Anima AnwarDavid Levy WR150 06 March 2015
Governments implementation of healthcare has sparked criticism
and support among the years. Prices for medical treatments have
skyrocketed, leaving low income families with much worry. Some
medical insurance companies could reject applicants with
pre-existing conditions. Before the implementation of the
Affordable Care act, a large percentage of Americans were uninsured
for this reason (among others). With the Affordable Care Act,
Medicaid is now expanded to cover millions of low income families.
In the eyes of Ayn Rand, those who do not achieve their financial
accomplishments are lazy and insubordinate. While everyone has a
right to life, sustaining this life is ones own responsibility.
Some would agree that those who do not meet the financial standings
for specific goods and services should be written off as lazy
instead of given aid, even healthcare. Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand
uses objectivist ideals in order to explain a right-wing view that
discourages government aids like Medicaid. Proponents of the
Affordable care act would be economists like Karl Marx. In the
Communist Manifesto, Marx would support the idea of the expansion
of Medicaid to low income families. This would be one step closer
to closing the class gap that exists.
In Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand uses a fictional character, John
Galt, to explain her view on the idea of classes and the rich and
poor. Galt is an activist trying to rally up men of that mind.
These are individuals who think rationally and therefore, succeed
in the free-market economy. These people stand by their own
rational judgment are independent. The other type of individual
Galt introduces in a parasite. This is someone unable to
financially fend for themselves. These individuals hold back the
rational thinkers and slow down society as a whole. In the
circumstance of healthcare, Rand would argue that those poor
pathetic masses that need Medicaid are the parasitic individuals
that take charity and do not deserve it. Medicaid expanded to the
poor would be at the expense of the rational thinkers in society
that are financially fit (who pay their taxes and are the reason
that a thing like Medicaid exists). Galt would argue that the
governments spending into Medicaid is not warranted, as those poor
individuals are at the bottom of the pyramid of class system and
therefore, useless to any benefit to production and expansion of
the economy.
While Ayn Rand is against aiding to the poor, Karl Marx would
want to close the rich and poor class system all together. In Marxs
explanation of the economy, the classes consist of the bourgeoisie
and the proletariat. The bourgeoisie in the case of healthcare
would be the insurance companies that hinder low income families
ability to pay for their medical bills. These families are being
exploited by the upper class who can make things like healthcare
available to the working class
