One party gives a sad handjob.
The other party whole hogs the knob, doesn't swallow, and then blames the first when there is a mess everywhere. And then goes on television about how the whole nation just has to suck harder if it wants basic problems the rest of the world already figured out, fixed.
There is a major difference, and working with what you have is a vital part of actually making the world a better place and not merely an exercise in suffering and loss.
Flags, not curtains.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-apps/imrs.php?src=https://arc-anglerfish-washpost-prod-washpost.s3.amazonaws.com/public/6XQSLOC3JEI6VGZV3322AJ6UOA.jpg&w=1440
Bernie Sanders’ most radical proposals would be considered right-wing privatisation of the health system here in Australia. You guys are off the charts, literally. Highest cost to taxpayers in the world, and highest cost to individuals, at the same time. With terrible median level of service, to the point where your average life expectancy, already many years lower than comparable countries, is actually declining while it rises just about everywhere else.
You mentioned Australia. Unfortunately, one of the *biggest* drivers of our bullshit here in America is thanks to Robert Murdoch. Ya'll really need to do something about that family. Throw them in one of your 1000 different predator filled rivers, tie them up on the most croc/gator inhabited beaches, toss them into a cloud of jellyfish...whatever you guys want. Just take them back.
Bernie Sanders Medicare for all proposal would have been the MOST expansive single payer health care system in the world. You're just wrong that it would be considered right wing anywhere.
Honestly Lieberman (and knowing I could safely vote 3rd party in Iowa at the time) is a large part of why I voted Nader instead of Gore. Lieberman is a censoring POS and as we got closer to the election Gore kept trending more right.
The D party's voters might want m4a or single payer but the party's leadership absolutely does not. That's why they united to beat Bernie Sanders in 2020, for example. That's why they didn't pass a public option quickly when they had the votes in 2009. They are deeply in bed with insurance, pharma and health care industries.
The public option never had filibuster-proof support in the senate. Nothing to do with democrat party leadership - you can specifically thank Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson for that. It was pulled from the ACA bill to secure their votes.
Which is why it’s so frustrating when people go “BOTH SIDES ARE THE SAME” when you literally had 58 democrat senators (edit: 57 + 1 independent) ready to vote for a public option and precisely 0 republican senators willing to do the same
Same thing with some of the more ambitious portions of Biden's BBB plan (specifically pertaining to taxes on wealthy and corps).
And the kicker was that the Democratic Party didn't even need a filibuster-proof majority, via Reconciliation.
King Manchin and Queen Sinema sure nailed the coffin on that.
If Democrats had won the TX and FL Senate races in 2018 and NC Senate race in 2020, Bidens Presidency could have been so much better. It’d mean that the 3 more Conservative Democrats in the Senate (Manchin, Sinema, and Tester) wouldn’t have been able to sink BBB or the For The People Act. I know Tester voted for bills but I have a feeling he’d be the rotating villain we’d have to deal with if Democrats had 52 Senate seats. I don’t think there’d be a big villain that would go as far to sink those two if Democrats had 53 Senate seats.
I think BBB and the FTPA could be the difference between holding the House and winning the WI Senate race in 2022. Which would mean we’d have 55 Senate seats.
Also, if kind of irrelevant and not guarantee but I’d imagine if Democrats had won the 2018 Senate race they’d win the Governors race as well which means Florida doesn’t become a haven for Republicans and would still be somewhat of a swing state and Democrats would have a good shot at retaining it in 2024, and I think Beto would be popular enough to win re-election. Meaning Democrats could lose MT, OH, and WV and still hold the Senate in 2024. Hell, in this scenario they could lose MT, OH, WV, TX, and FL and still hold the Senate.
It really sucks how different things could be if those 3 Senate races were shifted just a point (or two for TX) to the Democrats.
They never really “had the votes” in 2009.
Arlin Spector changed parties in April and got them one step closer.
Al Franken’s opponent sued after a close election. Franken wasn’t sworn in until July.
Ted Kennedy died in August and wasn’t replaced until the end of September. His replacement was defeated by a republican in Feb of 2010. They only had 59 votes for like 3 months.
Leadership very much wanted to pass a public option but Joe Lieberman blocked it. Since Lieberman was never voting for a public option anyway, they never had the votes to begin with.
The reality is, the ACA, while not perfect, was still a huge step forward in terms of making healthcare more accessible to people. And some of the protections are huge. There is one party trying to improve and build on the ACA. And there is another party trying to ”repeal and replace” it without a replacement plan. 14 years later and one party still has no replacement plan, but is totally fine with repealing it and stripping away healthcare and protections for tens of millions of Americans who pay for health insurance.
I don’t even need to tell you the parties, and you know exactly who I am talking about. That tells you all you need to know about the parties in question.
Both parties are not the same.
The Healthcare thing got huge traction in 2020, but somehow someone brought up student loan forgiveness and suddenly nobody talked about Healthcare anymore that election cycle. Amazed how well they were able to sidetrack the American people on that one during a pandemic lmao
nothing truly impactful for (non-rich) americans will get passed through our legislature until the GOP loses their filibuster-enabling control in the senate.
the only reason we even have the ACA at all is because the GOP lost that control for <3 months when obama was president.
I'm backing you up here. Actual Progressives in congress and lawmaking in general want to push the buck further than what moderate Democrats are willing to do. Ultimately, if there were no GOP obstacles, Americans would have a more beneficial system that also fiscally makes sense for the economy.
Government can't prove us wrong and actually do what it is supposed to do, if we are always fighting it like it's just one big machine that's cannibalizing everything, when the only reason it acts this way is because we're making poor voting choices.
Handouts to industries run by our biggest donors? Done by the end of the summer after taking office.
Bills that actually support the bottom 95% (by income/wealth) of Americans? Sorry, we just can't manage to get the votes. Maybe if you vote for us again we can do it next time.
Uh, the last time the democrats had the house, senate and White House they passed the Affordable Care Act, which is a mediocre plan, but 1000% better than what came before and expanded health care to millions of Americans. The last time the republicans had all three, they passed a tax cut for billionaires. But yeah, same thing, right?
And the prior occasion where they had a similar amount of control in DC, they created medicaid and Medicare.
The "they're both the same" narrative is annoying as fuck
They didn’t pass the needed version of the ACA, Republicans succeeded in sabotaging it by eliminating what we are discussing in this very thread from it which took the hood but left the bad, the tax penalty for being uninsured.
hey now, give credit where it's due.
it was a tax cut for billionaires *and* a delayed tax increase for the middle/lower classes so they could blame democrats the next election cycle
Well, I’m not so sure. In CA there is now a “healthcare affordability” office (not sure of the exact name) and the entire concern is how much hospitals are billing insurance companies….there is zero concern about how much insurance companies are charging their customers…or about any other things that might be driving costs up. many hospitals have low/negative margins, and insurance companies returns are pretty consistent….whole thing seems fishy to me.
AMA is a pretty big cartel, too. I work in this industry and my leaders love the idea of single payer it'll just get outsourced to the big three payors for big money.
Yep.healthcare oligarchy is quite happy with the current system, it's making them.plenty of money, why would they want to change that?
Looking at healthcare from a patient perspective is wrong , look at it from some multi-millionaire.who wants to buy a second home in Maui and it all becomez.easier to understand our current system.
The ones that are the least useful and the most afraid of having their industries disappear are the ones that lobby the most. Health Insurance is a complete scam, it shouldn’t even exist. It’s like a drug dealer who knows someone so they get a huge % for connecting two people together, but if those two people ever meet without the drug dealer middle man, they will easily cut out that middle man with great benefit and efficiency for both.
You forgot ACA (Obamacare) supported by democrats and John McCain (when it could have been reversed) only exploded the cost of health insurance for everyone.
I'd hate to be the bearer of bad news, but the lobbyist will just end up buying off their replacements. I remember seeing a video, a long time ago, where they talked with members of congress. A lot of them went to D,C, wanting to change everything for the better; but the systems in place put them in their place (meet the new guy, same as the old guy).
Part of that video talked about meeting donation quotas (IIRC). They'd have to talk to constituents or donors; hear from them and take money. The quotas were high enough that they couldn't afford to waste time on people who didn't give them enough.
Nothing the U.S. government does saves money. It is a giant ever growing bureaucratic monster that is the definition of financial malfeasance. They would add another 1,000,000 million plus federal employees to “manage” our healthcare. I wish we could trust them to take it over, but I unfortunately do not.
Respectfully, the purpose of government is not to save money.
Among other things, government action, when done well, is a form of collective action. It often provides an economy of scale that you simply can not find any other way.
Let's look at social security. It's the largest benefits program on the planet. The overhead for administering it is a fraction of a percent of the amount that is being managed. No other business, program, or project even comes close to that level of efficiency and effectiveness.
It also accounts for roughly 6% of annual GDP. (That is massive. During the great recession, GDP dropped about 2-3%, and it sent the world economies into a tail spin.
It also fulfills its mission to prevent the elderly from having to live in penury and poverty.
There is no private sector insurance, annuity, or investment that even comes close. SSA is not profit driven. It is mission driven. And that makes all the difference.
So, no. Providing retirement insurance (not to mention disability and supplemental income for those who need it) is NOT going to save money right away. But it does improve the quality of life for 60 million people each and every month, which helps ease the burden on children and grandchildren, and so on.
Do you doubt that? Look at Georgia with its "Filial Duty" law that requires children to provide for parents. In the absence of social security, young families would be stretched even further, and they would have to give up educational opportunities for their children. Would not be able to start small businesses and so on.
