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Massachusetts Makes Health Insurance Mandatory
Iron Condor writes "Massachusetts is the first state to require its residents to secure health insurance, a plan designed to get as close as practically possible to statewide universal health care. Presidential hopeful and former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney originally introduced the idea in 2004. Effective July 1, 2007, the law, which uses federal and state tax dollars, is aimed at making health insurance affordable to all residents of the state, including low-income populations. Those who fall below the federal poverty line may be eligible for health care at no cost."
Well the british healthcare system is known in Europe for being disastrous if you are too old, this is not the norm in Europe this is a british only thing! Generally Europeans are very proud on their healthcare being covered universally, they see it as a logical thing (and christian one) usually you get a very good treatment no matter how old you are, but if you are in GB, shudder!
You are welcome on my lawn.
Dude I realise your trolling with the rest of the crap, but if you aren't getting your prostate checked regularly you are taking stupid risk. Here's a tip, find an attractive doctor to do it, then it isn't "gay".
free-loading lazy scum sure has a price, I pay not only for their food and healthcare but their crime
DIGG SUCKS!!!!! Stop trying to become it. Two completely non-nerd non-tech stories in two days.. Things are not looking good here for the future of slashdot. If I want a discussion on the politics of health I will go someplace that discusses that. And for the people going to respond "Don't read it" Digg is our warning. See what happened over there when they started letting these sorts of discussions. For a community forum to remain a place for intelligent dialog it need to remained focused. If we've learned anything from the web, it's that.
Take the total amount spent by US citizens (and employers) per capita compared to what we spend on "evil-socialized-communist" health-care in Canada, you guys spend multiple times as much for a system that sucks.
Here's the problem that I have with the constant U.S./Canada comparisons: how do we know that the same services are being delivered at that price?
I don't think that any country, even Canada, has the range of lifestyle and dietary issues that we have here in the U.S., and which drive a large portion of healthcare costs. Even if the systems were exactly the same in the U.S. and $RANDOM_COUNTRY, what's to say that the per-capita cost would be the same? There are a lot of things that can change costs; it's not like "keeping one person healthy" is some sort of fixed constant.
Furthermore, speaking as an American, I have an idea of how people get when they know their tax money is being spent on something. A publicly-funded, single-payer healthcare system would be an invitation for the government to start regulating all sorts of stuff. People would demand it -- they're not going to want their tax dollars used to pay for "some asshole's smoking habit," or somebody else who likes to drive without a seatbelt, or someone else who likes to go hang-gliding at night.
Perhaps this doesn't happen in other countries with public healthcare. I'm glad to hear it. But America is a basically intolerant country full of intolerant people who love to dictate how the people around them can live their lives. A public healthcare system would be a wonderful bully pulpit that they could use to essentially dictate everything: from what you can eat, to how much exercise you have to do, to what kind of recreation you do -- or you'll lose your only source for health care.
If the difference in per-capita cost between Canada's system and the U.S.'s is what it takes to keep the various strains of Puritans, neo-prohibitionists, safety freaks, militant vegetarians, anti-gunners, etc. that we breed in this country -- basically whatever crackheads happen to be inhabiting Congress now, or at any point in the future -- from getting a firmer grip on private life, than that's a price I'm happy to pay. And considering the greater sacrifices that have been made over the years for the poor excuse for a 'free society' that we have left, I'm not really interested in a lot of whining otherwise.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Well, when or if that happens, you guys can fight it then. You got a nice constitution and everything, (though it may be a bit battered and tarnished right now), should be pretty good protections against that.
That's too short-sighted and dangerous an attitude for me to support, considering the gravity of the problem.
Everywhere I look, I see the government prying further and further into private life. I don't think it's a "problem" that can be pushed off until some time down the road, it's happening right now, almost inexorably. I think "the people" are losing right now, as it is; handing control of healthcare to the government is going to just accelerate that process further.
The problem is by bringing the government into healthcare, is creating a public interest in what used to be purely private affairs. Right now, it's not really anybody else's business if I smoke a cigarette, or have a few fingers of Jack D., in the privacy of my home after work. At most, it's between me, other people in my house, and perhaps with my insurance company. But if the government is going to pick up the entire tab for my healthcare, then suddenly there's a public interest in taking away my right to ingest what I want. (Or alternately, they can threaten to cut off my healthcare coverage if I don't comply with their lifestyle guidelines, and with a single-payer system, there won't be a lot of alternative choices.) After all, the people who don't drink or smoke, aren't going to want to see precious resources squandered on my consciously-chosen, obviously antisocial, habits.* It's the exact same argument that's used to justify seat-belt and helmet laws, and those got through just fine in 49 states without the weight of taxpayer healthcare to bolster them: this isn't just theoretical.
It's not clear that the Constitution would be of much help, either. Historically, the Constitution has been stretched, or just ignored, whenever it was convenient for the government to do so. Look at the bastardization of the Commerce Clause -- and that's ignoring an intent (limitation of Federal powers) that many of the founders felt strongly enough about to actually write down. There are no such enshrined protections for personal privacy.**
It is far easier to not give a government power, than for the people to give it and then try to get it back. Placing healthcare in the hands of the government -- particularly the Federal government -- would allow an unprecedented expansion of power into the private lives and choices of citizens. To give the government that power is a huge risk, and I'm not willing to take or support a gamble with stakes that high.
Bottom line: yes, the healthcare system is fucked up. But the government is fucked up even worse. In fact, they're probably the one bunch of weasels that I trust less than the weasels running the insurance companies. To give them the high ground from which they could wage war against lifestyles they disagree with is insane. If a thousand dollars or two thousand dollars per person, per year, is what we pay to keep politics as far from medicine as we can, than I think it's money well spent.
* Not only that, but do you really think that the hordes of Evangelicals, heck, even moderate Christians, are going to allow their tax dollars to be used in a public-health system for abortions or contraception? You'd be looking at a way to expand the Hyde Amendment to not only affect people on Medicare/Medicaid, but virtually everyone in the country. Particularly given the Supreme Court that's now in place, that's not a direction I want to go in.
** The entire 'right to privacy' in the U.S. rests on a rather shaky legal foundation; Google "penumbra argument" if you want to read about it. Although its effects are nice, it's mostly a legal fiction created by a few bright Supreme Court Justices, and it could evaporate just as quickly.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Taking my tax dollars and using them to give handouts to people is wrong and is called stealing, my money being taken at the point of a gun for something I completely disagree with. It's so easy to get health care currently but people think they should get full coverage working a part time teenager's job like being a cashier or flipping burgers. Join a construction union and you make 3+x as much easily AND get insurance!
Sure not EVERYONE can do that, but a large number of the 'working poor' can.
The status quo isn't acceptable either, something needs to be done about medical malpractice lawsuits because THEY are the reason prices are so high, because the doctor's need to have malpractice insurance for everything.
Lower standard of care, long waiting lines, etc. The only problem with the american system is the cost and this stems entirely from malpractice insurance being a necessity.