ETHICS AND MORALITY. HEALTH CARE. PT 5. UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE- A PRACTICAL APPROACH.

The scenario from part 4 was, of course, a fictional example.

However, all you have to do is change the job description and plug in different numbers to find out that this can be applied to any full time employee who is down-sized to part time, to avoid being offered employer subsidized health care.

Ignoring or disagreeing with the result in the story does not answer the questions that it poses.

• All working Americans are, in essence, producers.  It might be a Cook who prepares X number of meals per day, or a Truck Driver who makes a certain number of deliveries during a scheduled shift.  This also holds true for white-collar jobs.  Teachers produce educated students during a school year and Doctors treat a certain number of patients each day.

• When an employee has their work hours cut and are now part-time, they can no longer produce the same results achieved during a full-time work week.
• This reduction in out-put must be justified, if the only reason was to avoid offering Medical Insurance.
• The bottom line is simply this; Is there a reasonable explanation in shifting any full-time employee or employees to part-time, in that it will  be more profitable because they do not have an employer based Health Care plan?

What the scenario does not address is the long term benefits of having an employee, who did not have medical insurance, into one that has it available if needed.  Here are a couple of more points that should be considered;

• Many employees come to work ill, because they cannot afford the double whammy of paying a Hospitable Bill and losing a days pay.  At least with medical insurance the financial hit would not be so bad.  By staying home and receiving proper care, they are not on the job possibly infecting co-workers.
• Now preventive and rehabilitative medical care is available.  Not only is sickness treated properly, but future illness can now be prevented and injuries can be treated and healed more efficiently.  Loss of work production is decreased, for there are fewer days missed.

What amazes me is the number of Americans,without medical insurance, who don't question their politicians motivation for trying to prevent Universal Health Care.  That is a question that Medical Science cannot answer.