why are you against universal healthcare?

pjdude1219 said:
I have had a job. I intend to get one and currently pay federal taxes. Not some fancy high paying thing like you had. a real job that involved work. I would have gladly given my entire pay check universal healthcare.You know nothing of my reasons. Not having it cost me my cousin and yet you fucking presume to lecture me on the costs involved. You haven't the right. Tell me how much his life was worth to you? 200, 300 dollars? You talk about me supporting UHC because I wouldn't pay the cost and yet here I am having paid the cost for what you support; I think I paid a little more than you would have. You get to lecture me on this when you have to grieve over the human costs of what I believe. Until than go back to your ivory tower with your fine wines and caviar and quit shitting on every day americans.
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How many jobs - one? And I don't like wine and caviar AT ALL.

I'm sorry you lost your cousin - but it was hardly MY fault. I worked long and HARD - often more than 80 hours a week - to get what I have. The difference is that while I supported a wife and three kids and put myself through college at the same time, I *USED* my money wisely instead of blowing it like the average Jack/Jill/Pjdude. And I started with absolutely NO help from my family because they were as broke as I was when I left home and joined the Army the VERY day after I was graduated from high school.

So don't sing any hard-luck songs to me, Bub, unlike you, I worked for every penny I own.
 
read-only said:
This is NOT Australia, and as Americans we know full-well how our government would set it up here. There would be all manner of exclusions and conditions for treatment here along with TONS of read tape.
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If the US government cannot provide the standard first world industrial government services, then it's time for another government.

Would we accept no public roads, because the government would screw them up? No post office, because the government is incapable of delivering mail? No fire department? Police?

It's a presumption, this governmental incompetence peculiar to the US, that has brought us the most expensive and least comprehensive medical care in the first world. We actually have citizens dying in the street for lack of medical care routine in far poorer countries, because we cannot govern ourselves as well as other people can. I mean, that's what we ourselves say, right out front.

read-only said:
So don't sing any hard-luck songs to me, Bub, unlike you, I worked for every penny I own.
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Priorities are personal, of course, but if I had worked that hard, with no help from anyone except the people who paid for the army benefits and most of my college education and so forth, I think I would have better uses for 8 or 9 % of my income than preventing bums from seeing a doctor. Granted there's a certain satisfaction in denying the unworthy and the unlucky something they need, but that's kind of expensive - be cheaper to deny them the use of the sidewalks on alternate Wednesdays, wouldn't it?
 
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iceaura said:
If the US government cannot provide the standard first world industrial government services, then it's time for another government.

Would we accept no public roads, because the government would screw them up? No post office, because the government is incapable of delivering mail? No fire department? Police?

It's a presumption, this governmental incompetence peculiar to the US, that has brought us the most expensive and least comprehensive medical care in the first world. We actually have citizens dying in the street for lack of medical care routine in far poorer countries, apparently because we cannot govern ourselves as well as other people can.
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All I can tell you is just hang on and see WHAT you wind up with. My prediction is that you will be very, very disappointed.
 
read said:
All I can tell you is just hang on and see WHAT you wind up with. My prediction is that you will be very, very disappointed.
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I'm already disappointed. What I won't be is surprised.

I watched the core political body of my country, the demographic center of its nature and governance - the white male jobholding population between 30 and 60 - control the successive federal and state governments of the Reagan era (1981 - 2010 and counting), and what they haven't learned from that experience they never will.

They voted for John McCain and Sarah Palin, in 2008. These men, my fellow citizens, the best and the brightest, couldn't govern a county fair.
 
navigator said:
Ok lets walk through it.

The study you linked said there were 30 million uninsured. The census shows 17 million of the uninsured make $50k+.

