Should men share the costs for maternity insurance?

[jayarbar]

The argument by most people for the equal sharing of maternity insurance costs between men and women is that "it takes a man and a woman to create a baby"

 

So their argument is that the costs of the condition of the woman (pregnancy) should be shared by the man because they interacted in consensual voluntary sex that lead to the aforementioned condition.

 

Now consider the following:

A person eats at a restaurant everyday knowing that the food is cooked in fatty oil. This happens for years so that the person becomes obese. This obesity causes health problems requiring higher than average costs.

 

The above argument could apply here too.

The costs of the condition of the person (obesity) should be shared by the restaurant owners because they interacted in consensual voluntary trade that led to the aforementioned condition.

 

 

[Guest Ethan Glover]

I think the question ignores the child. Each parent has the responsibility of creating him/her. It's not that the man should help the woman pay for the costs of the baby. It's that he should pay for the costs of his child who has no choice in the relationship.

[Guest Exceptionalist]

The question is where does the reproduction rights start? To bone a chick doesn't equal the will to reproduce, since the woman has 100% birth control, she can abort the child, use conterception, give it up for adoption. If she choose to keep the child against his explicit will, she has to bear the costs and responsibility for her choice. The countdown starts right after insemination.

 

She has 100% choice in giving birth to a child. He has 100% choice in his fatherhood beforehand. Fertilization by accident doesn't mean a thing.

[Kevin Beal]

Maternity insurance doesn't make any sense. You can't insure people's choices. If she decides to keep a child, then it is her choice that the risk is there and the claim made. No insurance company in their right mind would ever insure that. Insurance is for things you don't want to happen.

 

The level of risk that insurance companies want to open themselves up to is very small. There are ton of awesome insurance programs that never get underwritten because insurance companies will go broke immediately if there is a claim and they weren't able to get re-insurance companies to purchase that risk thereby spreading the claim around. And no re-insurance company will buy the risk of a program that will pay out because somebody decided on a whim to make a claim that must be honored.

 

I would say that the woman is obliged to pay for the insurance if it's her choice to give birth, but it doesn't make any sense in the context of insurance.

[Guest Ethan Glover]

Maternity insurance doesn't make any sense. 

 

Even with proper medicine and hospital fees, insurance that acts as savings is viable. Most likely, just as now, it'd be packaged with regular healthcare. It may be kind of a funny business in a free society, but it's still possible and certainly profitable. Just because you think its silly or that it doesn't make sense, doesn't mean some women, against things like contraception and abortion, wouldn't buy it. Be careful with "doesn't make sense". I'd save it for those times when statements are actually illogical.

[Kawlinz]

Sorry for being dense but what's maternity insurance? 

[ThatAtheistPlace]

I'm with Kawlinz.  I've never heard of that.  I think the child support system as a whole is the devil.  If it's anything like that, where a man is legally obligated to pay a woman funds without any conditions or considerations for the child, then I say nay nay.

[Guest darkskyabove]

What about men, and women, who do not plan to have children (and act accordingly). Are they supposed to subsidize those that do have children, by paying for insurance they have no need of?

 

Are people claiming that everyone must have insurance "in case" someone becomes pregnant? I guess ObamaCare does, as the mandated policies require a laundry list of "protections", regardless of the actual lifestyle, or choices, of any individual.

 

And how is it considered "insurance" if it is bought only after pregnancy occurs.

 

This highlights the fallaciousness of equating insurance with health care. Insurance is to protect against unknowns. Health "care" implies a known. If someone chooses to pay extra to cover routine health care, so be it. If anyone chooses not to buy insurance, so be it. All else is authoritarianism.

[PatrickC]

I use the paternity insurance of a condom. For extra insurance, then I would use two of them.

 

For an iron clad guarantee, then I just don't engage in the more productive sides of sex. Or none at all.

 

But I would be prepared to go halves on an the after morning pill, if in the unlikely event (for me), it ever came to that.

[Guest Exceptionalist]

I use the paternity insurance of a condom. For extra insurance, then I would use two of them.

 

For an iron clad guarantee, then I just don't engage in the more productive sides of sex. Or none at all.

 

But I would be prepared to go halves on an the after morning pill, if in the unlikely event (for me), it ever came to that.

 

Say to the chick beforehand that you don't want to reproduce and ask her if she is on the pill, to prevent fraudulent behaviour.

