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Share of Americans skipping medical care due to money woes jumps significantly

arstechnica.com

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Re: Share of Americans skipping medical care due to money woes jumps significantly

#11

Post by ztrww »

pfannkuchen wrote: post #3
dfdg wrote: post #2

Encouraging generic drugs eases the problem a little bit. Right to health care should be in the constitution instead of right to own guns.

Health care requires other people’s labor though. If you make that a right you risk needing to implement some kind of forced labor system (sure it can be obfuscated as much as you like). Not taking guns doesn’t require anyone’s labor, so you don’t run into this hazard. I’m not particularly pro gun, I just don’t think positive rights are practical from a design perspective.

Income tax? Publicly funded education? Innumerable (in a comment) other things especially including Medicaid and Medicare?

> Not taking guns doesn’t require anyone’s labor,

It does. Somebody has to take care of all the bodies. Mass shootings and homocides in general are pretty expensive both directly and due to lost future productivity.

Re: Share of Americans skipping medical care due to money woes jumps significantly

#12

Post by Rebelgecko »

reaperman wrote: post #5
pfannkuchen wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Health care requires other people’s labor though. If you make that a right you risk needing to implement some kind of forced labor system (sure it can be obfuscated as much as you like). Not taking guns doesn’t require anyone’s labor, so you don’t run into this hazard. I’m not particularly pro gun, I just don’t think positive rights are practical from a design perspective.

Welp. Guess we can't have taxpayer funded roads then cuz all the forced labor needed for free roads. Guess we also can't have a right to K-12 education.

You don't have the right to roads. Similarly education is mostly implemented at the state level, there's nothing legally preventing a state from saying that public school is now K-8 only. Laws requiring people to go to school are kind of a mixed bag, and compulsory education laws usually only apply to children (and in some cases only to pre-teens). AFAIK there's no legal forms of adult forced labor, except prisoners who are exempt from some rights.

Re: Share of Americans skipping medical care due to money woes jumps significantly

#13

Post by pfannkuchen »

reaperman wrote: post #8
pfannkuchen wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are hopefully aware of the difference between a right granted to all citizens and a project funded by the government?

I am. But you dont make sense. All Americans have a right to K-12 education, it's funded by the government. How is that different from all Americans having a right to healthcare, being funded by the government? If someone doesn't wanna be in healthcare anymore they can still switch to whatever they want to. They're not forced labor any more than teachers are. Perhaps you'd like to sign a petition to lower forced labo…

There is fairly well developed theory in this area, I don’t think I’m going out on a limb here.

Americans do not have a “right” to education in the same way they have a “right” to e.g. free speech. The government can reduce or even eliminate state funded education without violating the constitution. If not enough e.g. teachers will work for the state (for the pay offered, based on tax revenue available, etc), the state can respond to changing circumstances by reducing or eliminating the education services provided. If education were to be added as a “right” then this reduction or elimination in service would not possible, unless you make that “right” so flimsy as to be basically meaningless (i.e. if the government is able to meaningfully remove it, it is not really a right).

I don’t believe in forced prison labor at all, so yes I’d be happy to sign that petition. I’m not sure what it has to do with this discussion.

Re: Share of Americans skipping medical care due to money woes jumps significantly

#14

Post by derelicta »

pfannkuchen wrote: post #3
dfdg wrote: post #2

Encouraging generic drugs eases the problem a little bit. Right to health care should be in the constitution instead of right to own guns.

Health care requires other people’s labor though. If you make that a right you risk needing to implement some kind of forced labor system (sure it can be obfuscated as much as you like). Not taking guns doesn’t require anyone’s labor, so you don’t run into this hazard. I’m not particularly pro gun, I just don’t think positive rights are practical from a design perspective.

Clearly letting poor folks die is the most moral option.

If positive rights make you so uncomfortable, I'll let you know they are very much widespread in today's constitutions. My canton's has many economic rights enumerated, including the right to a proper shelter. And I don't hold it for a nasty totalitarian dictatorship (yet?)

Re: Share of Americans skipping medical care due to money woes jumps significantly

#15

Post by pfannkuchen »

ok_dad wrote: post #9
pfannkuchen wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Health care requires other people’s labor though. If you make that a right you risk needing to implement some kind of forced labor system (sure it can be obfuscated as much as you like). Not taking guns doesn’t require anyone’s labor, so you don’t run into this hazard. I’m not particularly pro gun, I just don’t think positive rights are practical from a design perspective.

