From a doctor's perspective, is it better to repeal or keep healthcare reform

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Originally Posted by IDBasco

LOL! Nothing pisses people off like pointing out their absurdity by adding more absurdity.







No rights given by the gov are in the DOI. But, if they are endowed by the "Creator" as per the DOI, rather than the gov, how exactly does that include free health care access courtesy of the gov, or rather, the taxpayer? Why do I get the feeling you don't believe in God or anything He could endow anyway? Just an expediency for you? Probably.



You are a racist. Plain and simple. Care to continue here?

There have been times I haven't had insurance for a year or more at a time. I won't argue over my parent's income growing up as you would just deny everything I say. Pointless to go there. Tell me how old I am, by the way, and my income for each year for the past 20 years...I'm waiting.


Wow, look at you putting all these words in my mouth, Your jump-to-conclusions mat is getting quite a workout.

Originally Posted by CaptainSSO

Again..you're stating this from the privileged position of having access to healthcare. Everyone is going to die--we all know that, but if it were that simple, we wouldn't even have healthcare to begin with, or we'd all just blow our brains out right now because it's inevitable anyway. You're telling me you wouldn't seek treatment for an illness?

Anyway, what is your mathematical theory? I am more interested in those kinds of arguments, logistical arguments, than I am with the idea that some people don't deserve healthcare. I just think that's a sick idea for people to believe.

PRISONERS get free health care. So you're telling me that the population as a whole doesn't deserve free health care?

The problem is healthcare isnt a fixed entity. One hundred years ago it consisted of very little technology, research, medications...etc. Since then we have had log-based growth in advances (each of which cost $$ to pts).

Its simple logic, if the rate of healthcare advances exceeds the growth of the salary of the average American then every year the percent of American's unable to pay for their treatments will increase.

Example numbers to show what I mean:

FOR FULL SPECTRUM OF CARE (fake numbers to prove my point)
Year Can Pay Cannot Pay
2012 80% 20%
2030 60% 40%
2100 15% 85% ---> so at this point is it feasible for the 15% to pay for the remaining 85%'s healthcare?

What if it gets to 1% paying for the 99%.

The biggest problem is every treatment in the future is going to be more specific than what we saw in the past 20 years. This means treatment's individual costs are going to skyrocket.....

There are bigger issues in life than who is editing posts and who isn't.

Originally Posted by Lysinee

From a doctor's perspective, is it better to repeal or keep the healthcare reform bill?

Thanks.

The Very Good:
- Increased insurance coverage = increased collection rate

The Good:
- 10% increase in Medicare payments to primary care physicians
- 10% incentive payments to general surgeons in underserved areas
- GPCI adjustments that increase Medicare payment rates in rural states
- Medicaid providers paid Medicare rates for 2013-2014 (hopefully this will get extended)

The Indifferent:
- Medicare incentives for complying with quality measures (zero sum game)

The Bad:
- Equipment utilization factor for imaging adjusted to decrease reimbursement

The Unknown:
- IPAB put in charge of Medicare fee schedule
- Accountable Care Organizations/Medical Homes
- Outcome of bundled payment pilot

If you read this 2009 UI report "Health Reform: The Cost of Failure" you will get the impression that the PPACA has simply put the whole sputtering health system on pressors. Personally I think single payer or two-tier is inevitable, it's just a question of how we get there.

Originally Posted by tobi44

Last I heard it was a 30% cut to medicare reimbursement to docs.

You have confused the PPACA with the SGR problem, which has been going on since 1997. The PPACA took no action in the SGR.

Originally Posted by tobi44

Go ahead and correct me if I'm wrong on any of this, I am certainly not an expert....

Funny, that never seems to stop anyone.

Originally Posted by link2swim06

They dont have the RIGHT to take my money that is for sure...

What right do you have to take hundreds of thousands of dollars of other people's money to pay for your schooling?

if we are going to die then, why care about having a 600 billion dollar DoD budget. Why care about 9/11, those guys were unlucky to work in a tall building. Why care about what happened in the holocaust, they should have risen up or fled, why should I or the rest of the world have to pay. Why should I pay for someone to have clean water, I have a spring near me. Why should I have to buy clothes because someone's religion makes the natural human body out to be something we should be ashamed of. Why do we need the police, I can protect my self, people have for thousands of years, so why do I have to pay??

