Hmm You want me to pay for what?

BrightSoul wrote:I was perusing the new posts section and rediscovered this thread that I had initially ignored, I think I ignored it, since I hate ideological disputes. This post is primarily related to the very first post.

That said I have to ask every American if they truly believe in religious freedom? If you are like me my relationship with God is my own and no one has the right to stick their nose into it.

Now, where does it say in the constitution that a corporation can dictate my religious beliefs to me? Where does it say that you, a board member of a corporation of any kind even a 501c, can dictate my beliefs? What the supreme court has said is that our freedoms extend only so far as our front door. Once we go to work we have few rights and they can be rejected by said corporation so long as they can convince 5 people that THEIR religious freedoms are infringed by the laws of the land, regardless of whether my actions infringe on my employees freedoms?

Is this right?

I've always had an issue with the idea that somehow contraceptives are automatically a sign of promiscuity or are automatically going to turn a chaste person into a ravening sex maniac. I know some women who were prescribed the pill due to health issues to moderate their hormones, does the supreme or the religious corporation have an answer to that?

The argument that contraceptives somehow stop the Divine in some way is weak. If you are a believer and believe that god is omnipotent then couldn't god make a person pregnant regardless of what contraceptives you are using? Isn't that the reason that no pharma company claims a 100% effectivness? Heck, put that way not even a vasectomy or hysterectomy could stop the big guy if he wants you to have a child.

Just my $0.02

This only affects closely held corporations (politician speak for family owned corporations) owned by very religious families and the problem that they have is that:

1. They feel it is a sin to pay for things that violate their religion (abortion primarily, but contraception as well in a few cases) .

2. The Bible is very clear on how employers should treat employees. Basically it all boils down to do unto others as you would have them do unto you. So these corporations which are owned by families whose beliefs are true and sincere strive to treat their employees in this manner (most of these religious families have reputations as treating their employees exceptionally well relative to the rest of their industries, heath insurance and otherwise). They include providing health insurance under this mantra. They feel that doing what some of their competitors are doing and dropping their employees to 29 hours a week and not paying for health care AT ALL is also a sin. This 29 hour trick while immoral is completely legal.



The first amendment freedom of religion require that any infringement on religion be as minimal as possible and the supreme court ruled that the government has other options including simply paying for birth control itself that don't attempt to force these families to violate their beliefs.

Keep in mind the practicalities as well. If these families were forced to violate their beliefs, some or all of them would choose the perfectly legal 29 hour trick over paying for abortions/birth control. Now if you were an employee who worked for them and did not share their beliefs would you rather pay for your own birth control/abortion or would you rather have your hours cut to 29 per week AND lose your health insurance (these companies were already providing health insurance to their employees before Obamacare because of their religious belief in treating employees well)?

This seems to be an example of very different cultures, in that I find the concept of businesses being Christian based and thus ethical to be bizarre.

In our culture it is not normally done for an individual or organisation to publically discuss their religious affiliation. That said some of our worst employment scandals have occurred from such organisations as the Catholic Church, Hillsong revival, and US based multinationals that espouse Christianity. Why should Christianity have a monopoly on ethics anyway? Many good people are Islamic, Hindu, Buddhist and secular.

From reading news and reports it appears that the US health system is an expensive and elitist shambles compared to most of the developed world's. We have all discussed this before but I get free basic health care as does every resident from our federal government Medicare, then I have opted for top additional private medical at $250 a month for a couple. Medicare is funded by a 1% levy on wages and my private health care is self funded from the contributions.
The US wouldn't have to invent a system, just copy it from many other societies. May have to shoot a few lawyers and health fund executives who protest about losing their gravy trains.

biochem wrote:

BrightSoul wrote:I was perusing the new posts section and rediscovered this thread that I had initially ignored, I think I ignored it, since I hate ideological disputes. This post is primarily related to the very first post.

That said I have to ask every American if they truly believe in religious freedom? If you are like me my relationship with God is my own and no one has the right to stick their nose into it.

Now, where does it say in the constitution that a corporation can dictate my religious beliefs to me? Where does it say that you, a board member of a corporation of any kind even a 501c, can dictate my beliefs? What the supreme court has said is that our freedoms extend only so far as our front door. Once we go to work we have few rights and they can be rejected by said corporation so long as they can convince 5 people that THEIR religious freedoms are infringed by the laws of the land, regardless of whether my actions infringe on my employees freedoms?

