MetallicaFan495

I agree with what your saying. I think one of the big things with healthcare is that people who make a certain income will 100% have healthcare cause they never have to worry about the cost, while people with lower incomes (who may work just as hard as the rich) cant seem to get healthcare and will be left to die in a hospital bed because of lack of payment. There is no justification for why this is fair, and it certainly needs to be changed. I would rather see everybody in america living comfortably, rather than seeing the rich prosper and poor suffer. Survival of the fittest seems logical to the people who dont even have to worry about it, but to me I would rather see everybody survive, rather than just the people who have money. Alot of people think that cause you make a lower income....that you dont work hard enough. That is complete bullshit and everybody knows it, and we all know at least one person who barely scraped by with payments but still work their asses off. The fact that we're required as humans to work to survive, why the hell shouldnt we be able to get healthcare if we get sick?

joebob4790

Although I don't agree with you, I thanked you for actually addressing the issue instead of calling me and anyone else not supporting universal health care right wing nuts, which is a very poor argument, and unfortunately, the reason why I, although conservative, do not like Fox News. Nor do I like CNN because they never come to any conclusions.. they just let people state their opinions and instead of letting the argument manifest itself, they say we gotta stop you there, and then show you a youtube video.

In response Pogo, I see what you're saying about Fed-Ex. Sure it passed on the difficult, not efficient routes. However, I fail to see how this translates into the educational system. Here is another example for you. NASA has nearly monopolized the space industry. If you want a satellite in space, you go through NASA. Is this because they are the most efficient, and best at the job? No. There are plenty (or at least a few) of private sector space industry companies out there. The reason people go through NASA is because they are willing to under bid, even to the point where they will lose money, the competition. This monopolization of the sector by the government is what I fear. If the government wants to offer a minimum, basic health care for a low price, I am fine with that, so long as the private sector doesn't become undermined and undercut by the government sector.

Plus, how is it that the United States government (and thus the United States tax payers) spend the nearly the most money on education, yet still is one of the worst countries to be educated in at the primary and secondary level? It is only logical to assume that this trend of ineptness will be carried into a Universal Health Care system.

Lastly, people often point to the UK and Canada for their evidence of a working Universal Health Care system. However this is somewhat flawed. Look at the population difference. The United States, as of October 20, 2009 (according to the Official USA population clock) had a population of 307,745,000. The UK, as of January 1, 2009 (according to a Eurostat estimate) had a population of 61,634,599, only twenty percent of the United States population. And Canada, the most often sited source of success, had a population (according to the Official Canadian Population Clock) of 33,817,000 as of October 20, 2009. This is only about eleven percent of the United States' total population. This means the United States has about a nine hundred and ten percent larger population or about 9.1 times the number of people. For every 100 canadians, we have 910. I don't believe the system these countries are using would be adequate for a nation of our size. Work in the already controversial issue of illegal immigration and how these folks would fit into the Universal Health Care system should it be implemented, and you can see that this idea, although good sounding (after all who can be against helping poor people), is generally flawed all around.

MrIMStoned

The only problem being that not everyone can afford private school or fedex. Do people deserve to die unnecessary deaths because they have less money than others?

__________________
"In the end the Party would announce that two and two made five, and you would have to believe it. It was inevitable that they should make that claim sooner or later: the logic of their position demanded it. Not merely the validity of experience, but the very existence of external reality, was tacitly denied by their philosophy. The heresy of heresies was common sense. And what was terrifying was not that they would kill you for thinking otherwise, but that they might be right. For, after all, how do we know that two and two make four? Or that the force of gravity works? Or that the past is unchangeable? If both the past and the external world exist only in the mind, and if the mind itself is controllable what then?"

MetallicaFan495

Absolutely not, everyone should be treated equal in the sense that we all have the same opportunities to succeed, but also that no ones stuck down in the dirt as hard as that person may work. No one should die from getting sick, technology has rapidly grown and we can cure at least 90% of sicknesses in the world. Hopefully soon it will 100% of sicknesses.

joebob4790

Firstly, Yana, I misunderstood your argument and A. thank you for clarifying what you meant, and B. I appreciate your use of the CPI and also appreciate you referencing the site you found it on. I will no longer be pushing the stamp argument.

Lack of health insurance does not equal death.

There are several different hospitals, usually religiously based and thus technically private, that forgive debts all the time. Some of these include the Order of St. Francis, St. Alexis, and the Alexian Brothers (these all exist in illinois where I am from). It is PUBLIC hospitals that refuse service, except in cases of an emergency, and when some one is unable to pay, they send your bill to a collection agency. This lowers your credit score and makes your economic life much more difficult until (if you ever can) pay back your debt. If public hospitals would take a lesson from certain private hospitals, then the universal health care plan would be pointless.


And who said death is bad? Is death not a part of life? I'm not saying make no attempt to save those who could be, but death need not have such a negative connotation.

MrIMStoned

A lack of health insurance does equal a higher mortality rate. Which is why I said unnecessary death.

I don't know what you're trying to say. Every hospital where I come from is private. It's the insurance that is public (by which I mean, provided by the government.)

This is an entirely different conversation. Wether death is good or bad, I cannot attest. What I can say is that most people don't want to find out.

joebob4790

Despite the fact that the hospitals you encounter are private, there are still public clinics that, like the private sector, cannot turn down patients in cases of emergencies. The differences lie in the fact that public clinics turn your bill, if you cannot afford to pay or are not covered, over to a collection agency. This in turn continuously lowers your credit score which can have serious effects on your economic life. Many private hospitals forgive this debt when it cannot be paid, a much better approach to the current problem of those in poverty than making a new system.

Like many socialist ideals, universal health care works best with a small population. A country of our size and money management skills would be poorly suited for such a system. A parallel to this is the socialist policies of a country the size of the USSR, and the early Mao Zedong Communist China. Both attempted to implement socialist ideas over a extraordinary population (China's new Communist regime is extraordinarily capitalistic, similar to the pure capitalism in America that existed during Rockefeller and Carnegie's reign). Socialism works best when you can identify with, know, or trust your fellow citizens. America is too diverse, too individualistic (aka the American Dream), and too skeptical of one another. I'm not saying all socialist ideas are bad, things like minimum wage help keep corporations from oppressing it's employees. If any universal health care system is created, it should be tested at a state level first. The federal government often lacks in its money management skills, and rarely get's things right the first time.

Herbania

FedeX doesn't deliver letters for under 50 cents though. Believe it or not, not everyone has the Internet.

__________________
Fighting fire with empty words While the banks get fat
And the poor stay poor And the rich get rich
And the cops get paid To look away
As the one percent rules America
-Queensryche

1956

True statements, but I am missing the point. ??????????

Herbania

People go on and on about how great fedex is, just in the statement you quoted even. But fedex charges a ton more and doesn't serve a all of the people. Part of the reason the postoffice has it's troubles is because it is forced to serve everyone and to keep the cost of a single letter down. So comparing Fedex to the post office is a straw man argument.