Do you need some assistance?

As for the capitalist system and Jesus's story about the workers in the vineyard, yes his story doesn't make much sense economically, but that was the point about salvation and the kingdom of God. The capitalist system is based on the notion of choice and voluntary exchange, and bosses who pay too little (or otherwise mistreat their workers) are supposed to find their workers quitting for greener pastures; such is actually bad for business, FWIW.

You're talking about something that can and should exist but does not due to greed. You say “it will almost certainly work better than….” but look around you. If it did work better, we'd have it now. If it did work better, we would not be looking to the government. It is because of selfish and greed filled people, including Christians, who are comfortable and unwilling to share their good fortune with the poor that we have anyone looking to the government for help. the help is NOT being freely given. I have donated and belonged to a parish in a church of over 1 billion people and yet when I have need I go to my church and I am turned away and told to go to Welfare. Yes, I was literally told this by my church whom I donated thousands of dollars to when I was able. When I was in crisis and in need, my church turned its back on me. And then they petitioned everyone for money to build a new sports stadium for their adjoining school which cost about half a million dollars. This is the fact of the matter. For every Christian who is willing to share their wealth you have at least 2 or 3 or 20 Christians who are tight fisted, avaricious and consumed with their own luxuries. Who cares if someone dies when you're in need of the latest texting plan for your $600 cell phone? Kill them all and let God sort them out. That's what YOU say.

But like the workers in the vineyard who were paid the agreed upon amount regardless of their hours invested, should we be questioning who receives what kind of pay for their work? So many Christian businessmen do not want to be forced to pay anyone anything above minimum wage because it would cut into their personal profits, and would argue that no one should force them to pay more. But we will question the same freedom in a socialist society? Were the Soviet workers slaves or did they freely choose to work for the same pay as their coworkers? We can not have this both ways. Capitalism and Socialism share the same concept here yet we can not condemn it only when seen within Socialism.

Do you need some assistance?

As for the capitalist system and Jesus's story about the workers in the vineyard, yes his story doesn't make much sense economically, but that was the point about salvation and the kingdom of God. The capitalist system is based on the notion of choice and voluntary exchange, and bosses who pay too little (or otherwise mistreat their workers) are supposed to find their workers quitting for greener pastures; such is actually bad for business, FWIW.

But like the workers in the vineyard who were paid the agreed upon amount regardless of their hours invested, should we be questioning who receives what kind of pay for their work? So many Christian businessmen do not want to be forced to pay anyone anything above minimum wage because it would cut into their personal profits, and would argue that no one should force them to pay more. But we will question the same freedom in a socialist society? Were the Soviet workers slaves or did they freely choose to work for the same pay as their coworkers? We can not have this both ways. Capitalism and Socialism share the same concept here yet we can not condemn it only when seen within Socialism.

The British NHS has its problems; the Canadian health-care system has its problems too. Our system has its problems as well. If we're honest, we'll admit that there is an asymmetry of information, and medical care is currently not a free market. There are perverse incentives on all sides; on the insured consumer to overconsume, on the provider to overprovide (since they're paid for doing more stuff, not to mention defensive medicine), on the insurance companies to minimize payments (so they have an incentive to deny any and all claims), and so on. On the bright side, reports of the Mayo Clinic and Cleveland Clinic engaging in actions that “work” at lower cost suggest that true reform is possible. Capitation schemes (where physicians are paid per patient, rather than for services rendered) create an incentive to do less, and *might* create a situation where lower quality care is rendered. But hopefully, if the rate paid is still a reasonable one, the physicians will provide the care they think is best, because they're in it to “help people” and their work is no longer subconsciously affected by financial considerations.

Tort reform has a lot to do with excessive regulation. People have to accept that we can demand good medicine, but not perfect medicine. Maybe a scheme similar to Workers Compensation, as is being tried in France, can help in that regard. I am thinking how reforms of drug patents (when there is a patent, there is a government-mandated temporary monopoly) can further help things. Trade longer patent periods for price caps, and maybe drug companies won't be stuck into destructive boom/bust cycles the way they often are now.

With all that being said, I remain firmly convinced that the status quo is unacceptable, with health-care currently eating up 1/6th of ALL spending. Paperwork is responsible for 1/3rd of health-care spending today, and hopefully the administration's push for electronic medical records can cut down on that.

When you give the power to corporations to decide our most important issues (especially issues of life and death) and you allow them to put a profit-motive on them – you are giving away your freedoms (just not to a government).
___________ [end quote] Unlike government, which essentially has no competition when it centralizes power, corporations, for all their faults, are answerable not just to shareholders but to competition from other coporations, who will provide a better insurance product if government regulations are streamlined, fine tuned, and in general lifted–like Jimmy Carter did to rescue the railraods from decades of regulatory strangulation in 1980. It worked, big time, and the environment, and our nation, are both better for his work on this issue (Staggers Rail Act of 1980)

One of the tendencies.of governments is to crowd in on or invent other purposes for itself. So a government which started out with very few and restrictive roles gradually grows totalitarian. This is how government justifies it's existence. It can come in the form of a hostile takeover, or it can come as a sales pitch convincing us we need government. The concept of “state” takes over the government. Essentially, all along the way, the government is replacing God. So really, the state grows from a distrust of God.

God is our provider of justice? Absolutely! Unless we take matters into our own hands, in which case he'll back away. He says, “vengeance is mine.” The implication for us that we should be patient and trust him. And if we can't, we'll go looking for another method…invented authority of government to give us justice now.

The goal is to find an affordable health care solution for the largest number of people. I simply don't trust government to provide that.

Quote:”We should look to God as our provider, healer, provider of justice, etc. When we begin looking to government for those things, we're asking for trouble.”