Is this right?

I've always had an issue with the idea that somehow contraceptives are automatically a sign of promiscuity or are automatically going to turn a chaste person into a ravening sex maniac. I know some women who were prescribed the pill due to health issues to moderate their hormones, does the supreme or the religious corporation have an answer to that?

The argument that contraceptives somehow stop the Divine in some way is weak. If you are a believer and believe that god is omnipotent then couldn't god make a person pregnant regardless of what contraceptives you are using? Isn't that the reason that no pharma company claims a 100% effectivness? Heck, put that way not even a vasectomy or hysterectomy could stop the big guy if he wants you to have a child.

Just my $0.02

This only affects closely held corporations (politician speak for family owned corporations) owned by very religious families and the problem that they have is that:

1. They feel it is a sin to pay for things that violate their religion (abortion primarily, but contraception as well in a few cases) .

2. The Bible is very clear on how employers should treat employees. Basically it all boils down to do unto others as you would have them do unto you. So these corporations which are owned by families whose beliefs are true and sincere strive to treat their employees in this manner (most of these religious families have reputations as treating their employees exceptionally well relative to the rest of their industries, heath insurance and otherwise). They include providing health insurance under this mantra. They feel that doing what some of their competitors are doing and dropping their employees to 29 hours a week and not paying for health care AT ALL is also a sin. This 29 hour trick while immoral is completely legal.



The first amendment freedom of religion require that any infringement on religion be as minimal as possible and the supreme court ruled that the government has other options including simply paying for birth control itself that don't attempt to force these families to violate their beliefs.

Keep in mind the practicalities as well. If these families were forced to violate their beliefs, some or all of them would choose the perfectly legal 29 hour trick over paying for abortions/birth control. Now if you were an employee who worked for them and did not share their beliefs would you rather pay for your own birth control/abortion or would you rather have your hours cut to 29 per week AND lose your health insurance (these companies were already providing health insurance to their employees before Obamacare because of their religious belief in treating employees well)?

This seems to be an example of very different cultures, in that I find the concept of businesses being Christian based and thus ethical to be bizarre.

In our culture it is not normally done for an individual or organisation to publically discuss their religious affiliation. That said some of our worst employment scandals have occurred from such organisations as the Catholic Church, Hillsong revival, and US based multinationals that espouse Christianity. .

We have those too. Too many. Sigh.... But in this case those who spent a fortune fighting it all the way to the supreme court were people who truly believed. I suspect Australia also has Christian businessmen who truly believe in following the Bible, the whole Bible including the parts on the ethical treatment of employees. The Australian government probably has just never given them reason to stand up (yet).

Many good people are Islamic, Hindu, Buddhist and secular.

Agreed. In this particular case though, they stated in their testimony that their exceptionally good treatment of employees was motivated by their Christian faith.

The US wouldn't have to invent a system, just copy it from many other societies. May have to shoot a few lawyers and health fund executives who protest about losing their gravy trains.

While I don't agree that a universal payer organization is best, the thought of shooting a few lawyers and health fund executives is very appealing......

The Republicans should launch an immediate bill basically stating that all Americans should be treated equally, so since some people & businesses were given exemptions from obomacare, then EVERYONE gets a permanent exemption. Thus no need to repeal it, just "everyone is exempt" – obama would veto it, but then congress can shove his veto up his nose with an override.

Daryl wrote:In our culture it is not normally done for an individual or organisation to publically discuss their religious affiliation. That said some of our worst employment scandals have occurred from such organisations as the Catholic Church, Hillsong revival, and US based multinationals that espouse Christianity.

Just because someone claims to be Christian doesn’t mean they are. There are lots of people who claim to be “Christian” but are anti-Semitic. That is impossible! How can someone hate Jews but worship an orthodox Jew as their savior? You claim to worship someone but hate everyone of his ethnicity/religion? Those are no more Christian than those you site.

Government paid heathcare isn't free. The services have to paid for regardless of who is sponsoring the healthcare plan in question. The proponents of publicly fund healthcare simply want the more well off and healthy to pay for the less well off and sick. On top of that they want one of the least efficient organizations in any society to manage that transfer of wealth. When efficiency means providing a service for the least amount of resources, why on earth would any sane and caring individual want ANY government near running healthcare? Regulate? Certainly. Manage and operate? Hell no!

