[OnMyPhone]

I hate it all, and would rather pay much more taxes if we had universal healthcare.

That aside, I had a few different people give me the following reason why this is acceptable to them. "Why should we pay any of our hard earned money to the government so some drug addict can get their fix?" "Why should I pay for single mothers who made bad decisions?" It is almost always other people making poor decisions or getting into poor situations that justify their choices on this type of stuff.

When you ask about parents who's kids can't get surgery, they reply in a similar fashion, "there's government programs for them, so I don't need to pay anymore taxes." They have never had to use one of these "wonderful" government programs. That's key to their thinking.

Try to tell them that it could be their kids that need a surgery they can't afford and it'll go something like, "well that's why we pay for insurance out of our pocket." They never stop to think about people who are in a bad situation.

There is NO getting through to some of these people until they need the help they refuse to pay for. I have seen one couple change their minds once their insurance refused to cover something for their kid. Immediately they were "raising awareness" for this type of stuff... but whatever at least they eventually came to.

So to answer your question, they aren't blind per se, as they see how stupid it is. They are however selfish as shit and don't care about anyone outside of their initial friends and family.

[Cthulhu_]

A simple retort to that would be "Why should we pay any of our hard earned money to the government so it can send our children off to some fucking desert to fight in an unwinnable war that was started before they were even born?"

60% of the US budget is spent on the military. Reduce that to just 50 or 40% and suddenly, hundreds of billions would become available to spend on health care, education, infrastructure, etc.

Raising taxes is probably also something to do though, the US is racking up trillions in debts at the moment.

[refurb]

60% of the US budget is spent on the military.

No, it's 16%.[1]

[1]https://www.nationalpriorities.org/budget-basics/federal-bud...

[ceejayoz]

53% of discretionary spending, though.

[assblaster]

And the rest is non-discretionary, most of which is welfare: Medicare, Medicaid, social security.

[emodendroket]

In addition to being cruel, this kind of penny-pinching is often penny-wise and pound-foolish. It's easy to lose more money verifying that people are not shiftless than you save by denying them benefits.

[ceejayoz]

For example:

https://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/18/us/no-savings-found-in-fl...

> Because the Florida law requires that applicants who pass the test be reimbursed for the cost, an average of $30, the cost to the state was $118,140. This is more than would have been paid out in benefits to the people who failed the test, Mr. Newton said. As a result, the testing cost the government an extra $45,780, he said.

[natoliniak]

"Why should we pay any of our hard earned money to the government so some drug addict can get their fix?" "Why should I pay for single mothers who made bad decisions?"

furthermore, taxpayers already foot the bill for these cases anyway since the government reimburses the hospitals, at least partially, for treating the uninsured. What the govt doesn't reimburse, the hospitals pass on to the insured customers (at this point it is hard to call them patients) in the form of higher costs.

[HillaryBriss]

> They are however selfish as shit and don't care about anyone outside of their initial friends and family.

evidently people in Canada, the UK, Japan, Sweden, Singapore and other places where there is a comprehensive, well-managed health care system are not "selfish as shit."

so, we should probably ask: "why? why are people selfish as shit in America?"

[briandear]

It seems pretty selfish to expect others to pay for your costs.

[darpa_escapee]

> There is NO getting through to some of these people until they need the help they refuse to pay for. I have seen one couple change their minds once their insurance refused to cover something for their kid. Immediately they were "raising awareness" for this type of stuff... but whatever at least they eventually came to.

There's a risk associated to the type of thinking that takes root before a breakthrough experience like this: it's the idea that if something bad like were to happen to them, it's because they are exception to the rule, where the rule is plugging your ears and repeating personal responsibility over and over again.

That's to say such a situation gets internalized as, "It's unfair that my treatment isn't covered because I pay for insurance coverage, so of course I expect to be covered when I'm sick. If you don't pay for insurance, you shouldn't expect anything."

Which is a close relative to, "It's okay that I'm benefiting from public assistance, because I'm actually suffering and I'm not cheating the system like everyone else."