single-payer system ... singled out

[Random]

Just a comment on the Esk/Rolfe/Zig stuff. It seems to come down to a question of whether or not healthcare is a fundamental right.

If healthcare is a fundamental right, you can’t really "mooch" off the system. You are entitled to healthcare, period. Just like you are entitled to police, fire departments, military protection, etc. You might not pay as much in taxes as you get in benefits, but them’s the breaks. Some pay less, some pay more.

If healthcare is not a fundamental right, then there is no reason to change the system we have currently. Why should your money be taken away and given to someone else? It’s theft by government.

Esk and Rolfe are talking past Zig, but they are not going to get anywhere. Zig has a different set of standards that he is evaluating the arguments from. He thinks personal liberty trumps the public good in this case, and while I disagree with him (and think he should pay taxes like the rest of us commies) he is entitled to his opinion.

 

[Professor Yaffle]

Because it's oh so hard for people to look up the page a few posts? What exactly is your point?

Go back and look at what we've been discussing lately. I said that taxes are a way to force other people to pay for something. This is always true. Rolfe responded that it's a way to prevent freeloaders. While that may be true in some cases, it is not true in general, and government-run health care is only one example of an exception to this rule. Since then, I have seen repeated claims regarding the desirability of taxation to pay for services which do not prevent freeloading, usually in emotionally charged language (arguments along the lines of "do you want my mom to die?"). But such arguments miss the point completely: whether or not it's desirable, that doesn't prevent freeloading, as Rolfe claimed, and it's still forcing other people to pay for something.

Now, if you want to go back to some other topic, or introduce a new one, feel free to do so. But if you want to claim that my statement about taxation is wrong, or that Rolfe's statement is right, you need to form an argument which addresses the actual claims. You have not done so yet.

Rolfe is simply using a different definition of freeloader than you are. Tax prevents people WHO CAN AFFORD to contribute from freeloading on the universal system - meaning keeping their money for themselves whilst still being able to access the system that other people are paying for.

 

[Professor Yaffle]

Just a comment on the Esk/Rolfe/Zig stuff. It seems to come down to a question of whether or not healthcare is a fundamental right.

If healthcare is a fundamental right, you can’t really "mooch" off the system. You are entitled to healthcare, period. Just like you are entitled to police, fire departments, military protection, etc. You might not pay as much in taxes as you get in benefits, but them’s the breaks. Some pay less, some pay more.

If healthcare is not a fundamental right, then there is no reason to change the system we have currently. Why should your money be taken away and given to someone else? It’s theft by government.

Esk and Rolfe are talking past Zig, but they are not going to get anywhere. Zig has a different set of standards that he is evaluating the arguments from. He thinks personal liberty trumps the public good in this case, and while I disagree with him (and think he should pay taxes like the rest of us commies) he is entitled to his opinion.

Yes, i think you are correct. I guess it comes down to which you think is the worse thing that can happen - forcing people to pay taxes to contribute to other people's care, or allowing poor people to die through inability to pay for healthcare. If Zig really thinks that forcing taxes is worse than poor people dying, then I guess that's the end of the conversation; there's nothing more to say.

 

[Ziggurat]

Anyway, I don't really see the point of the discussion.

The point is to be clear about what's going on. I'm still not sure why my statement that taxes are a way of forcing others to pay for something drew any opposition in the first place. That statement doesn't deny the possibility that it can be justifiable to do so. Even Rolfe's claim that taxes prevent freeloading is a subset of my claim (so that my claim is necessarily true if his is), and one which is quite plainly not true in general.

The US system also pays for "freeloaders"

I'm aware of this.

If you are happy with the US system the way it is

I am not. My largest objection is that coverage should not be tied to employment.

then you have to consider the fact that you are paying more for the "freeloaders" than we are.

You will search in vain for a statement from me to the effect that one should never pay anything for freeloaders. But I am keen on acknowledging what it is we are doing or want to do, including aspects that may not be goals in and of themselves.

