This assertion by Rand Rover interested me (I’m not meaning to pick on him, I swear; it’s just that his arguments seem to be good exemplars of many points generally made from conservative/libertarian circles):
This put me in mind of similar claims by Rush Limbaugh:
Now, I once asked how countries with universal health care are less free than the U.S. - there were attempts to answer my question, but not many, and it sorta got off-track, IMO. It’s still an interesting question, but I thought I’d take the economic tack here (and leave the original for re-questioning later, perhaps).
How are the economies of countries with UHC affected by their systems? Is there even a way to tell if the savings/suffering, if any, comes from having UHC in particular or not? What about the economic health of their health care systems in particular (since that’s a big debate point here in the States, and at least partly what Rush is probably talking about above)?
Economics is good at determining the situation: there are valid metrics for measurement, tested and tried, workable. Is the USA in a poor situation economically? Yes, as are many others. For these purposes, the measurements of economics are reliable.
Causes, however, is a whole 'nother kettle of piranha. This is where variations in political persuasion come to the fore. Like the Gospels, there is hardly any political theory that cannot find comfort in some economic theory. Hence, I am instantly suspicious when economics are called upon to explain how something happened. UHC probably more than any other, there being so many variables, many of them human-type variables, which is the most variable of them all.
I fear, therefore, I will have little of value to offer in this conversation. So why don’t I just shut up? Good point.
I try to hate you, really, I do, but damn if you don’t go and make me spit soda all over myself from time to time. You should go into stand up routines.
This sounds like a false dillema to me. Of course you can blame economic problems on healthcare or anything you like. Just look at how much is spent and think “Whoa, thats money that could have been saved.” You can do the same with militaries, roads, schools, etc.
Here is a chart comparing percentage GDP spent on healthcare for many countries. We’re number 1 by far, with 13.9% versus Switzerland with 10.9%. The UK is down at 7.5%. if we had much better health outcomes than these countries we’d have an argument (but we’d have to be a lot better) but we all know we don’t.
What could another 6% of GDP put into more productive uses do for us? Not spending it on healthcare would mean more profitable and more competitive businesses, and better paid workers, getting some of that money to spend on something besides doctors. Think of the increase in consumer purchase if say 3% of GDP wound up in their pockets.
Sure our taxes might go up, but the effective taxes we are paying to insurance companies and hospitals would go down by a lot more. And things are going to get a lot worse unless we do something.
If your state were paying twice as much for the same quality roads as the next state over, wouldn’t you want to figure out why? I’m sure the head of your state’s DoT, Slippery Lou, will tell you how your state is just different, that your roads are the best in the country, and that drivers are miserable in those other states. Which you find odd, because they say they love their roads. Not only that, they don’t even have to pay taxes and tolls to pay off construction costs. Now, wouldn’t anyone buying in to Lou’s story be a chump?
Rand Rover originally posted this in healthcare thread:
(bolding mine)
When I called him on this, and pointed out that Jan 2010 unemployment rates at currently 8.3% in Canada vs 9.7% in the US…
He backtracked from “right this very minute”, and tried to move the goalposts to
Well, RR is going to have to go back in time all the way past 1982 if he wants to try to make that case. Canada has had better job creation compared to the US since then, and has narrowed the gap in the unemployment rate between the two countries. Not bad for a country experiencing “long term difficulties”.
Oh and check out a comparison of debt per capita ordebt/GDP ratios I don’t think countries with UHC are exactly circling the drain.
Yeah, and although france does have some long-term unemployment problems, this is usually seen as being due to stuffy employment laws and powerful trade unions (that make companies reluctant to hire).
Indeed, their employment market is so “un-american” you simply can’t use it as a country for a like-for-like comparison + UHC – at least not while you’re using unemployment levels as your scorecard.
<slightly off-topic rant>
Really, we’re watching the UHC thing unfold from countries like the UK with disbelief. You pay the most for your healthcare as a % of gdp. Yet tens of millions of americans have no health coverage at all.
And any time someone proposes UHC, in come the nonsense scare stories, which have been particularly absurd this time round.
e.g. the “death panels” BS, as well as massively overblown stories about such-and-such hospital in wherever (granted “sicko” was exaggerated in the other direction, but was still light years closer to the truth than much of the recent anti-uhc discussion).
</slightly off-topic rant>
I don’t know how the Danes are faring under the current world economic crisis, but before that they always seem to grab the title of “the happiest country.” They are taxed at a high rate, but they get so much back for that that there isn’t much complaining. The most noticeable thing is that there isn’t any poverty. Everyone is completely covered for health care from cradle to grave. I was told that no one pays for insurance; it is an unnecessary step.
The Danish are very proud of this system and happy to talk about it. I would be too!
Oh, and they also have a mandatory five weeks vacation every year. Everyonne.
I don’t think they would want to switch systems with us.
Gonna have to disagree with you there. If Europe had health care that was as high quality as ours, why would so many Europeans come to America to get treated for serious diseases? Sure, Canadian medicine are cheaper, but can you REALLY get the same quality of treatment in Canada as you can in the US?
America is a capitalistic society. The state of mind of most people here revolves around Capitalism. If you can prove to me right now, with a straight face, the following list of items, I will gladly accept UHC:
There will be no difference in the number of people who wish to become doctors and are willing to pay for and go through medical school themselves if doctors made less money.