17/30=56%
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study? I linked to the opinion pages of the nation. and if your going to use your sources number for uninsured why don't you use their number of total uninsured. around 47 million.
 
iceaura said:
Priorities are personal, of course, but if I had worked that hard, with no help from anyone except the people who paid for the army benefits and most of my college education and so forth, I think I would have better uses for 8 or 9 % of my income than preventing bums from seeing a doctor. Granted there's a certain satisfaction in denying the unworthy and the unlucky something they need, but that's kind of expensive - be cheaper to deny them the use of the sidewalks on alternate Wednesdays, wouldn't it?
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Nice try at zooming off on a tangent - but NO cigar!

8 or 9%? I'm ALREADY paying FAR above that. As I told pjdude earlier, my federal tax last year was just over $200,000. And I'm sure that at least some of that money (and the money from others like me) went to assist the "unlucky and unworthy" (as you call them - not me) through various "entitlement programs."

You really need to move into the realm of reality and stop attempting to use such absurd examples to support your unsupportable agenda against a few people who have a little money.
 
There's too much government control, an economy and a health care system functions better without the government dictating how things should be run. Our government is full of stupid people who think they understand the economy. The government should be more like a watchdog, make sure no one comes to kill us and make sure we don't kill each other.
 
read said:
8 or 9%? I'm ALREADY paying FAR above that
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You misunderstand:

That's the percentage you are paying on top of what first class first world health care costs for universal coverage, to deny coverage to the undeserving in your view.

That's the extra, on top of what you are paying out for actual health care received by yourself and the others you pay for, that you pay out to deny and ration coverage to others.

If you simply covered the entire population of the US with a single payer system of standard first world quality, using any of the several standard European or other comparable arrangements, you would have about that much extra of your gross available for other expenditures or whatever.

This is quite puzzling, from an outsider's perspective. But your fellow Americans understand.
 
pjdude1219 said:
study? I linked to the opinion pages of the nation. and if your going to use your sources number for uninsured why don't you use their number of total uninsured. around 47 million.
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You only get 47 million if you include illegal aliens. And President Obama specifically said illegal aliens wouldn't be covered. Remember, that's what prompted thet rude Republican to yell, "LIar!"?
 
Try Again said:
There's too much government control, an economy and a health care system functions better without the government dictating how things should be run. Our government is full of stupid people who think they understand the economy. The government should be more like a watchdog, make sure no one comes to kill us and make sure we don't kill each other.
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Why is health care where you draw the line, and not all the other government agencies and services that most people depend on these days? Even if you think government should be limited, I would think an exception could be made for saving the lives of our citizens.
 
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iceaura said:
If you simply covered the entire population of the US with a single payer system of standard first world quality, using any of the several standard European or other comparable arrangements, you would have about that much extra of your gross available for other expenditures or whatever.
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I'd like to see some hard, reliable source to confirm that claim.
 
madanthonywayne said:
You only get 47 million if you include illegal aliens. And President Obama specifically said illegal aliens wouldn't be covered. Remember, that's what prompted thet rude Republican to yell, "LIar!"?
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I think you are missing the point. This is not about universal coverage. It is about cost reduction and reigning in federal spending. The solution to healthcare in the US have been for the federal governement to step in and pay for it since it has not been affordable for average Americans for some time now. So as time passes the federal government is increasingly on the hook for healthcare cost. It simply cannot continue.

We have to have a more efficient way of delivering healthcare in this country. Other industrialized countries have a much more efficient and effective delivery system. If we are smart and if we kick out the influences of special interests we will copy the more efficient systems reducing healthcare expenses from 17 percent of our economy to something more in line with other industial countries (8-9 percent) of GDP.

Further with healthcare costs so out of line, it is an impediment to trade. It adds to the level of taxation and to the costs of goods and services produced in this country. It is indeed a sad state of affairs. And it is a matter of now or latter. Would we like to address it now and save us some expense or would we like to let if fester a bit longer and pay more? I choose lets deal with it now. If universal healthcare is a byproduct so be it. The bottom line is we need to get our healthcare expenses in line with that of other countries. We need a better more efficient form of healthcare delivery in the US. It is time to wake up and deal with the problem.
 
