I don’t have health insurance right now. Not that this is a new experience. I suppose my parents and I have saved a bundle that we didn’t have in the first place to protect against things that for the vast majority of the time didn’t happen. But it’s a life where accidents can not happen.
My brief exposure to middle class American health insurance actually was pretty disappointing. I figured for all that money you’d be getting some serious service. Not really. It was far more hassle than the free clinics that I have been to. I’m really quite infuriated at the bloat and inefficiency, and how each cog goes on their merry way piling on the huge bills with a topping of repeated mistakes that I’m left to wade through.
So the US’s health care system is broke and makes me whine. It’s bigger than that, though. As a nation, and personally, we are looking down the slope of destitution and seeing how very little is protecting us from snowballing down. Pinellas County has gone from 5,500 homeless a year ago to 7,500 this year.
All this is making how the Germans and Dutch handle public services look extremely attractive. That peace of mind is such a powerful thing to provide for the whole country. Talk about a making a real impact, if not to ending, then improving poverty. What a noble endeavor.
From Wiki:
The World Health Organization (WHO), in 2000, ranked the U.S. health care system as the highest in cost, first in responsiveness, 37th in overall performance, and 72nd by overall level of health (among 191 member nations included in the study).
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As a proportion of GDP, public health care spending in the United States is larger than in most other large Western countries.
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According to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences, the United States is the “only wealthy, industrialized nation that does not ensure that all citizens have coverage” (i.e. some kind of insurance).
I’m not trying to make the argument that everybody else is doing this so we should too, but I would like to point out that it seems like providing public health care is not something that everyone else has found to be insurmountable. And they seem to be managing it for cheaper than we are.
No, that peace of mind isn’t free by a long shot. The Dutch pay around 52% of their income in taxes. When life is going great, you’re healthy, your boss loves you and the business is thriving, that 52% doesn’t do much work for you, personally. What you get, however, is support when your luck turns and you have the least resources with which to help yourself. There is no precipice. We’ll see for how long these European systems can support their entire country going into what, for us at least, is a once in a century slump, but from the anecdotes I’ve been reading, we’re already in trouble, watching the tent cities spring up, while the quality of life hasn’t dropped much in Germany or the Netherlands.
I wonder how many of the people who argue against universal coverage have had to live without health insurance for very long. I wonder if they have every grew up with such poverty that effort to make from day to day becomes a long depressing nightmare where every contingency, every unexpected happening could result in a bill that crushes the life out of you.
None of them, I would guess.
When writing this post, I sought out a couple of arguments against universal health care, because I figured there’s got to be some reason, you know, two sides of the argument kinda thing. The only justifications I found were appalling selfishness and outrageous false claims that shamelessly portrayed the poor as a foreign subspecies that apparently deserves the misery they get. And it’s not like you have to be all that poor to fall into the category of the uninsured. I can’t comprehend how anyone could straight faced say that health care should not be a basic right. But even if one rejects the dreamy process of attempting to identify what an ideal society would be and then work on how to make it a reality, the embarrassing fact that systems can be achieved for cheaper than our current awful arrangement seems to leave few excuses beyond sadism.
One of the most fundamental differences that I experienced once getting out of college and actually having money was the newfound lack of constant fear of something going wrong and not being able to pay to have it/me/whatever, fixed. What if my car breaks down? What if for some reason I have to go to the hospital (and quite a reason it would have to be)? Even the idea that I can go on a trip, short or long, and not pack for every contingency, because why pay for any duplicated item (aka souvenirs), or even food, if I could instead drag it all with me, has been really transformative for me.
I was watching Newt Gingrinch on the Daily show last night. His arguments against the universal coverage were…
1) Do you want some bureaucrat in charge of heath care?
My answer echoe’s Steven Colbert’s answer: You mean unlike my current health care where a private sector bureaucrat is in charge?
2) Big government can’t do anything right.
John Stewart’s answer: Yet you trust big government to run 2 simultaneous wars?
3) It will cost money
My answer: A great many worth while things do.
4) It will be inefficient.
My answer: According to a study cited by the book “What you wanted to know about politics but were afraid to ask.” Medicare and Medicaid spend 85 cents out of each dollar on patient care. No private sector company exceeds that number.
5) Finally, I say that for those with no healthcare, any care is better than none.
Ps: I just stole your sandwich.