18 thoughts on “If The Government Can Force Us To Buy Health Insurance”
I found the emphasis on hunting down “freeloaders” to be loathsome. By passing such laws, we create the opportunity for more freeloading and for more law to attempt to regulate said freeloading. That approach is one way to grab more power even if the government doesn’t have an explicit intent to do so. It’s also a situation where incompetent enforcement of law by government allows future opportunities for more power.
Also it’s bizarre how the people backing such regulation ignore what will happen when political opponents replace the current group in power. Of the people disturbed by the Bush administration’s stance on numerous issues of privacy, legal rights, and government secrecy, how would they feel about such an administration also tapping into medical records as would be required for this particular medical care proposal?
Obama won’t stay in power forever. Eventually, someone you don’t like is going to have that power. Why do you trust that future government so much?
Eventually, someone you don’t like is going to have that power. Why do you trust that future government so much?
You’re thinking like a republican (small r), Karl, like the kind of guy who resigns himself to the will of the majority, knowing sometimes that majority is going to make dumbass election decisions.
Stalinists don’t think that way. To be sure, they often use the majority to gain power, but they see no reason why, having once performed that useful act, the majority should then be allowed to risk its own future welfare by being foolishly allowed to continue to exercise actual power.
More demand from people who treat “health care” like the lottery, will lead to a reduction in supply for those who see it as an earned standard.
I have a problem with insurance in general. I’m not well off, in fact I’m poor, but there were times when I had “good coverage.”
And I remember, going in to a dermatologist, cuz my podiatrist told me it was a skin issue.
5 bucks for the podiatrist, and out of pocket for the dermatologist, cuz my feet have been effed up for about 12 years.
Dermatology was an out of pocket expense for a grown man, who doesn’t have systic acne.
If I were more well off, and if I understand that I had to be able to interpret contracts that consist of hundreds of pages, or hire (spelling?) a lawyer to watch out for my interests, I would have payed the extra for better insurance coverage. Even with what I made back then.
Making medical insurance mandatory will have the same effect that most treat mandatory auto insurance as.
GRAFT.
Power enough to save a man who does not want to be saved is power enough to enslave him. Depressing.
MAKE THEM PAY!!!
MAKE THEM PAY!!!!
That’s the game.
Power enough to save a man who does not want to be saved is power enough to enslave him.
The Obamarrhoids never think that far through the concept.
Or any concept, really.
Like I said before, the “individual mandate” is an unconstitutional house of cards. That they plan to circumvent the 4th and 5th amendments, as well as the privacy act, to pull it off just makes it worse.
Maybe someone can help me out here. If this thing passes, it seems like the smart thing to do is immediately cancel my health insurance because I believe that the fine plus my out of pocket expences for routine care will be less than my health insurance premiums. Since “pre-existing conditions” are no longer an issue, why shouldn’t I defer signing up with anybody until I face a catastrophic expense? And then why I shoudn’t I cancel my policy as soon as I’m better? I realize that would make me a super-freeloader, but wouldn’t I be dumb not to do it?
If this thing passes, it seems like the smart thing to do is immediately cancel my health insurance because I believe that the fine plus my out of pocket expences for routine care will be less than my health insurance premiums.
HR3200 taxes you 2.5% AGI if you don’t have a HMO plan. HMO premiums run about $10K. So unless your AGI > 400K, you’re better off being a “free-loader” and then signing-up only after you get sick.
I realize that would make me a super-freeloader, but wouldn’t I be dumb not to do it?
Yup. Enabling freeloaders is what Democrats do. It’s their whole purpose.
All I’ll say is, read my Screen Name. It is way past time to take back our country.
5 bucks for the podiatrist, and out of pocket for the dermatologist, cuz my feet have been effed up for about 12 years.
Try washing your feet regularly using soap with triclosan.
> Enabling freeloaders is what Democrats do.
More like fostering dependency under the guise of taking care of people. Wouldn’t do for the freeloader to move on when things fall apart. If fostering dependency encourages bad behavior, that’s the price they’re willing to pay for a lock on power.
Stalinists don’t think that way. To be sure, they often use the majority to gain power, but they see no reason why, having once performed that useful act, the majority should then be allowed to risk its own future welfare by being foolishly allowed to continue to exercise actual power.
You mean Troskyites. Stalinists would make sure the competition was dead first before they made such assumptions.
Also, to return to my original consternation, most people aren’t Stalinists. They just think government should do all these wonderful, feelgood things. Then they get upset when someone they don’t like starts doing disagreeable things with that new power. I guess they can’t connect cause and effect.
I’ve found that I get the most traction describing this as a poll tax.
Fail to pay -> felon -> loss of right to vote.
most people aren’t Stalinists
Yes and no, Karl. I think most people who do not think about things carefully, and are not forced to make actual governing choices, are pretty Stalinist in their thinking. They do tend to think Ach, phooey, all these damn interests and corporations and [insert organized influence here]. The will of The People — which I, of course, understand perfectly — is not being followed, and this explains everything from psoriasis to bankruptcy to bad luck. Put me (or someone who thinks just like me) in power, absolute power, and we’ll fix that right up.
