5 ms·

I think funding the elderly is a lofty goal, but I don't see a good intellectual argument for FORCING our children to pay for our healthcare. You shouldn't vie

I think funding the elderly is a lofty goal, but I don't see a good intellectual argument for FORCING our children to pay for our healthcare. You shouldn't view your child (nor your neighbor's child) as your own personal piggy-bank to extract from when you get ill. IMO our goal should be to hand down resources from parent to child, not the opposite direction. If I made this story a bit more personal and wrote ("I am too ill to work anymore, so I drove to my son's house and took $200 off his counter to buy my medication) HN would be reacting with outrage.

notreallyserio 4y ago
What alternative do you propose? Suicide booths?
- notch656a 4y ago
  Literally any other option than telling our children they must involuntarily pay, like they're our own personal piggy bank. Saving, asking nicely, charity, debt/mortgage the house, and other forms of voluntary transactions sound acceptable. If you truly have no other options then you can make the moral judgement whether you want to involuntarily take from our children because you think the investment on yourself is worth more than the investment on the youth.
Krasnol 4y ago
I don't understand your argument. You are helping others & others help you. What's the problem? > If I made this story a bit more personal and wrote ("I am too ill to work anymore, so I drove to my son's house and took $200 off his counter to buy my medication) HN would be reacting with outrage. How about making the story more fitting the reality here: You drive to your sons house and ask him to help you with your health bill and he helps you because...why wouldn't he?
- notch656a 4y ago
  >You drive to your sons house and ask him to help you with your health bill and he helps you because...why wouldn't he? Asking is fine. Telling them they must is not. If the mechanism for payment from the youth to the elderly is voluntary I have no problem with it.
  - Krasnol 4y ago
    It kinda is voluntary. If you don't like it, you can leave the country which wants you to pay. I don't get why you have a problem with that. It sounds to me like some anti-social behaviour pattern. Don't you pay for taxes or Government services too? This is how a civilized society works. The attitude you display here has become a bad joke when people talk about the US health system. You must be aware of that. What do you expect people to do which can't afford to pay their health bills because they've been unlucky or something like that? Are they supposed to just die?
    - nybble41 4y ago
      > It kinda is voluntary. If you don't like it, you can leave the country which wants you to pay. Voluntary would be staying where you are and still not being forced to pay. When a mugger presents their victim with a choice like "your money or your life" they're not paying voluntarily just because there was another option. You don't have the right to evict people from their homes any more than you have the right to take their money. > It sounds to me like some anti-social behaviour pattern. The attempt to normalize theft is the only "anti-social behaviour pattern" here.
      - Krasnol 4y ago
        The funny thing here is that your obviously anti-social behaviour only works in a society where being anti-social has been normalized. You'd be dead in a social society because as a lone, greedy individual, you're weaker than a group where the strong care for the weak. But even you must be aware that your model is coming to an end. The anti-social aspects of it have become a topic. Something which hasn't been the case in the past decades because the downsides of this model became so obvious. You are part of a finally dying thought system and the parts you didn't answer to speak for themselves.
boeingUH60 4y ago
> I am too ill to work anymore, so I drove to my son's house and took $200 off his counter to buy my medication Maybe it is because we come from different cultures, but I see absolutely nothing wrong with this. In fact, I recently paid for my parent's hospital bills and did it happily. My country doesn't have universal healthcare, but I'll be happy if we did. At the end of the day, we live in a society, and one of the imperfections is that we end up paying for things we don't like regardless of our opinions. I think healthcare should be a priority...
- notch656a 4y ago
  >In fact, I recently paid for my parent's hospital bills and did it happily. Yes and I recently paid thousands of dollars for my wife's hospital bill, would you like a cookie? That's how it's supposed to work: you voluntarily decide to help your loved ones and the payment is made. How it isn't supposed to work is that the elderly make a moral judgement that the youth are less deserving of investment than themselves, and involuntarily they extract that money from the youth without their consent. I have no problem with a society where you voluntarily pay your parent's hospital bill, in fact you can do that in most any country already. Congratulations, your goal is already achieved. >we end up paying for things we don't like regardless of our opinions In this case you seem to mean we are made to pay for others without our consent. >I think healthcare should be a priority.. Maybe I think hookers should be a priority; sex is correlated with good health. You wouldn't mind if I took a couple hundred from you for my health would you?
  - boeingUH60 4y ago
    > Maybe I think hookers should be a priority; sex is correlated with good health. You wouldn't mind if I took a couple hundred from you for my health would you? Well, different priorities, and that’s fine. But, let’s assume in a democracy, the majority of people decide to vote for free hookers and blow for everyone, why not :)
    - notch656a 4y ago
      >But, let’s assume in a democracy, the majority of people decide to vote for free hookers and blow for everyone, why not :) Majority of _what_ people. The majority of people within my square mile? This continent? The majority of people in my house? I merely reduce down 'democracy' to its logical smallest element, the individual. I vote what I will spend my earnings on, and as the only voter my vote wins. Of course, my vote has no effect on obligation of others, as they are not part of my own 'democracy.' Very few people want a pure democracy. Pure democracy is 5 people in a house, and 4 vote to beat the shit out of the fifth. Pure democracy is when 60% whites vote to make blacks their slaves. Pure democracy is voting to intern the Japanese in camps. Voting is fine, involuntary extraction of resources from others is not.

notreallyserio 4y ago

What alternative do you propose? Suicide booths?

notch656a 4y ago
Literally any other option than telling our children they must involuntarily pay, like they're our own personal piggy bank. Saving, asking nicely, charity, debt/mortgage the house, and other forms of voluntary transactions sound acceptable. If you truly have no other options then you can make the moral judgement whether you want to involuntarily take from our children because you think the investment on yourself is worth more than the investment on the youth.

