Is Health Care a Right?

[Perchoutofwater]

A MINORITY VIEW

 

BY WALTER WILLIAMS

 

RELEASE: WEDNESDAY, MARCH 10, 2010

 

 

 

Is Health Care a Right?

 

 

 

Most politicians, and probably most Americans, see health care as a right. Thus, whether a person has the means to pay for medical services or not, he is nonetheless entitled to them. Let's ask ourselves a few questions about this vision.

 

Say a person, let's call him Harry, suffers from diabetes and he has no means to pay a laboratory for blood work, a doctor for treatment and a pharmacy for medication. Does Harry have a right to XYZ lab's and Dr. Jones' services and a prescription from a pharmacist? And, if those services are not provided without charge, should Harry be able to call for criminal sanctions against those persons for violating his rights to health care?

 

You say, "Williams, that would come very close to slavery if one person had the right to force someone to serve him without pay." You're right. Suppose instead of Harry being able to force a lab, doctor and pharmacy to provide services without pay, Congress uses its taxing power to take a couple of hundred dollars out of the paycheck of some American to give to Harry so that he could pay the lab, doctor and pharmacist. Would there be any difference in principle, namely forcibly using one person to serve the purposes of another? There would be one important strategic difference, that of concealment. Most Americans, I would hope, would be offended by the notion of directly and visibly forcing one person to serve the purposes of another. Congress' use of the tax system to invisibly accomplish the same end is more palatable to the average American.

 

True rights, such as those in our Constitution, or those considered to be natural or human rights, exist simultaneously among people. That means exercise of a right by one person does not diminish those held by another. In other words, my rights to speech or travel impose no obligations on another except those of non-interference. If we apply ideas behind rights to health care to my rights to speech or travel, my free speech rights would require government-imposed obligations on others to provide me with an auditorium, television studio or radio station. My right to travel freely would require government-imposed obligations on others to provide me with airfare and hotel accommodations.

 

For Congress to guarantee a right to health care, or any other good or service, whether a person can afford it or not, it must diminish someone else's rights, namely their rights to their earnings. The reason is that Congress has no resources of its very own. Moreover, there is no Santa Claus, Easter Bunny or Tooth Fairy giving them those resources. The fact that government has no resources of its very own forces one to recognize that in order for government to give one American citizen a dollar, it must first, through intimidation, threats and coercion, confiscate that dollar from some other American. If one person has a right to something he did not earn, of necessity it requires that another person not have a right to something that he did earn.

 

To argue that people have a right that imposes obligations on another is an absurd concept. A better term for new-fangled rights to health care, decent housing and food is wishes. If we called them wishes, I would be in agreement with most other Americans for I, too, wish that everyone had adequate health care, decent housing and nutritious meals. However, if we called them human wishes, instead of human rights, there would be confusion and cognitive dissonance. The average American would cringe at the thought of government punishing one person because he refused to be pressed into making someone else's wish come true.

 

None of my argument is to argue against charity. Reaching into one's own pockets to assist his fellow man in need is praiseworthy and laudable. Reaching into someone else's pockets to do so is despicable and deserves condemnation.

 

Walter E. Williams is a professor of economics at George Mason University.

 

If all economics professors had the sense of Mr. Williams we would never be in the shape we are in today. We wouldn't have trillions and trillions in unfunded future debt looming over us like the blade of a guillotine.

[i_am_the_swammi]

" Reaching into one's own pockets to assist his fellow man in need is praiseworthy and laudable. Reaching into someone else's pockets to do so is despicable and deserves condemnation"

 

What he forgot to add as a final line:

 

Unfortunately, there are cretans and the greedy that don't understand that living in a society means everyone helping everyone....and those that refuse to help their fellow man necessitate those despicable actions. The pathetic cause pathetic repercussions.

[Perchoutofwater]

What he forgot to add as a final line:

 

Unfortunately, there are cretans and the greedy that don't understand that living in a society means everyone helping everyone....and those that refuse to help their fellow man necessitate those despicable actions. The pathetic cause pathetic repercussions.

