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Universal Health Care: from someone who lived under both ...

aociswundumho said:
So what. Many Russians still support Stalin.
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Have you taken a moment to consider WHY so many Russians have decided that maybe Stalin wasn't so bad?
The person in charge at the moment must be pretty awful if they're waxing poetic about Uncle Joe.
I've had moments where I would gladly welcome Pennywise the Clown instead of who we have now, even if Pennywise was a Republican.

By the way, they don't STILL support him, rather....support for him is increasing in the face of Putin's decline.

free-hugs-clown.jpg

The rise in Stalin’s standing follows Kremlin efforts to play down his tyranny in school history books and recast him as a modernizer who transformed the Soviet Union into a superpower through rapid industrialization and victory in World War II. It comes amid deepening disenchantment among Russians with Putin, the longest-serving Kremlin ruler since Stalin, following the unpopular increase in the pension age last year. There’s also growing hardship after five straight years of declining consumer incomes.
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Checkerboard Strangler said:
So you felt compelled to move the goalposts. We were talking about a healthcare system, not a person.
I consider British poll figures about their opinions on their healthcare to be strong evidence that the NHS is beneficial.
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Why? What the brits think..and what the US citizen thinks could be and usually is.. tremendously different.

Do you think they would change their government system for ours? If not. should we then change our government system for theirs.. because they like their system?

think about it.

For the wealthiest among us, concerns about egalitarianism have never applied.
Why is that my concern? My concern is whether or not the majority of Americans can afford decent healthcare.
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Right now 87% of americans can afford decent healthcare. Actually probably more.. since a percentage of those that aren't insured in the US are not insured because they choose not to be. (probably around 3-5% best guess).
 
jaeger19 said:
Why? What the brits think..and what the US citizen thinks could be and usually is.. tremendously different.

Do you think they would change their government system for ours? If not. should we then change our government system for theirs.. because they like their system?

think about it.
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I am not suggesting a copy/paste of the British system here in the United States. That wasn't the point of the thread.
The thread is about life in a nation that has a UHC system, but there is no reason to suggest that implies some notion that the UK NHS is a good fit for us.

The phrase "change our government system" (I guess you meant 'swap') is vague.
When public programs of any kind are enacted, some aspects of life changes but that is the case when private sector does certain things as well. When the private sector inflates the price of an essential lifesaving medication to stratospheric levels, it can cause a drastic change in the lives of millions, millions who by the way did not even get a chance to VOTE on that private sector change, because there is no "vote" if you can't live without that medication.


jaeger19 said:
Right now 87% of americans can afford decent healthcare. Actually probably more.. since a percentage of those that aren't insured in the US are not insured because they choose not to be. (probably around 3-5% best guess).
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That doesn't pass the smell test. In fact, guessing that 87 percent can afford their healthcare is not only suspect, the notion that ten or eleven percent are just scoffs who just go without because they don't think they need it is also suspect.
But I don't even trust your figure of 87 percent to begin with.

Guess How Many Americans Don't Have Health Insurance

Even the insured often can't afford their medical bills

87M Adults Were Uninsured or Underinsured in 2018, Survey Says

Americans Borrowed $88 Billion to Pay for Health Care Last Year, Survey Finds

Worse yet:

Cancer patients are being denied drugs, even with doctor prescriptions and good insurance


But it's not all bad news because prior to Obamacare, TWENTY PERCENT could not access healthcare, according to a 2007 report: Health, United States, 2007, from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

So the REASON WHY more people can get health insurance today IS BECAUSE of something you Republicans decried as a "government takeover of healthcare", something you tried to repeal a record 52 times during Obama's tenure and tried again several times in the last three years.

And you don't have any kind of a plan to replace it once it does finally collapse due to Republican attacks.
But you go ahead and keep painting those pretty pictures.

Here's the picture I keep seeing when I think of "Trumpers and healthcare" :

JesusPreExistingCondition.jpg
 
aociswundumho said:
So it's a two-tier system. Doesn't sound very egalitarian.
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It’s not unlike the public school system here in the US. It works OK. Sure there are problems, but overall it’s much better to have it than not.
 
vegas giants said:
Harvard is great....if you can afford it
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The context is public schools, not the most prestigious university in the world.

