US should implement Universal Health Care

I held from posting this round as per his request. Rebuttal 1: Kant's Categorical Imperatives I was shocked to see Con present a Kantian argument against Universal Health Care. It's well known that the Kantian arguments support the argument for Universal Health Care, not against it. Here are three Kantian defenses of UHC [1][2]. I will explain this complex philosophical argument to the reader to the best of my ability, and show how this will play significantly for my favor. But before we continue, Con didn't explain why Kant's Categorical Imperatives should be considered as the standard to be used for defining morality. Even if the Kantian argument holds, Con fails to show why we should adhere to the Kantian standard. In any case, I will show how the Kantian argument will turn this contention for my favor against Con's claim. I ask the reader to bear with me because this is very philosophical and can be confusing. Kant's argument that humans "have an absolute worth that makes it necessary that all humans treat each other as one wishes to be treated" [2]. And that we should never treat someone as means, but only as ends [3]. So if I steal from someone an object, then the person I stole from is a mean to the object I stole, which makes it an immoral act. How about Universal Health Care? We all want to have access to Universal healthcare. No one wishes to be denied healthcare nor to be forced to pay bills that have a significant financial impact. Everyone wished to be able to do preventive checks to ensure we are healthy. According to Kant, this would be the maxim that we should promote for. Therefore Universal Healthcare would be considered Perfect Duty (Falsifying Con's second premise). Finally, Kant's arguments are very extreme. Based on Kant's analogy, the government shouldn't collect taxes as it's not considered a Perfect Duty. Not to mention we cannot kill a terrorist even if we are saving millions of lives [3]! That's absurd. So I apologize to Con, but this contention is dead. Rebuttal 2: Universal Health Care is ineffective? ! Cherry Picking Fallacy Con's argument is considered a Cherry Picking fallacy [4]. Con presented some issues in the British and Swedish health systems, and concludes that UHC is ineffective. That's like saying that the Golden State is a terrible NBA team, because they lost to terrible teams in the NBA (LA Lakers, Utah, Brooklyn…etc) [5]. This type of cherry picking is fallacious, and for the record Golden State won the NBA championships and had an amazing record of 67-15 [6]. To properly evaluate if the Universal Health Care is effective or not, let's look at studies that consider several factors pertaining to quality of health care. The Commonwealth Fund ranked seven countries based on Measures of Quality, Efficiency, Access, Equity, and Healthy Lives [7]. Where did the US fall in this list? Dead last. The other 6 countries ranked in order are: Netherlands, UK, Australia, Germany, New Zealand, Canada. All of those countries have UHC [8]. Not satisfied with this study? Another study shows that the US is ranked 37th in the world. The top 20 (I stopped checking) health care systems in the world all provide Universal Health Care to their citizens. If UHC is ineffective, why is the US ranked 44th in the world in effectiveness, and all West European countries and Canada are deemed more effective than it? [9] To claim that UHC is ineffective is a laughable argument. Con brings an odd argument: "The employee is better off to charge a $50 doctor bill to the insurance company…etc" According to the strange analysis, the alternative is "having the employer pay [the employee] an extra $70 in cash". What is Con talking about! Since when UHC requires an employer to pay the employee, and on top of it, charge it for taxes. Con doesn't understand UHC. This is invalid. It's UHC, not Obamacare Con then brings an argument that UHC would lead to 2.9 loss of jobs. That's false! What Con is referring to is the impact of ACA (a. k. a. Obamacare), not UHC. The reason that there are job losses is because businesses with 50 employees or more must provide health coverage. This caused some businesses to "cut back employee hours to part-time to avoid paying for their health coverage" [10]. This debate is not about ACA or Obamacare, it's about UHC. I've already shown the UHC reduces strain on businesses, increases productivity and provides companies competitive advantage. This claim works for my favor against Con. The Conservative Economist Pro then brings the opinion of a biased economist Friedman, who was a major