My family is among the estimated 40 million Americans without health insurance...and let me be very clear: I don't want health insurance!  My family takes responsibility for our own medical care, and since we pay out of our own pocket we use it only when it is actually necessary, or when we feel it is worth the price (braces for the kids, for instance).  We participate in a voluntary needs-sharing organization (you should become familiar, if you aren't, with Samaritan Ministry, Medi-Share, and others like these) to help us cover extraordinary needs, so we will not become a burden on the taxpayers.

The problem with medical insurance, and even worse with government-funded medical care like Medicaid, is over-consumption.  This is a result of two facts of human nature:

1. When people have no personal responsibility to pay for what they buy, they buy more than they otherwise would. 
2. People who don't pay for their own care often choose to engage in riskier lifestyles and activities (antecdotal evidence documented HERE) and then need more medical care than people who know they will bear the cost of their own lifestyle and activities.

This over-consumption is simply not fair to responsible people.  To force--either through forced pooling of costs through mandatory health insurance participation or through extraction of tax dollars through a government-funded plan--people who are careful in their lifestyle and activities and who use services sparingly to pay for the decisions of others is simply immoral and unjust.  

 

Would you make everyone pay green fees for people who choose to golf? the dinner tab for those who prefer expensive restaurants? for a boat for those who go to the lake on weekends?  Of course not, that would be unjust and immoral.  (On the other hand, that is where socialism is leading, and many elected officials would probably not bat an eye at doing so!) Then why force people to bear the costs of others' health-related choices?

 

We (my family) choose to live a healthier, lower-risk lifestyle and bear the burden of our own health care costs (with a "safety net" of the medical sharing group in case of disaster).  We do not want to be forced into sharing the expenses of others who choose different paths: everyone should bear the cost of our own decisions.

Don't be bullied down Obama's path!  Any Health Care reform should create more private competition and personal accountability, not government subsidy or mandatory pooling of risk.  Any reform should make the buying decision closer to the payment responsibility.

Traveling last week on business, I was seated on the plane next to two teachers.  One of them was also a counselor.  In the course of our conversation she told me about a ten year old boy she had counseled, and whose home she had visited.  She was trying to motivate the boy to work harder in school:

"What do you want to be when you grow up?"

"I wanna be a thief," he replied seriously.

The counselor, a bit surprised, maintained her composure.  "Tell me, what does that mean to you.  What does a thief do?"

"Well, you go into other people's houses, usually while they're gone, and take some of their stuff.  Then you sell the stuff and that way you get money to take care of your family."  He never missed a beat, was as earnest as could be.

"Hmm.  How do you suppose it makes the other people feel...the people whose stuff you took?  Wouldn't that make them sad."

"Oh, you don't understand.  There's this thing called 'insurance.'  When we take their stuff, they tell the insurance people, and the insurance people buy them new stuff to replace it.  So if we take their TV, then they get a brand new TV.  So it works out pretty well for them, too."  This little boy hadn't thought of that on his own, of course.  The counselor had been to their home, and knew that his daddy didn't live there, but he and his mom and siblings lived there with some of his cousins, two of his uncles (when they weren't in jail) and grandma.  These things had been worked out in the minds of the older generation, and were passed on to the younger.

The counselor thought of one more approach: "What about the fact that it is against the law, and if you get caught being a thief you would go to jail?"

Without hesitation, the reply came: "Oh, jail!  My uncles go to jail, and do you know what?" Continuing with a touch of incredulity, "They feed you three meals every day, and you get your own bed to sleep in!"

The counselor knew that in his home, they didn't get three meals a day, and there were only three beds shared by the conglomeration of 'family' who lived there; one child slept in the bathtub, most on the floor, some with a parent (when the parent didn't have a 'friend' over for the night).

Hearing the story nearly moved me to tears.  What a tragic example of the consequences of many choices.

When small children are taught in their home how to justify robbery as an acceptable career path, something is wrong.  We are clearly reaching a crisis in our nation.  It is a moral crisis, more than anything.  Often we think 'moral' is just about sexual issues, but morality touches every area of life; it's the question of objective right and wrong. 

The proliferation of regulation is the result of, and at the same time I believe is a contributing cause of, this moral crisis.  No longer do we teach simple honesty as the standard for dealing with our fellow man.  No longer do we suggest that there may be eternal consequences.  No longer do we explain that there is a Creator God who knew best, knows best, and therefore deserves our respect and obedience.

Perhaps it started with Bill 'Philanderer-in-Chief' Clinton lying about his sexual harassment of an intern, but I don't think so.  Maybe it began with stealing information from the DNC headquarters, by Richard 'I-am-not-a-Crook' Nixon?  Or when the Supreme Court said you could not post the Ten Commandments on the wall of a public school?  Or pray in school?  Maybe it began with the New Deal, when it became fashionable to presume that others should be responsible for your retirement needs?  Probably each of these was just one more small step, one more choice that seemed right at the time, disregarding objective morality.  Each was just one more 'situational ethics' decision, and 'everything is relative' conclusion. 

As man has continually rejected any outside, objective standard of morality, he has gradually, ever so slowly, step-by-step, slid into a slough ...where little boys are now being taught robbery as a perfectly acceptable, logically-justified career option.