[Broken_Hippo]

Every time I see such a comment, I'm happy I'm no longer covered under the American health care system.

It isn't like I'm going to start playing Food Poisoning Roulette any time soon. But if I happen upon some bad food, there is a limit to the expenses occurred.

[mypastself]

This does not necessarily apply to you, but that system could also encourage making reckless dietary choices with the knowledge others would pay the potential bill.

[Broken_Hippo]

Which you do with any health care system. Your health care premiums aren't really based off of your health alone, but of everyone that health care company covers - plus the costs of hospitals and so on. Those costs, too, include folks that didn't make the best choices.

And overall, I'm OK with this. I'd rather help folks when they need it even if they didn't make perfect choices than leave folks suffering - and make sure their kids aren't growing up watching their parent physically suffer because the parent messed up when they was younger.

[danparsonson]

You think people might carelessly choose to eat spoiled food because they won't have to foot the medical bill? Have you ever had food poisoning before?? It's not a pleasant experience....

[mypastself]

People tend to perform risk-benefit analyses of their actions, even if unconsciously. They also engage in all sorts of risky behavior.

If they determine the benefit of eating something outweighs the risks, they might do it. Reducing the financial part of the equation reduces potential risk. It’s as simple as that.

[danparsonson]

I think that's quite a naive and simplistic view of human nature but let's assume it's all true - what's the benefit of food poisoning? Because one either thinks the food is safe to eat or not; why would someone knowingly poison themselves (assuming they expected to survive)? Do you see what I'm saying? Removing the financial risk still leaves the huge health risk - food poisoning can be deadly, and even if not, enormously unpleasant.

[mypastself]

I’ve actually had food of questionable provenance myself, including oysters bought from a sketchy street vendor in an Asian country - and I’m not even a particularly risk-taking type.

I accepted some degree of health hazard for a pleasant meal. Let’s say someone managed to convinced me I was also at risk of losing a great deal of money in the process. I might have declined the vendor’s offer then…

[danparsonson]

OK well that's a fair point; in any case I don't find it a compelling counterargument to socialised healthcare. Having lived in two different countries with such a system, to my knowledge hospitals do not fill up with people recklessly endangering themselves just because they don't have to pay for treatment. Far more common are accidents, and we all have those from time to time - a paid system such as that in the US punishes people for being poor and/or unlucky.

[veidr]

I'm just commenting so I can find this again, as it pithily exemplifies a certain type of argument (prevalent here, but also elsewhere) that is also performed unconsciously: the meaningless application of some kind of principle in favor of actual reality.

There are now more than 8 billion people on this planet. And many (though not as many as you might think) billions before that.

Not a single one of them has ever decided, "Fuck it, this might give me 2 days of violent vomiting and involuntarily shitting liquid, but our HEALTH CARE system will cover so WHOO HOO YOLO BABY!!!"

[watwut]

Except that somehow Americans are not more healthy nor have less of food poisonings. All that price tag achieves that they afraid of a lot of things that are actually safe.