Dear detsaoT,
Actually, for someone who winds up in the hospital with a debt that he cannot realistically pay back (especially if we charge a minimal amount of interest), we do have a legal facility. It's called bankruptcy.
Thus, in that this is precisely a kind of circumstance for which the bankruptcy law was designed and intended, folks should be able to escape your proposed system through the use of bankruptcy law.
As well, generally, the inability to repay a debt isn't considered theft, although there are exceptions. Everyone who grants credit (I own a business and I grant credit) knows that if you grant credit and someone can't pay you, you can't have them arrested for theft, generally speaking.
sitetest
Yeah, you do make a good point, though I'd argue that we have a system of Charity hospitals already in place to assist those who can't realistically pay for their service. Bankrupcy law (which is actually our replacement for the old debtor prison system, which I'd argue was more effective) also has it's place, though as a legal recourse, it is only really available to legal citizens, and therefore we'd still require some kind of recourse to take if an illegal alien breaches the hospital's trust...
The reasons for our high medical rates are obviously pertinent to the discussion, but probably not necessarily appropriate for this thread. I'd theorize that the fact that only 1 out of every 8 patients pay for their service has something to do with it... :)
Question: When your business grants credit, do you check the person's citizenship? Do you do anything to ensure that you're not putting yourself at risk for granting said credit? I'd theorize that hospitals should be able to do the same thing, if businesses routinely do it.
Regards,
~dt~