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Why do we need to rationalize these things with a hypothetical best-case scenario?
by jahaja 8y ago
Why do we need to rationalize these things with a hypothetical best-case scenario?
- marvin 8y agoWell, I live in a country that does have a socialized welfare system. So the best-case scenario isn't entirely hypothetical. Everyone who earns money pays ~50-75% of their income in various taxes, and everyone who hits economic or medical hardship gets enough help that they'll survive and keep a minimum of dignity. No one starves, no one has to be homeless, no one is forced to work a job that ruins their mental or physical health, although some do come close before they are diagnosed and get permanent (paid) medical leave. Almost no one dies from diagnosed and treatable diseases, with a few exceptions in cases where treatment is extremely expensive and ineffective (e.g. treatment costs $1 million per year and increases life expectancy by 2 years). We do still have drug addicts, homeless people, people with massive gambling debts, people with untreated psychological illnesses and prostitutes of many types. I think it's an interesting philosophical discussion to which degree those who suffer the most on the lowest rungs of my society are victims (in the sense that society should have done more to help them). The vast majority are certainly _offered_ a large amount of help. Some seem unable or unwilling to accept help. Many do accept help, but keep making self-destructive decisions, and it is considered unethical to use force to stop them. Most receive help and live decent lives. Interestingly, acts like surrogacy, prostitution and donating blood or plasma for money is still illegal here. Even though few better systems could be devised to ensure that on one is forced to take part in these against better judgement. "No one should be allowed to sell their body" is a mantra you'll hear a lot, but there hasn't been a very comprehensive discussion about the pros and cons of this.
- jahaja 8y agoI think it's important to emphasize that in this context there's an explicit mention of scale. Surrogacy as something of the future. Almost as an institution. For this scale to be possible, an exploitative relationship between the buyer and seller is required. It's a prerequisite. Otherwise there wouldn't even be a mention of it, since it would be at the negligible scale of a friend or family member donating a kidney to a loved one.
- marvin 8y agoI don't think an exploitative relationship is implied or required here, but it's certainly a big danger (probably the biggest) one would have to be super alert for if this was to be performed at any scale (which exists already, by the way). E.g., I heard that Minnesota has some sort of routine in place for voluntary surrogacy, which costs the adoptive parents on the order of $100k, of which only ~25k goes to the birthing mother. (A large part of the cost is administration and health checkups/treatment/insurance). It doesn't sound right to me that only 25% of the proceeds should go to the star of the show, so to speak. But this doesn't imply that it is impossible to do this ethically. Regulation that's well thought-out, as well as a sound, pre-existing social welfare net, is critical.