What should be subsidized besides health care?

If we are entitled to health care guaranteed and paid for by the government, what else does the government owe us? Dignity? Respect? Housing? Food? Recreation? Economic protection ?A job from which one cannot be fired absent just cause as determined by the government? Most of these are actually guaranteed by the European Union.

https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:12012P/TXT

We can't have all these things and simultaneously enjoy liberty. It's one or the other.

 

Middle class subsidies for having babies at an extreme amount. To the point where clothing, feeding, babysitter, etc are tax write offs if you provide receipts.

 

I think every 80 year old man that wants one should be give a Corvette. BTW im 80.

 

Guaranteed healthcare paid by ourselves. Dignity and respect would be nice to have again, after we lost them with Trump. We have shelter and food as part of the safety net. Recreation?... fun is free. Economic protection.... we have some of that too, I think. Not sure if we're talking about the same thing.. A job from which one cannot be fired absent just cause or proper mandatory compensation, definitely! Worker rights should be our next struggle. We need those things to enjoy life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I didn't make that up. Maybe those who drafted the Declaration of Independence should've thought better.

 

My problem with this resides in the coercive nature of it. The government guaranteeing my health care and telling me and my insurer that we can not opt out of it is dictatorial.

 

Secondly, what is the limit of governmental authority to prescribe and limit what is good for me? I can't see that progressives draw that line anywhere, except in the area of abortion. It puts me in an anarchic frame if mind.

 

What liberty do you have that you think someone in the UK or, say, France doesn't have?

 

Everything. It is your moral responsibility to produce on behalf of strangers and be punished if you do not do so for no good reason.

 

I believe in the right to self-termination of life. Other than that, not sure what you mean.

You can't opt out of paying for roads, public education, police protection, armed forces, ....

Is there some country where you can order Government a-la-carte?

 

No person has any legitimate authority to force his fellow man to serve him or hand over property.

So...nothing. Nothing should be subsidized, including healthcare. Not through violence, at least.

 

Got it. So no roads. No police. No laws. Total anarchy. Thanks for playing. Next!

 

Socialism, like the ancient ideas from which it springs, confuses the distinction between government and society. As a result of this, every time we object to a thing being done by government, the socialists conclude that we object to its being done at all. We disapprove of state education. Then the socialists say that we are opposed to any education. We object to a state religion. Then the socialists say that we want no religion at all. We object to a state-enforced equality. Then they say that we are against equality. And so on, and so on. It is as if the socialists were to accuse us of not wanting persons to eat because we do not want the state to raise grain. – Frédéric Bastiat

 

You should try to make up your mind. Is any tax okay? You've already said no. Let's see you flip flop in less than 10 minutes.

 

Flip flop? I'm not sure what you're talking about?

 

OK, but a whole lot of us like civilization.

 

Heil!

 

Well, first, healthcare isn't paid for by the gov't, it is paid for by americans who would pay into it, like they pay private sector insurance.

So that may spoil your OP, because you fabricated something that was not fact.

 

The idea of entitlement is very problematic and doesn't work in the real world. Its just another example of ideological thinking that we see on both the left and right. A better way of thinking about healthcare is to ask whether the policy benefits society as a whole. I do believe that many universal healthcare systems are quite good and are superior to our own and we should emulate them.

 

Well, you can be fined in France for saying something deemed hateful by bureaucrats. And I currently have the right to not buy health insurance or be taxed o pay for yours. But change in coming. I think it's wrong. Obviously if it becomes law I will obey, but I find it a worrisome, obnoxious, collectivist policy.

I would say also that in France, at least, the rights of employers to terminate at will are severely constrained. I think it's involuntary servitude to say that you must work for me, and equally involuntary to say that I cannot fire you without good cause.

 

No, and I admit I have struggled with this very question. The power of government to tax, in general, I do not question, and it would be futile anyway because it is specifically provided for in the constitution.

But we all have a right to complain about what our taxes pay for, and I am against this medicare for all business, especially if it results in termination of private health care services. (Be careful what you wish for.)

Some services are indispensable to a well-ordered society, and are essential to effective government. That doesn't mean that non-essential services are bad. I like libraries and soccer fields, but we can survive without the government providing them. The churches in my opinion did a better job of educating the masses in the 17th and 18th centuries than the government has done in America in the 20th. (See How the Scots Invented the Modern World.)

So we prioritize. As between schools and roads, and if I had to choose only one, I'd give priority to roads. (Now someone will say I hate schools. ). Roads are essential to commerce, and commerce is essential to everything, especially the production and distribution of food, without which we cannot do anything, and only government can effectively build roads. Not so with schools. There are kids schooled at home who shine, and those parents should be able to get some kind of credit against their taxes for doing the work themselves. I've already mentioned the success of churches in providing education.

As between schools and healthcare, I'd prioritize schools. Obviously health is important, but we can take care of ourselves with better diet and exercise, and without them, health care is useless anyway. Bottom line, I am uneasy with all government services, and healthcare is too personal.

 

Involuntary servitude? Anyone can quite whenever they want. And, both US and French employers have constraints on firing employees.

There are penalties of various kinds for certain kinds of speech in America, too. Speech can be illegal or tort.

Let's remember that both these countries provide healthcare for less than YOU pay.

 

"Constraints on firing employees????"

Which of us has the legitimate authority to constrain whom our fellow man may employ?

 

There is greater control over speech throughout Europe. Google Brigitte Bardot. Not the images, though those are good too! Controlling speech is a way of controlling thought. I'm against it. There are fire at will states in the USA. Not in France.

 

More here:

Under French law, in order to be valid, a dismissal must be based on a real and serious cause which must be exact, precise, objective and of a sufficiently serious nature to justify the dismissal. This requirement applies to any type of dismissal regardless of the age / position / length of service of the employee and the headcount of the company.

https://www.globalworkplaceinsider.com/2013/07/unfair-dismissal-in-france/

 

Yes, but in France, you can't fire anyone you want.

https://www.globalworkplaceinsider.com/2013/07/unfair-dismissal-in-france/