This healthcare proposal is better than any healthcare proposal my opponent can come up with.

I thank wjmelements for his response. I will start by rebutting his claims and then defending my proposal. My Opponent: "My opponent's proposals will not lower medical costs because they do not target the root." What is the root? Why are the costs of medical treatment so high? Why do insurance premiums keep going up? The answer is simple: uninsured Americans. Insured and uninsured people cannot be denied treatment. Have you ever walked into an emergency room and been turned away? No. Nobody has because hospitals treat you now and expect you to pay later. The problem is, when the bill comes around not everybody can pay. Some people file for medical bankruptcy. But in most cases, the hospital is still worse off. So, since it takes money to run a hospital (take care of sick and injured people), the cost of medical care have to rise or else adequate medical treatment won't be available. This, in turn, raises insurance premiums because insurance companies will have to pay for more expensive medical costs. Remove uninsured people from the equation, and a lot of the problem disappears. My Opponent: "2) Government Handouts" I love how my opponent calls helping needy Americans by letting them keep more of their money "Government Handouts". The word "handout" implies something is being taken from somebody else and being given to another person. This wouldn't happen because tax credits allow people to keep more of their OWN money. My Opponent: "This proposal doesn't even meet its goal! It simply grants free money to anyone who asks for it, given that they don't have health insurance." It would work. It would only be given once and once only. I couldn't apply for it year and year; it would be a one year thing. Also, even if these people chose not to purchase health insurance with it if an unexpected medical emergency came up they would at least be able to pay for it to some extent. My Opponent: "The natural result: welfare mothers will avoid purchasing health insurance to receive a subsidy." My opponent thinks anybody who doesn't have insurance is a welfare mother mooching off of the government. First of all, most people on welfare currently are eligible for Medicaid and hence wouldn't be eligible for the tax credit. Secondly, most Americans who don't have health insurance are working class Hispanic and White families who are too rich to receive welfare, yet to poor to afford health insurance on a month-to-month basis. My Opponent: "From an economic perspective, this subsidy steals money from producing Americans and gives it to welfare mothers and the burgeoisie. " The whole stealing money thing again, once again tax credits don't take money away from people, instead they let people keep more of THEIR money. Maybe my opponent should read a dictionary sometime… My Opponent: "A simpler step would be enforcing current fraud laws. However, fraud is not the problem." Why would we get so worried about fraud if fraud is not a problem, as my opponent insists? My Opponent: "Individuals are choosing not to read contracts, and are suffering the consequences." The current language used in contracts is so difficult to understand that it's impossible for anybody to make a well-though out, rationalized decision, on health insurance without the help of a lawyer (which is expensive). Not everybody is an expert on insurance contracts. My Opponent: "(Imagine the narrator of an ad having to read through everything covered and not covered by each offer mentioned!)" I didn't say that insurance companies have to make all commercials 100% true. I just said that they had to DISCLOSE THE ACTUAL PERFORMANCE AND PRICE. This doesn't have to be via a television commercial, it could be states via a readable contract. My Opponent: "What my opponent's proposition will do is prevent insurance marketing, eliminating consumer information entirely." No, it would make insurance companies want to tell the truth about their prices and performance. If insurance companies knew that their actual costs and performance were "just a click away" they would fare less likely to lie about it. Lying about that would hurt their credibility and only make them look worse. I will not attack my opponent's defenses of his arguments. My Opponent: "The midwife will no longer be required to have 10 years of medical school over the endocrine system and brain surgery. Instead, his/her training will be able to be focused on whatever field he wishes to focus on. The individual will be free to pursue a medical career without prohibitive medical school fees." Is this a bad thing? I do agree that having a midwife extensively study the endocrine and brain surgery might not make any sense, at first glance. Let's compare doctors to lawyers. Lawyers specialize in various areas (criminal law, common law, tort law, contracts, and many others), however, in order to be a good lawyer one must be well-rounded in all areas because law is highly connected. A doctor works the same way. Even though the doctor is a midwife, she or he must be well-rounded in all areas of human health and medicine because he or she could encounter any medical emergency at anytime. Emergencies don't just happen in hospitals. My Opponent: "Second, my opponent objects saying that children have some sort of natural right to a birth by a licensed medical provider. Wherefrom comes this right? Was every birth up til the institution of medical licensing a crime? What of the births in a car on the way to the hospital? Are those criminal?" In 2009 in an industrialized country such as the United States this holds true. Since birth is a highly complex and highly dangerous medical procedure, every child has the right to be birthed by a competent medical PROFESSIONAL. For the mother to infringe on this right by hiring one of these non-licensed medical workers is wrong. It would put the life of the baby (which is a human being) in risk. The mother shouldn't be able to do that. I understand that in every birth, including those performed by actual medical professionals there is risk, but more so with unlicensed medical workers. My Opponent: "Second, in order for individuals to want to pay for healthcare, they have to be confident in their operator." What if they can't afford the operator? They will be faced with two options: die or let the guy with the rusty spoon operate? Giving people a tax credit to buy their own health insurance would be a lot easier. My Opponent: "Lastly, assuming the existing system of liability, the taxpayer would not be responsible for the mistakes: the operator would. So, there is no tax concern." Liability still won't pay for all of it. People would still probably turn to government-aid. My Opponent: "Being liable for fraud and wanting to keep up consumer confidence will force companies to be confident that there will be no mistake. This testing will either be performed by the individual companies or by specialized testing companies, whichever the market finds more efficient." The private sector isn't a cure-all for our country's health problems. The government favors the citizen, the private sector favors profit. I don't want profit put above my health, do you? Let's suppose there a HIV vaccine becomes available, but first it must be approved. The testing company would rush through it to make it available to the market to line their pockets, the testing could be compromised. However, since the government will not make any money off this HIV vaccine it will be more careful and ensure it is safe. CONCLUSION My opponent's plan doesn't target the reason for rising medical cost because it doesn't provide insurance to anybody and doesn't require the insurers be more accurate with their performance and prices. All it does is give guys with rusty spoons perform medical procedures and puts profits before our health. I don't want that do you?