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

[Stoneburg]

Some freedoms I can do without include the freedom to get robbed or murdered, the freedom to have my house burn down, and the freedom to not be able to afford healthcare.

[Euphonious_Polemic]

Sam Stone’s “doctors in Canada are not free to determine the standards of care” theme has me a bit steamed.

That’s right Sam. Doctors here are terribly constrained in their freedoms by their own professional bodies in consultation with medical professionals who are drawing on the very best scientific and medical evidence. How sad for them.

In the meantime, Doctors in the US are free to determine whatever standard of care they wish…

(ahem) after close consultation with the bean counter at the patient’s insurance company of course.

It’s not rocket surgery…

[GIGObuster]

I mentioned these in the pit before, but it is more relevant here.

We have less freedom in the US now.
Many Americans do not have freedom from the fear… of going bankrupt for health reasons.

Latest reports show that even families that though had coverage find that bankruptcy is their only option after the insurers drop them.

Home - National Coalition on Health Care

A recent study by Harvard University researchers found that the average out-of-pocket medical debt for those who filed for bankruptcy was $12,000. The study noted that 68 percent of those who filed for bankruptcy had health insurance. In addition, the study found that 50 percent of all bankruptcy filings were partly the result of medical expenses.9 Every 30 seconds in the United States someone files for bankruptcy in the aftermath of a serious health problem.

Many Americans do not have the freedom to seek a different job or to work on their own.

Job Lock is specially real to families that have one their members suffer a condition that will be considered preexisting if a job switch takes place. (Even with COBRA the reality is that many can not afford the COBRA payments and then they can not expect the same coverage if another job appears) And Workers that wish to start a business on their own find that heath care costs put a barrier to it.

U.S. health system discourages innovation

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Countless workers in the United States are trapped in jobs they would like to leave because they cannot get health insurance elsewhere, calcifying innovation and mobility in the world’s largest economy.

“I would rather be freelancing, no question,” said Jessica Tolliver, a former editor who now works in public relations. “I got my work done in less time, because once I finished what I had to do, the time was my own.”

Economists call this phenomenon “job lock,” and studies suggest that it keeps between 20 percent and 50 percent of workers from leaving their current jobs.

Because health insurance is tied to employment in the United States, workers who leave their jobs can see health bills skyrocket if they strike out on their own or take a position with a company that offers fewer benefits. Workers who would like to retire early stay on, unable to qualify for the government’s Medicare program until they turn 65.

And those who have existing health problems may not be able to get coverage at all.

Job lock is difficult to measure because many employees don’t like to advertise their unhappiness. But economists and small-business advocates say it takes an enormous toll on productivity.

SLOWING INNOVATION

“We can definitely say that it’s slowing down the rate of innovation,” said Tim Kane, an economist with the Kauffman Foundation which promoted entrepreneurship.

Many Americans (and foreign companies) have less freedom to start a company in the USA thanks to the health care cost.

The high cost of health care is already a reason why the USA is not competitive with other nations.

http://www.cfr.org/publication/13325/

Competitive Disadvantage

The United States spent 16 percent of its GDP in 2007 on health care, higher than any other developed nation. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates that number will rise to 25 percent by 2025 without changes to federal law (PDF). Employer-funded coverage is the structural mainstay of the U.S. health insurance system. According the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, about 71 percent of private employees in the United States had access to employer-sponsored health plans in 2006. A November 2008 Kaiser Foundation report notes that access to employer-sponsored health insurance has been on the decline (PDF) among low-income workers, and health premiums for workers have risen 114 percent in the last decade. Small businesses are less likely than large employers to be able to provide health insurance as a benefit. At 12 percent, health care is the most expensive benefit paid by U.S. employers, according to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

These ballooning dollar figures place a heavy burden on companies doing business in the United States and can put them at a substantial competitive disadvantage in the international marketplace. For large multinational corporations, footing healthcare costs presents an enormous expense. General Motors, for instance, covers more than 1.1 million employees and former employees, and the company says it spent roughly $5.6 billion on healthcare expenses in 2006. GM says healthcare costs add between $1,500 and $2,000 to the sticker price of every automobile it makes. Health benefits for unionized auto workers became a central issue derailing the 2008 congressional push to provide a financial bailout to GM and its ailing Detroit rival, Chrysler.

It is difficult to quantify the precise effect high healthcare costs have had so far on the overall U.S. job market. Health care is one of several factors–entrenched union contracts are another–that make doing business in the United States expensive, and it’s difficult to parse the effects of each factor. Moreover, economists disagree on the number of U.S. jobs that have been lost to offshoring–the transfer of business operations across national boundaries to friendlier operating environments. The Princeton economist Alan S. Blinder, in a 2006 Foreign Affairs article, says that judging by data compiled from “fragmentary studies,” it is apparent that “under a million service-sector jobs in the United States have been lost to offshoring to date.” Blinder goes on to predict that somewhere between 28 million and 42 million U.S. jobs are “susceptible” to offshoring in a future where technology allows the more efficient transfer of jobs. Many other economists, however, have shied away from making such estimates, and some have criticized Blinder’s approach.

