Rights are a funny thing. You used to have the right to own slaves. To beat your kids. To box stocks and defer taxes on gains. Can't do none of it now. Things change. Frankly, your right to live badly and make me foot the bill for it can go the way of the buggy whip.
I think if medicare doesn't overstep criteria private insurers use, it's great. The obese, smokers and drinkers should pay more. A lot more. In Arizona, 25.5% of residents were obese as of 2009, according to figures from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, ranking it about in the middle among states. About 46% of Arizona's Medicaid enrollees smoke daily, according to a 2006 survey by the state's Medicaid agency. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100...0.html?mod=WSJ_hp_MIDDLENexttoWhatsNewsSecond
Perfectly reasonable for fatsos to pay higher health insurance premiums, no different than paying higher car insurance premiuns for higher risk people. Smokers and drinkers will simply lie about their habits, so excise taxes on alcohol and tobacco should actually be used for alcohol and tobacco related costs. Probably needs to be doubled, then you could cover most social medicine costs. The savings on insurance premiums would be worth it. The problem is politicians never use tax money appropriately. other steps: stop saving every damn fetal alcohol and crack preemie- tons of cash there, or simply stop thinking everyone deserves extreme medical care
If you want to smoke, go for it," said Monica Coury, spokeswoman for Arizona's Medicaid program. "But understand you're going to have to contribute something for the cost of the care of your smoking." ---------------------------------- What about minors who smoke who are enrolled in medicaid? And the fat kids on medicaid?
Smokers already pay for themselves though. It's called insanely high tax on cigarettes. It would be like saying that drivers should pay more income tax because of the cost of all the roads and ignoring all the tax on gasoline, which pays for the roads. Since 80% of the cost of cigarettes is tax, smokers foot the bill for their cancer with every pack they buy. Remember, that was the original justification Clinton used to throw the tax on cigs. Unfortunately, all the money went to highways and prisons.