Health care outside the U.S.

[Trevor]

[QUOTE=svxistentialist;613224
With the social security model, we get shouldered with a bureaucratic civil service quango that is self serving and inefficient. We get treatment delays but excellent treatment. We get 5 managers for every 1 nurse.

Plenty of room for improvement with both types I reckon.

Joe[/QUOTE]


Kia ora Joe,

We have voted in a right leaning government, who have promised to tidy up this very problem. We shall see.

Nga mihi nui, Trevor.

[Subie59]

For the Americans who say 13 per cent is too much and they could get a gold wheelchair for that price. what you don't understand is that in the US, once you start using the system, the HMOs start to increase your insurance and if you happen to get seriously ill, (and chances are you or a family member will over the course of your life) they will cut you off. That can be devastating. When I was 30 years old, I may have thought the same thing. Never been ill, never needed the healthcare system. But that is a false sense of security. The chances of you or a family member getting ill or getting into a serious accident is pretty good. When that happens, the chances of you losing everything is even better. It's why medical emergencies are the primary cause of bankruptcy in the US.

[lhopp77]

You are NOT paying only 13% as you say now. Previously you said that the employer also pays 10%, so in reality you are paying 23%. True, out of your pocket, it is 13%, but the other 10% is spread around everyone that buys goods or services. Companies don't pay the taxes--the customers do. Sooooo........its a very expensive system.

Our unemployment rate is just under 10%. Socialists programs such as this will only increase the percentage over time. Why work, when the government will meet your basic needs to include health insurance?? Heathcare is NOT the only socialistic program being planned by this administration.

Again, I go back to my local pub experience where a patron thought that I should pay for his health insurance, but he admitted that his bar bill was over $1000 per month.

Lee

[svxistentialist]

Originally Posted by lhopp77

Again, I go back to my local pub experience where a patron thought that I should pay for his health insurance, but he admitted that his bar bill was over $1000 per month.

Lee

Ha ha ha.

Hey, we got those guys over here too Lee, in fact, we might have invented them.

I didn't say only or merely 13%. In fact I mentioned the employee contribution is actually higher than this because of double taxation creative accounting by the Revenue. I deeply resent this, and I think the individual contribution here is too high.

However because our social demographic is moving relentlessly to a higher percentage of older people in the economy, I do appreciate from personal experience that these people do tend to use more money from the healthcare system. The way I look at that if they have contributed taxes to the running and the development of the economy over all those years when times were tough, this fact generates a burden of care on the state to look after them in their latter retirement years.

We have the shirkers and the leeches here too Lee, but they are a percentage of every population. The vast majority of people using the system have earned the right.

Joe

[Subie59]

Some form of universal healthcare is working ( or should I say thriving) in every modern western economy accept the US. And the benefactors (residents) for the most part are more than happy with paying higher taxes for the enormous benifits the program brings. In the US, where healthcare is the most expensive of any Western economy and a huge number of residents are either under insured, or worse, have no insurance, you still have people trying to maintain the status quo to ensure HMOs continue to reap huge multi million salaries at the expense of sick and dying residents.

[lhopp77]

I might point out that we (USA) are independent of the crown BECAUSE we objected to taxes. Your acceptance of high taxes is inbred, ingrained---accepted by ancestors for centuries. There is a bit of a difference.

Lee

[Trevor]

Originally Posted by lhopp77

I might point out that we (USA) are independent of the crown BECAUSE we objected to taxes. Your acceptance of high taxes is inbred, ingrained---accepted by ancestors for centuries. There is a bit of a difference.

Lee

N.Z. Is most certainly independent of the crown. We simply belong to a commonwealth as a means of cooperation when this is desirable.

The fact that a portion of the tax paid, is in fact an insurance premium, makes paying tax all the more acceptable.

