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Politics : A US National Health Care System? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Peter Dierks who wrote (689)	4/18/2005 3:30:11 PM
From: Lazarus_Long	Respond to of 42652

Are all people entitled to equal medical care? Quality? Quantity? Urgency? Is it morally defensible or morally indefensible that people could be allowed to purchase medical care that is not available to people with less disposable financial resources? If it is morally defensible, should people be able to purchase medical insurance that has no limits? should people be able to purchase medical insurance that has specific limits (and save premiums)? Is it morally defensible that people should be required to buy medical insurance that exceeds their available income? Should companies be allowed to offer a choice of great and terrible insurance to their employees? Why or why not? Hmmmm. I wasn't intending to go down the paths of theology and philosophy, but, hey, go for it.

To: Peter Dierks who wrote (689)	4/18/2005 3:32:35 PM
From: TimF	Respond to of 42652

Is it morally defensible that people should be required to buy medical insurance that exceeds their available income? You didn't ask that one before. I'd say no, assuming your sentence means what I think it means. Reading "required" to mean compelled by law or regulation or any for of force initiated against them. This is what I think you mean and what I think the term should mean, but some people have an odd idea of what "required" means. They would say that if a person has a health problem that needs a high level of care, and if the insurance to cover that level of care is beyond their income, that by "allowing" this situation to exist, and by not mitigating it by providing some sort of government program (or government require for their employer to provide a program) that covers all or part of their expenses that you are "requiring" them to get insurance (or directly pay for coverage) beyond their available income. I think that is a twisted way to use the term, but I recognize that people do sometimes say such things. Should companies be allowed to offer a choice of great and terrible insurance to their employees? Expanding on the answer in my previous post I would still say the answer is yes, but with the added point that it shouldn't be so terrible as to amount to fraud (to not really insure them while making even a reasonable and informed person think they are covered). Tim