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read and quoted as I went through...
On June 22 2011 05:41 Bibdy wrote:Show nested quote +On June 22 2011 05:33 Treemonkeys wrote:On June 22 2011 05:32 Bibdy wrote:On June 22 2011 05:23 Nightfly wrote:On June 22 2011 05:18 Bibdy wrote:On June 22 2011 05:10 Nightfly wrote:On June 22 2011 04:51 Bibdy wrote:On June 22 2011 04:45 Nero. wrote:
i dont get why americans are trying so hard to not get a statutory health insurance system.
In most of Europe we have it for such a long time and nobody here is walking around in chains or lost their freedom because of it
it just feels like the states act very "medieval" about this topic
Because America, being the beacon of capitalism, has this propensity to believe that EVERYTHING should be run by private organizations, rather than the government. They don't take the time to realize that when you take an industry like healthcare and put it in the hands of financiers, accountants, corporations and general bean-counters who's only concern is profitability, you've completely eliminated humanity and compassion from the equation. Capitalism works great when you've got products/services to sell. Not so great when someone's livelihood is on the line. rofl. dont you need food as well to survive? can you buy food from CORPORATIONS or do you need it provided by your friendly government? True, but its not likely that I will suddenly run out of food out of events that are entirely beyond my control (or if I did, we just got hit by a big fuckoff natural disaster and everyone else did as well, so we're in the same boat together). If some douchebag runs a red light and puts me in hospital, the situation suddenly boils down to how much money I should pay to fix a problem caused by some other asshole. What's wrong with society pooling together to help its least fortunate? I don't see why people should be penalized just for being unlucky enough to get caught in an accident. We're really that terrified of that 1% of douchebags in society that will try to scam the system, to lift a finger to help the rest? Call me crazy, but when a small handful of assholes at high school abused the school gym equipment, causing them to disallow anyone else to use it unsupervised, I thought that was completely bullshit. nothing wrong with that. what's wrong with me coming up to you with a gun and forcing you to pay my hospital bill? What does that have to do with literally anything we're discussing here? ...that is effectively how "government funded" healthcare works. Oh, so there's nothing wrong with a socialized healthcare system, except that we have to hand over control to someone else in order to organize such a thing on a scale large enough to manage nearly 400 million people. How do you propose we set one up them? Leave it to the individual states to manage? If that's the case, I'm curious what instills more faith in state government than federal government?
On June 22 2011 05:16 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On June 22 2011 05:08 On_Slaught wrote:
Didn't take long for this to turn into a US bashing thread. Is this a sad reality? Yes. Is EU style healthcare workable in a country the size of the US? Lol. Are there worse things that could happen? Yes.
Sadly we are a long ways from having a workable health care system that doesn't cause prices to rise. The EU is bigger than the US. Of course we're broken up into dozens of smaller countries which do things their own way but equally you guys are a federal state. The current system is broken, I think everyone can agree on that. It is neither free market nor public and the deep divisions and prejudices within American society keep it broken. End of the day, the problem is with the American people and their ability to cripple politician's attempts to fix it. That's not US bashing.
The primary reason of doing it at the state rather than federal level is the fact that there's a bit of a divide in the states when it comes to government involvement. There are some states that would go kicking and screaming against a federal healthcare program, while others would welcome it with open arms. So the idea is everyone ends up happy when the federal government has little say, then the states can screw themselves up however they want. If their programs fail, they would be highly incentivised to try the other option(s).
I'm a strong believer in States' Rights, and think the federal government should have less of a say in individual state economies, and in general focus on foreign policy and maintaining a military(but not as the World Police, but that's a story for another thread). This is probably based off the amount of corruption at the federal level. I'm not saying there's no corruption at the State level of government, but there's far less corruption in this field, and thus, more secure.(at least, here in Idaho. I know there's some very bad areas, such as Chicago Politics, but I have little knowledge about it)
On June 22 2011 18:13 Aoi SCV wrote:
I would not be alive if it wasn't for "socialist healthcare". I would never have been able to afford a health insurance given the number of problems I have had.
Just one of my treatments costed about 3k dollars every month (out of which I had to pay about 300 dollars a year).
