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Make Healthcare a Right?

After reading this ridiculous editorial, it seems apropos to re-post this column that I wrote almost two years ago. 

Is There A Right To Healthcare?

One of the major issues facing the country is the issue of healthcare.  The quality of healthcare available today is greater than it has ever been.  We have eliminated diseases that decimated previous generations.  We cure diseases that used to cripple people.  We have not only lengthened the average life span by decades in less than a century, but we have made those later years healthier and more enjoyable than ever before. 

All of this comes at a cost.  Healthcare costs much more than it used to because it can do so much more.  In the past, there were many ailments for which there were no treatments.  Now we have treatments for everything from cancer to dry skin.  In the past, a broken bone would have been set to heal back into somewhat the same place and then considered healed.  Now that bone is set to heal back and then the patient often undergoes months of physical therapy to regain full motion.  We even treat things now that were never even discussed in the past, like sexual dysfunctions and emotional instability issues.  All of this means much more healthcare is used for every person at a greater overall cost per person.

That isn’t the only thing driving up the cost of healthcare.  Things like company-sponsored health insurance, which shields the true cost of healthcare from the patient, and the costs of malpractice litigation, also drive up the cost of healthcare.  It is indeed a complex problem.

Because of the complexity of America’s healthcare system and the impact on society, it has become one of the premier political problems of the day.  Liberals argue that the government should take control of the healthcare system to provide equal healthcare to every citizen.  Conservatives argue that more of the free market should be introduced into the healthcare system to enable an efficient and effective distribution of healthcare at a reasonable price.  Before any solution for the healthcare problem can be determined, we must answer this question:

Is healthcare a right or a commodity?

All of the questions about what to do about healthcare stem from this question.  Liberals think of healthcare as a right.  The reasoning is that the right to healthcare is an extension of the right to life.  If one has a right to live, then one must also necessarily have the right to the means to maintain life.  One could also derive the right to healthcare from the right to liberty, or the pursuit of happiness, or any other number of well established human rights, but the right to life is the most fundamental of all of these for the right to life is the wellspring of all other rights. 

I do not accept the premise that healthcare is a right.  Rights are based upon the principle that each of us owns our own person.  From this foundation, it is plain to see that if one owns oneself, then one absolutely has the right to live, the right to worship, the right to free speech, the right to property, and all of the other rights to which we have become accustomed. 

If one owns oneself, then it is also necessarily true that every other person also owns themselves and is equally entitled to all of the same rights.  As such, by definition, rights can not extend past the boundaries of one’s own person.  One can not, for instance, exercise one’s right to free speech by demanding that one’s neighbor cease speaking, for by doing so, one would deny the neighbor’s right to free speech.  Given that healthcare, for the most part, is the product of someone else’s knowledge, labor, capital, and equipment, it is not within the boundaries of one’s own person.  Healthcare can not be a right because it makes demands on other people. 

That is not to say that one can not exercise any form of healthcare one may wish upon oneself.  That is certainly within the boundaries on one’s person, and so, within the definition of a right.  When healthcare demands the efforts of another person, however, it ceases to be a right and becomes a commodity.  At this point, healthcare is subject to all of the same rules of exchange that exist for all other commodities that pass between people.  A fair price must be agreed upon by both the seller and the buyer and then the product may be exchanged. 

Some will claim that the normal rules of exchange can not exist in the realm of healthcare because the buyer is under duress, and thus unable to make reasonable decisions.  Although this is true, it does not alter the relationship.  Many commodities are exchanged under duress.  For instance, when I need a server part for a down server and I need it ASAP, I will pay an exorbitant price to have the part delivered post haste because I am under duress.  When I am no longer in duress, however, I am free to make my displeasure with the price of the service known within the marketplace, thus applying normal market pressure to the provider in an effort to control the cost.  On a macroeconomic scale, all of the same forces apply. 

As I said before, the entirety of the healthcare debate revolves around this fundamental question.  If healthcare is a right, as liberals contend, then it is the duty of government to ensure that everyone can exercise that right.  If healthcare is a commodity, as I contend, then a free market is the optimum mechanism for ensuring its fair exchange.

