The Glade 4.0

Do we have a right to life?

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It feels like all the people who want limited government really just want government limited to Republicans.
---The Daily Show

Montegue:

Healthcare isn't a right. And you don't believe in a right to life anyway.

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Healthcare != right to life.

Nor is it synonomous with access to health care.

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"It's real, grew up in trife life, the times of white lines
The hype vice, murderous nighttimes and knife fights invite crimes" - Nasir Jones

Monty, what goods and services are contained in your umbrella of health care?

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Whatever gets his canidate the most votes next election cycle- duh.

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A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself. ~ John Stuart Mill

Again.

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

No, no, I'm serious. I don't believe I've seen from Monty, nor from anyone else, an inventory of what they reference when speaking of "health care". How close are you to the "Aspirin is freely procurable" end of things vs. the "We can fix him, we have the technology" end of things?

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I absolutely believe in a right to life. I simply dismiss the argument that a zygote constitutes a human life.

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It feels like all the people who want limited government really just want government limited to Republicans.
---The Daily Show

Do people have a right to life?

Again.

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It feels like all the people who want limited government really just want government limited to Republicans.
---The Daily Show

You just said they did. So predicated on this axiom, answer his question.

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"It's real, grew up in trife life, the times of white lines
The hype vice, murderous nighttimes and knife fights invite crimes" - Nasir Jones

I'll answer this one for myself, as it's an excellent question, and really does color any discussion it touches on. Knowing the answer that the person you're debating with really makes the discussion that much more productive and informative.

I believe that technological and medical advances are the primary source of our increasing health costs, and the increasing share of our GDP that the health care industry represents. I believe it has done this by increasing our societal expectations as to what our "rights" and "deserves" are. Actually, believe is the wrong word for the aforestated two sentences. I think it's demonstrable.

I believe, however, that our expectations have inflated at a rate not commensurate with our ability. The divorcing of ourselves from cost and accountability has created a gap in "reasonability" of many treatments, and the fact that what we're dealing with is so precious to us -- our own and our loved ones' lives -- makes pointing out that unreasonability societally taboo and certainly uncomfortable.

I, on the other hand, don't mind saying that the solution to health care costs is to accept that we're mortal, and will die. Those with greater means can afford to postpone it longer. Those with lesser, cannot. To demand otherwise is economically and societally infeasible -- to increase the supply of care to even be able to match the best care available and provide it to everybody would essentially have our entire society center around supporting those who are no longer productive in our society; a situation that would collapse in staggeringly short order. To mandate lesser care for all seems more inhumane than the free market solution.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

Kaffis' post above has some seriously flawed premises. First, we have had government run health care for a very long time. It has not been responsible for the increase in health care costs. Those costs have gone up for many reasons, and yes, advancement is one of them. However, the way we bill for our health care has a lot to do with it as well.

I am in the hospital. The radiologist comes in and introduces himself, and looks at my chart. That just cost several thousand dollars. Then the specialist comes in, and does the same thing. Again, several thousand dollars. Then, during surgery, they use a tool that, if properly constructed, could be re used once sterilized. Instead, they throw it away. It costs several thousand dollars. In recovery, I am paying an extreme amount of money per day just to heal.

Other countries with equal if not better health care than us get by with an entirely nationalized system.

Kaffis, I have to strongly disagree with the core concept behind your argument - rich people deserve to live longer than those not wealthy enough to afford the astonishingly lavish cost of health care.

Would you eliminate medicare? Before Medicare was passed, 50% of our seniors could not afford basic health care costs. Most of them went broke after losing their hard earned savings. Are you honestly arguing that it's humane to simply let them suffer in squalor and die? Seriously?

No, the humane choice is to guarantee quality health care for all people, regardless of their socioeconomic status. This is a moral issue, I agree. And the moral choice is to ensure that health care is enshrined as a basic right in our society.

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It feels like all the people who want limited government really just want government limited to Republicans.
---The Daily Show

Now if both of you could address the original question, viz. what is the inventory of goods and services that are in your definition of "health care".

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Costs have gone up because the inclusion of health care as a part of a work-place "benefits package" has created a non-free market for the insurance industry.