advisor to Republican U. S. President Ronald Reagan and Conservative British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher [11]. In his argument, he states: "The costs of ordinary medical care are well within the means of the average American family. And the problem of sometimes it being large and sometimes it being small is readily handled through the availability of private insurance arrangements. " So I agree that someone may be able to obtain private health care, but did Con forget about deductibles? As I've shown in Round 2, when someone has to pay more than $6,600 in deductibles, this leads to people skipping care (See the Uninsured Insured – Round 2). And people can be denied coverage. Cancer Support Community explains: "If you do not have health insurance at the time of your diagnosis, private health insurance will likely be difficult to obtain after your diagnosis. […]If you’ve been uninsured for more than 63 days, your task will be more challenging" [12]. So this argument is false. Economic Disaster Con argues that nationalization of UHC will harm the economy. He brings a very odd example of the "Yugos" car, and how nationalizing it impacted its productivity. But Con doesn’t fully understand UHC. The last country to implement UHC was Israel. What was the impact on the economy? A study explains: "It is important to note that since the introduction of [UHC] in 1995, the share of health in GDP has been stable, in contrast to a rise in the preceding decade" [13]. So this argument actually tips to my side. As I've shown in Round 2, the share of health in GDP in US will increase from 17% to 25% by 2025. That's not sustainable, and therefore UHC is definitely a better system. Rebuttal 3: Rand Paul Counter Plan Solves? ! I find Con's argument very interesting. Why? He uses the Kant's argument (Contention 1) against Universal Health Care. But if that argument stands, then it would refute this contention because Rand Paul's proposal isn't considered a Perfect Duty, and therefore ought not to be enforced. It's clear that Con is biased as he is an avid supporter of Rand Paul. I find it disappointing. Second, Pro doesn't explain why Rand Paul's proposal would work, and not face the challenges that he listed against UHC. Or is that just another biased argument? While I sympathize with Con for not having enough space, but unfortunately I can only rebut what Pro has claimed. Unfortunately, Pro's argument is a bare assertion. Con provided the Rand Paul's book as a source, and I actually had to read parts to it to find Rand's proposals. Con, please provide page numbers. That's not acceptable. So Rand Paul advocates for nothing new! He simply advocates that people should have access to insurance care (specifically the ones that federal employees have). That's not so bad, except there was no mention of the costs of these plans and the deductibles associates with them. If the plans and deductible are very low, and no one can be denied coverage even if they're diagnosed with a disease (e. g. cancer), then this is essentially very close to UHC. So I picked a random plan [14] (Don’t expect me to study the entire set). The premium for one and his family is $462.17 per month, and a $700 deductible. So the total cost in a year before the insurance company covers costs would be: $6,246.04 per year. And it's not 100% coverage. There are copayments if you need insurance. So, while I respect Rand's effort, (It's definitely better than no health care), it still leads to the issues I've listed before: Skipping care, less preventive care and financial burden. It also means that anyone who's diagnosed with complex diseases (cancer, AIDS) can apply for full coverage, and won't be denied coverage. This is great. But wouldn't this plan face the same issue of rising insurance coverage for everyone? Con's argument is hypothetical, biased, doesn't provide good health care (Skipping care, less preventive care and financial burden) and doesn't necessary relieve the impact to rising health insurance costs. Sources [1] R. Paul Olson, Moral Arguments for Universal Health Care: A Vision for Health Care Reform, pp. 185 [2] . http://www.peh-med.com... [3] . http://sevenpillarsinstitute.org... [4] . http://www.logicallyfallacious.com... [5] . http://sports.yahoo.com... [6] . http://www.nba.com... [7] . http://www.commonwealthfund.org... [8] . http://www.theatlantic.com... [9] . http://www.bloomberg.com... [10] . http://obamacarefacts.com... [11] . https://en.wikipedia.org... [12] . http://www.cancersupportcommunity.org... [13] . http://www.jhf.org... [14] . https://www.opm.gov...