EPT"Hurry up and die" - Page 2
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Rezudox
207 Posts
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Caihead
Canada8550 Posts
"At any cost" makes the poll irrelevant and sensationalist since human costs are also included. Exploitation of commons and degradation of the livelihood of others for marginal personal gain is common place, the poll is too extremist, please revise. | ||
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Bagration
United States18282 Posts
It's a very complicated issue, but it is ultimately a human issue. That being said, the words in OP's poll "at any cost" cause me to hesitate, since it brings in the possibility of extreme cases. | ||
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alQahira
United States511 Posts
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Forikorder
Canada8840 Posts
On January 24 2013 13:52 Bagration wrote: "Hurry up and die" is a very callous thing to say. I understand that there are huge economic implications at stake, and that the elderly do pose huge financial costs upon society. But rather than think of old people as just societal leeches, remember that many of them are parents, grandparents, great-aunts and uncles to their loved ones. Yes, economics is important, but is a society that places greater value of saving a few thousand dollars to end a life earlier over having a child have a few extra years with their grandparent really one we want to live in? It's a very complicated issue, but it is ultimately a human issue. That being said, the words in OP's poll "at any cost" cause me to hesitate, since it brings in the possibility of extreme cases. were taking more about hundred of thousands of dollars is it better to have a kid know his grandfather for an extra year or feed a kid who would otherwise starve for an extra year? there are many people who are struggling and suffering because of lack of funds and money taht is keeping the lderly alive could go to many other deserving areas | ||
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OutlaW-
Czech Republic5053 Posts
On January 24 2013 13:54 alQahira wrote: What Japan needs is a more open immigration policy. Some young fertile migrants from Indonesia, the Philippines, or even China would do wonders for the country. Or break every social stigma about sex and make it into something natural. Some countries don't want to get ''polluted'' by ''lesser'' countries. | ||
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docvoc
United States5491 Posts
Being an american, we place a high priority on life. I'll be honest, no government should have the ability to tell you when you are to die. I'm fairly liberal, but to give the government the powers of a god is to return to the god-king system of the B.C. era. That might be a bit of hyperbole depending on the system, but I don't trust government enough to not screw up. People should live until they die, now if they are on life support and are unable to communicate with no family, then, yes, we do have a conundrum. That said, I feel the need to distrust putting life into our governments hands. I spoilered my original post. I feel it doesn't fit the thread. I'll be honest, I don't think such a topic can be discussed without people being highly knowledgable about it. I really don't know if such a thing can be discussed outside of cultural norms since each culture has its own set of unique sets of rules regarding high level ethics and philosophy. Ethics in collectivist countries like Japan are not nearly the same as individualist countries like the U.S. | ||
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AnachronisticAnarchy
United States2957 Posts
On January 24 2013 13:39 Shady Sands wrote: So life-prolonging healthcare is the right of the rich? Try suggesting that in a democracy, and watch as those old people vote you out of office I'm not saying it's the right of the rich. That's not the main point, although it is unfortunately part of the deal. See my edited post for further clarification. By the way, I've always hated our health care. We drain our people dry to provide some of the ugliest "care" in the first world. I'm not going to be a part of the cycle that bleeds the young people dry in order to selfishly prolong a life that by that point would have become painful and pointless, so don't consider me a hypocrite. If you know the full picture, taking government money to prolong your life becomes selfish at a certain age. The money that I would be sucking from the younger generation provides me nothing next to what they would earn from it. | ||
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Parnage
United States7414 Posts
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Livelovedie
United States492 Posts
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Forikorder
Canada8840 Posts
On January 24 2013 13:56 Parnage wrote: You know, I..I don't even know what the hell is wrong with a person to think that it's okay to say "Yeah no, we can't waste resources on you, time for you to die" Screw the money, how about the morality. Who's got the nads to be the one to say who can live and who can die and at what point is it just "too much of a burden"? Whoever they are I can only hope they never get any real power because history is littered with despots and madmen who thought that he had the right to judge who lives and dies and rather or not someone was useful to society. should we bleed a family dry and possibly deny that family kids from having a future so some olderly person can jsut ly ina bed on life support for another year? | ||
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Archas
United States6531 Posts
On January 24 2013 13:56 Parnage wrote: You know, I..I don't even know what the hell is wrong with a person to think that it's okay to say "Yeah no, we can't waste resources on you, time for you to die" Screw the money, how about the morality. Who's got the nads to be the one to say who can live and who can die and at what point is it just "too much of a burden"? Whoever they are I can only hope they never get any real power because history is littered with despots and madmen who thought that he had the right to judge who lives and dies and rather or not someone was useful to society. But you can't simply say "screw the money," because that's an essential factor in this dilemma. Like it or not, you cannot consider this issue without taking into account how prohibitively expensive it is to consistently offer life-support to people who can't take dumps without help from a nurse. It sounds cold (and it probably is), but can we afford to do this? Cutting off a part to save the whole, in a sense. | ||
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Just_a_Moth
Canada1970 Posts
TL DR Old people need more physical activity | ||
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Larkin
United Kingdom7161 Posts
