I think people who think like you do should go live in a communist country for a while. I think you will be much happier there.
tee-hee!
But why? I already live in a country that has universal health care. If I lose my job tomorrow, or fall on hard times, I don't have to worry about declaring bankruptcy thanks to medical bills. Or juggling several hundred dollar-a-month premiums vs whether or not to buy food and put gas in the tank.
And you know what?
Every other industrialized country in the G8 has some form of universal healthcare. The U.S is the odd one out in this regard.
All the main arguments have been proven moot- that universal healthcare will somehow destroy your economy or lower citizens standards of living. Most of the G8 countries that have universal healthcare (could be all of them actually, I'd have to fact check though) have a longer average lifespan, lower infant mortality rate and overall are more healthy than the average U.S citizen per capita.
As to the economic effects, well, it is a VERY profitable venture for the HMO's, yet can be a fiscal nightmare for average joes who don't have employer coverage and have to make the choice between going without, paying out of pocket, or hoping that medicare will catch them in a net that has some very big holes!
As to my friends in the States, I only know folks predominantly from Texas. I've heard some horror stories firsthand from these people about having to take out second mortgages and declaring bankruptcy to make ends meet when an operation is due. One of my friends father's is a retired (disabled) fire-fighter.
He was injured on the job in such a way that he's pretty much disabled for the rest of his life with serious complications. Although he's covered by a pretty good plan taken care of by the Fire Department...or local municipality, not sure which, suffice it to say his employer at the time.... the actual HMO behind that policy has tried for years to find a way to say that his condition isn't permanent or as bad as the diagnosis of the doctors. Of course, this has been a fruitless venture for them because falling through a roof while on the job can indeed have some permanent side effects, but since he's costing them lots per year it hurts their profit margins. So, every few years odd things happen like unfamiliar people hanging out at his usual haunts (man sitting on bench suspicously reading newspaper while lowering it just enough to peer over, usual private eye cliche's) garbage sorted through, out of the blue requests to see a doctor he's not familiar with, blah blah blah.
Long story short:
Universal healthcare is not a bad thing. Conceptually, it goes against the grain of free markets, self-made men and pulling oneself up by one's bootstraps, so it has been demonized as an evil boogeyman symbol of communism.
In practice, most developed nations are already doing it, and as with all things in life the results are mixed. Anything, whether it exists in the private or public sector, can be really great or really crappy depending on how it's managed and implemented. Thanks to the shenanigans we see unfolding with the vaporization of some of the biggest banks in the U.S these last few weeks, the argument that private is always better than public has been revealed to be an ideological farce.
It's time the U.S joined the 21st century and embraced that spooky concept Reagan scared you all with called "socialized medicine"!!!!