It is clear, however, that healthcare expenses affect every level of U.S. industry. For large corporations they mean the massive “legacy costs” associated with insuring retired employees. For small business owners they can be even more devastating. “In many places, you have small businesses that simply cannot afford to offer coverage,” Sarbanes says. Often, he says, healthcare expenses make it impossible for small business owners to hire candidates they would otherwise desire.

So yes, people who are against changes in the current American system, are actually in favor of Americans having less freedoms.

[The_Tao_s_Revenge]

@IdahoMauleMan

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.

So threat of bankruptcy and/or death due to massive medical bills if you lose coverage or have it become a preexisting if you don’t suck your boss’s ass isn’t coercion?

Can you explain property rights in a way that doesn’t show you to be a hypocrite squatting on stolen Native American land?

[BrainGlutton]

@Sam_Stone

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

:dubious: Only if you conceptualize “freedom” as something in a single-actor vacuum rather than in a social context, as it actually is. The laws against theft, assault and murder are “regulations” in the sense you are using the term, but on the whole they make people more free rather than less.

[Shig]

I don’t really care about this “freedom” issue. The only thing I’m sure of is that after losing my job (along with the health insurance) in May, I have had two instances where I HAD TO have medication and therefore had to see a doctor. The year I spent at that job, I didn’t have to see a doctor once. When spending $100 per doctor visit, the only thing I was thinking was that if I lived 1500 miles to the north, I wouldn’t be paying $200 that I definitely don’t have right now. I’m sure I’ll regret saying this, but I don’t know a single person who is just completely thrilled with the insurance company/ plan that they have. I’m all for this UHC thing. It just seems to make sense.

[Cisco]

@Shig

I’m sure I’ll regret saying this, but I don’t know a single person who is just completely thrilled with the insurance company/ plan that they have.

I was head over heels for my plan at Bear Stearns. It was phenomenal. Doctor and dental visits were free, ER was 20 bucks. I could pick whoever I wanted. I trust I don’t have to tell you what happened to that job.

[UltraVires]

We ALREADY hear it in the U.S.: You shouldn’t smoke, drink, eat transfats, should always wear your seatbelt and motorcycle helmet, get plenty of exercise, and don’t masturbate too much because WE PAY FOR YOUR HEALTHCARE (sound of 8 year old girl whining)…and it’s only in an indirect way here. Imagine what happens 10 years from now when these laws are enacted as a method to reduce budget deficits.

It’s kind of like if you are 25 and still living with Dad. Since he’s paying, you have to follow his rules. The government is no different.

[cosmosdan]

@Sam_Stone

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).

There are independent insurance companies in Canada right? I find it hard to believe that someone with funds is not allowed to go see the specialist of their choice.
And why would someone in the middle class mortgage themselves to come to the US for care? Why can’t they receive the health care they are paying taxes on?

[Attack_from_the_3rd_dimension]

I didn’t notice this upthread, but I might point out that in Canada we are free to change jobs and provinces, or to be unemployed without it having any impact on our healthcare.

Hell, the big news issue in Canada now is disparity between provinces for catastrophic health care coverage. That is to say, in Canada, we are trying to sort out differences between provinces to help people pay for cancer drugs that cost $7,000 per month. In most provinces, you pay nothing, or a minimal fraction of the cost for these drugs. A couple of provinces don’t have these covered, and are now moving to do so. Doesn’t matter who you are, or what you do.

MD’s apply the same standard of practise regardless of their system of payment. No MD is ‘free’ to do whatever they want, and in the US the HMO’s put very significant restraints on what they can and can’t do. That said, within the restraints of good practise, there is a wide variety of options of what doctors will and won’t do. For instance, not all Canadian OB/GYNs do elective abortion, and a few years ago there was a case of a male-to-female transexual (sorry if my terminology is incorrect) who was being denied hormonal therapy after she had moved to Newfoundland, as the endocrinologists there were not comfortable with treating her.

[Attack_from_the_3rd_dimension]

@jtgain

We ALREADY hear it in the U.S.: You shouldn’t smoke, drink, eat transfats, should always wear your seatbelt and motorcycle helmet, get plenty of exercise, and don’t masturbate too much because WE PAY FOR YOUR HEALTHCARE (sound of 8 year old girl whining)…and it’s only in an indirect way here. Imagine what happens 10 years from now when these laws are enacted as a method to reduce budget deficits.

It’s kind of like if you are 25 and still living with Dad. Since he’s paying, you have to follow his rules. The government is no different.

So if you come to Canada, you expect to see thin nonsmokers only? C’mon. We’ve got Tim Horton’s and smoked meat, not to mention all them strippers in Montreal. Nobody says don’t do that stuff 'cause we pay for your healthcare. We say you ought not do that stuff 'cause you’ll die.

Again - Go to Newfoundland or the Prairies if you want to see freedom-loving unhealthy lifestyles persisting despite the tyranny of the State. Don’t go to Vancouver or the Kootenays though, it’s like living in LA with all the pervasive healthiness.

[Muffin]

If figure having the USA south of the border is a bit like having an ill brother with a tust fund – well off financially, but behind in health relative to the wealth.

