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Part 5: Health care — a right?
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I strongly disagree with this viewpoint. Society CAN come together and decide that each member will make a certain contribution toward the well-being of the whole community, and that community members will benefit according to their need and the resources available. We already provide some care to those in need, but we do it in expensive, inefficient, often humiliating ways. We can do better, and in doing so we can significantly reduce costs for everyone.
There are unalienable rights given by God such as "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."
Then there are rights given to you by the government, such as A driver's license gives you the right to drive on public roads, or a hunting license allows you to hunt. As such the government can give, and the government can take those away.
Certainly health care is not an unalienable right.
Nice. Society can decide that each member has to make a certain contribution. Which commission will decide this? How will they enforce it? How many tax dollars do you think they'll spend on these commissions & enforcements?
I'm sure that would make health care MUCH less expensive.
First off, I'm sorry about you and your wife losing jobs and insurance; I've been there myself.
But what does your paying taxes, and MY paying taxes all these years have anything to do with your losing health insurance when you lost your job? You GAVE that money to the GOVERNMENT so they could WASTE it. Do we want to give MORE money to the government in HOPES that in their benevolence they'll give us a Wonderful health care system?
Have you seen the abysmal state that Medicaid and Medicare are in?
We may not pay for commissions, but we pay for insurance companies' marketing, big bonuses to their executives, and dividends to their shareholders. We pay for the inefficiency of several companies all trying to do the same thing and our doctors having to keep all the different billing procedures and plan details straight (and directly related to this, the waste on both ends when procedures have been billed incorrectly). We pay for debt collectors to harrass people with no ability to pay their outlandish bills. We pay for dubious procedures that cover our doctors' butts more often than they provide any material benefit to patients. No commission is that expensive or wasteful.
Every other nation in the world with a standard of living comparable to ours has found one way or another to cover everybody at a cost that is substantially lower per capita than what the average American pays for a year of healthcare.
If you can not pay for medical care you should not get it! Only those who want something for nothing demand medical care as a right.
Why are the bailout capitalists so afraid of Government competition, if they are so wasteful?
This argument is so obvious it seems stupid to me.
We accept that education not only is a right, but is beneficial to society. All the arguments against health care can also be brought education.
We are all in this together. Those of us who have gotten the breaks need to share with those who are on the bottom rungs. I am an engineer, I have a good job. Were it not for public education, who knows where I would be?
If we are paying more than any other nation for healthcare than we should have the best healthcare.
Instead only the wealthy can afford good healthcare and the rest of us with insurance cannot even get it or afford it.
The United States healthcare overall is rated #34 not #1.
This means we should only be paying less for healthcare than 33 other countries.
The American Consumer is getting ripped off.
The Healthcare system in this country is a Farce Scam!
WE HAVE A RIGHT TO BE GIVEN WHAT WE PAY FOR AND WE ARE NOT GETTING THE RESULTS.
The governments all controlling approach will drain what's left of the incentive out of medicine. You'll be hard pressed to find a smart kid that will spend 12 years in school only to get out and work for government wages.
Health care and education is not a right. They are privileges. As a right the state can tax us for education and we only have the right, as citizens, to use these taxes for education, but only for the primary 12 years. Higher education is not included in our constitutuion as taxable and is illegal.
It is unconstituional for citizens to expect government be personal benefactors of government spending or welfare for any reason including health care. Free enterprise and freedom of choice is the right we have as citizens.
There is no comparison of american health care system to other industrialized nations who have at best a low end health care system. And they don't have or pay insurance companies. These other industrialized nations own the health care system, its doctors, hospitals, drug companies that control costs and services. It's not a free market system with individual choices, government chooses care.
How about my right to have a medical savings plan, in lieu of costly insurance? My right to negotiate with Dr.s on the cost of treatment, or the right of insurance companies to compete state-to-state, nationwide?
I think it is strange that in the US many think it is perfectly OK to spend tax money to heal sick banks, but spending it to heal sick people would be an abomination.
There are many working people, working at jobs where health care insurance isn't an option. I myself was laid off from a job and couldn't find another job with insurance for over 2 years.
One of the companies I had worked for during that period was 3-Com making palm pilots west of the Salt Lake Airport. I was working next to others who had health insurance, but all new employees hired to do that job such as I couldn't get it. I was technically working not for 3-Com but for a subcontractor they paid to supply them with workers.
I found it interesting and reprehensible they could afford to pay millions to get Candle Stick park named to 3-Com park and that they could afford to pay all the top execs millions each, but we couldn't get health insurance.
Listen to what it is that you are saying. Out of one side of your mouth you sneer at people unfortunate enough to not have the ability to get adequate medical care for them or their children. And out of the other side of your mouths you complain that many people outside Utah (read not LDS) say the Mormons aren't "Christian". Well, Mormons are Christian, really, but you wouldn't know it by their attitude on this issue. Many Utahns (read LDS) truly are not Christian on this issue of providing basic health care to everyone.
As has been been stated every other industrialized (and many not so industrialized) country provides basic health care to their citizens at a fraction of the cost that we do. These people in these "other" countries generally live longer and are healthier than we are and they don't go bankrupt when they get sick.
Let's see if we can truly be Christians on this issue, Utahns can do better in their attitudes toward those less fortunate.