 

[ddt]

In all fairness, (3) is over simplified - there seems to be some sort of political or philosophical objection to their helping out those who they perceive as having failed to take adequate steps to protect themselves.

Yes, I fully well realize that. That doesn't stop me from mocking it. I'm glad to live in a country that's civilized enough that its citizens don't have to end up in the gutter.

They also seem to believe that the USG couldn't run the proverbial p*** up in a brewery.

I noticed - a very strange notion. The government of the richest and greatest nation in the world is incompetent?

What, you have to pay taxes if you're unemployed and on welfare?

It differs from state to state of course - but in the Netherlands, yes, people pay taxes on welfare and other social security income. They also pay (separately listed) for health insurance. Contrary to US citizens on welfare, who get Medicare which is paid for by others.

I don't see, however, how this creates freeloaders. Welfare is less than you earn on a job in wages. I don't understand this obsession with a handful of freeloaders. Sure, there are some. But the vast majority of people on the dole are not jobless because they like it, but through accident and they'd love to have a job and earn their own living. Paying the handful of freeloaders welfare is a small price to pay for a civilized society in which we won't let those who, through accident of the economy, are out of a job, get in the gutter and in bad health.

 

[Architect]

Yes, i think you are correct. I guess it comes down to which you think is the worse thing that can happen - forcing people to pay taxes to contribute to other people's care, or allowing poor people to die through inability to pay for healthcare. If Zig really thinks that forcing taxes is worse than poor people dying, then I guess that's the end of the conversation; there's nothing more to say.

Agreed.

 

[Rolfe]

Why is it just healthcarehe seems to have such a problem with?

What about all the money you're being forced to pay for police, firefighting, street lighting, rubbish collection, foreign embassies, the army, public libraries, public toilets, schools, you name it? Are all these things so much more desirable than not leaving sick people to die?

Rolfe.

 

[Architect]

Assuming it's true, and that government-sponsored research is equally valuable w.r.t. saving and extending lives and increasing the quality thereof, a huge leap not born out by history in any other realm whatsoever, you still haven't covered everything.

Actually, you were the one that claimed that the private healthcare industry supported pharma research. Please, feel free to back it up.

 

[Ivor the Engineer]

Do I win the million?

 

[Architect]

Why is it just healthcarehe seems to have such a problem with?

What about all the money you're being forced to pay for police, firefighting, street lighting, rubbish collection, foreign embassies, the army, public libraries, public toilets, schools, you name it? Are all these things so much more desirable than not leaving sick people to die?

Rolfe.

I thought schools was the most glaring one, but you're right - why should they get their streets cleaned, their rubbish collected, access to libraries? Hell, it's their fault they're poor.....

 

[Ziggurat]

Esk and Rolfe are talking past Zig, but they are not going to get anywhere. Zig has a different set of standards that he is evaluating the arguments from. He thinks personal liberty trumps the public good in this case, and while I disagree with him (and think he should pay taxes like the rest of us commies) he is entitled to his opinion.

Except that nothing I've said in the last page or so regarding taxes even addresses what the preferred outcome is, or whether or not it's justified, but only the reality of what taxation does, so you're really just setting up a strawman here. Taxes force other people to pay for things. That's a reality: it's got nothing to do with values. The value judgment comes into whether or not it's right to force people pay for any particular thing, and how much they should be forced to pay, but that is a completely separate issue. And much as you might like to pretend that I'm some anarcho-capitalist, I do in fact think that there are cases where it's justified to force other people to pay for things.

 

[Architect]

And taxes are just dreamed out of mid-air, are they? They don't get developed by, say democractically elected governments? The push in the UK for the welfare state wasn't for example, the result of a massive social movement from the mid 1920s onwards? Governments who continually raise taxes without the support of the people don't get voted outr of power?

If society, through the democratic process, decides that it is wrong to let poor people die rather than afford them proper healthcare, then hard chucks. That's what democracy is about. And in the UK, you'll find gey few folk who would move away from the Welfare State - whether paying or otherwise.