Have a boo at Hans Rosling’s graphs: http://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_reveals_new_insights_on_poverty.html

[UltraVires]

@Attack_from_the_3rd_dimension

So if you come to Canada, you expect to see thin nonsmokers only? C’mon. We’ve got Tim Horton’s and smoked meat, not to mention all them strippers in Montreal. Nobody says don’t do that stuff 'cause we pay for your healthcare. We say you ought not do that stuff 'cause you’ll die.

Again - Go to Newfoundland or the Prairies if you want to see freedom-loving unhealthy lifestyles persisting despite the tyranny of the State. Don’t go to Vancouver or the Kootenays though, it’s like living in LA with all the pervasive healthiness.

I’m using the slippery slope here. Canada is far “ahead” of the U.S. in safety related stuff. Primary seat belt laws everywhere for many years now. Indoor smoking regulations are much more strict. Helmet laws, and very, very strict gun laws.

I’m not trying to hijack the thread. I’m just saying that it gives another hook to hang on the justification for these do-gooder laws: “Since we have to pay for your healthcare, we need to stop XXXXX from happening.”

[Muffin]

Freedom from toxic smoke is a freedom. Laws prohibiting smoking protect that freedom. If you think that health care for all lead to laws prohibiting smoking, then it follows that in this aspect health care for all leads to greater freedom, not less.

When balancing freedom from toxic smoke with the freedom to impose toxic smoke on others, there really should not be an issue, any more than any other balancing of freedom from harm verses freedom to harm.

The argument that health care for all reduces the freedom to cause harm to others is rather silly, for the freedom to cause harm to others for no good reason is not morally valid in the first place.

[gonzomax]

http://www.alternet.org/healthwellness/140918/we've_been_trapped_inside_a_bad_health_care_system_so_long%2C_we_don't_even_know_how_much_we're_missing_/ Actually our system of health care traps us. It makes us less free. When you are afraid to get a new job because you will be without health care for 90 days, it is trapping. When every single choice you make, health care coverage is a factor, you are less free.
A universal health care system would allow you to be free to follow your dreams without worrying about your coverage.
Of course wrapping cost of health care into every single thing you produce ,is another trap. How can you compete?

[Muffin]

As far as competition goes, put the cost on the shoulders of people through taxes rather than businesses.

Right now the American government and the American people are both paying more than they should for the level of health care they receive, so if they do a proper job of instituting socialized health care, businesses should be more competitive, taxes should drop a little, people will have more money in their pockets, people will be healthier, and people will live longer in a healthier state of health. http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=10373981 The big question is whether the USA has the smarts and the determination to put a more efficient system in place, or whether they will simply keep porking along, costing more and more for less and less.

[put_down_the_sabre]

I come from a country with great universal healthcare, and I’ve used it many times. I now live in the US, and I wouldn’t trade my home country’s system the US’s barbaric, brutal market in a thousand years.

But, having compulsory national healthcare clearly does restrict freedomin some way: in the US, I’m free to have health insurance, or not, if I can afford it. Premiums are not taken from me by force of law, as they are to fund the healthcare system back home.

Now, I think this is an entirely justifiable loss of freedom (like compulsory payment for fire/police/army, which are also some loss of freedom) but it’s not too bad - the question is where to draw the line.

pdts

[UltraVires]

@put_down_the_sabre

I come from a country with great universal healthcare, and I’ve used it many times. I now live in the US, and I wouldn’t trade my home country’s system the US’s barbaric, brutal market in a thousand years.

But, having compulsory national healthcare clearly does restrict freedomin some way: in the US, I’m free to have health insurance, or not, if I can afford it. Premiums are not taken from me by force of law, as they are to fund the healthcare system back home.

Now, I think this is an entirely justifiable loss of freedom (like compulsory payment for fire/police/army, which are also some loss of freedom) but it’s not too bad - the question is where to draw the line.

pdts

Great post, and you are correct. It IS a loss of freedom to have UHC; a loss of freedom that you are willing to incur for the perceived benefit.

So, I think that the OP is answered

[PrettyVacant]

Yep UHC is hell.

It’s just so bizarre. If Sam Stone really is Canadian he must know there is zero opposition to UHC in that country, as there is in every other industrialized country.

I have no idea on what basis he questions the principle of UHC because no one - NO ONE - in that country does. Give us a link Sam Stone, any link to a Canadian saying they want rid of the UHC system?

Utterly, totally bizarre position to adopt in the face of the factual and democratic reality. God knows what basis he has.

Sam Stone, you’re not Canadian, are you?

[Leaper]

@PrettyVacant

It’s just so bizarre. If Sam Stone really is Canadian he must know there is zero opposition to UHC in that country, as there is in every other industrialized country.

I have no idea on what basis he questions the principle of UHC because no one - NO ONE - in that country does.

I’ve seen posts here (I can’t find them right now; I apologize) saying that this is demonstrably a bad thing - that people in countries with UHC have become children dependent on the government health care teat, and thus their puppets.

This is one of the reasons why I started this thread: to see if this argument was serious, and to what extent.