it's difficult. i agree with ssez, mostly, but the difference i have is that i don't really think "choice" is a thing, "free choice" much less so. especially for people who are depressed, addicted, or both, i think of it less as a choice and more as if there was a parasite in their brain, driving them to do damaging things. however, as i'm not qualified to diagnose these things, my functional position is about where ssez's is i think
OTE="poxrooster, post: 380017, member: 9569"]I can fully respect that position. I get the moral quandary. However, having been an alcoholic, if I had a friend who was one, I'd attempt in every way possible to stop him from making that choice. I just think it is immoral.[/QUOTE] i think we would both react very similar to a friend whos addicted (i have had some). i also agree its a quandry that i see as posing a problem in all civilizations. i think the problem comes when "legally" enforcing something like addiction. if i was the moral authority i would outlaw it of course, the problem for me is do i really think i have that moral authority to rule over others? i think it gets to be even more of a quandry when say the addict has a small child. do i have the right to take the child away then also do i have the right to have others pay for it? i think the same problem arises on something like abortion, i would feel horrible if i aborted an unborn child because of its vulnerable state. others would not see it as even alive, do i have the right to force them to have a child? i personally dont think so but many others do. i can run all sorts of scenarios of quandry, so i default to not wanting to "rule" over others as much as possible because i wouldnt want others to try and rule over me with what they feel is immoral but i dont. i also feel that breeds rebellion in a society when done too much. i tend to put the persons responsability for themselves on them and no one else it prevents oppression etc. like with medical i dont feel right forcing people to pay for others medical bills, some would try to paint that as being a monster who doesnt care about people but i view it as the "moral" thing to do. i dont view me as having the right to say you must pay for my medical even though people would die as a result. I think its moral to encourage others to help those in need etc but i dont think its right to force them to. if people of their own free will decided hey yea we better group up and set up insurance im all for it because it makes sense but forcing someone to participate is where it crosses line. the quandry with that comes from what about the poor etc but my thoughts on thay take even longer to type lol
dont go and ruin all the fun! question for you, do you think its moral if an addict forced you to pay for his/her recovery? what if someone was an addict and kept checking into hospital? is it moral that he forces you to pay for him yet you cant stop him from being an addict?
How much of a problem were you to your surroundings? your squalor could have negative economic consequences for other business in the area. it is also a pretty miserable and ineffective way to do it. you can at least do it in a way where you are considerate of other people. there is also the issue that you might have mental problems or are in no state to make such a decision which is where euthanasia through the proper channels come in, is euthanasia immoral. I say it is not you say it is. euthanasia is not the same as suicide or self destructive behavior do you agree? Yes our taxes would pay for his recovery but if the person ends up in hospitals that person obviously gets complications or overdoses and that tends to sort itself out eventually, hopefully by quitting.
less moral than a vet or a handicaped person or a person with a serious medical condition even addication is a fickle thing, because people have different addication centers in their brains and are more or less likely to become addicted because of it. But sure, I can see your point, I'd rate it at a different level. Healthcare doesn't automatically include rehab in my book.
the rehab thing as burnpyro states is right, aids for quitting smoking were covered for a while but was dropped because people tend to fall off the wagon. best way to fight smoking and smoking related health problems is not to start. however not treating people with medical conditions related to drug use means you are deciding who lives and dies based on a single datapoint which I believe would classify as immoral.
i would probably argue that they are deciding by their actions if they live so dont put that burden on me. i can see how you would have your stance and dont think its stupid btw. good to have an actual discussion with you and burn at least once in 10 years! now i think of what if someone eats like crap, gets fat and sits around smoking etc i dont think its moral of that person to think i should have to pay for his bypass or throat cancer treatments etc. would you say its moral of that person to expect you to pay? i am not saying it would be moral to let the person die i am simply asking if their choice is moral in expecting others to pay for their treatment after they abuse their body?