[NeoEclectic]

I don't understand this topic.

 

If you're talking about two consenting adults that choose to have sex then they also choose to take the chance that a pregancy can occur. No contraception exists that is 100% effective and everyone knows this (or should). If a pregnacy does occur then the responsibility of the pregnancy is theirs.

 

If you're talking about the Affordable Care Act and how young males are being forced to pay for maternity insurance, which is mind boggling considering a male will never give birth to a baby, I consider that to be an outrageous abuse of power.

 

Currently, the ACA mandates that all policies also include maternity insurance. This is an absurd thing for a male to have to pay for but we know what's really going on here. The state is forcing me and other males to pay for someone elses choices. If I'm being forced to care for a woman's reproductive system, that I do not know and haven't had sex with, then I demand that I should be allowed to have sex with her out of fairness.

 

Women use more healthcare services than man thus they're more expensive to insure. The State is forcing us to pay for their utilization of healthcare services.

It only makes sense that if you use a lot of electricity that you should have to pay a higher bill at the end of each month. What the State is doing is taking your neighbor's electricty bill and telling you to pay it though you used none of that electricity.

[Guest Ethan Glover]

What about men, and women, who do not plan to have children (and act accordingly). Are they supposed to subsidize those that do have children, by paying for insurance they have no need of?

 

Are people claiming that everyone must have insurance "in case" someone becomes pregnant? I guess ObamaCare does, as the mandated policies require a laundry list of "protections", regardless of the actual lifestyle, or choices, of any individual.

 

Where has this topic gone? I feel like overnight is has gotten way off track by a few rants against Obamacare. Is anybody else noticing this or am I just crazy? OP, please jump back in and clear this up otherwise I can't take anything else said seriously.

 

(I don't mean to target you darkskyabove... I just don't understand why everyone is talking about ACA)

 

Sorry for being dense but what's maternity insurance? 

 

Maternity insurance is just insurance for costs involving pregnancy. So you buy it, and if you get pregnant you're costs are covered. I can see it being packaged with some women's health care. Espcially like full coverage kind of things. There's nothing wrong with it which is why the responses to this thread are so odd.

[PatrickC]

I'd say Kevin knocked it on the head fairly well. Your response didn't seem plausible frankly. No insurance company would offer this. It would just mean woman making decisions based on insurance premiums.

 

From a male perspective it could either be your life savings or the cost of buying lunch, dependent on the woman's choice. Therefore the responsibility must ultimately fall with her, seeing as it's her body and no one is going to force her either to go through with it or have an abortion.

 

The fact is most couples know when the risk of pregnancy is high, which in those events you just get a morning after pill for her. On the rare occasion the pill doesn't work, then it's still her decision, but not the mans cost.

[Kevin Beal]

Even with proper medicine and hospital fees, insurance that acts as savings is viable. Most likely, just as now, it'd be packaged with regular healthcare. It may be kind of a funny business in a free society, but it's still possible and certainly profitable. Just because you think its silly or that it doesn't make sense, doesn't mean some women, against things like contraception and abortion, wouldn't buy it. Be careful with "doesn't make sense". I'd save it for those times when statements are actually illogical.

It doesn't make sense for the insurance company. Savings is not insurance. Insurance is asking other people to take on your risk and you have to fit a set of criteria for the insurance company to be convinced that you wont make a claim. If you have a clean driving record (for example) your premiums will be less. In the case of a driving accident, you don't choose to get in that accident, and if it were determined that you did choose it, that would void your policy.

 

There is no way that a woman is going to give birth without choosing it. The very fact that a claim was made is the basis on which it should be void. There is no valid way that the claim could be honored unless you ignore people's choice because you are heavily subsidized by the state, thereby putting that ridiculous cost on taxpayers.

 

This is my industry. I'm no expert, but I have at least some idea about what I'm talking about.

 

There are ways you can save up for your maternity costs by including it as some kind of employee benefit as part of a healthcare package, or you could include maternity as a valid basis for withdrawing on some other benefit like a 401K or something, but that is not insurance. That's just savings. The insurance company that is involved with your healthcare plan wouldn't be taking that cost on themselves, it would be the company you work for. And it would only be to the amount that you already saved.

 

Morally speaking, you cannot force anyone to pay for your decisions. I'm just commenting on the fact that such a ridiculous form of insurance ostensibly exists.