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joepistole said:
I think you are missing the point. This is not about universal coverage. It is about cost reduction and reigning in federal spending. The solution to healthcare in the US have been for the federal governement to step in and pay for it since it has not been affordable for average Americans for some time now. So as time passes the federal government is increasingly on the hook for healthcare cost. It simply cannot continue.

We have to have a more efficient way of delivering healthcare in this country. Other industrialized countries have a much more efficient and effective delivery system. If we are smart and if we kick out the influences of special interests we will copy the more efficient systems reducing healthcare expenses from 17 percent of our economy to something more in line with other industial countries (8-9 percent) of GDP.

Further with healthcare costs so out of line, it is an impediment to trade. It adds to the level of taxation and to the costs of goods and services produced in this country. It is indeed a sad state of affairs. And it is a matter of now or latter. Would we like to address it now and save us some expense or would we like to let if fester a bit longer and pay more? I choose lets deal with it now. If universal healthcare is a byproduct so be it. The bottom line is we need to get our healthcare expenses in line with that of other countries. We need a better more efficient form of healthcare delivery in the US. It is time to wake up and deal with the problem.
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OK, I think I can buy into that thought. So for starters, can anyone put the actual numbers to where all the current health care (private and government) dollars go?

For instance:

Insurance
Hospitals
Doctors
Drugs
Assisted Living
etc.
 
Read-Only said:
OK, I think I can buy into that thought. So for starters, can anyone put the actual numbers to where all the current health care (private and government) dollars go?

For instance:

Insurance
Hospitals
Doctors
Drugs
Assisted Living
etc.
Click to expand...

Read only, i cant find them right now due to how slow this computer is being but if you search you can find the OECD figures for health expenditure. It actually shows that as goverment expenditure goes up as a percentage of total health expenditure total expenditure comes down (for the same level of treatment). Now the problem the US faces is that you ignore private expenditure compleatly when in reality it is putting a HUGE burden on the countries economy even if not a single tax $ is spent.

Why?
because it forces up wages and expenses and there for drives up inflation which further increases buiness costs and there for consumer goods which FURTHER fuels wage rises ect ect. By shifting it to the public purse and making it a tax expenditure you can cap the inflationary effects by driving profit motives out of health care. I constantly hear US citizans complaing that public servants cause increased costs but the same points compleatly ignore the section of expenditure which has to be set asside currently for profit (so that would be what? 45%?). Even when dealing with companies (such as pharmacutical companies) if its goverment paying the bill then there is a huge DOWNWARD pressure on price because the orders are so large and the companies know that if they push prices to high then the goverment can just go elsewhere for the same drugs. Inderviduals just dont have that sort of buying power.

Further more there is the increased costs to buiness (and other tax payers) to a) pay for nessary tax increases to increase social programs for people who are unable to work because of illness and injuries that should be easerly treated but arnt because of the massive costs on those inderviduals and b) the direct loss of prodivity caused by those losses either for long periods of time or even permidently caused by poor health in the workforce because the inderviduals cant afford proper treatment and there for "solder on".

These translate both to higher taxes and higher costs for consumer goods because of the higher taxes AND the loss of productivity both of which then fuel inflation.

So the community already pays for the fact that you have higher costs and there for poorer health but rather than this expenditure going towards FIXING the problem, insted it just bandaids the social problems if that.
 
Asguard said:
Read only, i cant find them right now due to how slow this computer is being but if you search you can find the OECD figures for health expenditure. It actually shows that as goverment expenditure goes up as a percentage of total health expenditure total expenditure comes down (for the same level of treatment). Now the problem the US faces is that you ignore private expenditure compleatly when in reality it is putting a HUGE burden on the countries economy even if not a single tax $ is spent.
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That sounds more like crowding out.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crowding_out_(economics)
 
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