However, most people who might be thrust into positions of actual governing power, forced to contemplate the actual effect on real people of their actual decisions, and confronting the severe limits on how well one man can understand very complex systems, would ethically recoil to a far humbler position, one much more consistent with individual liberty. That is, I think most people are theoretically Stalinist (or at least collectivist) but in actual practise revert to a more liberty-loving position.
It’s sort of like how we’re all superb back-seat drivers, or how those with the highest standards of child-rearing — I’d never let my kids do THAT you betcha — are those who aren’t parents yet.
This is why I think the underlying malaise of our century is not precisely an outbreak of collectivism, but rather the decreasing rate at which we accumulate practical life experience in the School O’ Hard Knocks. We are — at least in the United States, and at least until recently — unbelievably wealthy. We live lives of amazing ease, where we waft from birth to our mid twenties without suffering serious disease, or having someone near to us do so, without suffering serious material want, without generally needing to work at all, and instead spending our days in school, from kindergarten through our BA degree, focussed on nuanced and honed explorations of literary and philosophical themes.
To give you a crude example: my daughter just took the SATs, including the new “essay” question. The two prompts (about which you must write an essay) in the two tests she took were, roughly: “Is truth always to be preferred over falsehood?” and “Describe the importance of family.” Notice that these are very abstract, theoretical questions. They ask you to show a strong command of the discussion of values, like a Greek philosopher.
But is that really what most ordinary adults need to know how to do? Or would it be more relevant to test whether they can successfully describe a sales plan? The terms of a mortgage loan? The directions from here to New York City, to someone who has never flown before? How to plan a surprise birthday party for your wife? And so on.
This is not to even touch on the fact that practical subjects like shop or home ec have vanished utterly, to be replaced by AP Government (?!) and Honors British Literature (of the 19th century and before, natch). This is all fine stuff, for some small segment of society, but when it’s the standard public high-school fare — well, we are certainly eschewing the practical, life-experience oriented, hurly burly of the market for the quiet ponderous pondering of the hushed groves of Academe.
And is it any wonder, then, that we have raised a generation that so believes in the power of plausible theory — is so contemptuous of the caution and skepticism of empirical experience — that they easily fall prey to the brilliant intellectual porn of collectivism? As many have said, the collectivist theories of government are certainly those that sound the nicest, most noble. Only someone with a harsh skepticism about the difference between how things sound and how they work out in practise could fail to be seduced by them.
Click my name to see Richard Epstein deconstructing the big lie before us now.
I found the emphasis on hunting down “freeloaders” to be loathsome. By passing such laws, we create the opportunity for more freeloading and for more law to attempt to regulate said freeloading. That approach is one way to grab more power even if the government doesn’t have an explicit intent to do so. It’s also a situation where incompetent enforcement of law by government allows future opportunities for more power.
Also it’s bizarre how the people backing such regulation ignore what will happen when political opponents replace the current group in power. Of the people disturbed by the Bush administration’s stance on numerous issues of privacy, legal rights, and government secrecy, how would they feel about such an administration also tapping into medical records as would be required for this particular medical care proposal?
Obama won’t stay in power forever. Eventually, someone you don’t like is going to have that power. Why do you trust that future government so much?
Eventually, someone you don’t like is going to have that power. Why do you trust that future government so much?
You’re thinking like a republican (small r), Karl, like the kind of guy who resigns himself to the will of the majority, knowing sometimes that majority is going to make dumbass election decisions.
Stalinists don’t think that way. To be sure, they often use the majority to gain power, but they see no reason why, having once performed that useful act, the majority should then be allowed to risk its own future welfare by being foolishly allowed to continue to exercise actual power.
More demand from people who treat “health care” like the lottery, will lead to a reduction in supply for those who see it as an earned standard.
I have a problem with insurance in general. I’m not well off, in fact I’m poor, but there were times when I had “good coverage.”
And I remember, going in to a dermatologist, cuz my podiatrist told me it was a skin issue.
5 bucks for the podiatrist, and out of pocket for the dermatologist, cuz my feet have been effed up for about 12 years.
Dermatology was an out of pocket expense for a grown man, who doesn’t have systic acne.
If I were more well off, and if I understand that I had to be able to interpret contracts that consist of hundreds of pages, or hire (spelling?) a lawyer to watch out for my interests, I would have payed the extra for better insurance coverage. Even with what I made back then.
Making medical insurance mandatory will have the same effect that most treat mandatory auto insurance as.
GRAFT.
Power enough to save a man who does not want to be saved is power enough to enslave him. Depressing.
MAKE THEM PAY!!!
MAKE THEM PAY!!!!
That’s the game.
The Obamarrhoids never think that far through the concept.
Or any concept, really.
Like I said before, the “individual mandate” is an unconstitutional house of cards. That they plan to circumvent the 4th and 5th amendments, as well as the privacy act, to pull it off just makes it worse.