[svxistentialist]

Originally Posted by lhopp77

I might point out that we (USA) are independent of the crown BECAUSE we objected to taxes. Your acceptance of high taxes is inbred, ingrained---accepted by ancestors for centuries. There is a bit of a difference.

Lee

Originally Posted by Trevor

N.Z. Is most certainly independent of the crown. We simply belong to a commonwealth as a means of cooperation when this is desirable.

The fact that a portion of the tax paid, is in fact an insurance premium, makes paying tax all the more acceptable.

Well put, Lee. I have to add that we still get free cups of tea in Accident & Emergency, even though Boston Harbour soaked up a lot of it some time ago.

And in Ireland we [well, in the South anyway ] became independent of the crown for more reasons than taxes. But just like the Kiwis we retain the best of what came from the Old Enemy, like Rugby and Cricket and so on.

[Subie59]

Canada too is independent of the Crown too. it is nothing more than a figurehead.

[JaySVX]

Universal health care might work in some areas, but I don't think it would work in the US. You all come from very nice countries, but I get pretty damned pissed off every time I have to look around the ghetto of Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Dallas, Washington DC at all the people living voluntarily off welfare and unemployment checks. People that make no effort to get a job, or contribute to society. People that pump out as many kids as they can to get extra checks, extra "government aid" to live off of. And they do it happily. And if I was suddenly paying for their medical coverage, I'd be pretty damned enraged, especially if I was paying 13% gross.

It's nice and noble to be willing to help spread the cost around so everyone can be happy and healthy. And sure there might be a few bad seeds here and there to take advantage. But here we have entire societies that thrive off the employed, not just a few here or there. We have single cities twice the population of your entire country. On this size scale, it simply doesn't work.

And the damned ghetto pisses me off so much...

[Stilor]

Welcome Soviet Union, where people had universal healthcare and were criminally prosecuted (well, the actual prosecution was rare, but still possible under Soviet Union's Criminal Code) for voluntary unemployment

Originally Posted by JaySVX

Universal health care might work in some areas ... but I get pretty damned pissed off every time I have to look around the ghetto of Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Dallas, Washington DC at all the people living voluntarily off welfare and unemployment checks. People that make no effort to get a job, or contribute to society.

[JaySVX]

Because that will work... Our prisons are already heavily over-populated, throwing more in will just cause higher costs for the tax-payers, and won't do a whole lot to deter most of the people in this area, that's just instant friends, excercise, free room & board, and free food. Lets solve one problem before creating another.

[lhopp77]

Again what we need in the US is LEGAL REFORM (NOT UNIVERSAL HEALTHCARE) with some tweeking of the SS and Medicare systems the way GW tried. The funds from them AGAIN need to be put in a trust fund that NO politician can touch. While I think the initial idea for these was bad--to much has been invested to let go down the drain. Effective legal reform will lower our insurance rates in ALL sectors thereby reducing costs and making private medical insurance much more affordable.

Our healthcare system with lower rates for care, medicine AND insurance would be infinitely better than any existing socialistic system. Not to mention much cheaper and more responsive.

Lee

[lhopp77]

I didn't say it before because did not want to alienate some of our foreign members. How is it that while you say your medical care is much better than ours--survival rates for most types of cancer and some other serioius conditions are much better in the US than in the socialized medicine countries? Humm, interesting question.

I know we rate lower than some of those countries, but you need to check out who is doing the rating. I think results are the best method of rating and our results are the best in the world-bar none.

Lee

[svxistentialist]

Originally Posted by lhopp77

I didn't say it before because did not want to alienate some of our foreign members. How is it that while you say your medical care is much better than ours--survival rates for most types of cancer and some other serioius conditions are much better in the US than in the socialized medicine countries? Humm, interesting question.

I know we rate lower than some of those countries, but you need to check out who is doing the rating. I think results are the best method of rating and our results are the best in the world-bar none.

Lee

I think y'all catch cancer earlier 'cos you catch cancer quicker stressing about those hospital bills.