what about someone who smokes and gets throat cancer? think society should foot the bill for his choice? i am someone who could be talked into universal healthcare in the state society is in, the thing is i can think of a million ways to abuse it and drain the system that would hurt others. same thing with someone riding a motorcycle without helmet and gets brain damage then needs healthcare for rest of life because of poor decision..etc etc
the problem would be that once in a hospital but unconcious they are no longer able to make their wishes known and the doctors would be obligated to help. a concious person ( of sound mental state and not under the influence of mind altering substances) has the capacity to deny aid. a drunk, unconcious, high or underage person for underage ( up to 12y/o parents decide 14 to 18 equal to parents in decision) there was a case recently where a 14 year old decided against chemotherapy and the father brought the case to court to try and force treatment. the father obviously wanting the chance of the cancer returning to be minimised because he loves his child, the childs being unwilling to deal with the side-effects of chemo ( and having been found to be of sound psychological health and in full understanding of the risks), the mother unwilling to side against her child. the father may still take the case to a higher court. as for payment of the bills would it be unfair to ask a smoker who does not get cancer to pay for the treatment of someone who never smoked but still got cancer? by spreading the cost of healthcare we raise the chances for everyone but selection becomes an issue. there have been ideas and movements where people would be penalized in their rates for unhealthy behaviour or incentivized for healthy lifestyles and this is an atractive idea. but I worry there might be people with pre existing conditions or health risks outside of their control that would also be penalised. A lot of these questions humans disagrees about seem to concern sensitivity and specificity, the false positives and negatives, people abusing and leeching off the system VS people that deserve the help not being helped to stop the first group. you seem to firmly want to deal with the problem posed by false positives, people who use aid but should not need it ( if they had lived healthily) while I seem more concerned with the possibility of false negatives; people being denied aid while they should receive it. Neither is wrong, neither is mutually exclusive ( thought I believe currently unatainable, making the issue one of which you prioritize as more important)
I would consider myself pragmatic, so i am not exactly against government taxes. in a larger theoretical way i may be against them but only in the sense that you cant really go anywhere on earth and be free from someone elses rule. in a practical way i clearly see great use for them to get roads, military etc. my real issue with them is how easy they are to abuse, how hard they are to remove and how little detailed information they actually give you on how and what exactly they are used for. having worked on government contracts, from my view there is an absurd amount of waste. i could get onboard for things like universal healthcare if better accounting/details/breakdowns were provided and a much much better system was introduced to prevent waste. thats one of the bummers i find about my country. i would think both partys could agree to eliminate waste and introduce better measures but joe average has no political will to do that or even understand it so the same old thing keeps happening. basically we (usa) are getting pennys on the dollar returned in value and that cannot sustain itself. I see that as a much bigger problem than the actual taxes right now. in general i find less taxes better for a few reasons the key of which is the more the people and system are dependant on taxes the easier and farther it can fall and the more pressure it has on it. i am not the omg taxes=evil type though but i do see how much "evil" has been done with them so i am very cautious. i also see for many trying to solve issues, their first go to is taxes because they think throwing money at the problem is the way to solve it. i could go on and on about this stuff but i feel this is good enough to get a general idea of how i feel on them. to quote diddy...mo money mo problems lol
When it comes to taxes some times I ask people to play a thought experiment whereby instead of paying taxes, all resources and infrastructure were all communal and we all paid for using everything like having tolls (which might be what a Geolibertarian would argue for). Every mile you or your company's vehicle drive? You pay. Every gallon of water you consume? You pay (more than the current amount which is usually just to pay for the infrastructure, not the resource). Your company mines ore? You pay for each ounce you pull out of the ground. You have a house/land? You pay for every square feet it covers. Sometimes people say, "That's just property tax!" And it's a reasonable reaction, but the point of this is that at the end of the day, this type of "fee per use" structure largely mimics a progressive tax structure - if you own a lot of stuff and do a lot of things, you end up paying more by virtue of actually consuming/utilizing more. (Taxation is vastly more complicated than this of course, but this is a good way, in my experience, to get people to think about taxes in a different light instead of just "government is stealing from me.") The efficiency problem is an interesting one. But first, I do want to say that I don't think the private sector is more efficient on average - in some ways it is actually less efficient, though there are certainly stellar examples of efficiency. I have been involved in enough startups/businesses to know just how much money basically gets wasted. In general, government spending is more baseline and you shouldn't expect amazing things but it's not going to be terrible either, while private sector spending is much more volatile (all else being equal, economies with a higher % of spending being government spending is has slower growth during boom times but less slowdown during downturns compared to economies where the % of government spending is lower and more % of spending is private - there are many factors to this, but it generally holds for many reasons). The difference