Category: Business

Should Health Care Be Tied To A Person’s Employment?

For many people, at least in America, health care is largely subsidized by their employer. Does that system make sense?

Health care is one of the more controversial topics in American politics. Millions of Americans get their health insurance, to pay for the ever-increasing cost of health care, from a plan offered by their employer.

It is easy to see how this situation evolved. In addition to salary, an employer may offer additional benefits as an incentive to take a job. These might include, among other things, generous vacation time, stock options, and yes, cheaper health insurance.

Indeed, that can be an attractive benefit, as health insurance is very expensive. This is due to the fact that health care is expensive. However, large companies that represent hundreds or even thousands of employees, can negotiate lower prices that would be unavailable to individuals.

One downside to this scenario, though, is that having health care offered through an employer means employees are put at a severe disadvantage. A worker might be unhappy with a particular job, but feels they are unable to leave because they can’t afford to lose the health insurance for them and possibly their family.

Additionally, an employer’s choice of plan could impact what medical procedures an employee is allowed to get, or even which doctor they are allowed to have.

So, which is it? Is subsidized health insurance a nice perk that comes with signing on with a big company? Or is it a tool that gives an employer unfair leverage over their employees? Should health care be tied to a person’s employment?

Related questions: Is health care a human right? Health care: private or public? What does it mean to be healthy? Is your sense of self tied to your job?

Are Regulations Necessary?

There are rules that each of us must follow. Some come from our town, our state, or our country. Are these regulations truly necessary?

It is easy to dislike regulations. They often prevent us for doing things we want to do. Or they cost time and money in working around them. They can be poorly worded, ineffective, or overly complicated.

And yet, we count on regulations to protect us. In theory, they keep our food safe to eat, our drinking water pure, and our air free of pollutants. They keep marginalized groups safe, and safeguard animals on the verge of extinction.

Or at least, that was the original intention. While individuals and neighbors might look out for one another, companies and corporations surely won’t. They need to be told specifically and exactly what they can and cannot do, in their quest to turn a profit. Those rules are the origin of regulations.

Protection and safety sound good. But too much red tape can strangle a small — or even a large — business. Is it possible to ease the regulatory burden on companies and individuals?

One extreme is to have no restrictions on what companies are allowed to do. The other is to require every decision, no matter how small, to be controlled to make sure they are in the best interest of the masses. Is there some middle ground allowing businesses to flourish while also keeping the community safe? Where are we currently on this spectrum?

Related questions: If you were to create a small business, what would it do? What role does community play in your life? What makes a community? Unrestrained capitalism or social democracy?

Do We Have Too Much Stuff?

In many ways, our society is based on the idea of buying things. It helps keep our economy active, but does it lead to us having too much stuff?

Having a healthy economy seems to be good for everyone. Companies have the resources to produce goods, workers have money to buy those goods, and owners can turn a profit. Everyone wins, right?

Of course, it is not that simple. One problem we are seeing is that people buy things without necessarily having the money to be able to afford them. Credit, in the form of loans or credit cards, make it all too easy to buy things without necessarily having the money for them.

Another issue is with the environment. Making goods takes resources and energy, and those are available in finite quantities. Our consumer culture is leading to the depletion of natural resources, or environmental devastation in the effort to get more.

The primary problem we are talking about today regards the accumulation of stuff. In a consumer culture, an entire industry has been created around convincing you that you need to buy the latest tech, another car, tchotchkes and doodads of all sorts.

Some people have a problem with hoarding, bringing item after item into their home and never throwing anything out. Others move their excess stuff to a storage locker, if they have too much to fit in the home where they live. Or perhaps things just get dumped in a landfill if we no longer have space.

Is this a real problem in our society? Are we living in an unsustainable way when it comes to our belongings? Or is it just a case of some people having too much disposable income and too little self control?

Related questions: How much is enough? What material possession means the most to you? What possessions of yours will someone want when you die? How many pairs of shoes do you own?

What Does The Government Do That Wouldn’t Be Done Otherwise?

Governments can be slow, inefficient, and wasteful. Despite this, are there things that only a government can accomplish?

The government of a country behaves differently than an individual or a for-profit company. As a result, there are things that a government can do that would be too expensive, take too long, or otherwise be problematic for someone else.

Private companies are subject to different motivations. A company has an incentive to offer a product or a service at the highest quality and lowest price that it can. Otherwise, a competitor might steal away customers.

However, there are no competitors for a government. The incentives are different, and that might mean proliferation of waste or fraud, which many people are concerned about. There have been many efforts over the years to reduce fraud and abuse, with varying levels of success.

Still, there are some things that a government can do that private enterprise cannot or will not. One of the more common examples is the postal system. To send a letter via the postal service, cost might be around a dollar or so. You could send that same letter via a commercial shipping company (like UPS or FedEx), but it would be much more expensive.

In part, that’s because the goal of the two is different. The company’s goal is to make a profit. The government’s goal is to deliver the public’s mail — even if it is done at a loss.

Can you think of other examples of projects that have to be done by a government, or they would be more expensive or wouldn’t get done at all?

Related questions: What role should the government play in our lives? What are our responsibilities to others? How much power does an individual have? Where does authority come from?

How Important Is Accountability?

The actions we take can impact the people around us. How important is it to hold ourselves accountable for the consequences of those actions?

What you do matters. It matters for your own life, and can have ripple effects on the people around you. This is true in your personal life, with your family and loved ones. It is also true in your professional life, as your actions can have consequences on your coworkers, your boss, your company, and others.

In a perfect world, we would be rewarded for the positive actions we take, and punished for the negative ones. At work, we might get a raise if we introduce a best-selling new product. Or we might get fired for messing up and doing damage to our coworkers or the company’s brand.

We can call this system of rewards and punishments “accountability”.

However, the world doesn’t always hold people accountable for their behavior and actions. For instance, the punishment and reward system can work in reverse.

Sometimes people are rewarded despite having made questionable decisions. The company does well, and so everyone gets a Christmas bonus, regardless of performance or merit. Or layoffs at a struggling company might be first hired, first fired, ignoring the positive contributions someone has made.

In addition, it is human nature to accept credit for good outcomes, but to minimize blame for bad ones. If good events happen in my private life, no doubt it is because I am smart and made wise decisions. Bad things are someone else’s fault, or beyond my control.

Does this matter? How important is it to hold yourself accountable for your actions? How important is it to hold others accountable for theirs? Do you think about those — yourself and others — differently?

Related questions: What are we responsible for? How do you judge yourself? How are you underappreciated? What are our responsibilities to others?