These things can be said not just for the Healthcare law, but for many other aspects of society. The answer is because we want to live in a better society, where we protect everyone, and help save the life and improve the quality of life of people and the society as a whole. Unless you are a total Anarchist, you do believe that you ought to pay for the greater good of society to some extent, the difference is how much of an extent. I, who grew up without insurance until it was mandated in college, and I who never saw a physician other than the required immunizations after 5 years old until college, thinks that we can do better, and I hope less and less people have to live through the same.

Originally Posted by Gut Shot

The Very Good:
- Increased insurance coverage = increased collection rate

The Good:
- 10% increase in Medicare payments to primary care physicians
- 10% incentive payments to general surgeons in underserved areas
- GPCI adjustments that increase Medicare payment rates in rural states
- Medicaid providers paid Medicare rates for 2013-2014 (hopefully this will get extended)

The Indifferent:
- Medicare incentives for complying with quality measures (zero sum game)

The Bad:
- Equipment utilization factor for imaging adjusted to decrease reimbursement

The Unknown:
- IPAB put in charge of Medicare fee schedule
- Accountable Care Organizations/Medical Homes
- Outcome of bundled payment pilot

If you read this 2009 UI report "Health Reform: The Cost of Failure" you will get the impression that the PPACA has simply put the whole sputtering health system on pressors. Personally I think single payer or two-tier is inevitable, it's just a question of how we get there.

+1 for actually answering the question. How does this change if the SGR fixes stop getting passed year after year and we actually see a huge cut to Medicare? Would docs just stop taking Medicare in the same way that many stopped taking Medicaid? Would we be better off in the long run without Medicare/Medicaid? Just curious what you think.

Is anyone the least bit surprised by this news?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/busine...hmR_story.html

Is it accurate to say that this helps primary care more than specialties?

Yes, and it also helps those who are too stupid to get insurance or don't make it a priority. To me it is like car insurance; not having it is crazy and I have no problem with it being "mandated".

Originally Posted by notbobtrustme

What right do you have to take hundreds of thousands of dollars of other people's money to pay for your schooling?

None. The government doesn't need to be in the business of student loans either.

Originally Posted by powerincarnate

if we are going to die then, why care about having a 600 billion dollar DoD budget. Why care about 9/11, those guys were unlucky to work in a tall building. Why care about what happened in the holocaust, they should have risen up or fled, why should I or the rest of the world have to pay. Why should I pay for someone to have clean water, I have a spring near me. Why should I have to buy clothes because someone's religion makes the natural human body out to be something we should be ashamed of. Why do we need the police, I can protect my self, people have for thousands of years, so why do I have to pay??

These things can be said not just for the Healthcare law, but for many other aspects of society. The answer is because we want to live in a better society, where we protect everyone, and help save the life and improve the quality of life of people and the society as a whole. Unless you are a total Anarchist, you do believe that you ought to pay for the greater good of society to some extent, the difference is how much of an extent. I, who grew up without insurance until it was mandated in college, and I who never saw a physician other than the required immunizations after 5 years old until college, thinks that we can do better, and I hope less and less people have to live through the same.

You can have this opinion and still believe healthcare isnt a right. The police and clean water arent going to grow on a log base cost-wise in the next couple decades either.

IMHO, the belief that health is or isn't a right is irrelevant. EMTALA essentially decided that some base level of access to care was, in fact, a right. Interestingly enough, it was passed by a Democratic House, Republican Senate, and signed into law by Pres. Regan.
That said, the increasing legislation of healthcare since then has been a foregone conclusion. Once the government made the decision that something was so important that businesses have to provide it regardless of the customer's ability to pay, eventually the government (taxpayers) end up paying for it.
As the government has legislated more and more access to care, specific services, etc, via numerous medicare/medicaid acts and regulations implemented in various ways, the healthcare system has moved further and further from the free-market model. It has now become so regulated that the free-market doesn't control the costs.
I believe there are two possible outcomes.
1. The government gets out of healthcare regulation and allows the free market to control costs. This is never going to happen, as the perpetual solution of government is more regulation, not less.
2. The government enacts a single payer system after realizing that the Affordable Care Act doesn't control the rising costs of health care.

I could go on about how it doesn't control costs, but various posters above have made that point.

I agree completely, and as long as a person can walk into an ER and get treatment without paying or presenting proof of insurance (or proof of citizenship), we as a society are implicitly acknowledging that some level of baseline care is a human right. To deny that level of care would require that we turn away gunshot victims, acute MI's, etc, and completely throw away the Hippocratic Oath.