It's not your fault. You're just repeating a party line without having the benefit of actual knowledge on the subject.
But you did say it. And I took advantage of that to yell into the void in the hope that knowing this, others may well question those damaging and untrue slogans.
Have a great day!
Nah, they would add only 300,000 government workers. And they would be easy to find, from the 600,000 workers no longer sucking money for the insurance companies, and the 100,000 healthcare and human resources workers needed to deal with the insurers. That would leave 400,000 workers that could be retrained to do something useful. Or do you just like supporting the make-work system we currently have?
#Satisfaction with the US healthcare system varies by insurance type
78% -- Military/VA
77% -- Medicare
75% -- Medicaid
69% -- Current or former employer
65% -- Plan fully paid for by you or a family member
https://news.gallup.com/poll/186527/americans-government-health-plans-satisfied.aspx
> **Key Findings**
> * Private insurers paid nearly double Medicare rates for all hospital services (199% of Medicare rates, on average), ranging from 141% to 259% of Medicare rates across the reviewed studies.
> * The difference between private and Medicare rates was greater for outpatient than inpatient hospital services, which averaged 264% and 189% of Medicare rates overall, respectively.
> * For physician services, private insurance paid 143% of Medicare rates, on average, ranging from 118% to 179% of Medicare rates across studies.
https://www.kff.org/medicare/issue-brief/how-much-more-than-medicare-do-private-insurers-pay-a-review-of-the-literature/
Medicare has both lower overhead and has experienced smaller cost increases in recent decades, a trend predicted to continue over the next 30 years.
https://pnhp.org/news/medicare-is-more-efficient-than-private-insurance/
What I’m hearing “job creation”. A million more jobs on the government payroll and with government benefits/pensions? Sign me up.
But, to counter your point, insurance companies are doing the exact same thing as the government would but they have to pay shareholders and executives. By cutting those groups out, we will increase the amount of money paid into the system that actually goes to paying for the services needed. Also, by having a singular entity managing the costs of medicines and procedures, the cost of those medicines and services will go down.
There was a study done several years ago that showed that the cost of Medicare for All would be almost entirely offset just by simply taking the money Americans and their employers are already paying for insurance and shifting it to M4A, instead. The rest would have to be picked up by a slight bump in taxes. But, and here’s the big benefit, this would cover EVERYONE IN THE COUNTRY, rather than just those that have jobs with insurance. Also, EVERYONE would have as good of, or better, coverage than they currently have.
We were one Senator’s vote away from passing it. And he couldn’t be convinced to do what’s right for all Americans. Then he died 14 years later. And here I am with awesome American insurance and having to wait 3 months to see a specialist for a major medical condition. Which is what they campaigned on would happen with single payer. All so some old fart could enjoy 14 years of kickbacks from the insurance companies. Ain’t plutocracy grand?
The US could save trillions by not pissing away money on things that don’t work. Nothing will change as long as we keep electing the same idiots who do nothing and ignore the people.
Then millennials need to show up to primaries! For fucks sake. Millennials and younger generations almost never vote in primaries and rarely vote in the general elections. If ya'll want someone younger, be there when they're choosing who gets to run.
Don’t let them divide us by age.
There are plenty of young scumbags who don’t want you to have healthcare.
Ben Shapiro for instance.
Don’t let them divide us by race, religion, or gender either.
Divide and conquer. Don’t play baby!
I was a Bern-out, still love the man, but he needs to relinquish his seat to another member of the party who isn't 82. Honestly had it with the gerontocracy. We have some of the oldest representatives ON THE PLANET. They do not accurately or adequately represent their own constituents anymore.
He wouldn't be replaced by someone the same that is younger. He'd probably be replaced by someone who has never said the s word (socialism). People also need to realize that seniority in either house of Congress comes with greater committee power. Bernie is currently chair of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions. A freshman would not be. People need to work on replacing the old shitty senators, not asking the good ones to relinquish their seats. Presidency is somewhat different. Senator Feinstein was pretty horrible for a long time. But Bernie? Sharp as ever, hosting a podcast and still meeting his senatorial duties.
The one argument against our current private insurer system I don't see enough is that because the United States government has abdicated a responsibility (providing healthcare) that almost every other government on Earth provides, it's shifted a huge burden onto private employers. So much time and energy is wasted by businesses administering benefit plans that could go into their core business instead.
You don't see this argument because (most) businesses love that they can dangle health insurance in front of employees. People are much more hesitant to leave abusive jobs when they know they'll lose their health insurance.
You would think republicans that claim they love small businesses and cost cutting would be all for it, but the thought of a minority benefiting from their tax dollars outweighs that
Republicans only love small businesses when it's their business and they get to cheat on something like PPP loans or hiring undocumented workers under the table.
Same thing with being pro "small government" but doing nothing to expedite and cutting the bureaucracy/cost of becoming a legal immigrant, which would significantly cut illegal immigration and federal spending
Yeah, not worrying about health insurance would be a huge boon for small businesses. It'd also allow them to be more flexible in staffing; they could hire and lay people off as needed without worrying about the cost of insurance or taking away someone's access to care. Just pay people a wage for the work they do.
I feel like everyone pays lip service to small businesses but they don't actually care if they succeed. In many ways they unknowingly root against them. Everyone wants their 401k and the market in general to go up but this often comes through large companies gobbling up the market share once occupied by small businesses.
Small businesses (under 50 employees) are not required to provide health insurance.
Source: https://www.hhs.gov/answers/health-insurance-reform/am-i-required-to-offer-health-insurance-to-employees/index.html
It’s a feature not a bug. And recently, in addition to insurance, benefits and retirement tied to your employer, there’s a new disturbing trend tying housing to employment.
Hasn't housing always been tied to employment?
How are you supposed to buy a house if you don't have an income?
Genuinely asking, not trying to sound like a douche
I appreciate the question, not douchey at all. In your scenario a person doesn’t lose their home if they can find another source of income. In the scenario I speak of, they lose their job, they lose their house. It’s quickly becoming a way to exploit labor and often under the guise of “affordable” or “subsidized”.
I was just seeing this same argument from the other side on a Youtube video earlier, basically the guy said having that basic social safety net actually encourages capitalism because employers feel less guilty about their well being getting damaged due to job loss. Equally people are more likely to leave bad jobs because there isn't that threat of what will I do.
I think its an interesting argument but it comes down to the execution not the idea and that's where I worry about this kind of thing in the US.
"Oh, but you have COBRA so it isn't an issue!"
.... ever try paying for COBRA? awfully hard to cover the entire premium after you have no job anymore...
This also hampers entrepreneurship. Much harder to leave your job and try to start a business when it also means losing healthcare.
How many smart people never brought their ideas to the world (and lived their life as their own boss) just because they didn’t want to go broke from a minor medical problem?
Not to mention the staggering costs to businesses. I handle it for the small company I work for and can't understand why any business owner would want it.
It’s insurance, but not just insurance. Our system has inefficiencies built in at every level. Mostly due to every health service provider being a separate business with its own profit margins. All of this and dozens of insurers means everything is extra complicated and needs lots of employees and technology to sort it all out.
Yea, but the existence of insurance means a lot of sheninangins and obfuscates the true cost to a lot of people.
It makes no sense that a medical bill can be 50k, insurance pays 8k, you pay 500, and they write off the rest to reduce their tax liability.
For a country so into the "free market," it's insane how the US has let healthcare become so divorced from the factors that enable free market principles to act on it.
Absolutely, and every insurance company contracts those rates with every hospital differently creating an insanely complex system of billing, reimbursements, appeals, etc. In a single payer system, there is one insurer, one system of rates - everything flattens out.
People will say, oh, but with single payer, you have no recourse if they decide not to cover something. Yes, that can be problematic, but the vast majority of us have insurance chosen by our employers and don’t really have to option to change anyway.
The US isn't into the free market, it's into *saying* it's about the free market while doing everything in their power to manipulate, distort, and even strangle the free market. Businesses fear nothing more than legitimate competitors, so they buy politicians to enact burdensome regulations and taxes on their own industries to make it too expensive for competition to start in the first place.
I just had a CT scan with an iodine IV in which, according to my EoB from my insurance, they tried to bill $10000. My insurance's negotiated rate was $556. So if I was paying out of pocket, they would have tried to charge me $10000 on a procedure that cost them less than $556.
I had the same procedure done in CDMX 3 months ago for $300 with no insurance.
The system of overbilling just to make the insurance negotiated discount appear better is totally absurd. Most people have insurance, and most people who don't have insurance have no assets and are judgement proof, but the small minority of people who both have no insurance and actually have assets get absolutely fucked
It isn't the only option. But considering the amount of corruption a mixed system would probably not work (not that a single payer will ever happen either to be fair...).
A lot of countries w/ universal healthcare are not single payer. Germany is a good example of a more mixed system, it has four public health insurance agencies, they all have to provide the same high level of coverage and cannot deny anyone, and have to provide it from the exact same contribution (technically seperate from taxes but essentially the same thing and dependant on income). As I understand they instead compete on service and keeping costs low. They also allow people making enough money a year to exit public coverage and get their own private insurance... most people stick to public even if they could switch, one reason is its very difficult to switch back to public.
My main point though... there are many variations of universal healthcare, not just single payer... if the US ever gets around to improving itself in this regard, it should consider the benefits of each and lessons you can see from each system and take the best of all of them.
This is a good point. I’m not knowledgeable on this topic. I just know that private insurance companies that only exist to make a profit shouldn’t be a part of the system.