Maybe someone can help me out here. If this thing passes, it seems like the smart thing to do is immediately cancel my health insurance because I believe that the fine plus my out of pocket expences for routine care will be less than my health insurance premiums. Since “pre-existing conditions” are no longer an issue, why shouldn’t I defer signing up with anybody until I face a catastrophic expense? And then why I shoudn’t I cancel my policy as soon as I’m better? I realize that would make me a super-freeloader, but wouldn’t I be dumb not to do it?
If this thing passes, it seems like the smart thing to do is immediately cancel my health insurance because I believe that the fine plus my out of pocket expences for routine care will be less than my health insurance premiums.
HR3200 taxes you 2.5% AGI if you don’t have a HMO plan. HMO premiums run about $10K. So unless your AGI > 400K, you’re better off being a “free-loader” and then signing-up only after you get sick.
Yup. Enabling freeloaders is what Democrats do. It’s their whole purpose.
All I’ll say is, read my Screen Name. It is way past time to take back our country.
5 bucks for the podiatrist, and out of pocket for the dermatologist, cuz my feet have been effed up for about 12 years.
Try washing your feet regularly using soap with triclosan.
> Enabling freeloaders is what Democrats do.
More like fostering dependency under the guise of taking care of people. Wouldn’t do for the freeloader to move on when things fall apart. If fostering dependency encourages bad behavior, that’s the price they’re willing to pay for a lock on power.
Stalinists don’t think that way. To be sure, they often use the majority to gain power, but they see no reason why, having once performed that useful act, the majority should then be allowed to risk its own future welfare by being foolishly allowed to continue to exercise actual power.
You mean Troskyites. Stalinists would make sure the competition was dead first before they made such assumptions.
Also, to return to my original consternation, most people aren’t Stalinists. They just think government should do all these wonderful, feelgood things. Then they get upset when someone they don’t like starts doing disagreeable things with that new power. I guess they can’t connect cause and effect.
I’ve found that I get the most traction describing this as a poll tax.
Fail to pay -> felon -> loss of right to vote.
most people aren’t Stalinists
Yes and no, Karl. I think most people who do not think about things carefully, and are not forced to make actual governing choices, are pretty Stalinist in their thinking. They do tend to think Ach, phooey, all these damn interests and corporations and [insert organized influence here]. The will of The People — which I, of course, understand perfectly — is not being followed, and this explains everything from psoriasis to bankruptcy to bad luck. Put me (or someone who thinks just like me) in power, absolute power, and we’ll fix that right up.
However, most people who might be thrust into positions of actual governing power, forced to contemplate the actual effect on real people of their actual decisions, and confronting the severe limits on how well one man can understand very complex systems, would ethically recoil to a far humbler position, one much more consistent with individual liberty. That is, I think most people are theoretically Stalinist (or at least collectivist) but in actual practise revert to a more liberty-loving position.
It’s sort of like how we’re all superb back-seat drivers, or how those with the highest standards of child-rearing — I’d never let my kids do THAT you betcha — are those who aren’t parents yet.
This is why I think the underlying malaise of our century is not precisely an outbreak of collectivism, but rather the decreasing rate at which we accumulate practical life experience in the School O’ Hard Knocks. We are — at least in the United States, and at least until recently — unbelievably wealthy. We live lives of amazing ease, where we waft from birth to our mid twenties without suffering serious disease, or having someone near to us do so, without suffering serious material want, without generally needing to work at all, and instead spending our days in school, from kindergarten through our BA degree, focussed on nuanced and honed explorations of literary and philosophical themes.
To give you a crude example: my daughter just took the SATs, including the new “essay” question. The two prompts (about which you must write an essay) in the two tests she took were, roughly: “Is truth always to be preferred over falsehood?” and “Describe the importance of family.” Notice that these are very abstract, theoretical questions. They ask you to show a strong command of the discussion of values, like a Greek philosopher.
But is that really what most ordinary adults need to know how to do? Or would it be more relevant to test whether they can successfully describe a sales plan? The terms of a mortgage loan? The directions from here to New York City, to someone who has never flown before? How to plan a surprise birthday party for your wife? And so on.
This is not to even touch on the fact that practical subjects like shop or home ec have vanished utterly, to be replaced by AP Government (?!) and Honors British Literature (of the 19th century and before, natch). This is all fine stuff, for some small segment of society, but when it’s the standard public high-school fare — well, we are certainly eschewing the practical, life-experience oriented, hurly burly of the market for the quiet ponderous pondering of the hushed groves of Academe.
And is it any wonder, then, that we have raised a generation that so believes in the power of plausible theory — is so contemptuous of the caution and skepticism of empirical experience — that they easily fall prey to the brilliant intellectual porn of collectivism? As many have said, the collectivist theories of government are certainly those that sound the nicest, most noble. Only someone with a harsh skepticism about the difference between how things sound and how they work out in practise could fail to be seduced by them.
Click my name to see Richard Epstein deconstructing the big lie before us now.