Today I am a healthy and contributing member of society, I hope my tax money can help to pay for someone else's health care. I would like to think that society as a whole has profited off of the investment they did in supplying health care to me.
On June 22 2011 17:35 snotboogie wrote:Show nested quote +On June 22 2011 16:08 Geolich wrote:
what a joke of a country america is
i cannot fathom how people can be so heartless to say 'well its his problem, why should i pay for it'
what sort of attitude is this? i mean some idiot earlier compared this to paying for his neighbours tire when it goes flat after driving over glass. are you fucking serious?
give me my tax bracket system up to 49% or 50% such as we have in australia so that citizens do not have to be without necessities such as healthcare. Seriously, this thread makes me so thankful to be an Australian citizen. I just don't understand why America's system is the way it is. They've bought into the ideology of capitalism so much that it's now overruling basic neighbourly love and compassion. So sad that things are the way they are.
I think this is interesting. Americans are the most charitable people on Earth. However, we are (mostly) vehemently against using taxation and the federal government as a form of charity for our own interests(i.e. advancing/modernizing our welfare state). We like to give, but we refuse to be forced to give.
Meanwhile, in other European countries and Australia & New Zealand, you have people who are proud to pay their taxes, knowing it's going to something to better the collective. Perhaps it's an ideological perspective? Americans(believing in individualism) give to other individuals, while Europeans(believing in collectivism) give to the collective? Tax rates are the minimum tax, but few in the USA ever offer more than what is necessary. Is it like that in Europe as well, or do people often offer more of their income?
If the federal government was the most efficient, national charity in existence, I'm sure you'd see more Americans invest in it. But with the current wars, the bureaucratic nightmare, the heavy levels of lobbying and corporatism, divisiveness in the 2-coalition party system, and generally inefficient federal work(They can't even run a Postal Service, let alone a single payer system for the elderly- why should I trust them to have the competence to run a truly universal healthcare program?), I honestly think it'd be easier to weaken the beast of government and use private means, both non-profit and for-profit, than to attempt to tame that beast. Social programs produced by State governments would be more efficient, and easier to implement since you wouldn't have an as broad political landscape to appease. An exaggerated comparison would be having the EU Parliament run every EU member state's economy and social programs. Would a German want Greece to have a voice on their fiscal policy? Likewise, would a Texan want California to have a voice on their fiscal policy?
I wouldn't consider myself very experienced in this field, so please correct me if I've got anything wrong.
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On June 23 2011 06:27 Iodem wrote:read and quoted as I went through... Show nested quote +On June 22 2011 05:41 Bibdy wrote:On June 22 2011 05:33 Treemonkeys wrote:On June 22 2011 05:32 Bibdy wrote:On June 22 2011 05:23 Nightfly wrote:On June 22 2011 05:18 Bibdy wrote:On June 22 2011 05:10 Nightfly wrote:On June 22 2011 04:51 Bibdy wrote:On June 22 2011 04:45 Nero. wrote:
i dont get why americans are trying so hard to not get a statutory health insurance system.
In most of Europe we have it for such a long time and nobody here is walking around in chains or lost their freedom because of it
it just feels like the states act very "medieval" about this topic
Because America, being the beacon of capitalism, has this propensity to believe that EVERYTHING should be run by private organizations, rather than the government. They don't take the time to realize that when you take an industry like healthcare and put it in the hands of financiers, accountants, corporations and general bean-counters who's only concern is profitability, you've completely eliminated humanity and compassion from the equation. Capitalism works great when you've got products/services to sell. Not so great when someone's livelihood is on the line. rofl. dont you need food as well to survive? can you buy food from CORPORATIONS or do you need it provided by your friendly government? True, but its not likely that I will suddenly run out of food out of events that are entirely beyond my control (or if I did, we just got hit by a big fuckoff natural disaster and everyone else did as well, so we're in the same boat together). If some douchebag runs a red light and puts me in hospital, the situation suddenly boils down to how much money I should pay to fix a problem caused by some other asshole. What's wrong with society pooling together to help its least fortunate? I don't see why people should be penalized just for being unlucky enough to get caught in an accident. We're really that terrified of that 1% of douchebags in society that will try to scam the system, to lift a finger to help the rest? Call me crazy, but when a small handful of assholes at high school abused the school gym equipment, causing them to disallow anyone else to use it unsupervised, I thought that was completely bullshit. nothing wrong with that. what's wrong with me coming up to you with a gun and forcing you to pay my hospital bill? What does that have to do with literally anything we're discussing here? ...that is effectively how "government funded" healthcare works. Oh, so there's nothing wrong with a socialized healthcare system, except that we have to hand over control to someone else in order to organize such a thing on a scale large enough to manage nearly 400 million people. How do you propose we set one up them? Leave it to the individual states to manage? If that's the case, I'm curious what instills more faith in state government than federal government? Show nested quote +On June 22 2011 05:16 KwarK wrote:On June 22 2011 05:08 On_Slaught wrote:
Didn't take long for this to turn into a US bashing thread. Is this a sad reality? Yes. Is EU style healthcare workable in a country the size of the US? Lol. Are there worse things that could happen? Yes.
