# US Healthcare rant. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [January 8, 2017, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630 "2017-01-08T15:50:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![not\_what\_you\_d\_expect](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_what_you_d_expect/32/3246_2.png) [@not\_what\_you\_d\_expect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_what_you_d_expect)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/21 "2017-01-08T20:28:23Z")
The most infuriating part is that we do have real world models that are successful, yet we still claim it can’t be done. ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/22 "2017-01-08T20:44:02Z")
I can’t wait for all the conservatives here to flood in and calmly and rationally explain to the OP why he’s wrong and it’ll never ever work here and (s)he is a slave to their government and they’d be better off having more freedom and keeping more money. ---
**Author:** ![levdrakon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/23 "2017-01-08T20:45:00Z")
It’s interesting looking at what different countries spend their money on. I believe the largest employer in the UK, and the thing they spend the most money on, is healthcare. In the US, the largest employer is the military, and that’s what we spend the most on. I don’t see the US ever having UHC until we deprioritize the military. Never happen. If you do want socialized medicine, join the military. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/24 "2017-01-08T20:49:12Z")
> [@Saint\_Cad](#): > > But Obamacare fixed all the problems and lowered not only insurance costs but health costs are lower as well so we’re all good. Well, two out of three ain’t bad: it lowered insurance costs\*, and lowered the _rate of increase_ of health costs (nobody ever claimed it was going to make health care costs _decrease_). And it drastically reduced the uninsured rate in the U.S. Did it ‘fix all the problems’? Of course not. It wasn’t the perfect UHC legislation; it was just the best plan that could get the votes of 218 Representatives, 60 Senators, and 5 Supreme Court Justices. As the OP points out, yes, it’s needlessly complicated, and can hit people with a lot of unnecessary stress and paperwork on top of the stress and heartbreak of a medical crisis in the family. That’s because it had to work through the existing system of private insurance to get those 218/60 votes, and that’s how private insurance _had already been working_. A national single-payer system would solve all those problems. And if only Dems would get out of the way, Republicans would pass such a plan in a heartbeat, right? :mad: ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/25 "2017-01-08T20:51:41Z")
> [@not\_what\_you\_d\_expect](#): > > The most infuriating part is that we do have real world models that are successful, yet we still claim it can’t be done. That’s because we’re too stupid to figure it out. ---
**Author:** ![pidgeon92](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/50afbb/32.png) [@pidgeon92](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pidgeon92)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/26 "2017-01-08T20:57:25Z")
> [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > I don’t have children. I’ve never had children, and I never _will_ have children. And yet, I have to pay taxes to send other people’s children to school! How is that fair? > > Well, I recognise that an educated population is good for people’s well-being, that it’s good for the economy, it’s good for national security, and it’s good for international relations. Since the United States was set up to ‘promote the _general_ welfare’, the United States was set up to provide for social programs that increase the well-being of citizens and, by extension, of the country. > > Similarly, a healthy population is essential for the well-being of the country and its population – just like public education. It’s astounding that so many Americans are incapable of thinking of the big picture. I totally agree with these sentiments. We don’t have kids, either, but I think education and healthcare are the two biggest failings of our government. And our new administration doesn’t think people deserve either. I fear it’s going to take decades to dig out from the crater both with fall into over the next 4 years. ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/27 "2017-01-08T20:57:56Z")
Totally agree with the OP, which isn’t really a rant as much as a reasonable description of the frustration of anyone from any civilized country looking in from the outside on the chaos that is the US health care system. At the risk of oversimplifying a complex and multifaceted problem, I think a major root cause is that health care is fundamentally an essential public service, unless one believes that people who are unable to afford to pay for health care should be left to die in the street. And the fundamental disconnect occurs when an essential public service is treated as if it was a business problem, amenable to solutions provided only by the awesome Invisible Hand of the Free Market™. And this mythology is helped along by an incessant torrent of lies and disinformation about