 

And yet our nation survived for almost 150 years without having to take these despicable actions. People used to help one another. Now unfortunately some people expect the government to take care of most of their needs, and almost as unfortunate many people who could help or help more now expect the government to take care of these people, and often times think they've already given at the office so to speak through their taxes.

[muck]

A couple of quotes from a recent book I read may be illustrative that both IAS and Perch (and Dr. Williams) have good points:

 

thread

 

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"Why do republics so regularly fail? Which passion kills them? Envy, it turns out, is the most destructive social passion -- more so than hatred. Hatred is at least visible and universally recognized as evil. Envy seldom operates under its own name. It chooses a lovelier name to hide behind and prefers to do its work invisibly." (page 90)

 

****************************

 

"...the history of the twenty-first century may be bloodier than the twentieth. Liberty does not come with a guarantee. Its price, our founders remind us, is everlasting vigilance. Liberty is in some ways the least stable of regimes; it depends on fidelity to key ideas. Any one generation at any moment may surrender liberty, give up on it, thrust it back to the giver. ... The greatest threat to liberty lies in the human heart." (page 95)

 

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"Yet this characteristic worldliness is tame compared to the aggressive animal-like sexuality and brutal violence that form the lure of television's excitement and innuendo. By their products, the creators of the television world would seem to do their work with a constant leer. Naturally, the public is susceptible to this constant playing to their prurient interests. It assaults us in our own homes; it is amiable; it is free; and part of our nature does respond to it -- the least noble, most beastly part of our nature. We often consent to it even when cheapened by it. "Giving the public what it wants" is here no boasting matter. It is, in fact, a form of prostitution. ... All around the world, the major existing threat to free markets and democracy at the end of the twentieth century springs from the systematic corruption of popular culture. Systemic moral decline undermines the capacity of peoples for self-government." (pages152-153)

[Ursa Majoris]

And yet our nation survived for almost 150 years without having to take these despicable actions. People used to help one another. Now unfortunately some people expect the government to take care of most of their needs, and almost as unfortunate many people who could help or help more now expect the government to take care of these people, and often times think they've already given at the office so to speak through their taxes.

Slavery

Child labor

Seven day working weeks

Strikers shot by the militia

Lynchings

Grinding poverty

Early death

Pestilence unchecked

Tenement slums

 

Yes, our nation sure did survive it's first 150 years. Ah, the good old days.

[Clubfoothead]

I talk too much and take things too personally around here sometimes. As a friend of mine pointed out to me years ago when calling me out on a few of my comments, these debates we have aren't always in the abstract for some.

Edited March 14, 2010 by Clubfoothead

[Ursa Majoris]

Dr. Eric M and Dr. Jane K. If there is such a thing as angels them and their staff are it. I owe them a combined $1,245,600.00ish after my insurance. They know they'll never see that, just never lead a life that would allow me to cover such a bill. I owe the hospital even more. They drive fat cars and live in Highland Park. I don't begrudge them because they deserve it. They have sold off most of my debt to third parties who apparently can't figure out that I'll never be in a position to pay it all. So they sell it to someone else - I'm on my 5th collection agency. All this money changing hands on debt I'll go to my grave with, I assume that's kind of like what dirivatives are when discussing the real estate crap.

 

I pay the doctors about $500.00 a month some months more some less and along with what my insurance pays them (on top of $1,200 a month for health insurance and medication and co-pays and deductibles for medical tests and out-of-network specalists bills - none of whom work for free), and they continue to treat my daughter while I try and keep my paid off 1997 Mitsubishi Mirage on the road. And everything is fine. Unless I lose my job. I consider these two doctors among the finest human beings to ever walk the earth; however, if they were ever to make the unfortunate decision to not treat my daughter because of money, well, I'd feel pretty bad about how things went down from my cell.