 

[lomiller]

Taxation is the only compulsory payment under discussion. This is fundamentally different than a contractual obligation that you voluntarily agree to. Do you really not get the difference? No, I guess you do not.

No I don't mainly because there is no differerence when the terms are “pay or suffer death or grave health consequences” . Those are not terms reasonable people consider voluntary. Simply waving your hands and saying as long as the government isn’t involved it’s voluntary is neither realistic nor accurate.

 

[Ziggurat]

Why is it just healthcarehe seems to have such a problem with?

What about all the money you're being forced to pay for police, firefighting, street lighting, rubbish collection, foreign embassies, the army, public libraries, public toilets, schools, you name it? Are all these things so much more desirable than not leaving sick people to die?

Rolfe.

For most of what you list, the answer about the difference has already been given: externalities.

But if we are to judge whether or not something should be provided by the government solely on the basis of its importance, why don't you advocate for a national meal service? Surely you don't want people starving in the streets, do you, Rolfe? The government could to a far more efficient job at distributing nutritionally healthy food, and reduce all that redundancy and waste from all those different restaurants. If you're hungry, just go into a government-run food outlet and ask for a meal, no need to waste money on processing bills for each customer. How can you advocate having restaurants when children are starving in the Congo? It's wasteful: you're paying far more than you need to for your food, while others are starving. Surely the UN can do a better job at distributing food than this mess of independent restaurant chains.

Or perhaps such a comparison is shallow and meaningless. Just like your list.

 

[Ziggurat]

No I don't mainly because there is no differerence when the terms are “pay or suffer death or grave health consequences” .

Except those aren't generally the terms on offer. Many people choose not to pay for insurance (and I've known some personally) because the alternative is not death, but rather just risk (and usually not of death, but of financial trouble), and frequently low risk at that.

 

[Architect]

But if we are to judge whether or not something should be provided by the government solely on the basis of its importance, why don't you advocate for a national meal service? Surely you don't want people starving in the streets, do you, Rolfe? The government could to a far more efficient job at distributing nutritionally healthy food, and reduce all that redundancy and waste from all those different restaurants. If you're hungry, just go into a government-run food outlet and ask for a meal, no need to waste money on processing bills for each customer. How can you advocate having restaurants when children are starving in the Congo? It's wasteful: you're paying far more than you need to for your food, while others are starving. Surely the UN can do a better job at distributing food than this mess of independent restaurant chains.

Far be it from me to criticise the quality of your research, but - recognising that poor nutrition is a major health issue in deprived communities across Scotland - our Government is introducing free school meals for primary school children across the board. We also spend considerable sums on domestic nutritional and dietary education programmes.

Furthermore both the Scottish and UK governments contribute significantly to overseas aid programmes.

I'm sure Rolfe with appreciate your apology in due course.

 

[lomiller]

Are you going to claim that this VAT tax is enough to cover your health care costs, or is even as much as one's welfare benefits?

We have already established that people pay less under a universal single payer systems. If you are still paying less why would you care if there is someone else out there paying a lot less? Are you saying you would willing to pay more for your healthcare just to be sure there no one else is getting theirs for free?

 

[ddt]

But if we are to judge whether or not something should be provided by the government solely on the basis of its importance, why don't you advocate for a national meal service?

You mean like US welfare (food stamps)? The cost of food is very predictable these days. The cost of healthcare is not: one person does not need health care all his life, whereas another needs a very costly operation. But for everyone, the risk of needing that very costly operation that bankrupts him, is around the corner. The same applies to a lot of other things on Rolfe's list, e.g., firefighting.

 

[lomiller]

The idea behind insurance is to pool risk. But UHC's do more than just pool risks. In fact, the primary advantages cited as justification of UHC systems, and the only real distinguishing features compared to private insurance, come precisely from doing more than just pooling risks.

Yes they do more then pool risk, but as I pointed out above they do a better job of pooling risk then voluntary insurance, due to the impact of self selection.

 

[Architect]

And once again: you pay double what we do, Ziggy, for levels of overall care which are - at best - comparable.