Private schools in the states I checked are cheaper or about the same as what public schools spend per student per year.
 
aociswundumho said:
The context is public schools, not the most prestigious university in the world.

Private schools in the states I checked are cheaper or about the same as what public schools spend per student per year.
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So if all schools are privatized, is it OK to just let large portions of the population who cannot afford them just not get even a basic education?

On the free market, not everyone can afford everything. Cars are on the free market, and not everyone can afford them. That’s OK. But the problem with some of these things that have been labeled as basic human rights in the Universal declaration of human rights, like food, clean water, shelter, a basic education, or access to healthcare, is that most societies cannot stand to watch their citizens doing without those things.

There seems to be this idea that if everything is left to the free market, it will be affordable for all. Clearly, that is not the case. The only question then is whether a particular society is willing to provide some basic safety nets for its citizens for the protection of their basic dignity and human rights when they are facing tough times.

That becomes a question of human values, not just dollar value.
 
aociswundumho said:
The context is public schools, not the most prestigious university in the world.

Private schools in the states I checked are cheaper or about the same as what public schools spend per student per year.
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Dont know where the hell you are looking. By the way....they get to turn down the expensive kids
 
ataraxia said:
So if all schools are privatized, is it OK to just let large portions of the population who cannot afford them just not get even a basic education?
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What's better in your opinion: public housing projects, where the government builds and owns the apartments, or the section 8 voucher system where poor people get a voucher and live in privately owned apartments?
 
aociswundumho said:
What's better in your opinion: public housing projects, where the government builds and owns the apartments, or the section 8 voucher system where poor people get a voucher and live in privately owned apartments?
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Give some examples of homes or apartment buildings built by the United States Federal Government.
 
aociswundumho said:
You are denying that public housing projects exist in the US? Try google with the appropriate keywords.
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That's not what I said.
You offered a choice between government built and owned housing and Section 8 housing.
I asked you to specifically give examples of housing built and owned/operated by Uncle Sam.
 
aociswundumho said:
Why does private sector healthcare exist, when the government is providing healthcare for everyone? .
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For the same reason we have Medicare supplemental insurance. The universal healthcare does not necessarily pay for everything. There is an opportunity to private insurance to layer on top of the core coverage.


aociswundumho said:
Right, which most people would use as evidence against socialized medicine.
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That is probably the only argument against national health insurance, as the private model that exists in the United States is generally an abysmal failure. We have some of the poorest outcomes in the 1st world with the highest costs. Any business analyst worth is salt would tell you that is a failure.

The 36 Best Healthcare Systems In The World - Business Insider
Here's a Map of the Countries That Provide Universal Health Care (America's Still Not on It) - The Atlantic
Healthcare System Ratings: U.S., Great Britain, Canada
Survey Ranks the U.S. Health Care System Lowest in Performance | Time
US healthcare worst in the developed world, study finds
https://www.theatlantic.com/health/...the-us-healthcare-system-is-the-worst/563519/
 
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upsideguy said:
The universal healthcare does not necessarily pay for everything.
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Why not? What exactly is the problem?


as the private model that exists in the United States is generally an abysmal failure. We have some of the poorest outcomes in the 1st world with the highest costs. Any business analyst worth is salt would tell you that is a failure.
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I agree completely. You don't need to convince me, I've been arguing against the "regulated capitalism" model for 20 years.

The first major government intervention into the healthcare market was the HMO act of 1973, and it's been more and more regulation and higher and higher prices ever since. Prior to that, healthcare in the US was cheap and affordable.
 
upsideguy said:
That is probably the only argument against national health insurance
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aociswundumho said:
Right, which most people would use as evidence against socialized medicine.
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People don't get to use the "VA sux" argument quite so much anymore.
In the 20th century, particularly in the post-Vietnam War period, and certainly in the 1980's and 1990's, the VA mission eroded and quality of care went drastically South. Starting around 2000, with Bush SecVA pick Anthony J. Principi, the VA reinvigorated what was to be a long but steady process of rehab.
Today, study after study says that VA healthcare is now as good or even sometimes better than the private sector, it's just that the public is still being fed the old baloney and they haven't caught up.