Sadly we are a long ways from having a workable health care system that doesn't cause prices to rise. The EU is bigger than the US. Of course we're broken up into dozens of smaller countries which do things their own way but equally you guys are a federal state. The current system is broken, I think everyone can agree on that. It is neither free market nor public and the deep divisions and prejudices within American society keep it broken. End of the day, the problem is with the American people and their ability to cripple politician's attempts to fix it. That's not US bashing. The primary reason of doing it at the state rather than federal level is the fact that there's a bit of a divide in the states when it comes to government involvement. There are some states that would go kicking and screaming against a federal healthcare program, while others would welcome it with open arms. So the idea is everyone ends up happy when the federal government has little say, then the states can screw themselves up however they want. If their programs fail, they would be highly incentivised to try the other option(s). I'm a strong believer in States' Rights, and think the federal government should have less of a say in individual state economies, and in general focus on foreign policy and maintaining a military(but not as the World Police, but that's a story for another thread). This is probably based off the amount of corruption at the federal level. I'm not saying there's no corruption at the State level of government, but there's far less corruption in this field, and thus, more secure.(at least, here in Idaho. I know there's some very bad areas, such as Chicago Politics, but I have little knowledge about it) Show nested quote +On June 22 2011 18:13 Aoi SCV wrote:
I would not be alive if it wasn't for "socialist healthcare". I would never have been able to afford a health insurance given the number of problems I have had.
Just one of my treatments costed about 3k dollars every month (out of which I had to pay about 300 dollars a year).
Today I am a healthy and contributing member of society, I hope my tax money can help to pay for someone else's health care. I would like to think that society as a whole has profited off of the investment they did in supplying health care to me. Show nested quote +On June 22 2011 17:35 snotboogie wrote:On June 22 2011 16:08 Geolich wrote:
what a joke of a country america is
i cannot fathom how people can be so heartless to say 'well its his problem, why should i pay for it'
what sort of attitude is this? i mean some idiot earlier compared this to paying for his neighbours tire when it goes flat after driving over glass. are you fucking serious?
give me my tax bracket system up to 49% or 50% such as we have in australia so that citizens do not have to be without necessities such as healthcare. Seriously, this thread makes me so thankful to be an Australian citizen. I just don't understand why America's system is the way it is. They've bought into the ideology of capitalism so much that it's now overruling basic neighbourly love and compassion. So sad that things are the way they are. I think this is interesting. Americans are the most charitable people on Earth. However, we are (mostly) vehemently against using taxation and the federal government as a form of charity for our own interests(i.e. advancing/modernizing our welfare state). We like to give, but we refuse to be forced to give. Meanwhile, in other European countries and Australia & New Zealand, you have people who are proud to pay their taxes, knowing it's going to something to better the collective. Perhaps it's an ideological perspective? Americans(believing in individualism) give to other individuals, while Europeans(believing in collectivism) give to the collective? Tax rates are the minimum tax, but few in the USA ever offer more than what is necessary. Is it like that in Europe as well, or do people often offer more of their income? If the federal government was the most efficient, national charity in existence, I'm sure you'd see more Americans invest in it. But with the current wars, the bureaucratic nightmare, the heavy levels of lobbying and corporatism, divisiveness in the 2-coalition party system, and generally inefficient federal work(They can't even run a Postal Service, let alone a single payer system for the elderly- why should I trust them to have the competence to run a truly universal healthcare program?), I honestly think it'd be easier to weaken the beast of government and use private means, both non-profit and for-profit, than to attempt to tame that beast. Social programs produced by State governments would be more efficient, and easier to implement since you wouldn't have an as broad political landscape to appease. An exaggerated comparison would be having the EU Parliament run every EU member state's economy and social programs. Would a German want Greece to have a voice on their fiscal policy? Likewise, would a Texan want California to have a voice on their fiscal policy? I wouldn't consider myself very experienced in this field, so please correct me if I've got anything wrong.