Originally Posted by SteinUmStein

I agree completely, and as long as a person can walk into an ER and get treatment without paying or presenting proof of insurance (or proof of citizenship), we as a society are implicitly acknowledging that some level of baseline care is a human right. To deny that level of care would require that we turn away gunshot victims, acute MI's, etc, and completely throw away the Hippocratic Oath.

Originally Posted by SteinUmStein

I agree completely, and as long as a person can walk into an ER and get treatment without paying or presenting proof of insurance (or proof of citizenship), we as a society are implicitly acknowledging that some level of baseline care is a human right. To deny that level of care would require that we turn away gunshot victims, acute MI's, etc, and completely throw away the Hippocratic Oath.

So if we agree that access to baseline (which needs to be defined for this argument) care is a human right, are you advocating for Universal Health Care/Single-Payer/Government system of some sort?

Personally, I don't see how what you are saying could possibly allow for for-profit medicine to be practiced.

Originally Posted by Shakespeare37

So if we agree that access to baseline (which needs to be defined for this argument) care is a human right, are you advocating for Universal Health Care/Single-Payer/Government system of some sort?

Personally, I don't see how what you are saying could possibly allow for for-profit medicine to be practiced.

Personally, I don't think most other industrialized countries lie awake at night worrying about this.

Originally Posted by scarshapedstar

Personally, I don't think most other industrialized countries lie awake at night worrying about this.

Most other industrialized nations have a far better outcome/dollar spent on health ratio than we do.

Originally Posted by SteinUmStein

+1 for actually answering the question. How does this change if the SGR fixes stop getting passed year after year and we actually see a huge cut to Medicare?

Won't happen. Put it out of your head.

Originally Posted by SteinUmStein

Would we be better off in the long run without Medicare/Medicaid? Just curious what you think.

If Medicare were simply abolished tomorrow, every non-pediatric hospital in the country would face a choice: stop treating seniors or go bankrupt within weeks. Does that sound like an appealing future?

Private insurers don't want to touch seniors with a 40 foot pole. That's the whole reason Medicare was started in the first place. The only way to ditch public insurance for older Americans is to force private insurers to accept them, and then regulate the Hell out of their premiums. Pretty much what the Swiss do.

"It is hard to ignore that in 2006, the United States was number 1 in terms of health care spending per capita but ranked 39th for infant mortality, 43rd for adult female mortality, 42nd for adult male mortality, and 36th for life expectancy."

"These facts have fueled a question now being discussed in academic circles, as well as by government and the public: Why do we spend so much to get so little?"

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp0910064

Originally Posted by Lysinee

"It is hard to ignore that in 2006, the United States was number 1 in terms of health care spending per capita but ranked 39th for infant mortality, 43rd for adult female mortality, 42nd for adult male mortality, and 36th for life expectancy."

"These facts have fueled a question now being discussed in academic circles, as well as by government and the public: Why do we spend so much to get so little?"

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp0910064

That's the price of being THE BEST AT EVERYTHING. Cherry-picking statistics about 'outcomes'* ignores the only number that matters:

#1!

*Oh, also, crack babies and crackheads are responsible for all of that.

Originally Posted by Gut Shot

Won't happen. Put it out of your head.

If Medicare were simply abolished tomorrow, every non-pediatric hospital in the country would face a choice: stop treating seniors or go bankrupt within weeks. Does that sound like an appealing future?

Private insurers don't want to touch seniors with a 40 foot pole. That's the whole reason Medicare was started in the first place. The only way to ditch public insurance for older Americans is to force private insurers to accept them, and then regulate the Hell out of their premiums. Pretty much what the Swiss do.

Thanks for the response, I'm a second year so all of this is theoretical to me for the next few months. Your answers make sense though.

Originally Posted by Lysinee

"It is hard to ignore that in 2006, the United States was number 1 in terms of health care spending per capita but ranked 39th for infant mortality, 43rd for adult female mortality, 42nd for adult male mortality, and 36th for life expectancy."

"These facts have fueled a question now being discussed in academic circles, as well as by government and the public: Why do we spend so much to get so little?"

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp0910064

I used to hear this alot and the issue is truly not as simple as some political agendas would have you try to think. You have to ask yourself why we have these relatively high numbers for mortality and life expectancy. Of course, it's multifactorial. One simple example though...

