5 ms·

Hasn't worked for single payer healthcare yet. Nobody brings up that almost every other country's government pays less than the US.

• ksenzee 10y ago
  a) Lots of people bring that argument up. I hear it all the time. b) There's a difference between "the US pays" and "the US government pays".
  • lostlogin 10y ago
    Can you explain b). Doesn't "the US government pays" mean that the US pays, one step later?
    • jpttsn 10y ago
      Yes-ish; but maybe not the other way around.
  • Joof 10y ago
    For b) we get the worst of both worlds. The US government pays one of the highest costs per person AND it costs the individual an exorbitant amount. Without significantly better outcomes.
  • DanBC 10y ago
    The US government pays more for healthcare than average. http://visual.ons.gov.uk/how-does-uk-healthcare-spending-compare-internationally/ http://visual.ons.gov.uk/how-does-uk-healthcare-spending-com...
• Consultant32452 10y ago
  If you're a wealthy person anywhere in the world and you have a really terrible disease you're probably going to come to the US to get care. Why? Because we have the highest quality healthcare in the world. There's a reason why there was some mild drama over Danny Williams (Premier of Canadian province) hopped the border to have heart surgery in the US. We're the best. What we lack is healthcare access for the poor. Dampening the profitability of health care with single payer will reduce quality and increase access. That's an okay argument to make, just make sure you're stating both sides when you make an argument. Otherwise it's just disingenuous. Also, it's important not to be fooled by some of the comparative health stats. Many of our poor health stats are the more the result of culture than they are a lack of access to health care. Being able to go to the doctor without paying a copay doesn't matter much when you're 100 pounds overweight and don't follow the diabetic diet your doctor laid out for you.
  • and0 10y ago
    I'd have to look into this, but I'd imagine the fact that the best doctors preside a.) in the richest country in the world with b.) the most lucrative health industry has a lot to do with the former as well as the latter. Danny Williams also claimed he traveled to the US to see a specific specialist, not because no one in his own province could do the surgery, although we can't know for sure. To make your arguments and not take all that into consideration also seems disingenuous. (I also can't imagine that heart surgery would become drastically more dangerous in the US under universal healthcare, certainly not enough to offset it's unavailability. Where exactly are these amazing doctors going to go, anyway?)
    • Consultant32452 10y ago
      >the most lucrative health industry Yes, that's the whole point of my argument. We have the best because it's lucrative. The health care plans people tend to put forth to fix our system would make our healthcare system less lucrative. >Danny Williams also claimed he traveled to the US to see a specific specialist, not because no one in his own province could do the surgery, although we can't know for sure. Right, he went to where he believed the best specialist was. In the US. > not take all that into consideration also seems disingenuous. I didn't not take all that into consideration. In fact, it was the entirety of my consideration.
      • andreasklinger 10y ago
        Re lucrative: "Private" doctors exist also in single payer models. If you want the premium model pay for the premium model. There is just a good enough alternative available to everyone.
  • jpttsn 10y ago
    Well said. I sometimes hear complaints that US healthcare is more expensive, that (perhaps just by mistaken reasoning) treat healthcare as a commodity. In Economics terms, that's a pretty hefty simplification: sort of like complaining that US phones are so much more expensive than Finnish phones.