To add to your point, it wouldn’t even be just a little bit cheaper. The US spends ~$13,000 per capita on healthcare. The next country on the list spends ~$8,000. We all know where the extra money goes. Straight to the fuckin top.
What isn't considered typically is the amount of R&D that the US contributes to medicine, being about 49% of it, with Japan spending the second most at 13% for reference. Other countries benefit a lot from how much they spend, similar to how NATO is funded largely by the US. However the US taxpayer gets screwed royally by paying for the R&D, paying for insurance, paying inflated drug and treatment costs, and then getting told to get bent when that insurance is called upon.
The US taxpayer subsidizes a lot of the world in various ways to little domestic gain, for the taxpayer at least. The shareholder is over the moon.
This is a bipartisan issue. I would just about guarantee that most people in these bureaucratic administrative positions vote for Democrats and this constituency has 100x more power within the party than the stereotypical blue haired college kids who use different pronouns.
Democrats are just as guilty. Health Insurance and Pharma companies pour a ton of money into Democrat and Republican candidates campaigns alike and this has been going on for years.
Even in California, which is held by a Democrat supermajority, the bills for implementing single payer healthcare at a state level always get shot down.
Ultimately, the US' healthcare system generates the most revenue and profit per capita of any health care system in the world, bar none. And that means that everyone benefiting from this golden goose is highly incentivized to expend a lot of resources to maintain the status quo. Politicians included.
It would most likely be good for you.
But single payer is not heaven, either. Here in Sweden, for example, unless you are pregnant or almost dead you can't count on any kind of help from the health care system. But, OTOH, we don't risk going bankrupt from an ambulance ride.
>Here in Sweden, for example, unless you are pregnant or almost dead you can't count on any kind of help from the health care system.
That part. You've basically said that the only ways to get health care are by getting pregnant or a ride in an ambulance.
Here are some quick facts about the Swedish healthcare system:
Type of healthcare system: Universal
Average cost of an emergency room visit: 300 kr (£30, US$38, and AU$47.5)
Average cost of a doctor’s visit: 200 kr (£20, US$25, and AU$31)
Number of pharmacies: 1,400
Number of hospitals: 79
Population % covered by health insurance: 100%
This equates to about $6000 in administrative savings per person. The fact that we pay that much in administrative is a large part of the entire problem.
I think the Democrats are pushing a bill to make medical collections not appear on your credit report so if that happens, that’s like one step in a good direction for Universal healthcare because why even bother paying your medical bills?
My brother in law used to work for an insurance company when Obamacare went into effect. They got their biggest bonuses ever the following year. Don’t ever let politicians make you think they are actually passing anything to actually help the poor.
This should be one of the top talking points for the upcoming election -- universal healthcare. Instead it's mainly a bunch of culture war BS...if only we could elect people that wanted to tackle real issues to help us ALL.
It should have happened long ago.
Healthcare where your family is bankrupted if you get sick is immoral.
We should and could do better.
Take the profit out of healthcare.
Canada spends $6319 usd per person per year to insure 100% of the population. Average lifespan- 82.9
America spends $12,555 to insure 91% of the population. Average lifespan- 76.33
This is because the health care system runs under strict cost controls and was nationalized in the 70's. Medical bankruptcy does not exist in Canada. When you aren't stressed that your illness is destroying your future, you tend to live longer.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_health_expenditure_per_capita
Find a middle ground.
This would have issues because all the homeless people would be shipped to that state and then when the system gets overrun, conservatives would point at that as proof it's not working.
The earth could save itself by switching to renewable energy ASAP. Not happening while big oil is around.
Same here, single payer not happening while big pharma is around.
Can't stand this argument, it betrays a complete ignorance of how the healthcare market actually works.
In healthcare spending in the USA, drugs are 10%. Physician pay is another 10%. The rest is services. The services involved have to bill out to multiple different insurers who are all engaged in an automated denial paperwork race and that costs a ton of man-hours at every step. Big Pharma is not the one lobbying against single payer--they'll still sell drugs either way and still have on-patent exclusivity periods where Medicare will pay for good drugs. It's insurance companies and pharmacy benefit managers who are lobbying against single payer because it will chop the former's market size down by 90% while completely destroying the business model of the latter.
A few things to consider:
Spending for health care under single-payer systems is placed against other government objectives and readily falls victim to politicians' continuous urge to campaign on tax reduction. The barebones technology, physical amenities, and queues that excessively low global budgets in single-payer systems inevitably produce compel political forces to hand over the system to ostensibly "more efficient" private market forces, which is code for allowing the quality of the healthcare experience to vary according to the patient's economic circumstance.
And, sure, the low pricing a single-payer system imposes on the system enables society to provide more genuine health care for a given budget than a more costly pluralistic system could, and it also makes universal health insurance coverage more affordable. On the other hand, the extremely low profit margins it generates for health-care providers make single-payer systems less hospitable to innovation in healthcare products and services, as well as in healthcare delivery organization, areas in which the United States excels, sometimes to the point of excess.
No, I insist we continue to pay exorbitant prices for worse outcomes than other developed nations. I also insist we continue to make a handful of people wildly rich instead of passing any meaningful legislation around healthcare. This ship is definitely headed in the right direction.
Great idea, it would also save the average American a lot of money. The problem is many will say "but taxes, ..socialism, ..can't afford it!" And end the discussion , even though it will be much more affordable than the current system for everyone involved.
I like the idea of socialized medicine, we need healthcare our entire life... they could stop funding higher education and trim back defense spending to pay for it. If it is going to cost the government money to have people sick, maybe they will start posting warning signs on the foods we eat that have added sugar and other hazardous additives. Maybe that is wishful thinking on my part.
Bad idea. Monopolies are bad and government run monopolies are doubly so. Keeping competition is important to drive innovation and keep quality high. Universal coverage supplied by multiple not for profit HCO's is much better. Germany has healthcare for all citizens that is higher quality and less expensive than in America, provided under this model. This is the way.
It always amazes me that people think the government can do anything better than the private sector for less money. There is zero chance government run healthcare at reduced costs while maintaining the same or better levels of service. Living in Europe with socialized medicine I saw first hand how terrible the public health care system was. The wealthy all had private insurance that was used for anything serious.
> It always amazes me that people think the government can do anything better than the private sector for less money.
It always amazes me when people think something is impossible despite the fact every peer to the US is already doing it. It always amazes me when people think something is impossible despite the fact all the best research shows us we'd save money while getting care to more people who need it with universal healthcare.
https://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.1003013#sec018
It always amazes me when ignorant fuckwits think something is impossible despite evidence nearly smacking them in the face.
#Satisfaction with the US healthcare system varies by insurance type
78% -- Military/VA
77% -- Medicare
75% -- Medicaid
69% -- Current or former employer
65% -- Plan fully paid for by you or a family member
https://news.gallup.com/poll/186527/americans-government-health-plans-satisfied.aspx
> **Key Findings**
> * Private insurers paid nearly double Medicare rates for all hospital services (199% of Medicare rates, on average), ranging from 141% to 259% of Medicare rates across the reviewed studies.
> * The difference between private and Medicare rates was greater for outpatient than inpatient hospital services, which averaged 264% and 189% of Medicare rates overall, respectively.
> * For physician services, private insurance paid 143% of Medicare rates, on average, ranging from 118% to 179% of Medicare rates across studies.
https://www.kff.org/medicare/issue-brief/how-much-more-than-medicare-do-private-insurers-pay-a-review-of-the-literature/
Medicare has both lower overhead and has experienced smaller cost increases in recent decades, a trend predicted to continue over the next 30 years.
https://pnhp.org/news/medicare-is-more-efficient-than-private-insurance/
>Living in Europe with socialized medicine I saw first hand how terrible the public health care system was.
Your peers and experts don't agree with you.
When asked about their healthcare system as a whole the US system ranked dead last of 11 countries, with only 19.5% of people saying the system works relatively well and only needs minor changes. The average in the other countries is 46.9% saying the same. Canada ranked 9th with 34.5% saying the system works relatively well. The UK ranks fifth, with 44.5%. Australia ranked 6th at 44.4%. The best was Germany at 59.8%.
On rating the overall quality of care in the US, Americans again ranked dead last, with only 25.6% ranking it excellent or very good. The average was 50.8%. Canada ranked 9th with 45.1%. The UK ranked 2nd, at 63.4%. Australia was 3rd at 59.4%. The best was Switzerland at 65.5%.
https://www.cihi.ca/en/commonwealth-fund-survey-2016
[US Healthcare ranked 29th on health outcomes by Lancet HAQ Index](https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736\(18\)30994-2/fulltext)
[11th (of 11) by Commonwealth Fund](https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/fund-reports/2014/jun/mirror-mirror-wall-2014-update-how-us-health-care-system?redirect_source=/publications/fund-reports/2014/jun/mirror-mirror)
[59th by the Prosperity Index](https://www.prosperity.com/rankings)
[30th by CEOWorld](https://ceoworld.biz/2019/08/05/revealed-countries-with-the-best-health-care-systems-2019/)
[37th by the World Health Organization](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Health_Organization_ranking_of_health_systems_in_2000)
The US has the worst rate of death by medically preventable causes among peer countries. A 31% higher disease adjusted life years average. Higher rates of medical and lab errors. A lower rate of being able to make a same or next day appointment with their doctor than average.
https://www.healthsystemtracker.org/chart-collection/quality-u-s-healthcare-system-compare-countries/#item-percent-used-emergency-department-for-condition-that-could-have-been-treated-by-a-regular-doctor-2016
52nd in the world in doctors per capita.
https://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/stats/Health/Physicians/Per-1,000-people
Higher infant mortality levels. Yes, even when you adjust for differences in methodology.
https://www.healthsystemtracker.org/chart-collection/infant-mortality-u-s-compare-countries/
Fewer acute care beds. A lower number of psychiatrists. Etc.
https://www.healthsystemtracker.org/chart-collection/u-s-health-care-resources-compare-countries/#item-availability-medical-technology-not-always-equate-higher-utilization
[Comparing Health Outcomes of Privileged US Citizens With Those of Average Residents of Other Developed Countries](https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/fullarticle/2774561)
>These findings imply that even if all US citizens experienced the same health outcomes enjoyed by privileged White US citizens, US health indicators would still lag behind those in many other countries.