Posted by Owen at 1715 hrs
Culture + Politics + Politics - Wisconsin

1. If the rich can buy more of it and make their own lives better as a result, it is a “right”.  At least, that’s how the left views things like this.

   I don’t believe healthcare is a right.  Humans, even under the most ideal conditions and lifetime of treatment, can only live so long.  The countries with the longest lifespans are only ahead of the U.S. by a handful of years.

   Some will argue that even if we had the same lifespan, we’re spending too much money on healthcare - that if it was nationalized, we’d “save” money.

   First off, those are apples and oranges comparisons.  Many other countries implement wage and price controls over their health care systems.  Then, there is the fact that those who can afford to still go out and buy supplemental insurance and use it to pay private (and sometimes illegal) doctors for non-government care.  Those costs are not reflected when comparing it to the U.S.

   But it doesn’t matter anyway.  It’s not the government’s job to make sure my prostate exam is “cheap” or that a certain drug is cheap.  I know lefties: how dare those scientists demand like compensation for coming up with drugs that prolong and improve the lives of so many people?!?!

   The truth is: it’s not the government’s business to make sure I eat well or get a broken arm put into a cast, or take a pill to cure what ails me.

   Posted by David on May 21, 2007 at 1814 hrs
   
   
   

2. The distinction that isn’t made by this editorial is this:  ACCESS to healthcare is a right, no one can tell you not to go to the doctor. 

   The healthcare itself is NOT a right, because who then would pay for it?  If YOU get a service for YOURSELF, why should anyone else pay for it?  Where do we draw the line? 

   That and this editorial misunderstands completely the meaning of the word “right” in this context.  A Right is something the government nor anyone else cannot stop you from doing.  The government can’t infringe your right to bear arms.  The government can’t infringe your right to free speech.  They can’t tell you where or what to worship.  And so on…...

   Find the language in our governing documents that says that healthcare is a right. Look carefully. No where is that present, because the founding fathers were concerned about the federal government dictating too much to the states.  Dictating when and where you go to the doctor and for what (that is the reality of socialized medicine) is certainly the government reaching too far into the personal lives of its citizens. 

   Anyone who really understands the reality of national healthcare or government run systems would be VERY against this - because they just don’t work.  Because it costs too much.  Because it results in a HUGE bureacratic mess. 

   If you are in favor of something like this, of healthcare being a right, then figure out how to pay for it.  But do yourself a favor too and make it revenue neutral, if you could please. 

   Because I’m tired of paying high taxes for something I don’t use or support.

   Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on May 21, 2007 at 1822 hrs
   
   
   

3. The problem, though, is the conflict between what should be and what is.  Health care, like oil, ought to be treated as a commodity, subject to free market principles and pressures.  Free market principles depend on the presence of real supply, demand, and competition.  When government regulations tamper with any of those three basic ingredients, depending on the extent of the interference, free market principles become more or less irrelevant.  So now you have a number of basic industries in this country which have been tied up in knots by years of government regulation (for regulation read “interference”) and prices spiral out of control.  But where does that leave us?  My folks need medication now, not at some future date when we can finally elect some politicians who would actually do what we elect them to do, assuming that we can find any.  Or do we just start throwing crates of Sudafed into Boston Harbor?

   Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on May 22, 2007 at 0813 hrs
   
   
   

4. Healthcare is a right in the way that PublicAccess described above. Demanding that the government pay for people’s right to healthcare is akin to demanding that the government pay for my weblog or publish a newspaper for me so that I can have my right to free speech. It’s a ridiculous suggestion that shouldn’t even be considered.

   Posted by Matt on May 22, 2007 at 0909 hrs
   
   
   

5. I hear you and agree.  But what do we do about prohibitive costs?  The government legislation already in place has erected a money fence between your herd of cows and the waterhole.  How do you keep the herd alive while trying to talk the government into tearing down the fence?

   Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on May 22, 2007 at 0917 hrs
   
   
   

6. Oops, that’s PublicService, not PublicAccess. My bad.

   Posted by Matt on May 22, 2007 at 0923 hrs
   
   
   

7. MK, how about forcing hospitals to actually compete with each other? I’m all for government regulation smashing monopolies and cartels.

   Posted by Matt on May 23, 2007 at 1655 hrs
   
   
   

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