On January 24 2013 13:56 Parnage wrote: You know, I..I don't even know what the hell is wrong with a person to think that it's okay to say "Yeah no, we can't waste resources on you, time for you to die" Screw the money, how about the morality. Who's got the nads to be the one to say who can live and who can die and at what point is it just "too much of a burden"? Whoever they are I can only hope they never get any real power because history is littered with despots and madmen who thought that he had the right to judge who lives and dies and rather or not someone was useful to society. 1. Morality isn't real. 2. It's not about the person in charge deciding, it's about democracy. The will of the people. Should people decide a "cut off point" for the elderly. | ||
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ETisME
12781 Posts
"Those who want to die are kept alive and the expense are paid by the government, these people should feel ashamed. I hope they would die quicker, this problem (high medical expense paid by government) is not to be solved without thinking in this way." He thinks it's the worst area for government to spent money on. Personally I think it's a lesser issue everywhere since most countries do not end of life care paid by the government, and this problem is especially worse in Japan simply due to it's silver hair generation and the population is decreasing overall. In Hong Kong, a place getting more similar to the situation Japan is in where we also have a greying population (Excluding the immigrations from China), medical care to these elders was only a small attention because elders get they receive some discount for using public services. We are more concerned with the number of elders going into those elder care houses, which is what most elders are usually sent off to when the kids are married and working etc. The government had been trying to encourage more to employ a part time elder carer to help their daily life and stay at their home instead. | ||
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docvoc
United States5491 Posts
On January 24 2013 14:01 Larkin wrote: 1. Morality isn't real. 2. It's not about the person in charge deciding, it's about democracy. The will of the people. Should people decide a "cut off point" for the elderly. Are you kidding me? Morality isn't real? Are you going to neglect thousands of years of philosophical works on the subject in 3 words? Give me a break dude. It isn't about democracy either (democracy only exists with the morals of people, that is to say people have to have the moral reasoning to demand they have a say in their representation). Democracy doesn't decide if there is a cut off point, backroom politics does that. | ||
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LimeNade
United States2125 Posts
 User was warned for this post | ||
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IMoperator
4476 Posts
On January 24 2013 13:54 alQahira wrote: What Japan needs is a more open immigration policy. Some young fertile migrants from Indonesia, the Philippines, or even China would do wonders for the country. I volunteer to be a young fertile migrant for Japan. | ||
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sths
Australia192 Posts
A sovereign nation with a free floating exchange rate (ie: US, Japan, Australia, NOT EU countries or countries with pegged exchange rates) can never run out of its own currencies. The limiting factor for a nation is never the amount of its own currency it can get access to but the productive capacity of the population. Taro Aso, the finance minister, said on Monday that the elderly should be allowed to "hurry up and die" to relieve pressure on the state to pay for their medical care......The health and welfare ministry, he added, was "well aware that it costs several tens of millions of yen" a month to treat a single patient in the final stages of life. Statements like the above shows a lack of understanding of what money is. Japan's problem isn't that they don't have the "millions of yen", its that they don't have enough doctors, hospitals, nurses etc to care for their ever growing senior population. The real cost to a nation is how much productive capacity do we dedicate to taking care of our elderly, NOT how much yen this will cost. The good news is that productive capacity can be grown. The bad news is that everyone seems to think that the government is just like a household or an individual and must "save currency" to pay for stuff. If you ask me, dedicating a large portion of your economy to taking care of your elderly is a lot better compared to how much we currently dedicate to the entirely parasitic financial sector. Oh and who else thinks Shady should stop making these discussion threads and go back to writing about Chinese/Japanese james bond shit. Or perhaps another chapter from his life story. | ||
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Danglars
United States12133 Posts
The next logical step is a bit more chilling. Knowing that demand for healthcare is infinite, but that costs are partially socialized (and even if they weren't, they would still harm the economy), shouldn't the average working man have a say in how much healthcare the average retiree gets, and hence how long he or she will live? Follow that logic all the way to the end: since a democratic government is the executor of the popular will, shouldn't it get to decide how long a person lives? And if they're such a drain on us--the rational, utility-maximizing, economic agents that macroeconomic history has demonstrated we often are--after sixty-five, shouldn't retirees just hurry up and die? How so, that if the costs on healthcare were not born by a spread of taxpaying citizens, that they would still harm the economy? How about a free society, say America a decade or so ago, that has his own health insurance, paid out of savings for health insurance privately, possessing also a private life insurance policy for his surviving spouse? Presumably, the man or woman is entitled to pay for his own medical care, but you're sitting there condemning him for the act because he is not dying up front and giving part to his family for more economically productive means, and the rest confiscated by the state? I think we're indeed over a large threshold here. If the state partially funds or completely funds a portion of medical care for the aged, regardless of their ability to afford it, now the years left to live is a state concern, and worthy of time spent on investigating the acceleration of death. Secondly, what does it exactly mean to say that there is not enough money left in the financial system to do it? Must we assume that the money is being well spent now, with a third party in charge of the reimbursement to doctors treating a patient (the government agencies)? I for one say the welfare state as conceived today in America is in dire need of reform specifically for the third party payer system of growing cost and decreased control over results. The Ryan Plan proposed in Congress went a distance in addressing these concerns. The lives of the aged well past the average lifespan will be determined by themselves and their families and their ability to pay the cost of the procedures. | ||
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