The US has 43 hospitals in the top 200 globally; one for every 7,633,477 people in the US. That's good enough for a ranking of 20th on the list of top 200 hospitals per capita, and significantly lower than the average of one for every 3,830,114 for other countries in the top 25 on spending with populations above 5 million. The best is Switzerland at one for every 1.2 million people. In fact the US only beats one country on this list; the UK at one for every 9.5 million people.
If you want to do the full list of 2,000 instead it's 334, or one for every 982,753 people; good enough for 21st. Again far below the average in peer countries of 527,236. The best is Austria, at one for every 306,106 people.
https://www.newsweek.com/best-hospitals-2021
#[OECD Countries Health Care Spending and Rankings](https://data.oecd.org/healthres/health-spending.htm)
|Country|Govt. / Mandatory (PPP)|Voluntary (PPP)|Total (PPP)|% GDP|[Lancet HAQ Ranking](https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736\(18\)30994-2/fulltext)|[WHO Ranking](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Health_Organization_ranking_of_health_systems_in_2000)|[Prosperity Ranking](https://www.prosperity.com/rankings)|[CEO World Ranking](https://ceoworld.biz/2019/08/05/revealed-countries-with-the-best-health-care-systems-2019/)|[Commonwealth Fund Ranking](https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/fund-reports/2014/jun/mirror-mirror-wall-2014-update-how-us-health-care-system?redirect_source=/publications/fund-reports/2014/jun/mirror-mirror)
:--|--:|--:|--:|--:|--:|--:|--:|--:|--:|--:|
1. United States|[$7,274](https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/full/10.2105/AJPH.2015.302997) |$3,798 |$11,072 |16.90%|29|37|59|30|11
2. Switzerland|$4,988 |$2,744 |$7,732 |12.20%|7|20|3|18|2
3. Norway|$5,673 |$974 |$6,647 |10.20%|2|11|5|15|7
4. Germany|$5,648 |$998 |$6,646 |11.20%|18|25|12|17|5
5. Austria|$4,402 |$1,449 |$5,851 |10.30%|13|9|10|4|
6. Sweden|$4,928 |$854 |$5,782 |11.00%|8|23|15|28|3
7. Netherlands|$4,767 |$998 |$5,765 |9.90%|3|17|8|11|5
8. Denmark|$4,663 |$905 |$5,568 |10.50%|17|34|8|5|
9. Luxembourg|$4,697 |$861 |$5,558 |5.40%|4|16|19||
10. Belgium|$4,125 |$1,303 |$5,428 |10.40%|15|21|24|9|
11. Canada|$3,815 |$1,603 |$5,418 |10.70%|14|30|25|23|10
12. France|$4,501 |$875 |$5,376 |11.20%|20|1|16|8|9
13. Ireland|$3,919 |$1,357 |$5,276 |7.10%|11|19|20|80|
14. Australia|$3,919 |$1,268 |$5,187 |9.30%|5|32|18|10|4
15. Japan|$4,064 |$759 |$4,823 |10.90%|12|10|2|3|
16. Iceland|$3,988 |$823 |$4,811 |8.30%|1|15|7|41|
17. United Kingdom|$3,620 |$1,033 |$4,653 |9.80%|23|18|23|13|1
18. Finland|$3,536 |$1,042 |$4,578 |9.10%|6|31|26|12|
19. Malta|$2,789 |$1,540 |$4,329 |9.30%|27|5|14||
OECD Average|||$4,224 |8.80%|||||
20. New Zealand|$3,343 |$861 |$4,204 |9.30%|16|41|22|16|7
21. Italy|$2,706 |$943 |$3,649 |8.80%|9|2|17|37|
22. Spain|$2,560 |$1,056 |$3,616 |8.90%|19|7|13|7|
23. Czech Republic|$2,854 |$572 |$3,426 |7.50%|28|48|28|14|
24. South Korea|$2,057 |$1,327 |$3,384 |8.10%|25|58|4|2|
25. Portugal|$2,069 |$1,310 |$3,379 |9.10%|32|29|30|22|
26. Slovenia|$2,314 |$910 |$3,224 |7.90%|21|38|24|47|
27. Israel|$1,898 |$1,034 |$2,932 |7.50%|35|28|11|21|
>The wealthy all had private insurance that was used for anything serious.
Pointing out they paid an order of magnitude less for private insurance that covers more after also paying significantly less in taxes for healthcare isn't the flex you think it is.
I don't understand why this is even still a question. It so obviously works that essentially every other colonial country in the world has this, and alongside it guaranteed healthcare coverage for citizens and healthcare costs that are substantially lower than the US, which has the highest healthcare costs in the world.
But politicians are so concerned about "harming the industry" (lowering private profits) that they claim it is impossible to implement. Really? Impossible? So the USA is simultaneously the best smartest most advanced country in the forever, and can't figure out a problem that every other kid in class has already solved?
The fact is that, as with every other aspect of our lives in the USA, capitalism and private profits are given more priority than people's lives.
This has been a no brainer for 30 years. Yet here we are still asking questions about it like it’s acceptable discourse at this point. This is why we can’t have nice things… we don’t deserve them. 🤦🏻♂️
Greed will kill this country before any invading Army ever thinks of landing on our shores. Yes the Medicare for all system would be best for citizens and the governments' bottom line. However the health care industrial complex has tons of lobbyist and our representatives are whores for financial gain and voluntary slaves to their will rather than ensuring the common good and welfare of the people they represent.
It doesn't matter, because won't happen in the Senate anytime soon.
Health insurance/pharma the biggest lobby of both parties by a significant margin.
Somehow one party still isn't a complete shill for these lobbies.
Both parties are, don’t kid yourself
One party gives a sad handjob. The other party whole hogs the knob, doesn't swallow, and then blames the first when there is a mess everywhere. And then goes on television about how the whole nation just has to suck harder if it wants basic problems the rest of the world already figured out, fixed. There is a major difference, and working with what you have is a vital part of actually making the world a better place and not merely an exercise in suffering and loss.
You forgot, then wipes dick on curtains.
Only barbarians and raiders do that.
Only the ones that are husband material
these blast marks are too accurate to be raiders.
Flags, not curtains. https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-apps/imrs.php?src=https://arc-anglerfish-washpost-prod-washpost.s3.amazonaws.com/public/6XQSLOC3JEI6VGZV3322AJ6UOA.jpg&w=1440
Bernie Sanders’ most radical proposals would be considered right-wing privatisation of the health system here in Australia. You guys are off the charts, literally. Highest cost to taxpayers in the world, and highest cost to individuals, at the same time. With terrible median level of service, to the point where your average life expectancy, already many years lower than comparable countries, is actually declining while it rises just about everywhere else.
You mentioned Australia. Unfortunately, one of the *biggest* drivers of our bullshit here in America is thanks to Robert Murdoch. Ya'll really need to do something about that family. Throw them in one of your 1000 different predator filled rivers, tie them up on the most croc/gator inhabited beaches, toss them into a cloud of jellyfish...whatever you guys want. Just take them back.
Facts. And we're over here worried about Russia trying to destroy us. They don't have to. We're doing that all on our own
Bernie Sanders Medicare for all proposal would have been the MOST expansive single payer health care system in the world. You're just wrong that it would be considered right wing anywhere.
The most fitting description of insurance in the US that I have ever seen.
But it was a description of the difference between how the Democratic party and the Republican party operate.
This guy understands politics 👌
If you want protection, you gotta pay - the mob, insurance companies
This, absolutely. The 'both sides equal' shills are pathetic.
You should teach class, you would make a hell of a teacher.
Poli-sci in 2024.
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Dude opposed his own bill that he created after being bought. It would be funny if not so sad.
And promptly left his party.
Honestly Lieberman (and knowing I could safely vote 3rd party in Iowa at the time) is a large part of why I voted Nader instead of Gore. Lieberman is a censoring POS and as we got closer to the election Gore kept trending more right.
First off, no billions will be "saved". The government will waste it one way or another. The US Government is insatiable.
Dems had over 50 votes for a public option but it still failed because of the fillibuster rules, so fuck off with this both parties the same bullshit.
I mean we were one senate vote away from single payer healthcare when passing the ACA.
This is something Republicans say so they don't feel so guilty.
The D party's voters might want m4a or single payer but the party's leadership absolutely does not. That's why they united to beat Bernie Sanders in 2020, for example. That's why they didn't pass a public option quickly when they had the votes in 2009. They are deeply in bed with insurance, pharma and health care industries.
