[QUOTE=fable]Then you're wrong, to put it bluntly. My wife and I have thoroughly researched this matter, if for nothing other than out of self-interest. Some of the drugs I use are very inexpensive; others are sky-high, because the research and development costs on those medications were through the roof, with little hope of return if sold for less. It's the so-called government hand-out you're referring to that has actually allowed pharmaceutical companies, hospitals and doctors to charge less to patients, and absorb most of the cost. The days of rampant cheating have been over for several decades, as the legal loopholes in medical compliance were closed.[/QUOTE]
Maybe I have not completely sted my opinion here.. I support money going to hospitals, and for R&D. I think the focus should be on making those drugs affordable and safe, and getting them available sooner, not paying people's medical bills. And cheating is rampant, I don't know where you're getting your information there, but if it's from the government, that's your problem. I know multiple people that have done it and when I tried to report it the government official told me that it costs too much to fight them and take it away to bother.
[QUOTE=fable]
Also, if the US had real problems like the nations that you're referring to, the millions spent on charity annually would cover those problems and not shipping money out to be spread thin across problems we'll never see.
The fact that charities are spread thin and can't even begin to handle 1/100th% of the cost of all the medical care admiinistered to the elderly and indigent in the US is because it's simply not there. Check out some of the websites that monitor 501c3's, tax-exempt public foundations, and the amount of money they garner.
People simply don't donate enough to handle it, and throughout history, never have come close.[/QUOTE]
I'm talking international aid, everything. No more Rawanda, Somalia, Ethiopia, etc. I don't know if that would cover it, but if it didn't I could see spending some money to reduce the cost of things in addtion to the funding I mentioned above. If we only spent money on countries that could reciprocate with something then more could be diverted to domestic causes. You don't want to know my opinions on foreign policy.
[QUOTE=fable]
1) The elderly are covered bu Medicare, this I'm not too mad about though I personally feel that if you have 40 years to save and you can't do it that's your fault.
This shows a remarkable lack of empathy for individuals who have put children through school, saved the best they could, and then found themselves faced with medical costs due that dwarf all expectations. My parents saved for roughly the time you indicate; and my father's expenses for his cancer treatments in the first 6 months after his diagnosis literally would have left them broke. To be sure, this is simply personal anecdotal evidence, but from what I can tell, my parents were neither extravagant in their living standards, no remarkably frugal; the same story has been repeated time and again with others. The cost of medical R&D these days is simply too great for the burden to be subsumed by patients, or hospitals--or by the manufacturers, for that matter. The alternative is simply to scrap most of the medical treatments that have been placed into use over the last 30 years, including expensive cancer treatments, heart bypass surgery, and the like.[/QUOTE]
I agree that medical care for the elderly is expensive, but I think there are alternatives. I'm not saying scrap it all together, but I think there should be some changes. Income restrictions
eek: From a conservative! OMG!) on it. You need to be poor. Period. Rich people don't need medicare. I know that isn't popular in the RNC but tough. I also think we could move back the age you get it if we focussed more on prevention. I know that this doesn't fit completely with everything I have posted, but if all my other suggestions were implemented and it wasn't enough, this is what I would want.
[QUOTE=fable]
2) The people doing unskilled work are in good condition and are not about to keel over, in fact, most of them have no healthcare anyway. Also in the time periods that you are referring to those people were allowed to die becasue they were considered utterly worthless. In fact, given the option I'm sure many would have helped them along.
Where are you gettting this stuff? There's no indication that these people were considered "worthless." Their early deaths was a constant subject of discussion and concern in legislatures, newspapers, sermons, books, and discussion groups. There simply was no solution because charity was considered the only solution; the idea of a government using tax dollars to fund a safety net for the elderly and indigent had yet to be more than voiced by a few isolationists. In fact, it was because of this intolerable situation that the nations under discussion finally developed a consensus towards social legislation.[/QUOTE]
Notice that I said people doing unskilled work that were in good condition, not elderly and indigent. I'm talking mostly of men in their 20s, in Georgian England and the like. And the people that you cited as discussing this were Avante Garde, it was the general agreement of the aristocracy that this was a bad thing. They didn't care if people were killed in factories, if they did, they'd have put in safety measures.
[QUOTE=fable]
I'll be glad to browse your reading list, but like I said I'm talking about the US, now. I don't think that there was never a time for liberalism, now just isn't the time. If labor had never organized I don't think we would be where we are in industry. Also if the New Deal never existed, our economy would not be were it is. Liberism has it's place, I just don't think it has it's place in the US welfare system today.
This isn't about flag-waving isms that make no sense at all, like the specious what-ifs over labor and industry, above: it's about doing what's morally right at this moment, on the ground. If we could spend literally $200 billion federally last year to fund a war in Iraq alone without reference to the rest of the defense budget, then we can afford to spend money to keep our own elderly from dying in the streets through no fault of their own, and a tiny fraction of the cost. [/QUOTE]
I put military funding as primary. If we could get a little more imperialism and stop worrying about hurting peoples feelings the costs wouldn't matter. Also I don't mix business with pleasure, or politics with morality.