Any other organization(s) that isn't a monopoly or oligopoly can do the job more efficiently. That means more healthcare for any given level of resources.

PeterZ wrote:Government paid heathcare isn't free. The services have to paid for regardless of who is sponsoring the healthcare plan in question. The proponents of publicly fund healthcare simply want the more well off and healthy to pay for the less well off and sick. On top of that they want one of the least efficient organizations in any society to manage that transfer of wealth. When efficiency means providing a service for the least amount of resources, why on earth would any sane and caring individual want ANY government near running healthcare? Regulate? Certainly. Manage and operate? Hell no!

Any other organization(s) that isn't a monopoly or oligopoly can do the job more efficiently. That means more healthcare for any given level of resources.

On the other hand, the government is at least theoretically interested in your welfare. A for-profit insurance provider is not - in fact, they have a direct incentive to drop you if you get too expensive.

That's why the whole idea of health insurance requires regulation to set guidelines. Government has a role. Just not in managing the system.

Eyal wrote:

PeterZ wrote:Government paid heathcare isn't free. The services have to paid for regardless of who is sponsoring the healthcare plan in question. The proponents of publicly fund healthcare simply want the more well off and healthy to pay for the less well off and sick. On top of that they want one of the least efficient organizations in any society to manage that transfer of wealth. When efficiency means providing a service for the least amount of resources, why on earth would any sane and caring individual want ANY government near running healthcare? Regulate? Certainly. Manage and operate? Hell no!

Any other organization(s) that isn't a monopoly or oligopoly can do the job more efficiently. That means more healthcare for any given level of resources.

On the other hand, the government is at least theoretically interested in your welfare. A for-profit insurance provider is not - in fact, they have a direct incentive to drop you if you get too expensive.

PeterZ wrote:Government paid heathcare isn't free. The services have to paid for regardless of who is sponsoring the healthcare plan in question. The proponents of publicly fund healthcare simply want the more well off and healthy to pay for the less well off and sick. On top of that they want one of the least efficient organizations in any society to manage that transfer of wealth. When efficiency means providing a service for the least amount of resources, why on earth would any sane and caring individual want ANY government near running healthcare? Regulate? Certainly. Manage and operate? Hell no!

Any other organization(s) that isn't a monopoly or oligopoly can do the job more efficiently. That means more healthcare for any given level of resources.

Free societies are great in that intelligent people can freely debate items even though they may be poles apart. My experience is that there are some things best run by government, and some best by profit seeking corporations. As my granny used to say "The proof of the pudding is in the eating."

Our system has government looking after basic healthcare (emergencies and routine stuff), while extras are optionally covered by paid for businesses. I pay 1% of my income for Medicare government cover (about $1k a year), and $3k for the extras. Combined this means that I and wife can have anything medical we reasonably need or want.
An example is that we used to have a universal job finding service which a conservative government outsourced to private enterprise. End result is that it now costs 3.5 times as much to get a welfare client a job. Hilarious karma is that the wife of a progressive leader then grasped this business opportunity and made over $200m in less than a decade, he then won the election and deposed the conservatives.

Your granny is wise. Using her analogy, the pudding recipe is best prepare for some number of people. Expanding that recipe without adjustment for agreat many more people will result in a much less tasty proofing. So what works for Australia where immigration is controlled won't work for the much larger US that has very porous borders.

Daryl wrote:Free societies are great in that intelligent people can freely debate items even though they may be poles apart. My experience is that there are some things best run by government, and some best by profit seeking corporations. As my granny used to say "The proof of the pudding is in the eating."

Our system has government looking after basic healthcare (emergencies and routine stuff), while extras are optionally covered by paid for businesses. I pay 1% of my income for Medicare government cover (about $1k a year), and $3k for the extras. Combined this means that I and wife can have anything medical we reasonably need or want.
An example is that we used to have a universal job finding service which a conservative government outsourced to private enterprise. End result is that it now costs 3.5 times as much to get a welfare client a job. Hilarious karma is that the wife of a progressive leader then grasped this business opportunity and made over $200m in less than a decade, he then won the election and deposed the conservatives.