Quote:
Originally Posted by Shawnee123
Whose money. I'm trying to get back to my point...since the health care debate started in full force, I've heard a lot about using "our" money (presumably taxpayers) to help people who are just druggies, or alkies, or a slew of other "bad choices." The thought seems to be that "we" shouldn't help those who made a bad choice.
|
No reason to draw any line. Those who make bad choices die earlier. Put less stain on the system. The most expensive people are the healthy people who life on and on and on. Who slowly degrade. I have seen numbers that put the cost of this category as high as 50% of insurance costs.
Insurance means covering everyone. That is what insurance is about when the purpose of insurance is more important than profits. By not having insurance, we are simply dumping the 'stresses' on other parts of the economy - ie through bankruptcies, hospitals (especially children's hospitals) covering the costs that customers cannot pay for, and long term harm to kids because the most stressed families cannot get insurance.
One part of the economy that gets stuck for the bills if we do not change the system - government. Those costs exist no matter who does and does not pay. The idea of insurance is to stabilize what is now an economically and socially destructive way of paying for those costs.
Why are these costs dumped on government? Because we have no working health insurance system. And because the existing system is so beneficial to the upper 50% at the expense or the lower 50%. A large number of that lower 50% are children.