 

Right now it's all cross our fingers and hope CFH stays employed because it'll be a uncovered pre-existing condition at my next job. So what do we do about that? Because if she dies because of my lack of big money, she won't be the only one. When it comes to healthcare, please understand why I say fu(k the free market.

And there we have it.

 

All the best to you and yours, Club, and God bless the doctors working in this ludicrous system.

[dmarc117]

in the usa, you become a doctor to get rich. in the rest of the world, you become a doctor to help others.

[gilthorp]

Is being born with a silver spoon in your hand a right?

[bpwallace49]

in the usa, you become a doctor to get rich. in the rest of the world, you become a doctor to help others.

 

Therein lies the bastardization of the goal of the US health care system.

 

very well put dmarc . . . .

[i_am_the_swammi]

in the usa, you become a doctor to get rich. in the rest of the world, you become a doctor to help others.

 

you are living in a past life before liability insurance.

 

Doctors make nice money, but very very very few of them will be rich. You have a better chance of being "rich" doing a long list of other things than being your typical General Practitioner.

[The Irish Doggy]

in the usa, you become a doctor to get rich. in the rest of the world, you become a doctor to help others.

 

Baloney.

[The Irish Doggy]

If all economics professors had the sense of Mr. Williams we would never be in the shape we are in today. We wouldn't have trillions and trillions in unfunded future debt looming over us like the blade of a guillotine.

 

 

I sure wish someone had made a contract with America and put the adults in charge 10 years ago. Maybe then all would be well.

[Kid Cid]

in the usa, you become a doctor to get rich. in the rest of the world, you become a doctor to help others.

Tell that to the General Practitioner making less than 100K annually with over a quarter mil in student loans he or she is trying to pay off.

[bushwacked]

If all economics professors had the sense of Mr. Williams we would never be in the shape we are in today. We wouldn't have trillions and trillions in unfunded future debt looming over us like the blade of a guillotine.

 

Says the guy who supports trillion dollar invasions of foreign countries while rolling out asinine tax cuts.

[Chavez]

I talk too much and take things too personally around here sometimes. As a friend of mine pointed out to me years ago when calling me out on a few of my comments, these debates we have aren't always in the abstract for some.

The thing is your personal story is a great qualitative lesson on why there is a NEED for national healthcare of some sort.

[wiegie]

For what it's worth, I agree that nobody has a "right" to healthcare.

 

I thought I had said almost that exact same thing once here before, but I couldn't find it when I did a search. (Since I am certain that I did say such a thing somewhere, I must have said it to one of my classes once.)

[dmarc117]

Tell that to the General Practitioner making less than 100K annually with over a quarter mil in student loans he or she is trying to pay off.

 

 

this gp youre talking about is kinda like the team long snapper. in the big leagues, but not getting paid.

[bushwacked]

this gp youre talking about is kinda like the team long snapper. in the big leagues, but not getting paid.

 

Whatever anyway, doctors in other countries make out pretty damn good.

[Chavez]

Tell that to the General Practitioner making less than 100K annually with over a quarter mil in student loans he or she is trying to pay off.

Well according to this GPs DO make less than $100k...in the first year.

 

After that, no it isn't as lucrative as being a hotshot surgeon but it's tough to feel much woe for someone in a field where the median after 5 yrs is solidly in the $130k range.

[i_am_the_swammi]

After that, no it isn't as lucrative as being a hotshot surgeon but it's tough to feel much woe for someone in a field where the median after 5 yrs is solidly in the $130k range.

 

I don't define that as rich...I define that as moderately above middle class.

[Ursa Majoris]

I don't define that as rich...I define that as moderately above middle class.

+1

[bushwacked]

I don't define that as rich...I define that as moderately above middle class.

 

 

You're above my pay-grade.

[caddyman]

You're above my pay-grade.

Who isn't?

[The Irish Doggy]

Who isn't?

 

Vaudeville performers. Ghey fluffers. You.