We in the US have a tremendous burden of cardiovascular disease and cerebrovascular disease (as do many developed countries). We have a population that engages in incredibly unhealthy lifestyle choices, including diet/obesity, alcohol intake, smoking, and an absolutely amazing amount of non-compliance with medications for their serious medical conditions such as diabetes and hypertension. Then when someone actually has a stroke, they get highly expensive EM care, get admitted to the neurological intensive care unit for 1 week, stay in a stroke unit for 1 week, go to a rehab facility for two months, and then get put on lifetime dosages of expensive medications. So for an extravagant amount of money...well, you get the idea. The damage is done for the unfortunate patient, and alot of the healthcare cost is spent in "cleaning up" the horrible fallout.

Another very, very contentious point of debate is the utterly fantastic amount of money we spend on ICU care for patients who often have hopeless or near-hopeless chances of survival, return to consciousness, or so-called "meaningful recovery." But the hypothetical potential solutions to this are very difficult to put into practical use. How do you decide who gets expensive life prolonging care and who doesn't? How can you decide who has a good enough chance of survivial to spend the money on and who doesn't? How do you decide when to stop? It's incredibly hard, I think. In these horrible situations, doctors simply do what the patients themselves have requested, or what their families dictate that the patient would want. No matter the long term cost or the unlikelihood of such extensive actions bearing any good outcome. But how would you act if the roles were reversed? What else can we do? And that's why most politicians run the other way when you bring it up. Too many potential lost votes.

I'm not trying to get invloved in the debate too much here, but simply trying to point out that cost of health care isn't so simple as "I pay X so I should see Y result" without understanding where so much of the money goes, and what types of health problems (and their etiologies) are being monitored in these studies.

Originally Posted by danielmd06

Another very, very contentious point of debate is the utterly fantastic amount of money we spend on ICU care for patients who often have hopeless or near-hopeless chances of survival, return to consciousness, or so-called "meaningful recovery." But the hypothetical potential solutions to this are very difficult to put into practical use. How do you decide who gets expensive life prolonging care and who doesn't? How can you decide who has a good enough chance of survivial to spend the money on and who doesn't? How do you decide when to stop? It's incredibly hard, I think. And that's why most politicians run the other way when you bring it up. Too many potential lost votes.

Death panels!!!!!11111



But seriously, great points, and really tough to solve when any potential solution is easily manipulated by political opponents to make it sound like they want to kill granny to save a buck. Unfortunately, it's something we absolutely have to deal with if we ever want a functional health care system.

What about from a young G's perspective?

If there was an easy answer to any of this, we would have found it by now.

As this discussion demonstrates, people tend to have one of two viewpoints: either healthcare is a "right" and we should find a way to provide it for everyone, or healthcare is a service and each person should have individual responsibility for ensuring that they have it, with some sort of a safety net for those that can't.

The people who advocate for the healthcare right tend to stress:

1. That this is simply the "right" thing to do, and we shouldn't as a society watch people become ill or die because they can't afford healthcare.
2. That there is a public good to providing healthcare -- preventing others from getting infectious illnesses, or preventing someone from having a seizure and crashing their car into you, etc.
3. That providing healthcare to everyone is ultimately cheaper in the long run, since treating illnesses in later stages is more expensive.

Of course, none of these points is absolutely valid, as:

1. If we have a functioning safety net, those who are unable to provide their own healthcare will get it. This is the way we provide food, shelter, and clothing to people in the US.
2. The public good of healthcare for all is overstated. Yes, infection control is important and that should be addressed by the government. Other than communicable diseases, treating other people's health usually will not influence your own health.
3. The thought that early treatment will save money is highly flawed. First, it is true that treating illnesses early is cheaper than treating them later. However, since you usually need to treat lots of people to prevent a single bad outcome, it ends up being more expensive to do so unless the "treatment" is very cheap and effective (Colonoscopies to prevent colon cancer are a good example. It seems clear that doing colonoscopies over the age of 50 prevents colon cancer. However, the cost of all of those colonoscopies is much higher than the cost of treating the cancers, since very few people actually get colon cancer). Plus, if you save someone's life from something, it actually costs the system more in the future, when they get ill from something else. Likewise, the thought that treating people will generate more $$$ in the economy from a healthier workforce is questionable.