My husband and I didn't have insurance the first few years of our married life and we KNEW that and to steps accordingly. We had a savings account for just in case, and we were made sure that we took care of ourselves and our children, (yes we had those while we had no insurance and paid the doctor along the way).
Insurance is NOT A RIGHT, IT IS A PRIVILEGE!!!!!
People need to get over this sense of entitlement. Should we try and help our 'community'? Definitely. But community should be helping themselves too!!
Belgium, Holland, Denmark, Germany... all have universal health care without being "communist" countries. These industrialized nations have found ways to make sure all citizens enjoy health care, just as they provide education to the children. The US is lagging behind and reform is really necessary.
Rights come from God. The Constitution protects those rights. You can't simply make up a right and start enforcing it with a gun, even by a Constitutional amendment. One of the basic rights is property. It is unconscionable to seize my property (in this case, by taxing my money) to pay for someone else's healthcare.
"Who are we to say who can or can't have good health?" Who are YOU to say how MY money should be spent? "Who are we to tell people if they can live or die?" Who are YOU to play God with my rights?
These kinds of arguments are made by those who want to right the wrongs in the world by appealing to the force of government. But only free, God-fearing individuals can truly succeed.
Hatch describes our rights, health care is not one of them. The more control we give our government, the fewer rights we will have.
First, health care is not a right BUT we as a society try to get health care to everyone. Working in the health care industry I know that overall the industry tries to help all regardless of ability to pay. I know....there are still exceptions.
Second, most conservative I know want insurance reform, tort reform, and some type of health safety net. They just don't want Obamacare or Obama-lite. Why tear apart a good system when simple reforms will fix it at a lower cost.
Third, government health care is not free or cheap. It costs a lot in tax dollars. Have you ever seen anything the government does that is cheaper than private industry? I have been around for over six decades and I sure have not.
I hope that you are able to sleep at night when you sit in judgement over millions of people's lives and decide that the health insurance companies should be able to send some of us into financial ruin BECAUSE WE GOT SICK. When did the Republican party lose its ability to be compassionate? Why shouldn't we have access to the same health care that our elected officials have?
Everyone, even illegal aliens, has a right to access. No one is turned down.
"I think we need to differentiate on whether health CARE is a right, or heath INSURANCE is a right."
I don't care what you think. You can try to differentiate between health care and health insurance but it makes you a fool.
It's time for the kid gloves to come off. I just wished the Deseret News allowed profanity because you would hear exactly what I think about you and your opinion and I can guarantee you that you have not heard the likes of it before.
"How about my right to have a medical savings plan, in lieu of costly insurance? My right to negotiate with Dr.s on the cost of treatment, or the right of insurance companies to compete state-to-state, nationwide?"
When you can't afford it and the government has to give subsidies to hospitals because you were rushed there after you got into a car accident and accrued an 800,000 to $1.5 million dollar bill then we can talk. Let's see how far your medical savings plan goes then but I bet you will want charity or government to pay.
So in your opinion, LTY, one of the fundamental tenets of Christianity is supporting government in its efforts to forcibly seize taxpayer funds to provide basic services?
Isn't it possible that a true Christian believes in freedom? Somewhere in the teachings of the LDS Church I believe there might be a section about agency, I'm not sure...maybe like we actually get to choose to do right or wrong, without being forced by Satan to do right...something like that.
This life is the time to prepare to meet God. If you really are a Christian and do your best to help out your neighbors, you will be blessed for it. Inserting the government into the equation makes it much more difficult for us to have the choice to help out charitably. I don't envision God interviewing the 80% of Utahns that believe healthcare is a right and saying "It's okay that you misunderstood one of the most fundamental aspects of the Plan of Salvation and ended up taking Satan's side in this argument. I can see how it was confusing."
If these things are basic human rights, why do so many in the world wake up each day wondering where their next meal is going to come from?
Unfortunately, we don't live in a utopian, ideal world where governments have unlimited resources and can just write a check for every citizen in their country to have whatever they need or want. There are always financial restraints and concerns that don't make this utopian world possible (Obama's solution is to just print more money). Last I checked, our country is already insolvent.
When it comes to "basic human rights" and entitlements, where do you draw the line? Food, shelter, cars? At what point do people take a measure of responsibilty to provide for themselves and not rely on the government and others to make their way?
Healthcare is a privilege; not a right. Charity is the gift that makes it possible. Yes, we can take care of one another, but not through compulsory government programs. Charity is voluntary. No one stops any of us from giving to charity, irregardless of tax incentives. We can always give what we can in our time,talents & means.
If we all were generous, & thought of others first before filling our own temporal wants (not needs), yes, the world would be a better place.
None of us have unlimited monies; we all have to budget their use. How we spend our discretionary funds, whether on charity or a house bigger than we need; whether on building our bank account & investment portfolio or forgiving someone's debt; whether on someone else's needs (not wants) or on keeping up with the Jones.
Charity is the answer: Donate your time, talents & means to your favorite Healthcare. Mine is LDS - IHC - IMC.
I'm wondering if the LDS Church if for or against National Health Coverage?
Anyone?
The left is trying their old tactics of making-up new 'rights' to push their agenda.
It isn't enough that their is equal access for all, there must be in the lefty socialist totalitarian 'utopia' the same outcome - except, of course, for themselves. 'progressives' are special, you see, and they don't have to obey the orders they issue for the proles.
Freedom=bad; socialism=good, repeat along with barryy, harry and nancy...
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