[Lowe D]

The term maternity insurance can make sense.  Say you think your kid might have a child beforehe or she can afford to raise one.  In the event of a pregnancy, the insurer pays for an abortion, or for pre-natal care, a hospital delivery, a parenting class, and a few years' worth of baby supplies.

 

That's not how the term is used, though.  Also that plan probably won't ever exist, because if you are forward-thinking and intelligent enough to buy one, you probably already passed those values on to your child, which would prevent this situation.

[Kevin Beal]

The term maternity insurance can make sense.  Say you think your kid might have a child beforehe or she can afford to raise one.  In the event of a pregnancy, the insurer pays for an abortion, or for pre-natal care, a hospital delivery, a parenting class, and a few years' worth of baby supplies.

Say you choose to get into a car accident before you can afford to pay for the damage. Lol.

 

It's not pregnancy insurance, it's maternity insurance. Pregnancy insurance makes a lot more sense, but they aren't nearly the same thing.

[Stefan Molyneux]

The person who used to help pay for a woman's pregnancy, and the cost of raising children, was called a husband, but they are in relatively low demand and scarce supply these days, so many women turn to the state, to show how free they are from patriarchy.

[Kawlinz]

Maternity insurance is just insurance for costs involving pregnancy. So you buy it, and if you get pregnant you're costs are covered. I can see it being packaged with some women's health care. Espcially like full coverage kind of things. There's nothing wrong with it which is why the responses to this thread are so odd.

 

Thanks for that, but I guess that's why I didn't understand what it was instinctively. The only thing that's wrong with it is that it doesn't make sense. If you're trying to get pregnant, you wouldn't buy insurance for getting pregnant, because you plan to get pregnant. Maybe you would buy a service that manages everything about your pregnancy for you, so you don't have anything to worry about, but that's not insurance. If we tried a similar type of insurance based on the same types of choices, it seems silly.

 

Like butter insurance - I pay you every month for butter insurance, and if I desire butter and grab some butter at the store or supermarket, you pay for it. If I get more butter than I would've been able to buy with the same amount of money, then you're out money, and your service would disappear. If I get less butter than I would've bought for the same price, then I have no reason for the insurance, I'll just buy it when I need it. Your only customers will be people trying to save money at your expense.

[Josh F]

When it comes to men paying for women's healthcare, lets remember, there is no argument being made, only force. 

 

"We have to pass it to see what inside."

 

There was never a debate, no good point in having one now.  It wasn't like this was foisted upon us by a populist movement of passionate socialists.  It was forced on the American people by a secretive and powerful government.

[Guest Ethan Glover]

Thanks for that, but I guess that's why I didn't understand what it was instinctively. The only thing that's wrong with it is that it doesn't make sense. If you're trying to get pregnant, you wouldn't buy insurance for getting pregnant, because you plan to get pregnant. Maybe you would buy a service that manages everything about your pregnancy for you, so you don't have anything to worry about, but that's not insurance. If we tried a similar type of insurance based on the same types of choices, it seems silly.

 

I'd invite you to read all my other comments. I can't take this thread seriously anymore and have to unfollow. =/

[Kawlinz]

I'd invite you to read all my other comments. I can't take this thread seriously anymore and have to unfollow. =/

what makes you think that I haven't?

[LanceD]

The better question is, why do you think maternity insurance exists?

 

Insurance is to protect you from excessive risk, choosing to have a child is not risk.

 

Then again any medical insurance above policies designed to protect against catastrophic illness/accidents is breaking the rules of insurance.

[Guest darkskyabove]

Insurance is to protect you from excessive risk, choosing to have a child is not risk.Then again any medical insurance above policies designed to protect against catastrophic illness/accidents is breaking the rules of insurance.

 

But we live in the "Great Society", where we all work together, so I can count on you to subsidize my life by paying a higher premium so I can be insured against my own poor choices.

[jayarbar]

Some good responses in here.

The reason I posed the question because Obamacare mandates that maternity insurance be covered in all plans.

I wouldn't mind if a private insurance company mandated this for every insurance policy to minimize costs.

[BigSecksi]

I think if you do not engage in activity that could cause maternity then you shouldn't have to pay for insurance. The possibility of the government forcing everyone to pay for it is even more frustrating. I consider it theft.