On the other side, some people have the viewpoint that healthcare should be a service. They usually focus on:

1. Making people financially responsible for their healthcare will promote better expenditure of health care dollars.
2. Competing services usually drive down prices and drive up quality. The Apple / Microsoft battle is a classic example.
3. The government usually screws things up, because of political pressures and special interests. Healthcare will be no different if the gov't gets more involved.

Of course, all of these arguments have flaws also:

1. Given the current state of healthcare, much of it is unaffordable for most Americans.
2. Competition in the health care market is largely illusionary. It's very difficult to measure "quality" in health care. Most people will not be able to compare hospitals / physicians / etc. In emergencies, people will certainly not have time to find the "best deal".
3. Although gov't involvement with some processes does distort the market, when providing a valuable service to the entire population, it may be the best choice.

So what's the answer? There is no "correct" answer. We can try to continue with our current plan of private insurance for those less than 65, and public insurance for those above 65. We can try to create legislation to cover more people, like the ACA. We could move to a universal health care system. All of these result in the same outcome -- those that currently pay for their health care coverage will pay more to cover the new costs.

Or, we can try to "spend less and get more". That sounds nice, but it's much harder to do. Spending less means that someone's going to make less money, or there's going to be less jobs, or that some element of health care will be "denied" to a patient. Although people talk about wasted health care resources, other than true medicare / insurance fraud, it's hard to decide what care really isn't needed. Many of the people giving / getting "unneeded" care would argue that it was fully justified.

Regardless of which direction this country heads, health care spending is a big problem. I don't believe that a single payer system itself will really decrease costs, nor do I think that a high deductible / catastrophic policy for all with increased price competition for healthcare dollars will decrease costs either. And, whenever you start talking about decreasing costs, everyone in health care points to someone else. Docs say that hospitals / testing costs are too high. Hospitals point to insurance company profits. Insurance companies point to medmal payments, and they also blame patients for demanding everything. The honest truth is that everyone is likely to take a payment haircut somewhere in the future, and the only question is how big of a cut it's going to be, and how it's going to happen.

Originally Posted by aProgDirector

We could move to a universal health care system. All of these result in the same outcome -- those that currently pay for their health care coverage will pay more to cover the new costs.

It has been noted for some time that adopting a more efficient system of universal coverage would actually decrease costs. I hold up every other industrialized nation as evidence. When one steps back and looks at the whole mess it's really quite bizarre that America is (1) such an outlier, and (2) so accepting of our current state.

There is no right to free healthcare. No right can exist which infringes upon the rights of other individuals, which a right to healthcare does. It means confiscation of other citizens' property to pay for that healthcare or infringement upon the healthcare providers' liberty by forcing unpaid labor and expenses upon them. You may say you think it is right to provide universal healthcare, but it is not a right.

Originally Posted by cpants

There is no right to free healthcare. No right can exist which infringes upon the rights of other individuals, which a right to healthcare does. It means confiscation of other citizens' property to pay for that healthcare or infringement upon the healthcare providers' liberty by forcing unpaid labor and expenses upon them. You may say you think it is right to provide universal healthcare, but it is not a right.

Just because you axiomatically decided the right to self determination/property is the ultimate inalienable right, that doesn't make it true. Its your opinion. You could just as easily build a system of rights on the axiom that the right to have delicious ice cream is the ultimate right that humanity must uphold and it would be no more or less correct than your system of rights.

Originally Posted by surftheiop

Just because you axiomatically decided the right to self determination/property is the ultimate inalienable right, that doesn't make it true. Its your opinion. You could just as easily build a system of rights on the axiom that the right to have delicious ice cream is the ultimate right that humanity must uphold and it would be no more or less correct than your system of rights.

That makes no sense. You are the one who is declaring a right which is arbitrary and delicious-icecream-like. I am saying that rights are not invented. They are inherent. A right to healthcare or delicious ice cream or free wifi or any other government-invented 'right' you may come up with cannot supersede the natural rights we have as human beings.

Originally Posted by cpants

That makes no sense. You are the one who is declaring a right which is arbitrary and delicious-icecream-like. I am saying that rights are not invented. They are inherent. A right to healthcare or delicious ice cream or free wifi or any other government-invented 'right' you may come up with cannot supersede the natural rights we have as human beings.

Says who?

Originally Posted by surftheiop

Just because you axiomatically decided the right to self determination/property is the ultimate inalienable right, that doesn't make it true. Its your opinion. You could just as easily build a system of rights on the axiom that the right to have delicious ice cream is the ultimate right that humanity must uphold and it would be no more or less correct than your system of rights.