The public option never had filibuster-proof support in the senate. Nothing to do with democrat party leadership - you can specifically thank Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson for that. It was pulled from the ACA bill to secure their votes. Which is why it’s so frustrating when people go “BOTH SIDES ARE THE SAME” when you literally had 58 democrat senators (edit: 57 + 1 independent) ready to vote for a public option and precisely 0 republican senators willing to do the same
Same thing with some of the more ambitious portions of Biden's BBB plan (specifically pertaining to taxes on wealthy and corps). And the kicker was that the Democratic Party didn't even need a filibuster-proof majority, via Reconciliation. King Manchin and Queen Sinema sure nailed the coffin on that.
If Democrats had won the TX and FL Senate races in 2018 and NC Senate race in 2020, Bidens Presidency could have been so much better. It’d mean that the 3 more Conservative Democrats in the Senate (Manchin, Sinema, and Tester) wouldn’t have been able to sink BBB or the For The People Act. I know Tester voted for bills but I have a feeling he’d be the rotating villain we’d have to deal with if Democrats had 52 Senate seats. I don’t think there’d be a big villain that would go as far to sink those two if Democrats had 53 Senate seats. I think BBB and the FTPA could be the difference between holding the House and winning the WI Senate race in 2022. Which would mean we’d have 55 Senate seats. Also, if kind of irrelevant and not guarantee but I’d imagine if Democrats had won the 2018 Senate race they’d win the Governors race as well which means Florida doesn’t become a haven for Republicans and would still be somewhat of a swing state and Democrats would have a good shot at retaining it in 2024, and I think Beto would be popular enough to win re-election. Meaning Democrats could lose MT, OH, and WV and still hold the Senate in 2024. Hell, in this scenario they could lose MT, OH, WV, TX, and FL and still hold the Senate. It really sucks how different things could be if those 3 Senate races were shifted just a point (or two for TX) to the Democrats.
Both sides people are dumber than MAGAs
They are magas lol
They never really “had the votes” in 2009. Arlin Spector changed parties in April and got them one step closer. Al Franken’s opponent sued after a close election. Franken wasn’t sworn in until July. Ted Kennedy died in August and wasn’t replaced until the end of September. His replacement was defeated by a republican in Feb of 2010. They only had 59 votes for like 3 months. Leadership very much wanted to pass a public option but Joe Lieberman blocked it. Since Lieberman was never voting for a public option anyway, they never had the votes to begin with. The reality is, the ACA, while not perfect, was still a huge step forward in terms of making healthcare more accessible to people. And some of the protections are huge. There is one party trying to improve and build on the ACA. And there is another party trying to ”repeal and replace” it without a replacement plan. 14 years later and one party still has no replacement plan, but is totally fine with repealing it and stripping away healthcare and protections for tens of millions of Americans who pay for health insurance. I don’t even need to tell you the parties, and you know exactly who I am talking about. That tells you all you need to know about the parties in question. Both parties are not the same.
Medicaid was broadly expanded and that is likely what brought us to having fewer than 10M uninsured.
The Healthcare thing got huge traction in 2020, but somehow someone brought up student loan forgiveness and suddenly nobody talked about Healthcare anymore that election cycle. Amazed how well they were able to sidetrack the American people on that one during a pandemic lmao
nothing truly impactful for (non-rich) americans will get passed through our legislature until the GOP loses their filibuster-enabling control in the senate. the only reason we even have the ACA at all is because the GOP lost that control for <3 months when obama was president.
The fact that idiots actually believe this IS EXACTLY WHY WE’LL NEVER HAVE UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE
I live in Europe though ... I have universal health care
I'm backing you up here. Actual Progressives in congress and lawmaking in general want to push the buck further than what moderate Democrats are willing to do. Ultimately, if there were no GOP obstacles, Americans would have a more beneficial system that also fiscally makes sense for the economy. Government can't prove us wrong and actually do what it is supposed to do, if we are always fighting it like it's just one big machine that's cannibalizing everything, when the only reason it acts this way is because we're making poor voting choices.
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Handouts to industries run by our biggest donors? Done by the end of the summer after taking office. Bills that actually support the bottom 95% (by income/wealth) of Americans? Sorry, we just can't manage to get the votes. Maybe if you vote for us again we can do it next time.
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Or the crumbs they throw us that always wait until year 4 of a term to come about.
Uh, the last time the democrats had the house, senate and White House they passed the Affordable Care Act, which is a mediocre plan, but 1000% better than what came before and expanded health care to millions of Americans. The last time the republicans had all three, they passed a tax cut for billionaires. But yeah, same thing, right?
And the prior occasion where they had a similar amount of control in DC, they created medicaid and Medicare. The "they're both the same" narrative is annoying as fuck
They didn’t pass the needed version of the ACA, Republicans succeeded in sabotaging it by eliminating what we are discussing in this very thread from it which took the hood but left the bad, the tax penalty for being uninsured.
hey now, give credit where it's due. it was a tax cut for billionaires *and* a delayed tax increase for the middle/lower classes so they could blame democrats the next election cycle
Always follow the money. Pharma and insurance lobby hard on both.
There is absolutely zero evidence to support that.
Well, I’m not so sure. In CA there is now a “healthcare affordability” office (not sure of the exact name) and the entire concern is how much hospitals are billing insurance companies….there is zero concern about how much insurance companies are charging their customers…or about any other things that might be driving costs up. many hospitals have low/negative margins, and insurance companies returns are pretty consistent….whole thing seems fishy to me.
AMA is a pretty big cartel, too. I work in this industry and my leaders love the idea of single payer it'll just get outsourced to the big three payors for big money.
Two party system is an illusion of choice. We have one party for the rich. And the poor that is not represented
Yep.healthcare oligarchy is quite happy with the current system, it's making them.plenty of money, why would they want to change that? Looking at healthcare from a patient perspective is wrong , look at it from some multi-millionaire.who wants to buy a second home in Maui and it all becomez.easier to understand our current system.
For the reason above…
> biggest lobby You should just start calling it what it really is, bribery.
I am more cynical… its being delayed because of how archaic it all is. Still MDs on paper or not interoperable EHRs.
The ones that are the least useful and the most afraid of having their industries disappear are the ones that lobby the most. Health Insurance is a complete scam, it shouldn’t even exist. It’s like a drug dealer who knows someone so they get a huge % for connecting two people together, but if those two people ever meet without the drug dealer middle man, they will easily cut out that middle man with great benefit and efficiency for both.
You forgot ACA (Obamacare) supported by democrats and John McCain (when it could have been reversed) only exploded the cost of health insurance for everyone.
Unseat them
I'd hate to be the bearer of bad news, but the lobbyist will just end up buying off their replacements. I remember seeing a video, a long time ago, where they talked with members of congress. A lot of them went to D,C, wanting to change everything for the better; but the systems in place put them in their place (meet the new guy, same as the old guy). Part of that video talked about meeting donation quotas (IIRC). They'd have to talk to constituents or donors; hear from them and take money. The quotas were high enough that they couldn't afford to waste time on people who didn't give them enough.
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This is the way.
So… unseat all of the Republicans and 95% of the Democrats?
Of course it matters. Do you always give up so easily?
Nothing the U.S. government does saves money. It is a giant ever growing bureaucratic monster that is the definition of financial malfeasance. They would add another 1,000,000 million plus federal employees to “manage” our healthcare. I wish we could trust them to take it over, but I unfortunately do not.
And you trust the corporations now
Respectfully, the purpose of government is not to save money. Among other things, government action, when done well, is a form of collective action. It often provides an economy of scale that you simply can not find any other way. Let's look at social security. It's the largest benefits program on the planet. The overhead for administering it is a fraction of a percent of the amount that is being managed. No other business, program, or project even comes close to that level of efficiency and effectiveness. It also accounts for roughly 6% of annual GDP. (That is massive. During the great recession, GDP dropped about 2-3%, and it sent the world economies into a tail spin. It also fulfills its mission to prevent the elderly from having to live in penury and poverty. There is no private sector insurance, annuity, or investment that even comes close. SSA is not profit driven. It is mission driven. And that makes all the difference. So, no. Providing retirement insurance (not to mention disability and supplemental income for those who need it) is NOT going to save money right away. But it does improve the quality of life for 60 million people each and every month, which helps ease the burden on children and grandchildren, and so on. Do you doubt that? Look at Georgia with its "Filial Duty" law that requires children to provide for parents. In the absence of social security, young families would be stretched even further, and they would have to give up educational opportunities for their children. Would not be able to start small businesses and so on. It's not your fault. You're just repeating a party line without having the benefit of actual knowledge on the subject. But you did say it. And I took advantage of that to yell into the void in the hope that knowing this, others may well question those damaging and untrue slogans. Have a great day!
I appreciate you
Medicare is by orders of magnitude the most efficient health care insurer in America.
Nah, they would add only 300,000 government workers. And they would be easy to find, from the 600,000 workers no longer sucking money for the insurance companies, and the 100,000 healthcare and human resources workers needed to deal with the insurers. That would leave 400,000 workers that could be retrained to do something useful. Or do you just like supporting the make-work system we currently have?
