In what ways are countries with UHC less free than the U.S.?

Great Debates
1

The argument I’ve seen quite a bit against UHC is that a public option would make us less free in some ways. Since there exists countries with UHC, I was curious about specifics - the ways in which they’re less free than those of us in the U.S. Of course, in this context, such ways would probably be financial in nature, but anything that’s affected or influenced by UHC and similar “safety nets” would be up for grabs, I guess.

So please, those of you in opposition, especially those who have brought up (or agreed with) the argument above before, I really would like to know (since usually this is brought up in the context of affecting the U.S., not countries that are already affected).

Thanks in advance.

2

this argument has bever made any sense to me. I live in Australia, we have decent universal health care and I consider it makes me more free, quite simply in that I have more choices in life.

Most US citizens need to be employed constantly as it’s the only way to get affordable health insurance, which means quite literally you are chained to a working life with otherwise the threat of unpayable medical bills looming over you. it’s modern day serfdom as far as I’m concerned.

At times in my past I have saved money and taken a year off to travel, I’ve started several small businesses, at some point I might decide to live off my savings and try and write a novel, or travel again. During the times I’m not working, or when my business is not making a profit, I’m covered by Medicare regardless, and don’t pay for coverage at those times.

All those options are much more difficult to people in the US, having to be always covered limits your personal freedom and makes it more difficult for entrepreneurs to take the risk of starting their own business.

3

It’s simply a fact that if government regulates something, it’s taking away freedom. That’s the essence of regulation.

You may feel ‘more free’. In the same way you might feel more free if the government killed your neighbor and gave you all his stuff. You may have more freedom, but it sucked to be the neighbor.

In Canada, doctors are not free to set the rates they wish to charge for their services. They are not free to pick their patients. They are not free to determine the standards of care they will apply. People on waiting lists are not free to seek out their own doctor and pay out of their own pocket. People who don’t want health care are not free to choose to go without and save their money, because their pay is taxed to pay for it.

There are plenty of freedoms we gave up directly for single-payer health care. And indirectly, we lose other freedoms because once the government pays for your health care, your body becomes part of the public balance sheet. Thus the government feels justified in intruding into your private life to punish you for bad habits like smoking. There’s talk of a ‘fat tax’.

But the big one for Canadians is that they simply aren’t free to pay to see a doctor. They must join the public queue, whether they could afford more care or not. Of course, the very rich can simply skip down to the U.S. for better, faster treatment, or the middle class can mortgage themselves to the hilt to pay for U.S. care (while still paying taxes for Canadian care they can’t receive).

4

What industries do you feel should be regulated by the government, and to what extent, and why are they different from the healthcare industry?

5

Somebody’s freedom is necessarily somebody else’s restraint. Do you want a freedom for the majority to get health care, food, housing by right, or for the minority to ration those to the whoever can pay?

6

That’s completely wrong.

Unless you disagree with the notion of property rights, or are trying to specifically reference freedom from coercion. Given the part of your post that I snipped, I suspect that is not the case.

7

None of that is true in the Australian system, doctors can choose to bulk bill through medicare, or they can be private practices, they still get a medicare rebate for each visit but they can set their own rates and choose patients.

I can choose to pay for private insurance on top of medicare or not, and I can pay for private hospitals or private doctors if I want.

the only “freedom” I have lost is the freedom to not pay for medicare at all, but its a sliding scale based on income and IMO is well worth the small amount deducted from monthly pay for the other freedoms it provides.

8

“Your freedom to swing a stick ends at my nose”. Unless your freedom is restricted in that way, ‘freedom’ only means social Darwinist might is right - the American creed since its foundation.

9

Why does my grandmother pay to see a private doctor in Canada? It’s all very much on the up and up.

10

do you favor eliminating taxes to support police and fire departments and instead having private security and fire brigades that only protect property of people that pay for it?

If not, why not? The current system is taking away the freedom of fire fighters and police to charge whatever they want to. personally I think that’s shocking.

11

I should have said ‘in some cases’. The Canadian government is trending towards delisting more and more services from the public health system and making them private. But there are many services where you simply don’t have the choice.

12

No, I don’t. But that’s not the argument, is it? The question asked was, “How are countries which have UHC less free than the U.S.?” I described how, at least in the case of Canada.

But actually, the current system does NOT take away the freedom of fire fighters to charge whatever they want to. If you want to hire a private security guard or a private fire fighter, you can. No one will arrest somebody for selling fire-fighting services. In fact, insurance companies in California have started hiring private firefighters to help with wildfires, and there are plenty of private companies offering services such as waterbombing and smoke jumping to control forest fires. Many small towns have private firefighting services or volunteer firefighters.

