The real issue is poverty, and in turn cost of living. People can't afford housing, become desperate, crime increases. But trying to fix this with "safety nets" is basically "let them eat cake" unless you have a way to fund it, and trying to fund it while the prices are still so high means the government can't afford it either, whereas if you were to adopt policies that lowered housing prices then that would be the solution in itself.
But now you need to make that happen in San Francisco.
How much money does SF spend on making sure people can get medical care without going into debt? When I went to the SF General emergency room after after a bike accident, I walked out with a just under $2500 bill, which would have been financially crippling for someone of less financial means.
SF spends a massive amount of money on social safety nets that don't fundamentally address problems, because they don't have the political will to implement cheaper solutions that actually solve the fundamental problems.
Put another way, SF spends a lot of money on feel-good programs, and very little on actual social safety nets.
It would not cripple anyone. They would simply not pay, and nothing would happen. That's just what happens to 95% of medical bills not paid by insurance.
Imagine thinking "just don't pay!" was a solution to the healthcare crisis.
I don't know what your intention was for what you said, but if your intention wasn't to insinuate that this solves the problem, you failed in your intention.
> But we cannot solve problems unless everyone is aligned on basic facts about the system we have now.
Disagree. Bringing up random irrelevant stuff overcomplicates already complex discussion. You're downplaying the problem, even if you don't intend to. This a tactic to paralyze the conversation, not further it. Whether this is your tactic or whether you're just repeating what others have said, I don't know, but if it's the latter, you should be more cognizant of the effects of what you repeat.
The fact that you can get away with simply not paying some medical debt is not a useful addition to this conversation. A society with a functioning safety net does not saddle people with medical debt, regardless of whether there is any way for that debt to be collected.
Notably, you're just passing off the problem to healthcare providers who now don't get paid in the "solution" you're talking about.
Wealth inequality, frankly, has little to do with it.
Individuals making a conscious and deliberate choice to commit violence or property crime is the cause of social disorder. Nobody's a robot without free will.