Debate

For this assignment, you need to take, and defend with evidence, a clear position on some question regarding health care in America. We will use these position papers as the basis for a class debate on Wednesday May 1.

State your position at the top of your paper in the form of a single sentence or question.

Some examples of possible positions:

  • Health insurance should be a free-market system with little or no government regulation.
  • Health insurance should be paid for by the government.
  • Health care should be provided by the government.
  • All Americans should be insured.
  • All people who live in the United States should be insured.
  • If universal coverage is mandated, the best way to cover everyone is to…
  • National health insurance undermines American free market capitalism. It is socialized medicine and therefore (pick one) … dangerous to our political system …. results in poorer-quality outcomes … unfairly rations care
  • If people are making unhealthy lifestyle choices which drive up their risk/care/costs, their insurance should be limited. And that limit should be defined as…
  • A single-payer system is preferred, because…
  • In a single-payer system, the government should control the system.
  • In a single-payer system, the government should not control the system.
  • A multi-payer system is preferred, because…
  • Health care is a civil right.
  • Health care is not a civil right.
  • Achieving universal coverage is the highest priority of health care reform. The best way to reach that goal is…
  • Lowering/containing health care costs is the highest priority of health care reform. The best way to reach that goal is…
  • Higher health care costs are necessary as an incentive to innovation, discovery, and improvements in care. If reimbursements dropped, so would the quality of health care.
  • The best person to decide on a medical treatment is … (pick one) the patient and/or the patient’s family… the doctor/ provider … someone who represents the insurance companies because they have access to national standards for best practices.
  • It’s good policy for healthy workers to bear (some of?) the costs of health care for retirees and those who cannot work. Because…
  • It’s bad policy for healthy workers to bear (some of?) the costs of health care for retirees and those who cannot work. Because…
  • The main problem in high health care costs is (pick one) … private, profit-driven insurance bureaucracy and overhead … necessary costs for researching cures and new medicines … malpractice lawsuits permitted under our current tort system … overuse of the ER by the uninsured and/or by noncitizens

Then back up that position with evidence. You can do this in the form of a 4-5 paragraph essay, or an outline with bullet points. Use Chicago Style references (footnotes + Bibliography) or some other consistent method to cite your sources.

The total assignment should be about 2-3 pages long.

The paper will be graded for clarity of question, use of evidence to support the position, and overall quality of thought and writing.

Note: you do not have to take “your own” position in this paper! You can argue a position with which you DISAGREE. Actually, having a variety of positions will make our debate livelier.