Health Care
The Left believes universal healthcare is a right. They support President Obama's passage of the Affordable Care Act (PPACA), aka ObamaCare. The middle are afraid of ObamaCare because they don't know what's in it, it means more taxation and higher federal debt, but they are equally afraid of skyrocketing healthcare costs. The Right believes that healthcare is an individual choice just like buying a home and the individual should control their personal healthcare decisions. Therefore, the Right believes PPACA (ObamaCare) is a misguided attempt at Socialism and should be repealed. The Right also believes the US cannot afford such a program when other countries are trying to relieve themselves of their previously instituted universal healthcare programs, and, under its current design more people will just opt out so it does not help access. Because ObamaCare is a federal program, costs will certainly rise in the form of both taxes to pay for it and the services it provides. The individual mandate was believed to violate the Constitution, but on June 28, 2012, SCOTUS issued an opinion which affirmed ObamaCare as a tax and as such was allowable under the Constitution. The fight now returns to the political arena. A very good healthcare blog where you can follow Healthcare and ACA issues can be found here. Below, and in the associated sub-categories, you can follow the arguments on both sides.

Charity Without the Welfare State

6/2/23
from Goodman Institute,
6/1/23:
One of the big sticking points in the debt limit discussions between President Biden and the House Republicans was whether there should be a small increase in work requirements for people receiving entitlement benefits. In the end, the negotiators basically punted on what is probably the most important public policy issue the nation faces: Who should get free food, housing, medical care and other benefits, and what—if any—should the conditions be? The current system is having a devastating effect on self-sufficiency, family formation and marriage. A better alternative is within our grasp. Let’s start with the harm our system is doing.
  • Penalties for working.
  • The marriage tax.
In search of alternatives.
  • Give food stamps, Medicaid, housing subsidies, earned income tax credits, and so forth, to everyone, and don’t reduce them with income.”
  • If instead of Medicaid, we simply designated certain hospitals and clinics as “safety net institutions” and made care available regardless of income, we could probably provide more care to more needy patients than we do now and avoid the costs of an enormous amount of bureaucratic paperwork in the process.
Conclusion. We can have a safety net that meets the needs of people who experience misfortune without creating a permanent class of nonworking dependents who behave in socially undesirable ways. More From Goodman Institute:  


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