Agree with you completely. To add-on to that, at least the States can't print their own money and add to the inflation. The Federal government needs to be stripped of most of its power, tons of taxes shouldn't even be in existence. Tons of regulations shouldn't be in existence. Tons of things that are currently funded by the government have no economical right to exist, especially not in the situation we're in right now.
Obama has no idea on how economics works. Public health-care is definitely not the most efficient way to go about things especially nation-wide health-care given the amount of bureaucracy. As of right now every single dollar that goes to the government for ANY purpose, I don't even care if it's for saving innocent kids from burning buildings is a dollar wasted, and I hate how foreigners from other places come into these threads not understanding American politics at all come in and say that our Federal government doesn't do enough, and that our people are moral-less, because some of them (those that aren't ignorant and lazy) don't want to give our government money, as if it's some kind of magical treasury box into which if you put enough of your hard-earned money, good things will happen to you, and all evils will be warded off.
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Sanya12364 Posts
On June 23 2011 03:31 SolidusR wrote:Show nested quote +On June 23 2011 03:27 TanGeng wrote:Yeah, it's the billionaires vs the rest of us. But when pols say tax the rich, they don't mean billionaires. They mean the people making 150k-300k a year. The solution that you want is more government which is also precisely the apparatus that those billionaires have total control over. So the solution is to take government out of the picture and let the wealthy have completely free reign over the people? What a joke. The state is the best chance we have. Saying I want "more government" is a really lazy thing to say, I want well regulated government and a fairer tax system. "More government" could mean literally anything.
What "universal health care" by the federal government is vesting more power in the very institution and political machines that the billionaires use to stick it to the rest of the population. You tell me what that will accomplish.
If you say government reform first, then do that first. When we see a good track record of it working, then I'd give the argument a little bit more credibility. If state under its current structure is the "best chance" we got, may god help us all.
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Sanya12364 Posts
On June 23 2011 03:30 The KY wrote:
Assuming public schools = bad schools? Mine was ok. Oh sorry, anecdotal evidence again.
Regardless, the obvious problem with people paying for their own kids is that the poor are forced to send their kids to the lower quality schools. Goodbye social mobility.
That would also assume that schools in poor districts and rich districts are the same quality, and that by living in a poor area, they aren't going to get a worse education. Separate but equal? Hardly.
Many inner city public schools in poor areas of US are terrible. In some cases, the kids would be better off not going to school because of the degree to which education system is disastrously run. In extreme cases, it can resemble a 6 hour jail term every weekday for children.
Anyone who lives in these districts send their children to private school or moves to a different school district. Case in point, Obama sends his children to private school rather than weather the DC school system. The only people who can't run away from these awful school systems in the US are the poor. If there is any cause for poor income mobility, it's because of the terrible inner city public education. And people have every right to complain about the terrible school systems.
The same is true for the police departments in such districts. Because of the drug war and crime, the cops view the residents of their districts as subjects to be subdued into submission rather than people who they are accountable to and who the are in charge of protecting. "Black people don't trust police officers?" I reckon they have every right not to trust them.
On June 23 2011 05:29 smokeyhoodoo wrote:
If we had a free market this wouldn't be a problem.
It's not as much a problem of a lack of free market as it is too expensive and risky for doctors to help this guy free of charge.
Under the current legal climate in US, there is either too much red tape or too much liability risk associated with helping someone who can't pay. The legal system is strangling the charitable spirit of doctors.
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On June 23 2011 08:36 TanGeng wrote:Show nested quote +On June 23 2011 03:30 The KY wrote:
If we had a free market this wouldn't be a problem.