The "right" to self-determination/property is self-evident. You recognize it when I kidnap you from your home, tie you up, and keep you in a cage. You also recognize it when I knock you over and take your wallet and cell phone. If these "rights" are subject to "opinion" then you have no real reason to protest - we simply have a difference in opinion. Lawl.

Originally Posted by jdh71

The "right" to self-determination/property is self-evident. You recognize it when I kidnap you from your home, tie you up, and keep you in a cage. You also recognize it when I knock you over and take your wallet and cell phone. If these "rights" are subject to "opinion" then you have no real reason to protest - we simply have a difference in opinion. Lawl.

Our current society has decided to grant us these rights, but that certainly has not been the case over the course of history. Does a deer have the right not to be eaten by a wolf?

Originally Posted by surftheiop

Our current society has decided to grant us these rights, but that certainly has not been the case over the course of history. Does a deer have the right not to be eaten by a wolf?

1. You have to recognize rights in order for them to be real. Can a deer recognize a right to live? Debate it with someone who gives a **** about deer.

2. You misunderstand that the infraction of a right does not mean the right does not exist. People with objections to "natural rights" seem to have this idea that if it was actually a right, it couldn't be infringed upon. Why the holy effing hell would you make such an asinine assumption? What is it based upon?

We are not "granted" natural rights any more than we are "granted" eyes and teeth. They simply exist as part of our human experience. We didn't need society, let alone government to come along and tell us that it was "wrong" to steal or kill or rape. We evolved in happy little hunter/gatherer families/clans/tribes and we developed natural morals to facilitate survival and get along with the group. If that's not natural, then nothing is. It wasn't some sort of idea that came up one day and was declared thusly by the "government" as there was no government, no society, no legislation, no court system. Are you actually saying this crap with a straight face, or are you trolling me here? Because if you're trolling . . . awesome job! You really got me!

Originally Posted by jdh71

1. You have to recognize rights in order for them to be real. Can a deer recognize a right to live? Debate it with someone who gives a **** about deer.

2. You misunderstand that the infraction of a right does not mean the right does not exist. People with objections to "natural rights" seem to have this idea that if it was actually a right, it couldn't be infringed upon. Why the holy effing hell would you make such an asinine assumption? What is it based upon?

We are not "granted" natural rights any more than we are "granted" eyes and teeth. They simply exist as part of our human experience. We didn't need society, let alone government to come along and tell us that it was "wrong" to steal or kill or rape. We evolved in happy little hunter/gatherer families/clans/tribes and we developed natural morals to facilitate survival and get along with the group. If that's not natural, then nothing is. It wasn't some sort of idea that came up one day and was declared thusly by the "government" as there was no government, no society, no legislation, no court system. Are you actually saying this crap with a straight face, or are you trolling me here? Because if you're trolling . . . awesome job! You really got me!

Yes, we did need society to tell us it was wrong to kill and rape. Look at other mammals.

Originally Posted by surftheiop

Yes, we did need society to tell us it was wrong to kill and rape. Look at other mammals.

Let me try this again . . . there . . . was . . . no . . . society.

And what about other mammals? Your point? Try and make one this time.

Originally Posted by surftheiop

Yes, we did need society to tell us it was wrong to kill and rape. Look at other mammals.

What is this...I don't even...

May he RIP!

Originally Posted by jdh71

Let me try this again . . . there . . . was . . . no . . . society.

And what about other mammals? Your point? Try and make one this time.

What do you mean there was no society? Two or more humans = society. My point is these rights your talking about didn't exist until your cave people decided they did.

Originally Posted by jdh71

The "right" to self-determination/property is self-evident. You recognize it when I kidnap you from your home, tie you up, and keep you in a cage. You also recognize it when I knock you over and take your wallet and cell phone. If these "rights" are subject to "opinion" then you have no real reason to protest - we simply have a difference in opinion. Lawl.

I've done some work on Indian Reservations, and when I was asking about the low quality housing (i.e. rundown trailers) a native told me that people don't have title to their property here; when a dwelling unit gets too "nice", the tribe appropriates it and gives it to somebody more deserving.

Apparently the right to property is subject to "opinion" in some societies within our borders. But I wouldn't want to live there.

Originally Posted by surftheiop

What do you mean there was no society? Two or more humans = society. My point is these rights your talking about didn't exist until your cave people decided they did.