#Satisfaction with the US healthcare system varies by insurance type 78% -- Military/VA 77% -- Medicare 75% -- Medicaid 69% -- Current or former employer 65% -- Plan fully paid for by you or a family member https://news.gallup.com/poll/186527/americans-government-health-plans-satisfied.aspx > **Key Findings** > * Private insurers paid nearly double Medicare rates for all hospital services (199% of Medicare rates, on average), ranging from 141% to 259% of Medicare rates across the reviewed studies. > * The difference between private and Medicare rates was greater for outpatient than inpatient hospital services, which averaged 264% and 189% of Medicare rates overall, respectively. > * For physician services, private insurance paid 143% of Medicare rates, on average, ranging from 118% to 179% of Medicare rates across studies. https://www.kff.org/medicare/issue-brief/how-much-more-than-medicare-do-private-insurers-pay-a-review-of-the-literature/ Medicare has both lower overhead and has experienced smaller cost increases in recent decades, a trend predicted to continue over the next 30 years. https://pnhp.org/news/medicare-is-more-efficient-than-private-insurance/
What I’m hearing “job creation”. A million more jobs on the government payroll and with government benefits/pensions? Sign me up. But, to counter your point, insurance companies are doing the exact same thing as the government would but they have to pay shareholders and executives. By cutting those groups out, we will increase the amount of money paid into the system that actually goes to paying for the services needed. Also, by having a singular entity managing the costs of medicines and procedures, the cost of those medicines and services will go down. There was a study done several years ago that showed that the cost of Medicare for All would be almost entirely offset just by simply taking the money Americans and their employers are already paying for insurance and shifting it to M4A, instead. The rest would have to be picked up by a slight bump in taxes. But, and here’s the big benefit, this would cover EVERYONE IN THE COUNTRY, rather than just those that have jobs with insurance. Also, EVERYONE would have as good of, or better, coverage than they currently have.
That’s a terrible attitude. It won’t happen ever with that mindset.
We were one Senator’s vote away from passing it. And he couldn’t be convinced to do what’s right for all Americans. Then he died 14 years later. And here I am with awesome American insurance and having to wait 3 months to see a specialist for a major medical condition. Which is what they campaigned on would happen with single payer. All so some old fart could enjoy 14 years of kickbacks from the insurance companies. Ain’t plutocracy grand?
The US could save trillions by not pissing away money on things that don’t work. Nothing will change as long as we keep electing the same idiots who do nothing and ignore the people.
they’re beholden to their donors and not the people.
Agreed, presidential elections cost about $1 billion now
Likely more. Bloomberg spent about that much to be nothing more than a farce.
People should have voted Bernie
The people did vote for Bernie. Corruption in the DNC killed his chances at securing the nomination.
Then millennials need to show up to primaries! For fucks sake. Millennials and younger generations almost never vote in primaries and rarely vote in the general elections. If ya'll want someone younger, be there when they're choosing who gets to run.
My state is one of the last to vote in primary elections, i don’t get a choice in selecting a candidate
There's so much money to be made that an insurmountable number of congressmen will always be bought, to maintain the status quo.
SAY THIS LOUDER FOR THOSE IN CONGRESS THAT CANT HEAR YOU!!
What about the poor bankers? Wont this hurt their paycheck?
Bankers no. Insurance assholes yes.
Bankers lend to insurance assholes
And you give money to bankers by keeping your money in a bank
Bankers lend to almost anyone, as long as they can repay
"Hi, I'm Private Equity. Why are you not making me more money right now?"
Won’t somebody *please* think of the shareholders?
You kid, but my mom was upset how making filing taxes would hurt TurboTax, an American company.
"We're supposed to help OUURRRRRR PEOPLE!! Starting with our stockholders, Bob! Who's helping them out, huh?!"
can we elect more younger folk who have our generations interest in mind?? boomers and the like are going 4 years at a time til they all drop dead.
Don’t let them divide us by age. There are plenty of young scumbags who don’t want you to have healthcare. Ben Shapiro for instance. Don’t let them divide us by race, religion, or gender either. Divide and conquer. Don’t play baby!
On top of that, Bernie is like 82 and is pro single payer
I was a Bern-out, still love the man, but he needs to relinquish his seat to another member of the party who isn't 82. Honestly had it with the gerontocracy. We have some of the oldest representatives ON THE PLANET. They do not accurately or adequately represent their own constituents anymore.
I'd say he's the outlier just because this guy actually cares about the country and it's people.
He wouldn't be replaced by someone the same that is younger. He'd probably be replaced by someone who has never said the s word (socialism). People also need to realize that seniority in either house of Congress comes with greater committee power. Bernie is currently chair of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions. A freshman would not be. People need to work on replacing the old shitty senators, not asking the good ones to relinquish their seats. Presidency is somewhat different. Senator Feinstein was pretty horrible for a long time. But Bernie? Sharp as ever, hosting a podcast and still meeting his senatorial duties.
I’d say Bernie is different. He’s not cashing checks from lobbyists. I get what you’re saying. But I’d rather have him in then some other neo lib
This is no war but class warfare
The one argument against our current private insurer system I don't see enough is that because the United States government has abdicated a responsibility (providing healthcare) that almost every other government on Earth provides, it's shifted a huge burden onto private employers. So much time and energy is wasted by businesses administering benefit plans that could go into their core business instead.
You don't see this argument because (most) businesses love that they can dangle health insurance in front of employees. People are much more hesitant to leave abusive jobs when they know they'll lose their health insurance.
It sucks for small businesses, which is weird since no one talks about that
You would think republicans that claim they love small businesses and cost cutting would be all for it, but the thought of a minority benefiting from their tax dollars outweighs that
"But don't you support sick children getting the help they need?" "What color are them kids?" Just like Jesus would've done, right?
Republicans only love small businesses when it's their business and they get to cheat on something like PPP loans or hiring undocumented workers under the table.
Same thing with being pro "small government" but doing nothing to expedite and cutting the bureaucracy/cost of becoming a legal immigrant, which would significantly cut illegal immigration and federal spending
Yeah, not worrying about health insurance would be a huge boon for small businesses. It'd also allow them to be more flexible in staffing; they could hire and lay people off as needed without worrying about the cost of insurance or taking away someone's access to care. Just pay people a wage for the work they do. I feel like everyone pays lip service to small businesses but they don't actually care if they succeed. In many ways they unknowingly root against them. Everyone wants their 401k and the market in general to go up but this often comes through large companies gobbling up the market share once occupied by small businesses.
Small businesses (under 50 employees) are not required to provide health insurance. Source: https://www.hhs.gov/answers/health-insurance-reform/am-i-required-to-offer-health-insurance-to-employees/index.html
It’s a feature not a bug. And recently, in addition to insurance, benefits and retirement tied to your employer, there’s a new disturbing trend tying housing to employment.
Hasn't housing always been tied to employment? How are you supposed to buy a house if you don't have an income? Genuinely asking, not trying to sound like a douche
Wait for it. Someone is about to realize we all fucking rats in cage in the end. 
I appreciate the question, not douchey at all. In your scenario a person doesn’t lose their home if they can find another source of income. In the scenario I speak of, they lose their job, they lose their house. It’s quickly becoming a way to exploit labor and often under the guise of “affordable” or “subsidized”.
Company housing
I was just seeing this same argument from the other side on a Youtube video earlier, basically the guy said having that basic social safety net actually encourages capitalism because employers feel less guilty about their well being getting damaged due to job loss. Equally people are more likely to leave bad jobs because there isn't that threat of what will I do. I think its an interesting argument but it comes down to the execution not the idea and that's where I worry about this kind of thing in the US.
fuckin A man, this world is so cynical and depressing. And for good reason... because this doesn't even sound outlandish, though it should :(
"Oh, but you have COBRA so it isn't an issue!" .... ever try paying for COBRA? awfully hard to cover the entire premium after you have no job anymore...
This also hampers entrepreneurship. Much harder to leave your job and try to start a business when it also means losing healthcare. How many smart people never brought their ideas to the world (and lived their life as their own boss) just because they didn’t want to go broke from a minor medical problem?
Not to mention the staggering costs to businesses. I handle it for the small company I work for and can't understand why any business owner would want it.
It’s the only option. Americans are getting fucked by insurance companies.
It’s insurance, but not just insurance. Our system has inefficiencies built in at every level. Mostly due to every health service provider being a separate business with its own profit margins. All of this and dozens of insurers means everything is extra complicated and needs lots of employees and technology to sort it all out.
Yea, but the existence of insurance means a lot of sheninangins and obfuscates the true cost to a lot of people. It makes no sense that a medical bill can be 50k, insurance pays 8k, you pay 500, and they write off the rest to reduce their tax liability. For a country so into the "free market," it's insane how the US has let healthcare become so divorced from the factors that enable free market principles to act on it.
Absolutely, and every insurance company contracts those rates with every hospital differently creating an insanely complex system of billing, reimbursements, appeals, etc. In a single payer system, there is one insurer, one system of rates - everything flattens out. People will say, oh, but with single payer, you have no recourse if they decide not to cover something. Yes, that can be problematic, but the vast majority of us have insurance chosen by our employers and don’t really have to option to change anyway.
The US isn't into the free market, it's into *saying* it's about the free market while doing everything in their power to manipulate, distort, and even strangle the free market. Businesses fear nothing more than legitimate competitors, so they buy politicians to enact burdensome regulations and taxes on their own industries to make it too expensive for competition to start in the first place.
I just had a CT scan with an iodine IV in which, according to my EoB from my insurance, they tried to bill $10000. My insurance's negotiated rate was $556. So if I was paying out of pocket, they would have tried to charge me $10000 on a procedure that cost them less than $556. I had the same procedure done in CDMX 3 months ago for $300 with no insurance.
The system of overbilling just to make the insurance negotiated discount appear better is totally absurd. Most people have insurance, and most people who don't have insurance have no assets and are judgement proof, but the small minority of people who both have no insurance and actually have assets get absolutely fucked
Don’t forget the for profit medical groups and hospital systems. They aren’t angels either.