for many people tho is that in the private sector if someone wastes their money, it's considered ok because it's their own money, but if the government wastes money, then it's bad because it's the taxpayer's money. This is a reasonable distinction, though on a macro scale it matters much less. What I am getting at here is that government spending is not, in my mind, inherently less efficient - it's just that it gets scrutinized in this manner. This doesn't mean it doesn't have waste/inefficiency, it does - just like the private sector. In particular, I find in the United States that policies seem designed to make government to be inefficient - for example, recent rule changes made by Congress to the EPA seems designed to make them less efficient without actually improving anything, while the decentralized DMV and other things which could be nationalized is just systemic inefficiency (imagine how many millions are lost each year to people dealing with DMVs just because they moved), or how the postal service is supposed to separated from the federal government so it can be ran like a business but Congress continually interferes (for example, by not allowing them to close offices or stop Saturday service), etc. Taxes are another great example where it's a $11 billion industry in the US, but in many European countries most people's taxes come in the mail, pre-filled, and you just confirm it's correct, then sign it and send it back (I actually support Trump's initiative to simplify things in this regard). In fact, a lot of people don't even understand how the tax brackets work - many people think you pay the rate on ALL your income as soon as you cross the bracket and complain about it on social media, etc. There are many examples of this kind of thing and sometimes I think some politicians do these things on purpose so they can turn around and say "look at the inefficiency!" Even with healthcare - the way it works now is grossly inefficient with lack of transparency in prices/information, tons of middlemen at every stage. You can get bills for YEARS after a major operation is completed. I posted in another thread before about how something like 25% of healthcare costs in the US is administrative - compared to countries with single payer healthcare which is typically in the 10-15% range. I also think that in many cases, it's difficult for the average person to really identify inefficiencies/waste - because we aren't embedded in the details of the operations and are mostly aware of macro scale things. For example, Pirates of the Caribbean had a "snack" budget of $2 million. Is that a lot? It sounds like a lot... but how many snacks does a movie production need? But when you are more involved, the waste is often right there on the surface - for example, my wife is a teacher and all kinds of money, IMO, is wasted on things like "snack bags." In one case, they had little bottles with candies in them and the bottles had the school district's name and logo on them). Now, don't get me wrong, feeding my wife when she has a mandatory event is fine... but this is candy, and a special order bottle? How does this benefit anyone? Just buy a rack of water bottles and some pizza! And it's not just money, of course, often human resources are also wasted/squandered - again, my wife being a teacher provides examples of this where she is inundated with meetings and paperwork at the expense of teaching time and student engagement. So I am with you on the efficiency issue, though I am not sure what the solution really is - and often I think different things are considered 'wasteful' to different people so a lot of times it's a matter of opinion. Also, in my opinion, most reasonable people don't advocate for just throwing money at problems - I think this kind of criticism is often just a convenient way to dismiss opinions. For example, someone might think that we should be spending more on education - but that doesn't automatically mean they think that's the ONLY thing to do, or that they should just "throw money." Most of the time, if you ask for details, they will have them - they might say, "I think teacher pay is too low and we aren't retaining good teachers or attracting enough good people" which is a specific, concrete thing to do with the money and doesn't really qualify as thinking money itself is the solution - because in this case, the individual is suggesting that teacher retention/quality is the issue and that one of the core issues is compensation (which HAPPENS to be solved potentially by money). In general, especially in the last 10 years or so, my experience has been most people do not just want more money thrown at a problem - but the debate tends to be about WHO should spend the money - government or the free market/individual (which is, of course, the debate with school choice, healthcare, etc.).
For me the only way to make sense of this stuff is to look at it at the big picture/macro level. It doesn't matter WHAT we talk about, there will be those who are too lazy/greedy/arrogant/whatever and abuse it in some way. The question is really whether the net value of supporting everyone in this manner outweighs the inefficiencies/problems introduced by abusers. This applies whether it's healthcare and addicts, or the justice system and having some % of innocents behind bars. We do our best, and no system is perfect, and the debate I guess comes down to how much false positives, fraud, or abuse is too much. But in general for me the potential for abuse is not a valid argument for not even trying.
Sure, but that's not the point of the post above. It was about what should fall under healthcare, not whether or not there is a possiblity to abuse it. I wouldn't bother checking within the times where healthcare would apply if someone casued it himself or whatever. I was pointing out that I could see a point of not having rehab automatically fall under healthcare, or not the same level. For example, would you put retirement homes fully covered? That's a huge chunk of money for society, for a group that's only going to grow because of how the age curve in society goes. You can see 70-60-50 are huge outliers in numbers. Once those all retire, society will have huge issues supporting them. It's already an issue, but if that weight it put fully on society, even more so. So how far would you want to support say retirement homes, rehab clinics or similar?