In most provinces in Canada, if you try to open a private heart surgery clinic, the government will shut you down. Even if you’re the best heart surgeon in the world and have the best facilities, and only take patients who pay out of pocket.

What you can do is start up a company like Timely Medical Services. They’re basically a broker to help Canadians get private surgery or diagnostic services - in the United States, or in some cases in Canada.

13

Is the US actually proposing the canadian system or are the proposals more like Australia with parallel private and public systems? How am I less free in the Australian system?

14

First, I’ll point out that Canadian Medicare is established by the federal government, but administered by the provinces. Sam Stone’s profile places him in Alberta, while my experience has been in British Columbia.

Quoted with some reformatting and my own interpolations (marked ‘***’):

15

That’s freedom from coercion, as I referenced in the my post. It’s a trivial example, and not the one you referred to in the second sentence of your post above.

16

One might consider UHC countries less free if they spent more public money per capita, since those with an increased taxation burden gained by imprisonment-threatening coercion are “less free” to spend that money as they choose (this ignores the greater freedom arguably bestowed on the recipients of such benefits, of course.)

But even that is not the case in the US, which seriously needs to reconsider how it can spend so much of its taxes on healthcare and still not achieve anything like universal care. I simply don’t understand how US conservatives can say that European countries have more “socialist” systems when they actually spend **less public money per capita** than the US.

17

It’s hell over here in Australia. I tell ya.

Everyday I wake up thinking “boy I wished I could move back to the good old USA where they understand freedom.”

Like the time I was free to go without health insurance, or dental care while I was in college. Man I was free! I also enjoyed the freedom I had to screw my credit up when I could not pay for treatment I recieved after a concussion. I guess all you saps are paying for that now. Maybe not Sam Stone, since he lives in Canada.

Like I said it’s hell over here in Australia.

18

Americans are free to worry about medical costs enough to avoid buying all the meds prescribed.
They are free to hide pre-existing conditions from their doctor, even if it means he has trouble making an accurate diagnosis.
They are free to be dropped coverage after paying in for a lifetime if they arrogantly have a good spell in the middle of a chronic illness. They should have checked that you only are covered for a “single course of treatment”

19

In Japan I am less free than in the US because I have to pay (via witholding tax) a certain amount every month for basic healthcare.

Also, I must, by law, take half a day off once a year for a complete physical check up. I can choose the extent of the check up and I usually choose the full check option. My employer pays half, by law and the full cost is about US 160 dollars. The check up includes, blood work up, urine and stool samples, chest x-ray, hearing, vision, blood pressure, barium, torso ultrasound, weight, and some other thing I forget right now (memory issues?).

Other than that I think I’m pretty free. I can choose to take out a more comprehensive private insurance, which I have, and that covers extended hospital stays (up to 9 months) and specialist health care treatments, surgery and medicines. That private insurance is about 120 US dollars a month per person, and incidentally they don’t ever ask about pre-existing conditions, lifestyle or past health problems.

I can choose any doctor/dentist in any facility without limitation, obviously though if I need specialist care and one particular doctor is regarded at the best in that field, I may have to wait for treatment. That hasn’t happened to me yet, but a friend developed an enlarged blood vessel surrounding the brain and needed surgery - I don’t know the precise terminology but it involved a catheter into the blood vessel to fill the extended portion with material so that blood would not pool into the already stressed area. She had to wait about a month for the operation performed by the top guy in Japan. If I have a common cold/flu, or cut/break I get instant treatment from anywhere. No waiting.

My basic healthcare is not linked to my place of employment (although it is linked to ‘employment’ per se in that if I am not employed or am self-employed, I would probably have to switch over to a different self-pay system.) So I’m completely free to change jobs and there’s no paperwork involved.

Speaking of paperwork, I don’t have to fill out any ever, other than when I visit a new hospital or clinic for the first time I fill out a small, one-page list describing my age, existing conditions/allergies etc. Other than that there is no paperwork or forms to fill. Nada.

I don’t feel less free. How about you?

20

I see there is a common falacy that our current healthcare system is superior to UHC. The way I see it, our current system sucks at least as bad as any UHC plan and serves only to make the large insurance companies wealthy. Being forced to choose between whatever health insurance is offered by your company is not “freedom”. Whatever you think of UHC, the current system blows.