Krasnol 4y ago

I don't understand your argument. You are helping others & others help you. What's the problem? > If I made this story a bit more personal and wrote ("I am too ill to work anymore, so I drove to my son's house and took $200 off his counter to buy my medication) HN would be reacting with outrage. How about making the story more fitting the reality here: You drive to your sons house and ask him to help you with your health bill and he helps you because...why wouldn't he?

notch656a 4y ago
>You drive to your sons house and ask him to help you with your health bill and he helps you because...why wouldn't he? Asking is fine. Telling them they must is not. If the mechanism for payment from the youth to the elderly is voluntary I have no problem with it.
- Krasnol 4y ago
  It kinda is voluntary. If you don't like it, you can leave the country which wants you to pay. I don't get why you have a problem with that. It sounds to me like some anti-social behaviour pattern. Don't you pay for taxes or Government services too? This is how a civilized society works. The attitude you display here has become a bad joke when people talk about the US health system. You must be aware of that. What do you expect people to do which can't afford to pay their health bills because they've been unlucky or something like that? Are they supposed to just die?
  - nybble41 4y ago
    > It kinda is voluntary. If you don't like it, you can leave the country which wants you to pay. Voluntary would be staying where you are and still not being forced to pay. When a mugger presents their victim with a choice like "your money or your life" they're not paying voluntarily just because there was another option. You don't have the right to evict people from their homes any more than you have the right to take their money. > It sounds to me like some anti-social behaviour pattern. The attempt to normalize theft is the only "anti-social behaviour pattern" here.
    - Krasnol 4y ago
      The funny thing here is that your obviously anti-social behaviour only works in a society where being anti-social has been normalized. You'd be dead in a social society because as a lone, greedy individual, you're weaker than a group where the strong care for the weak. But even you must be aware that your model is coming to an end. The anti-social aspects of it have become a topic. Something which hasn't been the case in the past decades because the downsides of this model became so obvious. You are part of a finally dying thought system and the parts you didn't answer to speak for themselves.

boeingUH60 4y ago

> I am too ill to work anymore, so I drove to my son's house and took $200 off his counter to buy my medication Maybe it is because we come from different cultures, but I see absolutely nothing wrong with this. In fact, I recently paid for my parent's hospital bills and did it happily. My country doesn't have universal healthcare, but I'll be happy if we did. At the end of the day, we live in a society, and one of the imperfections is that we end up paying for things we don't like regardless of our opinions. I think healthcare should be a priority...

notch656a 4y ago
>In fact, I recently paid for my parent's hospital bills and did it happily. Yes and I recently paid thousands of dollars for my wife's hospital bill, would you like a cookie? That's how it's supposed to work: you voluntarily decide to help your loved ones and the payment is made. How it isn't supposed to work is that the elderly make a moral judgement that the youth are less deserving of investment than themselves, and involuntarily they extract that money from the youth without their consent. I have no problem with a society where you voluntarily pay your parent's hospital bill, in fact you can do that in most any country already. Congratulations, your goal is already achieved. >we end up paying for things we don't like regardless of our opinions In this case you seem to mean we are made to pay for others without our consent. >I think healthcare should be a priority.. Maybe I think hookers should be a priority; sex is correlated with good health. You wouldn't mind if I took a couple hundred from you for my health would you?
- boeingUH60 4y ago
  > Maybe I think hookers should be a priority; sex is correlated with good health. You wouldn't mind if I took a couple hundred from you for my health would you? Well, different priorities, and that’s fine. But, let’s assume in a democracy, the majority of people decide to vote for free hookers and blow for everyone, why not :)
  - notch656a 4y ago
    >But, let’s assume in a democracy, the majority of people decide to vote for free hookers and blow for everyone, why not :) Majority of _what_ people. The majority of people within my square mile? This continent? The majority of people in my house? I merely reduce down 'democracy' to its logical smallest element, the individual. I vote what I will spend my earnings on, and as the only voter my vote wins. Of course, my vote has no effect on obligation of others, as they are not part of my own 'democracy.' Very few people want a pure democracy. Pure democracy is 5 people in a house, and 4 vote to beat the shit out of the fifth. Pure democracy is when 60% whites vote to make blacks their slaves. Pure democracy is voting to intern the Japanese in camps. Voting is fine, involuntary extraction of resources from others is not.