to, and the modus operandi of more than a few folks 'round these here parts would have been to deny that the original summary was anything less than perfectly compelled.
I think it’s a little facile, myself, but I also think it deserves being accurately summarized before being rebutted.
I can only speak for myself, but I do object to such laws. And, for the record, it’s not quite true that ERs have to take everyone. They have to if the accept Medicare payments. They can opt out if they don’t. Not that many do, but they can.
Still, this is more like saying 20-year-olds don’t have the right to drink alcohol. The only reason they don’t is that almost every state bent to the blackmail from the feds about receiving federal interstate highway funds. I think they should have that right.
Whoa, the Americans are arguing there crazy health care stuff again.
Can you imagine living in a society where none of this mattered, where just about the entire population supported the system because the principle worked and none of this stuff was in issue. That’s how it is throughout the developed world: A complete non-issue.
Actually, it isn’t. Not at the federal level. Equal education is a right when any is provided, but states aren’t required to provide education and religious groups have been exempt from state laws.
You know, I still don’t get it. Why wouldn’t you want health care to be a right along the lines of speech, guns, and religion?
That every American be entitled to basic life saving measures, and access to affordable health insurance.
What is so horrible about making sure everyone in society has a chance to contribute?
Not everyone needs colour 4-D ultrasounds, but shouldn’t even the poorest member of society have access to basic prenatal care? She doesn’t need a private room with a big screen tv, she just need a bed with access to a physician.
So why not just follow that forward to health care? Establish a minimum standard that is available to all. Those with means can choose to get more, those without make due.
The media and bought politicians has the entire population running around like a dog with seven dicks with all these false associations and disengenuous emotional hot buttons.
Those last three things don’t require me to provide people with a newspaper, a gun, or a church. They also don’t require me to own a gun, by a paper or join a church.
I have no problem, as a matter of public policy, to help those in need. That includes providing health care for the poor. The vast majority of Americans do not need that help.
I’m 100% certain that no one has a right to a 4-D ultrasound.
It’s not a thesis that the UK spends twice as much as Canada, and the US spends twice as much as the UK as a percent of GDP. If Canada were to match the UK budget percentage it would be a 20 billion dollar hit against other expenditures. Health care would certainly take a hit.
Do you think that, alternatively, there should be state run emergency rooms that do take people who can’t pay for services elsewhere?
Or do you think that there can be a society as just as possible in which the laws on the books fail to ensure that someone with no posessions can still recieve emergency medical services?
That’s a nice point, in a way. In fact, you do think health care is a right (I’m guessing) in the sense that you think the gov’t shouldn’t make rules preventing people from buying and selling health care.
You just don’t think it’s a right in the sense that everyone is entitled to it. You also don’t think everyone is entitled to a gun–if too many people wanted guns, and the market couldn’t adequately supply that demand, you’d be against laws forcing us to pay for the manufacture of guns to give to the surplus gun-demanders, correct?
Some of your initial assumptions are just fine - it’s your conclusion that sucks.
Healthcare in Canada would take the same hit if we threw 20 billion dollars into pit and burnt it. We’d also have the same positive effect on our personal safety.
In other words, it is my opinion that the extra money per capita the US spends on defense that is above and beyond the amount that the rest of the world spends per capita on defense is, in effect, totally wasted.
You might say that, but then everything you can buy is a “right” and that sorta dilutes the term. I’d prefer to say you generally have a right to spend your own money unless there is some overwhelming reason that you shouldn’t be able to do so. Most rights have some sort of limit associated with them.
The problem is that approach does not appeal to the conservatives. Instead we should point to all the examples of places that have lower costs and better care (and then shake a set of shiny keys).