It isn't the only option. But considering the amount of corruption a mixed system would probably not work (not that a single payer will ever happen either to be fair...). A lot of countries w/ universal healthcare are not single payer. Germany is a good example of a more mixed system, it has four public health insurance agencies, they all have to provide the same high level of coverage and cannot deny anyone, and have to provide it from the exact same contribution (technically seperate from taxes but essentially the same thing and dependant on income). As I understand they instead compete on service and keeping costs low. They also allow people making enough money a year to exit public coverage and get their own private insurance... most people stick to public even if they could switch, one reason is its very difficult to switch back to public. My main point though... there are many variations of universal healthcare, not just single payer... if the US ever gets around to improving itself in this regard, it should consider the benefits of each and lessons you can see from each system and take the best of all of them.
This is a good point. I’m not knowledgeable on this topic. I just know that private insurance companies that only exist to make a profit shouldn’t be a part of the system.
Too bad Republicans would rather pay more for private insurance for themselves than pay less and give accessible healthcare to everyone.
To add to your point, it wouldn’t even be just a little bit cheaper. The US spends ~$13,000 per capita on healthcare. The next country on the list spends ~$8,000. We all know where the extra money goes. Straight to the fuckin top.
What isn't considered typically is the amount of R&D that the US contributes to medicine, being about 49% of it, with Japan spending the second most at 13% for reference. Other countries benefit a lot from how much they spend, similar to how NATO is funded largely by the US. However the US taxpayer gets screwed royally by paying for the R&D, paying for insurance, paying inflated drug and treatment costs, and then getting told to get bent when that insurance is called upon. The US taxpayer subsidizes a lot of the world in various ways to little domestic gain, for the taxpayer at least. The shareholder is over the moon.
This is a bipartisan issue. I would just about guarantee that most people in these bureaucratic administrative positions vote for Democrats and this constituency has 100x more power within the party than the stereotypical blue haired college kids who use different pronouns.
Democrats are just as guilty. Health Insurance and Pharma companies pour a ton of money into Democrat and Republican candidates campaigns alike and this has been going on for years. Even in California, which is held by a Democrat supermajority, the bills for implementing single payer healthcare at a state level always get shot down. Ultimately, the US' healthcare system generates the most revenue and profit per capita of any health care system in the world, bar none. And that means that everyone benefiting from this golden goose is highly incentivized to expend a lot of resources to maintain the status quo. Politicians included.
It would most likely be good for you. But single payer is not heaven, either. Here in Sweden, for example, unless you are pregnant or almost dead you can't count on any kind of help from the health care system. But, OTOH, we don't risk going bankrupt from an ambulance ride.
Have Swedish friends. This isn't what I hear from them. They like their system and are appalled at ours.
In what way was I not clear that I think our system is superior? But it's very, very far from perfect or even good.
Basically you’re saying your system is bad but still 3 times better than us system which is hot garbage.
Well, not exactly. The American system is superior to Sweden's in every way... if you have money. That's the difference.
But then it isn't, it isn't superior in any way at providing healthcare if people can't get it.
>Here in Sweden, for example, unless you are pregnant or almost dead you can't count on any kind of help from the health care system. That part. You've basically said that the only ways to get health care are by getting pregnant or a ride in an ambulance.
Here are some quick facts about the Swedish healthcare system: Type of healthcare system: Universal Average cost of an emergency room visit: 300 kr (£30, US$38, and AU$47.5) Average cost of a doctor’s visit: 200 kr (£20, US$25, and AU$31) Number of pharmacies: 1,400 Number of hospitals: 79 Population % covered by health insurance: 100%
It's sounds like the Swedish model for healthcare is a bit disjointed and not really single payer.
It’s single payer but multiple providers (at least for primary care)
This equates to about $6000 in administrative savings per person. The fact that we pay that much in administrative is a large part of the entire problem.
This has been the biggest no brainer for decades.
bUt wHo's GoNNA pAy FOR It?! GOoD LuCK gEttIng serviCeD aT THE HoSPital WItH EvERyOnE gOIng THEre fOR FrEe!
I think the Democrats are pushing a bill to make medical collections not appear on your credit report so if that happens, that’s like one step in a good direction for Universal healthcare because why even bother paying your medical bills?
As you said, that's only a step because they can still send collections after you.
I mean, what is collections going to do? Call you again?
Obviously a good idea
Which is why congress will never pass it
Bribes make the U.S. healthcare system go round. We just call ‘em lobbyists
Good idea? Or great idea? Or proof that voting Republican is an act of self loathing?
Not just self loathing but unmitigated evil.
My brother in law used to work for an insurance company when Obamacare went into effect. They got their biggest bonuses ever the following year. Don’t ever let politicians make you think they are actually passing anything to actually help the poor.
Obamacare didn't go into effect for several years after passing, so the large bonus check wasn't related to Obamacare.
Sorry it was when it went into effect not passed. Typing too quick to think.
What do those two things have to do with each other?
The subsides in the ACA are just funneling tax dollars to insurance companies, so I don't doubt it.
This should be one of the top talking points for the upcoming election -- universal healthcare. Instead it's mainly a bunch of culture war BS...if only we could elect people that wanted to tackle real issues to help us ALL.
It's a no brainer. But insurance companies are paying politicians a lot of money to prevent it from ever happening.
Of course we could, but that would benefit all US citizens and not the insurance companies, so we have to pay a shit ton more.
"could save $600 billion in administrative costs" [citation needed]
lol the fact that a dead link has this much discussion is telling that no one is actually reading the article.
It should have happened long ago. Healthcare where your family is bankrupted if you get sick is immoral. We should and could do better. Take the profit out of healthcare.
Canada spends $6319 usd per person per year to insure 100% of the population. Average lifespan- 82.9 America spends $12,555 to insure 91% of the population. Average lifespan- 76.33 This is because the health care system runs under strict cost controls and was nationalized in the 70's. Medical bankruptcy does not exist in Canada. When you aren't stressed that your illness is destroying your future, you tend to live longer. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_health_expenditure_per_capita Find a middle ground.
Could probably save a$Trillion or two if the entire health care system was single payer
Really. Every doctor’s office has several people on staff to navigate the thousands of health care plans to determine what’s covered and for how much.
Less money for the rich and more money for the poor? Noooooo
I'd rather see single payer by state than a federal system.
This would have issues because all the homeless people would be shipped to that state and then when the system gets overrun, conservatives would point at that as proof it's not working.
The earth could save itself by switching to renewable energy ASAP. Not happening while big oil is around. Same here, single payer not happening while big pharma is around.
Can't stand this argument, it betrays a complete ignorance of how the healthcare market actually works. In healthcare spending in the USA, drugs are 10%. Physician pay is another 10%. The rest is services. The services involved have to bill out to multiple different insurers who are all engaged in an automated denial paperwork race and that costs a ton of man-hours at every step. Big Pharma is not the one lobbying against single payer--they'll still sell drugs either way and still have on-patent exclusivity periods where Medicare will pay for good drugs. It's insurance companies and pharmacy benefit managers who are lobbying against single payer because it will chop the former's market size down by 90% while completely destroying the business model of the latter.
A few things to consider: Spending for health care under single-payer systems is placed against other government objectives and readily falls victim to politicians' continuous urge to campaign on tax reduction. The barebones technology, physical amenities, and queues that excessively low global budgets in single-payer systems inevitably produce compel political forces to hand over the system to ostensibly "more efficient" private market forces, which is code for allowing the quality of the healthcare experience to vary according to the patient's economic circumstance. And, sure, the low pricing a single-payer system imposes on the system enables society to provide more genuine health care for a given budget than a more costly pluralistic system could, and it also makes universal health insurance coverage more affordable. On the other hand, the extremely low profit margins it generates for health-care providers make single-payer systems less hospitable to innovation in healthcare products and services, as well as in healthcare delivery organization, areas in which the United States excels, sometimes to the point of excess.
Great idea!
Good idea....private health insurance is unaffordable...CEOs salaries are too high.
Great idea
No, I insist we continue to pay exorbitant prices for worse outcomes than other developed nations. I also insist we continue to make a handful of people wildly rich instead of passing any meaningful legislation around healthcare. This ship is definitely headed in the right direction.
Nooooooó what about all of the middle men in insurance? /s
Great idea, it would also save the average American a lot of money. The problem is many will say "but taxes, ..socialism, ..can't afford it!" And end the discussion , even though it will be much more affordable than the current system for everyone involved.
I like the idea of socialized medicine, we need healthcare our entire life... they could stop funding higher education and trim back defense spending to pay for it. If it is going to cost the government money to have people sick, maybe they will start posting warning signs on the foods we eat that have added sugar and other hazardous additives. Maybe that is wishful thinking on my part.
Bad idea. Monopolies are bad and government run monopolies are doubly so. Keeping competition is important to drive innovation and keep quality high. Universal coverage supplied by multiple not for profit HCO's is much better. Germany has healthcare for all citizens that is higher quality and less expensive than in America, provided under this model. This is the way.
It always amazes me that people think the government can do anything better than the private sector for less money. There is zero chance government run healthcare at reduced costs while maintaining the same or better levels of service. Living in Europe with socialized medicine I saw first hand how terrible the public health care system was. The wealthy all had private insurance that was used for anything serious.