Individuals have very few real choices in plans. If their workplace offers choices, those are, ultimately, the only cost-effective ones available to the individual, because they're subsidized and pre-tax, vs. all the others that are not. And companies will generally only offer plans from one provider, which, by necessity, will not necessarily be plans appropriately tailored to the individual's needs and desires.

Montegue, I understand you disagree with the core concept behind my stance. That's okay -- I expect many people to do so. As I said, societal expectations have shifted. I believe they've done so to an unreasonable degree, from a standpoint of economic sustainability, but that is, indeed, an opinion.

However, your argument on Medicare is built upon the shaky ground of Social Security, fixed pensions, and Keynesian economics undermining and disrupting private investing and retirement. The increasing life expectancy has also skewed things a lot there. Look up some figures, sometime, on how many years of social security were being collected, on average, among social security beneficiaries for the first, say, 2 decades of the institution vs. today. People used to die much more quickly after retirement, thus, health care costs were manageable. It's only when we started making them live longer, and pay an arm and a leg to do so, that retirees were finding themselves broke. Why? Because they used to die before they went broke.

It's very noble of you to decide that providing economic goods is a moral right. I wish you luck in determining how to morally guarantee their provision without infringing on the rights of others. I do not think you can, however, so I suspect you will fail to do so. I don't think you're ideologically wired to recognize that you're failing, though.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

In what context? I'm by no means an expert on the field or even familiar enough with the myriad of procedures and treatments available to create an exhaustive list.

I do not believe, for instance, that when talking about the goods and services that are health care in the "right to life" sense that Montegue is discussing are very extensive at all.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

Perfectly fine, I just ask for enough for trending data. For example, let's start with medications. Are basic OTC medications all that are included in your inventory of health care? Aspirin, NyQuil, Sudafed, etc. Does your inventory contain more? Up to what level? Recently (<1 year) approved medications for treatment of life-threatening diseases? Next up physician interactions. Yearly physical and handful of doctor visits for colds/flu enough? Or do you demand that the top neurosurgeon at Johns Hopkins be at the beck and call of any? Then to accidents/injuries. Is there a point where risky behavior makes you ineligible for treatment?

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Again, what context are we talking?

I'll reply pre-emptively based on the assumed context in which Montegue is speaking, namely the sort of "health care" that is included in our "right to life."

OTC medications? Yes, those are covered, insofar as I have a right to access. Recently approved medications? Probably not. Physician interactions -- I would say right to access annual physical. Risky behavior definitely draws a line somewhere, and probably quite early. I would say mass transit accidents/injuries should be covered under right to access, for sure.

Anything beyond that -- recently approved medications, doctor consultations more involved than a couple 15 minute check-ups, risky behavior (such as driving!) injuries... -- are all beyond rights, and should be privately negotiated via your retention of an insurance policy and your selection, in cooperation with your insurer, of a health care professional or professionals, at which point, such health care becomes a contractual matter, rather than a matter of rights.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

In the original context directed towards Monty, of what you expect society to foot the bill for. The rest of you are free to answer that query in such context, or whatever subset you deem appropriate, just make known what you are speaking to.

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I doubt very much that Monty has a concrete idea of what is and isn't something he'd want covered.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Medicare would be a good guide, at least as a starting point. However, the premise of your question presumes that health care is a good, and I disagree with that.

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It feels like all the people who want limited government really just want government limited to Republicans.
---The Daily Show

Again with the inability to comprehend what people write.

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"Dress cops up as soldiers, give them military equipment, train them in military tactics, tell them they’re fighting a ‘war,’ and the consequences are predictable." —Radley Balko

I understand you disagree with the concept of health care as a good itself, but do you disagree that health care is composed of goods and services? A pill is a good, a doctor provides service, surely this is an acceptable representation?

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I'm sure that we can all agree that Monty took the forum from civil to (#*$&# in the matter of moments. Course he's the blow up liberal crusader wavy arm man.

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A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself. ~ John Stuart Mill

Monty,
Everybody has a right to life, but they have to provide the means to attain it. You don't have a right to food or shelter. You have to work to buy these things. They're sometimes provided on an emergency basis and EMTALA already guarantees health care on an emergency basis regardless of ability to pay. EMTALA is also the reason that illegal aliens bleed hospital ED's dry in border states.

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The Dude abides.

Of course. I just want to be clear on that point.

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It feels like all the people who want limited government really just want government limited to Republicans.
---The Daily Show