the alleged failures of UHC provided by the shovelful by the health insurance industry and conservative wingnuts, and by the wealthy who fear that their privileged access to health care may be diluted by (gasp!) the not-so-wealthy also getting access to it. The mythology and the pack of lies is helped along by the fact that the public service perspective defines health care as essentially a social issue, and its solutions therefore involve elements of government regulation and control, which decades of propagandizing has characterized as “socialism” and causes many Americans to head straight for the fainting couch. Instead, a fundamentally broken and worsening health care system is wrapped in the flag and celebrated as a victory of “American exceptionalism” and the glories of free enterprise. The problem is, as every civilized country on earth has discovered, running health insurance as a profit-making business enterprise is fraught with such extreme conflicts of interest that it can only function within ethical and moral boundaries if it’s very strongly regulated or, preferably, outlawed entirely and replaced by a public system or strongly regulated non-profit. Otherwise you have to limit it to a very small horizontal or vertical market segment – that is, either a segment where it insures a full range of services to a small group of (usually wealthy) participants who voluntarily opt in, or a segment where it is broadly available only to cover a list of specific non-critical supplementary services. One way or another, you generally end up with de facto single-payer for the majority of the population, along with some form of financial subsidy or tax-based funding to ensure universal access to medically necessary services regardless of income. Otherwise it just doesn’t fucking work. Most countries realized this at some point in the post-war era, some even earlier, and launched targeted initiatives to create public health care systems. Thanks to Republican leadership, however, US health care policy has exhibited all the astute realization of a chicken with its head cut off staggering around in circles. ---
**Author:** ![elbows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b3f665/32.png) [@elbows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elbows)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/28 "2017-01-08T21:19:14Z")
I fear the monetizing of other current ‘social’ systems, is in your future frighteningly! They’ve already monetized prisons. And now seem to be giving public education the stink eye, too! It’s kinda scary because if you’re already profiting from people getting shot and going to jail, keeping them uneducated, denying them access to birth control, etc, almost seems like a scheme to help insure bigger profits! Can police and fire services be far behind? Because that’s gotta be a capitalist’s wet dream, I should think. Once that train gets rolling I’m not sure how you turn it around! The truth is Canadians are a little afraid for our American cousins. (On a lot of fronts! ) ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/29 "2017-01-08T21:25:28Z")
Our health care system is a mess. It’s designed to benefit insurance companies and maintain their profits. The insurance companies in turn make sure to donate to politicians who promise to maintain the system. ---
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/30 "2017-01-08T21:27:20Z")
My mother went to the ER the day after Thanksgiving, and was admitted to the hospital that night for a one day stay. Under her insurance, she doesn’t have to pay for the ER if she’s admitted to the hospital, but if she is not admitted, she has to pay $50. Now, admittedly, this is small change compared to what other people have to pay. But her insurer is now telling her that she has to pay the $50 because she was not admitted to the hospital, she was only sent there for evaluation. She says she isn’t going to pay it. She actually has paperwork from the hospital which uses the word _admitted_. ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/31 "2017-01-08T21:27:23Z")
> [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > I don’t have children. I’ve never had children, and I never _will_ have children. And yet, I have to pay taxes to send other people’s children to school! How is that fair? Careful, remember all the people who’d answer, “it’s not. That’s why we need to demolish the underperforming and wasteful public education system.” ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/32 "2017-01-08T21:41:16Z")
> [@Leaper](#): > > “That’s why we need to demolish the underperforming and wasteful public education system.” … And replace it with the Bible. That’s all anyone needs to know! ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/33 "2017-01-08T22:23:58Z")
> [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > No, is the short answer. Absolutely no is the slightly longer answer. > > We think of healthcare in the same way as we do schools, roads, police, army, judiciary, fire services etc. We all contribute taxes to a central pot and those services are then provided free at the point of use to those that need them. > > **Johnny L.A.** captured our mindset quite neatly and for sure it is a mindset that is widespread within the USA populace as well regarding most of the above services, why it is such a leap to considering healthcare in that bracket I don’t know. To be fair, in the UK a lot of people are quite unhappy about those dirty immigrants getting health care. ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/34 "2017-01-08T22:31:02Z")