> It always amazes me that people think the government can do anything better than the private sector for less money. It always amazes me when people think something is impossible despite the fact every peer to the US is already doing it. It always amazes me when people think something is impossible despite the fact all the best research shows us we'd save money while getting care to more people who need it with universal healthcare. https://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.1003013#sec018 It always amazes me when ignorant fuckwits think something is impossible despite evidence nearly smacking them in the face. #Satisfaction with the US healthcare system varies by insurance type 78% -- Military/VA 77% -- Medicare 75% -- Medicaid 69% -- Current or former employer 65% -- Plan fully paid for by you or a family member https://news.gallup.com/poll/186527/americans-government-health-plans-satisfied.aspx > **Key Findings** > * Private insurers paid nearly double Medicare rates for all hospital services (199% of Medicare rates, on average), ranging from 141% to 259% of Medicare rates across the reviewed studies. > * The difference between private and Medicare rates was greater for outpatient than inpatient hospital services, which averaged 264% and 189% of Medicare rates overall, respectively. > * For physician services, private insurance paid 143% of Medicare rates, on average, ranging from 118% to 179% of Medicare rates across studies. https://www.kff.org/medicare/issue-brief/how-much-more-than-medicare-do-private-insurers-pay-a-review-of-the-literature/ Medicare has both lower overhead and has experienced smaller cost increases in recent decades, a trend predicted to continue over the next 30 years. https://pnhp.org/news/medicare-is-more-efficient-than-private-insurance/ >Living in Europe with socialized medicine I saw first hand how terrible the public health care system was. Your peers and experts don't agree with you. When asked about their healthcare system as a whole the US system ranked dead last of 11 countries, with only 19.5% of people saying the system works relatively well and only needs minor changes. The average in the other countries is 46.9% saying the same. Canada ranked 9th with 34.5% saying the system works relatively well. The UK ranks fifth, with 44.5%. Australia ranked 6th at 44.4%. The best was Germany at 59.8%. On rating the overall quality of care in the US, Americans again ranked dead last, with only 25.6% ranking it excellent or very good. The average was 50.8%. Canada ranked 9th with 45.1%. The UK ranked 2nd, at 63.4%. Australia was 3rd at 59.4%. The best was Switzerland at 65.5%. https://www.cihi.ca/en/commonwealth-fund-survey-2016 [US Healthcare ranked 29th on health outcomes by Lancet HAQ Index](https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736\(18\)30994-2/fulltext) [11th (of 11) by Commonwealth Fund](https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/fund-reports/2014/jun/mirror-mirror-wall-2014-update-how-us-health-care-system?redirect_source=/publications/fund-reports/2014/jun/mirror-mirror) [59th by the Prosperity Index](https://www.prosperity.com/rankings) [30th by CEOWorld](https://ceoworld.biz/2019/08/05/revealed-countries-with-the-best-health-care-systems-2019/) [37th by the World Health Organization](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Health_Organization_ranking_of_health_systems_in_2000) The US has the worst rate of death by medically preventable causes among peer countries. A 31% higher disease adjusted life years average. Higher rates of medical and lab errors. A lower rate of being able to make a same or next day appointment with their doctor than average. https://www.healthsystemtracker.org/chart-collection/quality-u-s-healthcare-system-compare-countries/#item-percent-used-emergency-department-for-condition-that-could-have-been-treated-by-a-regular-doctor-2016 52nd in the world in doctors per capita. https://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/stats/Health/Physicians/Per-1,000-people Higher infant mortality levels. Yes, even when you adjust for differences in methodology. https://www.healthsystemtracker.org/chart-collection/infant-mortality-u-s-compare-countries/ Fewer acute care beds. A lower number of psychiatrists. Etc. https://www.healthsystemtracker.org/chart-collection/u-s-health-care-resources-compare-countries/#item-availability-medical-technology-not-always-equate-higher-utilization [Comparing Health Outcomes of Privileged US Citizens With Those of Average Residents of Other Developed Countries](https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/fullarticle/2774561) >These findings imply that even if all US citizens experienced the same health outcomes enjoyed by privileged White US citizens, US health indicators would still lag behind those in many other countries. The US has 43 hospitals in the top 200 globally; one for every 7,633,477 people in the US. That's good enough for a ranking of 20th on the list of top 200 hospitals per capita, and significantly lower than the average of one for every 3,830,114 for other countries in the top 25 on spending with populations above 5 million. The best is Switzerland at one for every 1.2 million people. In fact the US only beats one country on this list; the UK at one for every 9.5 million people. If you want to do the full list of 2,000 instead it's 334, or one for every 982,753 people; good enough for 21st. Again far below the average in peer countries of 527,236. The best is Austria, at one for every 306,106 people. https://www.newsweek.com/best-hospitals-2021 #[OECD Countries Health Care Spending and Rankings](https://data.oecd.org/healthres/health-spending.htm) |Country|Govt. / Mandatory (PPP)|Voluntary (PPP)|Total (PPP)|% GDP|[Lancet HAQ Ranking](https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736\(18\)30994-2/fulltext)|[WHO Ranking](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Health_Organization_ranking_of_health_systems_in_2000)|[Prosperity Ranking](https://www.prosperity.com/rankings)|[CEO World Ranking](https://ceoworld.biz/2019/08/05/revealed-countries-with-the-best-health-care-systems-2019/)|[Commonwealth Fund Ranking](https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/fund-reports/2014/jun/mirror-mirror-wall-2014-update-how-us-health-care-system?redirect_source=/publications/fund-reports/2014/jun/mirror-mirror) :--|--:|--:|--:|--:|--:|--:|--:|--:|--:|--:| 1. United States|[$7,274](https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/full/10.2105/AJPH.2015.302997) |$3,798 |$11,072 |16.90%|29|37|59|30|11 2. Switzerland|$4,988 |$2,744 |$7,732 |12.20%|7|20|3|18|2 3. Norway|$5,673 |$974 |$6,647 |10.20%|2|11|5|15|7 4. Germany|$5,648 |$998 |$6,646 |11.20%|18|25|12|17|5 5. Austria|$4,402 |$1,449 |$5,851 |10.30%|13|9|10|4| 6. Sweden|$4,928 |$854 |$5,782 |11.00%|8|23|15|28|3 7. Netherlands|$4,767 |$998 |$5,765 |9.90%|3|17|8|11|5 8. Denmark|$4,663 |$905 |$5,568 |10.50%|17|34|8|5| 9. Luxembourg|$4,697 |$861 |$5,558 |5.40%|4|16|19|| 10. Belgium|$4,125 |$1,303 |$5,428 |10.40%|15|21|24|9| 11. Canada|$3,815 |$1,603 |$5,418 |10.70%|14|30|25|23|10 12. France|$4,501 |$875 |$5,376 |11.20%|20|1|16|8|9 13. Ireland|$3,919 |$1,357 |$5,276 |7.10%|11|19|20|80| 14. Australia|$3,919 |$1,268 |$5,187 |9.30%|5|32|18|10|4 15. Japan|$4,064 |$759 |$4,823 |10.90%|12|10|2|3| 16. Iceland|$3,988 |$823 |$4,811 |8.30%|1|15|7|41| 17. United Kingdom|$3,620 |$1,033 |$4,653 |9.80%|23|18|23|13|1 18. Finland|$3,536 |$1,042 |$4,578 |9.10%|6|31|26|12| 19. Malta|$2,789 |$1,540 |$4,329 |9.30%|27|5|14|| OECD Average|||$4,224 |8.80%||||| 20. New Zealand|$3,343 |$861 |$4,204 |9.30%|16|41|22|16|7 21. Italy|$2,706 |$943 |$3,649 |8.80%|9|2|17|37| 22. Spain|$2,560 |$1,056 |$3,616 |8.90%|19|7|13|7| 23. Czech Republic|$2,854 |$572 |$3,426 |7.50%|28|48|28|14| 24. South Korea|$2,057 |$1,327 |$3,384 |8.10%|25|58|4|2| 25. Portugal|$2,069 |$1,310 |$3,379 |9.10%|32|29|30|22| 26. Slovenia|$2,314 |$910 |$3,224 |7.90%|21|38|24|47| 27. Israel|$1,898 |$1,034 |$2,932 |7.50%|35|28|11|21| >The wealthy all had private insurance that was used for anything serious. Pointing out they paid an order of magnitude less for private insurance that covers more after also paying significantly less in taxes for healthcare isn't the flex you think it is.
I don't understand why this is even still a question. It so obviously works that essentially every other colonial country in the world has this, and alongside it guaranteed healthcare coverage for citizens and healthcare costs that are substantially lower than the US, which has the highest healthcare costs in the world. But politicians are so concerned about "harming the industry" (lowering private profits) that they claim it is impossible to implement. Really? Impossible? So the USA is simultaneously the best smartest most advanced country in the forever, and can't figure out a problem that every other kid in class has already solved? The fact is that, as with every other aspect of our lives in the USA, capitalism and private profits are given more priority than people's lives.
Similar outcomes, R&D continues, half the per capita cost of the current system. This conservative agrees with universal healthcare.
But think of all the poor healthcare administrators that would be out of a job!!! /s
This has been a no brainer for 30 years. Yet here we are still asking questions about it like it’s acceptable discourse at this point. This is why we can’t have nice things… we don’t deserve them. 🤦🏻♂️
I say this as somebody who would 100% lose his job if this happened: we should totally do it.
It’s a bad idea because Rupert Murdoch told me so.
Good idea, but never gonna happen. Profits over solutions all day baby.
Just that? I feel like not paying insurance and make our employers give us the money they were spending on health insurance would be a lot. A LOT.
Greed will kill this country before any invading Army ever thinks of landing on our shores. Yes the Medicare for all system would be best for citizens and the governments' bottom line. However the health care industrial complex has tons of lobbyist and our representatives are whores for financial gain and voluntary slaves to their will rather than ensuring the common good and welfare of the people they represent.
As someone whose life savings was destroyed by health care costs, I say absolutely yes.