5 ms·

The US government already pays more per capita (that is, more for every single living person in the USA) for healthcare than any other nation on earth. This is

by throwaway2048 8y ago

The US government already pays more per capita (that is, more for every single living person in the USA) for healthcare than any other nation on earth. This is entirely WITHOUT universal public insurance, the US could easily save money by making public insurance avalible for everyone.

frockington 8y ago
With public insurance you would have no customer base besides those who are high risk. As a healthy individual there is absolutely no way I would sign up for universal healthcare. Thankfully the government won't be able to mandate it anytime soon as we have a first and second amendment protecting citizens
- ceejayoz 8y ago
  > As a healthy individual there is absolutely no way I would sign up for universal healthcare. That's fine, because you don't have to. It's just there if you need it. > Thankfully the government won't be able to mandate it anytime soon as we have a first and second amendment protecting citizens The First and Second Amendments didn't prevent Social Security or Medicare. Why would it be any different for Medicare-for-all?
chimeracoder 8y ago
> The US government already pays more per capita (that is, more for every single living person in the USA) for healthcare than any other nation on earth. The US also implicitly subsidizes all of the research and operations of the rest of the world. Over half the medical research in the entire world is directly funded by the US, and a significant portion of the rest is indirectly funded by sales in the US market. Biomedical and pharmaceutical companies in Europe make the lion's share of their revenues from the US, despite the US being half the population. You can't compare the US and European healthcare markets without accounting for the fact that they're deeply interconnected, and the biggest beneficiaries of that interconnectedness are, in fact, European patients.

frockington 8y ago

With public insurance you would have no customer base besides those who are high risk. As a healthy individual there is absolutely no way I would sign up for universal healthcare. Thankfully the government won't be able to mandate it anytime soon as we have a first and second amendment protecting citizens

ceejayoz 8y ago
> As a healthy individual there is absolutely no way I would sign up for universal healthcare. That's fine, because you don't have to. It's just there if you need it. > Thankfully the government won't be able to mandate it anytime soon as we have a first and second amendment protecting citizens The First and Second Amendments didn't prevent Social Security or Medicare. Why would it be any different for Medicare-for-all?

chimeracoder 8y ago

> The US government already pays more per capita (that is, more for every single living person in the USA) for healthcare than any other nation on earth. The US also implicitly subsidizes all of the research and operations of the rest of the world. Over half the medical research in the entire world is directly funded by the US, and a significant portion of the rest is indirectly funded by sales in the US market. Biomedical and pharmaceutical companies in Europe make the lion's share of their revenues from the US, despite the US being half the population. You can't compare the US and European healthcare markets without accounting for the fact that they're deeply interconnected, and the biggest beneficiaries of that interconnectedness are, in fact, European patients.