Your Right to Someone Else's Work

Most of us in the real world know that NO ONE has a moral right to the work product of someone else. We know that walking on to an automobile dealership lot and driving away with a vehicle is illegal, because we didn't PAY for it. That's one of the major differences between society the way the liberals see it, and society the way conservatives see it -- we engage in voluntary exchange, of goods and services, with another person or entity. I agree to hand over something of value, and in exchange I receive something of value. This principle is at work all the time, every minute of every day, from the electricity powering my computer to the iced tea I am drinking.

I do not have the RIGHT to any of those things; what I have is the ABILITY to purchase what I want and need from someone who offers it for sale. Thirsty? Buy a drink. Cold? Buy a coat. Exchange your money for that which you desire. Or barter, your service for someone else's. You don't have a RIGHT not to pay for it.

Where this principle is turned on its head, primarily (though not exclusively), is the area of healthcare. Since so many of us pay only indirectly for the health services we receive, we are blind to the costs of those services. How much is an X-ray, if you walked into a doctor's office and asked for one -- without insurance to cover the cost for you? I have no idea. It probably costs more than an entire month's worth of insurance premiums, but I have no clue. Do you? Of course not. Just because we don't KNOW the cost does not in any way mean there is no cost!

Things like that X-ray seem free, since we don't pay for them directly to the people that conduct them. The less economically-savvy among us therefore equate NO cost with UNKNOWN cost, and bristle at the notion that a doctor wants to be paid for what he provides. How dare he! It's that righteous indignation which is the hallmark of the left... but I digress.

If that X-ray is to be free to the patient, who will pay for the equipment, personnel, training, electricity, building, maintenance, etc.? Those things cost money. Who should pay this money? If you say, "The government!" then you have failed. That model has brought us where we are today...

Because 'government' has no money of its own, only money that it collects (through taxes and fees) to pay for anything. Anything paid for by 'government' has been paid for by the citizens who fund it.