So, while there are indeed still some systemic issues, and it is still a massive bureaucracy with all the pros and cons, and while there are indeed still some individual clinics and hospitals which are problematic, the VA, for the most part, just keeps getting better and better.

Veterans continue to say, in growing numbers, that they do NOT WANT the VA to be privatized.
The only veteran service organization officially serviced or listened to by the Trump administration is the Koch Brothers funded
Concerned Veterans for America, which stands firmly on the side of privatization AND dismantling of the system in place now.
 
People are going to have to pay for health care either way. The difference is that when government is the payer, the government can negotiate for lower costs because the profit motive is much less. This keeps households solvent, which helps the economy.

This idea of "your health care isn't free, someone still pays for it" is oversimplified. Of course someone pays for it, but they pay less, and costs are distributed over an aggregate population instead of a multi-tiered one. Household bankruptcy is a bane on domestic economy and lack of health insurance is a prime reason for it.
 
Checkerboard Strangler said:
That's not what I said.
You offered a choice between government built and owned housing and Section 8 housing.
I asked you to specifically give examples of housing built and owned/operated by Uncle Sam.
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Read much? I said "government" not "federal government". Public housing projects are typically funded by Hud and built and operated by state and local governments. The disaster known as public housing started of course with progressive hero FDR. I'm in the real estate business, I deal with local housing authorities who own and operate buildings and handle their own voucher systems.
 
aociswundumho said:
Why not? What exactly is the problem?




I agree completely. You don't need to convince me, I've been arguing against the "regulated capitalism" model for 20 years.

The first major government intervention into the healthcare market was the HMO act of 1973, and it's been more and more regulation and higher and higher prices ever since. Prior to that, healthcare in the US was cheap and affordable.
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Post World War I, the cost of healthcare became a more pressing matter as hospitals and physicians began to charge more than the average citizen could afford. Seeing that this was becoming an issue, a group of teachers created a program through Baylor University Hospital where they would agree to pre-pay for future medical services (up to 21 days in advance). The resulting organization was not-for-profit and only covered hospital services. It was essentially the precursor to Blue Cross.

Griffin - The History of Healthcare
 
aociswundumho said:
Read much? I said "government" not "federal government".
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I can't help it you didn't bother to specify. If we're talking about Uncle Sam, it's a lot different than talking about state and local governments. For instance, when tiny, almost microscopic Vermont tried their own UHC it failed, because it is such a small risk pool that the math wouldn't work.

Canada however, has a system even more involved than the single payer model most Americans seem interested in, among those who are looking at alternate models. And California has more people than Canada, and the move is afoot to remodel Medi-Cal as a fully featured public option that would be the state equal of a Medicare for all system in the country as a whole.
No government clinics or hospitals would need to be built, as the current system is already in place.
The budget would still be massive, but for the end user, offset by the elimination of most profit oriented private insurance.
Other models propose modification to private insurance where it functions as something of a gap policy for goods and services not covered by a state M4A system.

The private sector health insurance industry made close to a hundred billion last year. I would like to know how those insurance profits enhanced the quality and delivery of actual healthcare.

Health insurance is all about risk pools. The larger the risk pool the more spread out the risk.
The objective is to build the largest risk pool possible in order to manage costs.
 
Northern Light said:
People are going to have to pay for health care either way. The difference is that when government is the payer, the government can negotiate for lower costs because the profit motive is much less. This keeps households solvent, which helps the economy.

This idea of "your health care isn't free, someone still pays for it" is oversimplified. Of course someone pays for it, but they pay less, and costs are distributed over an aggregate population instead of a multi-tiered one. Household bankruptcy is a bane on domestic economy and lack of health insurance is a prime reason for it.
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Has anyone in this thread denied the existence of EMTALA yet?
It's usually right when someone bitches about "illegals getting free healthcare" because they don't realize that illegals AND ANYONE ELSE, legal or even citizen, gets the same thing...in the EMERGENCY ROOM, which costs five times more than standard healthcare.

If you're broke, that is what you get. And they only stabilize you. You won't get chemo or a heart surgery there.

Been that way since 1986.

BVGWV4DLBA5BTE2XJ6U3V7XS4Q.jpg
 
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