We must be defining "society" differently.

But regardless, they decided they existed because they recognized them. "When you take that from me, it makes me angry because it was mine, not yours". It's not arbitrary.

Originally Posted by bala565

May he RIP!

Carlin was also misguided about the idea that simply because you can initiate force against a right it means it doesn't exist.

That's the thing about natural rights, you don't recognize them until someone violates them.

Originally Posted by MT Headed

I've done some work on Indian Reservations, and when I was asking about the low quality housing (i.e. rundown trailers) a native told me that people don't have title to their property here; when a dwelling unit gets too "nice", the tribe appropriates it and gives it to somebody more deserving.

Apparently the right to property is subject to "opinion" in some societies within our borders. But I wouldn't want to live there.

Again the mere fact that rights can be violated isn't an argument against their existence.

I just find it amusing when people who have read a couple Mises books or even just watched a Ron Paul speech all of a sudden get super attached to this idea that property/self determination is some universally true right.

There are tons of well known philosophical schools of thought that completely disagree with this, and the Mises/Ron Paul crowd doesn't even acknowledge they exist.

I mean just look at the wiki, there are like a million different views on ethics/morality, many of which have no concept of natural rights and some that do would certainly not include personal property as a natural right.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethics

Originally Posted by surftheiop

I just find it amusing when people who have read a couple Mises books or even just watched a Ron Paul speech all of a sudden get super attached to this idea that property/self determination is some universally true right.

There are tons of well known philosophical schools of thought that completely disagree with this, and the Mises/Ron Paul crowd doesn't even acknowledge they exist.

I mean just look at the wiki, there are like a million different views on ethics/morality, many of which have no concept of natural rights and some that do would certainly not include personal property as a natural right.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethics

Uh. Duh.

It's kind of why we're even having a discussion. You don't get bonus points for extraneous and obvious information. Hell it's not even low hanging fruit.

To point out that competing schools of thought actually doesn't address the current argument though. I do, however, see what you did there.

Originally Posted by jdh71

Again the mere fact that rights can be violated isn't an argument against their existence.

It's also not an argument for their existence. Just because I feel my right to free delicious ice cream has been violated does not mean there exists a fundamental or intrinsic right to free delicious ice cream.

Originally Posted by pupster

Maybe that person should have taken personal RESPONSIBILITY for his/her health and his/her career/education. Not my problem. I'm already paying $$$ in taxes to fund people who go to the corner shop and buy Slim Jims with our tax dollars using EBT cards....

Are you not familiar with the cycle of poverty? Are you not familiar with how many school systems in the United States are failing? If you were born into a family that didn't care about your education and in a town that had a dropout factory for a school system, how do you know that you would not be in the same position yourself?

There is a very good chance that yes, you would be. And our society decided a long time ago that it should be a goal to not let people die a premature death solely because they are poor.

If I do make it into medical school, I honestly don't care if they cut my salary because medicine should be a vocation, a calling, not a way to make a ton of money. If I do make it into the 1%, I'm ok with the government taxing me more because I know I'm not going to keel over as a result of not being able to pay medical bills. And I realize my circumstances are what will make me likely succeed monetarily in life, because I acknowledge that I was born with two very educated parents and the means to pay for my top 20 undergraduate institution in a very suburban, rich school district.

Originally Posted by lenny8462

Are you not familiar with the cycle of poverty? Are you not familiar with how many school systems in the United States are failing? If you were born into a family that didn't care about your education and in a town that had a dropout factory for a school system, how do you know that you would not be in the same position yourself?

There is a very good chance that yes, you would be. And our society decided a long time ago that it should be a goal to not let people die a premature death solely because they are poor.

If I do make it into medical school, I honestly don't care if they cut my salary because medicine should be a vocation, a calling, not a way to make a ton of money. If I do make it into the 1%, I'm ok with the government taxing me more because I know I'm not going to keel over as a result of not being able to pay medical bills. And I realize my circumstances are what will make me likely succeed monetarily in life, because I acknowledge that I was born with two very educated parents and the means to pay for my top 20 undergraduate institution in a very suburban, rich school district.

Hold onto all that goodness in the face of massive student loans. I'm not being sarcastic, we need more physicians who can think like this and pursue things like primary care and free clinics in spite of their own financial circumstances. I only hope when I graduate in a few years I can still have views even marginally close to what you just said.