It's not as much a problem of a lack of free market as it is too expensive and risky for doctors to help this guy free of charge. Under the current legal climate in US, there is either too much red tape or too much liability risk associated with helping someone who can't pay. The legal system is strangling the charitable spirit of doctors.
Could you explain this further? I'm not trying to argue, just kind of ignorant on this topic so I would like some further reading from you or outside sources.
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On June 23 2011 03:18 natabata wrote:
i would have done the same thing myself, dont lots of homeless do it for food?
Yep, although generally more for shelter in bad weather conditions for food. 2 hots and a cot is pretty well known in the corrective system. They generally roll up to a 7-11 / rite aid / cvs and ask for cigerettes and not pay and hang out outside until the police get there.
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On June 23 2011 08:36 TanGeng wrote:Show nested quote +On June 23 2011 03:30 The KY wrote:
Assuming public schools = bad schools? Mine was ok. Oh sorry, anecdotal evidence again.
Regardless, the obvious problem with people paying for their own kids is that the poor are forced to send their kids to the lower quality schools. Goodbye social mobility. That would also assume that schools in poor districts and rich districts are the same quality, and that by living in a poor area, they aren't going to get a worse education. Separate but equal? Hardly. Many inner city public schools in poor areas of US are terrible. In some cases, the kids would be better off not going to school because of the degree to which education system is disastrously run. In extreme cases, it can resemble a 6 hour jail term every weekday for children. Anyone who lives in these districts send their children to private school or moves to a different school district. Case in point, Obama sends his children to private school rather than weather the DC school system. The only people who can't run away from these awful school systems in the US are the poor. If there is any cause for poor income mobility, it's because of the terrible inner city public education. And people have every right to complain about the terrible school systems. The same is true for the police departments in such districts. Because of the drug war and crime, the cops view the residents of their districts as subjects to be subdued into submission rather than people who they are accountable to and who the are in charge of protecting. "Black people don't trust police officers?" I reckon they have every right not to trust them. Show nested quote +On June 23 2011 05:29 smokeyhoodoo wrote:
If we had a free market this wouldn't be a problem.
It's not as much a problem of a lack of free market as it is too expensive and risky for doctors to help this guy free of charge. Under the current legal climate in US, there is either too much red tape or too much liability risk associated with helping someone who can't pay. The legal system is strangling the charitable spirit of doctors.
Yeah, agreed with you as well. When people argue for public healthcare like a lot of people here do they point to the current healthcare system which isn't really public, and they say, if this is capitalism and it's supposed to drive the prices down how come healthcare is so unaffordable? Obviously the common people are just being screwed by corporations, because healthcare is "essential" and so its cost can be jacked up as high as you want.
But this is wrong, people need to look at the $'s being made to see who's getting screwed by who? Are the doctors screwing the patients/insurance companies? Sure they make a lot, but you have to consider that they are already getting screwed by the enormous loans that they have, that are almost completely necessary nowadays in order to be able to make it through college and especially med-school (blame the inflation and guaranteed student loans for such high tuitions.)
Then there's the pharmaceutical companies that are offering bribes to medical facilities in order to use their drugs which are often times more expensive. But it's the doctors that stick their necks out to accept this. But then you gotta look at who creates the regulations for the work of these companies and the type of both risks and rewards that are artificially manufactured by the regulations that result from the public sector researchers. There's way more room for corruption, and bureaucratic money sinks in the relationship between the government regulators and the pharmaceutical companies than between pharmaceutical companies and the hospitals/clinics/doctors.
That's where all the money ends up getting stuck, there and the civil courts given how everyone sues everyone else left and right.
People say insurance is expensive... It's really not. Insurance is simply a guarantee for you to receive medical treatment, it can only be expensive relative to how much the medical treatment costs... So look at how much money the insurance companies are making... not all that much. It's not the insurance that's expensive, it's the actual medical treatment that's expensive right now, and why is it so expensive? The reasons listed above and then some, it's a complicated process, but in general wherever the government tries to lay down their regulations they create bureaucratic sinkholes, through which most of the consumers' cash falls into the lap of those whom the government arbitrarily puts in these overseeing positions of power.
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