I seriously don’t understand people whose ethics accept that some folks will just die because they don’t want to pay an extra few dollars in taxes. You grew up here, your success or failure depends on the health of our society in many ways, and our society is falling apart because opportunistic capitalists drain all of the productivity with very little gain for the average person since the 70s. I guess we can keep pl…

This is a great example of why discussing politics on the internet is annoying. People assume others’ positions and yell past each other.

Not making healthcare a “right” does not preclude having a government run health care system. Why would it?

Re: Share of Americans skipping medical care due to money woes jumps significantly

#16

Post by dragonwriter »

reaperman wrote: post #8
pfannkuchen wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are hopefully aware of the difference between a right granted to all citizens and a project funded by the government?

I am. But you dont make sense. All Americans have a right to K-12 education, it's funded by the government. How is that different from all Americans having a right to healthcare, being funded by the government? If someone doesn't wanna be in healthcare anymore they can still switch to whatever they want to. They're not forced labor any more than teachers are. Perhaps you'd like to sign a petition to lower forced labo…

> All Americans have a right to K-12 education

Federally, no, they don’t.

They may have a State Constitutional right, though.

Re: Share of Americans skipping medical care due to money woes jumps significantly

#17

Post by pfannkuchen »

derelicta wrote: post #14
pfannkuchen wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Health care requires other people’s labor though. If you make that a right you risk needing to implement some kind of forced labor system (sure it can be obfuscated as much as you like). Not taking guns doesn’t require anyone’s labor, so you don’t run into this hazard. I’m not particularly pro gun, I just don’t think positive rights are practical from a design perspective.

Clearly letting poor folks die is the most moral option. If positive rights make you so uncomfortable, I'll let you know they are very much widespread in today's constitutions. My canton's has many economic rights enumerated, including the right to a proper shelter. And I don't hold it for a nasty totalitarian dictatorship (yet?)

A government constitution should be designed to be robust. It should be assumed that no rights will be removed under any possible circumstances.

The inclusion of positive rights simply reduces the space of possible circumstances the government can traverse without removing rights, and depending on what sort of positive right we are taking about it does so drastically. Giving the government the ability to remove rights is dangerous for obvious reasons (they aren’t really rights at that point, are they).

If the medical system is ever mismanaged to the point of insolvency, should the government have the ability to violate a constitutional right to get things back in order? If they are allowed to violate that right, presumably they are able to violate other “rights” in the same class depending on the circumstances as well.

No one is saying constitutions with positive rights are totalitarian. I am just saying that they are fragile and should be avoided for that reason.

If what you want is a government health care system that can be modified or canceled based on circumstances, then that’s fine, but you can’t call it a “right” since you aren’t treating it as one.

Re: Share of Americans skipping medical care due to money woes jumps significantly

#19

Post by pfannkuchen »

ztrww wrote: post #11
pfannkuchen wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Health care requires other people’s labor though. If you make that a right you risk needing to implement some kind of forced labor system (sure it can be obfuscated as much as you like). Not taking guns doesn’t require anyone’s labor, so you don’t run into this hazard. I’m not particularly pro gun, I just don’t think positive rights are practical from a design perspective.

Income tax? Publicly funded education? Innumerable (in a comment) other things especially including Medicaid and Medicare? > Not taking guns doesn’t require anyone’s labor, It does. Somebody has to take care of all the bodies. Mass shootings and homocides in general are pretty expensive both directly and due to lost future productivity.

None of these are rights and they can all be modified without violating the constitution. What is your point?

Re: Share of Americans skipping medical care due to money woes jumps significantly

#20

Post by reaperman »

dragonwriter wrote: post #16
reaperman wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am. But you dont make sense. All Americans have a right to K-12 education, it's funded by the government. How is that different from all Americans having a right to healthcare, being funded by the government? If someone doesn't wanna be in healthcare anymore they can still switch to whatever they want to. They're not forced labor any more than teachers are. Perhaps you'd like to sign a petition to lower forced labo…

> All Americans have a right to K-12 education Federally, no, they don’t. They may have a State Constitutional right, though.

Okay. But all Americans do. Is that also forced labor? How does that line of logic hold any water?
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