If millions across the globe migrate for economic reasons why aren’t Americans voting with their feet? I’m not denying that the US health care system can use some fixing. I’m just puzzled that if millions of others migrate, even to the US to work, why don’t any Americans migrate for better services? And why do the migrants stop in the US instead of continuing to Canada where the health care and services are superior? ---
**Author:** ![D\_Anconia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@D\_Anconia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D_Anconia)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/35 "2017-01-08T22:43:18Z")
> [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > No, is the short answer. Absolutely no is the slightly longer answer. > > We think of healthcare in the same way as we do schools, roads, police, army, judiciary, fire services etc. We all contribute taxes to a central pot and those services are then provided free at the point of use to those that need them. You ALL do, or is it like in the U.S. where only 50-something percent pay taxes? ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/36 "2017-01-08T22:55:49Z")
> [@D\_Anconia](#): > > You ALL do, or is it like in the U.S. where only 50-something percent pay taxes? This fucking mind-numbing idiocy again? _Everyone in the USA who works pays taxes towards health care_. Federal payroll taxes may not be income taxes, but _everyone who works pays them_. No matter how shit your wage is, 6.2% of it is going to social security and, hey, big shocker, _medicare_. Here in Germany, I don’t make enough money yet to pay income tax either. I’m still losing about a fifth of my paycheck to my health insurance tax and my retirement insurance tax. I knew there would be stupid when I opened a thread to a post by D’Anconia. Can you maybe _try_ to turn on your brain next time, you semen-coated dunce cap? That 50% figure applies only to federal income taxes. Not state taxes. Not sales taxes. Not estate or property or luxury taxes. And not fucking FICA, you mental leper. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/37 "2017-01-08T23:02:26Z")
> [@D\_Anconia](#): > > You ALL do, or is it like in the U.S. where only 50-something percent pay taxes? You do realize that some of those who don’t pay income tax are former taxpayers who are retired, future income tax payers such as students and military in combat zones. And people like Trump. ---
**Author:** ![elbows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b3f665/32.png) [@elbows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elbows)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/38 "2017-01-08T23:03:13Z")
Didn’t MrTrump, (while making millions!), NOT pay taxes for two decades? But you’re upset with a disabled guy who can’t work, not paying his Share? Got it! ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/39 "2017-01-08T23:16:06Z")
> [@octopus](#): > > If millions across the globe migrate for economic reasons why aren’t Americans voting with their feet? I’m not denying that the US health care system can use some fixing. I’m just puzzled that if millions of others migrate, even to the US to work, why don’t any Americans migrate for better services? > > And why do the migrants stop in the US instead of continuing to Canada where the health care and services are superior? Isn’t it pretty difficult for an American who is non college educated and doesn’t have highly specialized skills to move to a country with UHC? If I’m wrong please correct me. I’d move to Canada in a heartbeat if they welcomed fast food workers. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Giles](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giles/32/60_2.png) [@Giles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giles)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2017, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630/40 "2017-01-08T23:28:37Z")
> [@octopus](#): > > If millions across the globe migrate for economic reasons why aren’t Americans voting with their feet? I’m not denying that the US health care system can use some fixing. I’m just puzzled that if millions of others migrate, even to the US to work, why don’t any Americans migrate for better services? > > And why do the migrants stop in the US instead of continuing to Canada where the health care and services are superior? If you are young and healthy, then health care is relatively cheap in the US, so there’s no incentive to move to Canada, Europe or Australia. If you are old and/or sick, and start paying the high costs of health care, then it’s too late: those other countries probably won’t let you immigrate. (That’s certainly true in the case of Australia, which only wants young, healthy and employable people to immigrate.) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/us-healthcare-rant/776630.md?page=3)