Sure he murdered a woman

Andy001 · Spaghetti

RE: Sure he murdered a woman

Jason · Only in cartoons

I don't care if the institutions are for profit. I care only that every step in the transaction is voluntary on both ends.

Andy001 · Spaghetti

Again, my commitment to individual rights forces me to agree that, in the final analysis, people should be free to pursue their healthcare needs through means of private commerce, if that is what they really want to do.
However, I would happily admit that as a general principle, I do not believe that a profit-driven system is anything like the best way to provide healthcare, not only in terms of efficiency, but also in terms of fairness. There are some situations which the market is not well-equipped to deal with.

DEATHPIGGIE · I'm fat and nobody likes me

I don't see how something driven by non-profit will ever be as efficient as a business. I've seen almost consistently that the private sector makes things a million times more efficient. When bridges are built by private organizations, you could goto bed bridgeless and wake up with a quicker way to work over the river. And the only thing that ever slows them down is bureaucratic red-tape.

What does a single entity have to thrive on other than their dedication to the sickly? Competition and profit make things better and faster for a reason.

Andy001 · Spaghetti

What incentive is there for privately-operating doctors to treat anyone other than the wealthy?
(Again, judgind by the ACTUAL FACTS of what went on it Britian prior to nationalisation, none).

DEATHPIGGIE · I'm fat and nobody likes me

Andy001 wrote:

What incentive is there for privately-operating doctors to treat anyone other than the wealthy?
(Again, judgind by the ACTUAL FACTS of what went on it Britian prior to nationalisation, none).

What incentive does anyone have to serve anyone but the wealthy? Applying what you think goes through a business man's head, there would be no low-cost grocery stores, no low cost housing, no low-cost HEALTH services, which are private.
My friend's mom worked at a private health clinic that served almost anyone, and Hillary Clinton ( Our senator ) eventually had places like that shut the **** down.

People have incetives to sell to poorer people, cause it's MORE people to sell too.
Wal-Mart, perhaps the biggest private entity on Earth, panders directly to the middle and lower classes.

DEATHPIGGIE · I'm fat and nobody likes me

And of course a poor person's health care won't necessarily be as good as a person who can pay out more for it, and so what? Not everyone gets the same brand of groceries or the same car service. Some people don't get the same education.

A society based on this kind of egalitarianism is doomed to fail.

Oh, and once again, this is where private charity can come in. Charities can give people money for their surgeries, check-ups etc. They don't necessarily have to foot the whole bill all the time.

Finally, I don't think a society should be based simply on charity. Eventually, who is going to be the provider? Where do you think wealth comes from? It has to be generated somehow. A society based strictly on charity and this specific kind of volunteerism will, IMO, breed a lot of weak people who don't know what being responsible is. A big mistake with many charities that deal directly with people is that those who have let themselves get in these situations don't seek to improve themselves. They rest their existence on the benevolence of other people. It's foolish.

-- Edited by DEATHPIGGIE at 22:14, 2008-08-26

Andy001 · Spaghetti

That's a nice idea, but sadly healthcare cannot be treated in the same way as groceries. Healthcare will always be a comparitively expensive service, as it invloves highly-skilled labour in combination with expensive, often very new, technology involved in providing treatment. That's what I've been saying, you can't treat all commodities as equivalent and say that if the market works for one, it will work for the others.
Of course, it's up to each business what strategy they use, and there will always be a certain number of organisations like the ones that you describe that try and go the hard way; however I think it is safe to say that such organisations are (a) almost always driven at least by motives of charity and benevolence rather than strict profit-making and (b) only ever a very small part of the overall provision of healthcare. The vast majority of private health companies are likely to proceed in the same way as those in Britian, both then and now; by providing a limited-scale service at high cost to a small pool of clients.

Andy001 · Spaghetti

Furthermore, I agree with almost everything you said about charities, and this is why I am not advocating charity as a general solution.
Also, I would like to ask what rational incentive the majority of people have to give widely to charity?

DEATHPIGGIE · I'm fat and nobody likes me

Andy001 wrote:

Furthermore, I agree with almost everything you said about charities, and this is why I am not advocating charity as a general solution.
Also, I would like to ask what rational incentive the majority of people have to give widely to charity?

People shouldn't be compelled legally or morally to give to charity. I don't think it's of utmost importance, though it's obvious how keeping people off the streets can benefit you in more than one way. Also, many people just care for people more than others. Some people have a lot of empathy, and that can be a positive thing. This normally comes when people are personally affected by it, like the parents/siblings of a handicapped child may give to a charity that helps handicap kids get special services for cheap.

Then there is the lowering crime rate when people aren't homeless or starving and therefore desperate.

Pizza · Sheriff of Paddy's

Scruffy knows who killed all them people.

DEATHPIGGIE · I'm fat and nobody likes me

THIS DOESN'T MAKE ANY SENSE.

john31584 · Zinc Saucier

DEATHPIGGIE wrote:

Andy001 wrote:

Furthermore, I agree with almost everything you said about charities, and this is why I am not advocating charity as a general solution.
Also, I would like to ask what rational incentive the majority of people have to give widely to charity?

People shouldn't be compelled legally or morally to give to charity. I don't think it's of utmost importance, though it's obvious how keeping people off the streets can benefit you in more than one way. Also, many people just care for people more than others. Some people have a lot of empathy, and that can be a positive thing. This normally comes when people are personally affected by it, like the parents/siblings of a handicapped child may give to a charity that helps handicap kids get special services for cheap.

Then there is the lowering crime rate when people aren't homeless or starving and therefore desperate.

Charity is all well and good, when you judge that someone truly needs and deserves your help.

Also, it should be noted that people are most likely to help others when they aren't forced to. In a truly free society, an act of charity can be nothing but an act of good will towards your fellow man.

In a socialistic/welfare state, however, another person's suffering becomes a millstone around everybody else's neck.