There will be no reduction in the salary of doctors if the hospitals they work for were forced to accept smaller payments from health insurance companies, especially those run by the government.
There will be an easy alternative to government-funded health care.
Free health care will not be abused in the same way emergency rooms currently are.
Respectfully, Babale.
EDIT: Zoe, kindly Google “Danish Banking Crisis”.
It would appear that the whole Danish system was a bubble. And that it popped quite recently.
I’ve never understood the fascination with how much the US spends on health care. Some people treat it as an argument in and of itself for UHC (which is what you seem to be doing). There’s a lot that goes into the percentage of GDP spent on health. I don’t see how it could possibly support an argument for UHC all by its lonesome.
There are many explanations for higher health care costs in the US that do not support UHC:
Who spends more on health care–people that know they are sick or people that don’t? The former, usually. Therefore, one possible explanation of higher expenditures on health care in the US is that we are better at finding diseases and disorders.
Who spends more on health care–obese people or non-obese people? The former, usually. The US has a ton (har) of obese people.
Some people like to drive BMWs, and some like to drive used Kias. If people are choosing to purchase the BMW of health care instead of the used Kia of health care, thus driving up the health care/GDP percentage.
Why are any of these an argument for UHC? The third one is an argument against UHC (i.e., people should be allowed to pay more for health care if they choose to).
The fact that we are less healthy does not mean we have worse health care. A lot more goes into the health of a population than the quality of the health care.
Well said, RR. I haven’t read much of your other posts-I’m a bit of a lurker here-but I doubt I agree with you on everything. But in this case, you are in fact spot-on.
EP. Your interpretation of “right this minute” is extremely flawed. I said they were suffering from the effects right this minute, and one of the effects is permanent unemployment. It is impossible to look at “permanent unemployment” without looking at figures in the past. That fact doesn’t negate the “right this minute” concept.
Also, you apparently didn’t look at my cite on Canadian unemployment. Unemployment in the US only recently reached 10%–Canada’s has been there for a long time.
Speaking of unemployment, Israel is quite a bit farther left than the US, and has pretty nice unemployment benefits. Surprise surprise, unemployment is a huge problem. When I was younger, it always struck me as strange that people get paid NOT to work, especially when getting a low paying job pays worse then staying unemployed. Now I understand that you can’t just leave people to die, but having a better salary as an unemployed man than as a janitor is just crazy. I think services should be provided to the unemployed, but not money. They want money, they can get a job. They stay unemployed? Fine. Provide them with basic necessities, but don’t give them a penny.
Every time I hear about raising the unemployment funds here in the States, I shake my head sadly.
Whoa, how did I get so far off topic?
EDIT: Oh, right. I was saying that RR is correct in saying that universal benefits of any source easily lead to permanent unemployment. If I can go to the doctor for free, get food from a soup kitchen, and pay for an apartment on my unemployment wages, why would I get a job?
Here’s just one thing about all that. Nothing wrong with a work ethic, so long as there is sufficient work to go around. When there isn’t, for whatever reason, then its nothing more than an arbitrary and cruel device to no good purpose. No ethic is taught by pointless suffering.
I quite agree with you, we should take immediate and effective steps to raise the janitor’s salary.
Cite please. How many do? And while you’re at it, how many Americans go to other countries for treatment?
Europe has superior health care than we do (in general, Europe isn’t one place). The reason rich people come here is that they want to jump the line for non-urgent operations or go to one of our really prestigious hospitals. We have a competent system for the ultra rich and being America, many of the best specialists are here, where they can make big money.
Yes. America has some of the best care in the world for the ultra rich. But for everyone else we’re terrible. In fact we’re in 37th place.
Except for police, fire departments, libraries, water standards, meat inspectors, the CDC, the military, the Interstate System, Social Security, Medicare and few hundred thousand other things? Right?
The current Senate bill has incentives to get more doctors in places we need them.
There is currently no government run health insurance company in the bill. However, doctors currently accept Medicare.
The current bill has no government funded health care.
The current bill doesn’t include free health care except for the very, very poor.
Sure, I could freeload. But would I? No. Because I have work ethics, and so do most people. But the minority who does not ruins things for everyone else.
@ elucidator: Yes, we should raise the janitor’s salary. Raising minimum wages is good. And lowering unemployment benefits, or at least exchanging pure monetary benefits with services, is just as good.
Note that this does not include benefits to people who CAN’T work due to disability. But the man who claims that although he tries, he can’t get a job? I’m not very inclined to believe him.
Unless you assume that Americans are inherently inept your argument is silly.
This is an utterly stupid argument. If we were better at finding diseases and had better care as you blindly and without evidence suggest, we would have better results.
And many of those obese people never see a doctor and have no access to preventive medicine or a warning that their blood pressure is dangerously high. If we had more access to HC we’d be a thinner nation.
Again, the current Senate bill does nothing to eliminate this. In fact most UHC across the world offers people stupid enough to want to pay more for private care the option to waste their money.
All of your arguments are worthless. Please try again.
Not a lot more. We can make changes culturally, but the reason our health care system sucks is because we have a stupid system that has the wrong incentives.