Letters to the Editor
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@D. Lord
50% income taxation? You were either making a hell of a lot of money in Canada or you needed a tax accountant, bad. I make ~$60,000CAD a year and I paid a little over 40% between the feds and the province. (Of course you might've been including all GST and and provincial sales tax in that too?)
But I agree with you - Americans are not willing to pay even 10% more, even if it means universal coverage. Which is a pity because Canadians are so happy with our system and the concept of universal coverage that it frequently turns up on polls of Canadian values, or what Canadians are proud of. When CBC held a contest a couple of years ago to vote for "The Greatest Canadian", Tommy Douglas, already mentioned here as the architect of the first universal health care plan, won. Beat Lester Pearson, Pierre Trudeau, Terry Fox and Wayne Gretzky.
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Rebates for actually taking care of yourself
One of the biggest (pun intended) problems with Americans and many in the West is that many of our diseases stem from a profoundly unhealthy lifestyle. We eat crap, we're obese, we stress ourselves out beyond sanity, we don't exercise, and then we take powerful drugs to counter the inevitable problems caused by these lifestyle choices: heart disease, hypertension, cancer, diabetes, et. al.
One solution I think makes a great deal of sense is to establish a government healthcare system that yes, uses increased tax dollars to pay for some basic level of care for all citizens and legal residents. But also, the same system should establish benchmarks for self-care that would be validated by primary care physicians in annual physical exams, which too many people don't get anyway. It would work something like this:
a. You'd visit your personal MD after the plan went into effect and get a baseline picture of your health.
b. If you have health problems like overweight, high cholesterol, etc. that can be attributed to lifestyle, you're given goals to meet to reach benchmarks that would be determined by, let's say, the CDC, healthcare professionals, and the Dept of HHS. If you're in good health, you're expected to maintain that same level of health.
c. You go back a year later for your next physical. If you've met some or all of your health goals, your doctor registers you to receive a tax rebate based on the goals you have met and their fiscal value. The more ground you've gained (losing 50 pounds and lowering your cholesterol and BP into normal ranges without drugs, let's say), the bigger tax credit or refund you get.
d. If you maintain crappy health or like being sickly fatass, then you keep shoveling money into the system.
I'm not saying this would be simple to set up or administer. And of course, we'd continue to see disease born of genetics or bad luck along with injuries from accidents and crime. But this would provide a financial incentive for Americans to get health and stay healthy. Since some studies have shown that 60% or more of premature deaths from heart attack and cancer could be prevented with radical lifestyle changes, this might be worth trying. Just as in companies that have instituted incentive systems, those who don't give a shit about their health would subsidize the system for those of us who do. And if 50 million adults got healthier, their lower healthcare costs would balance out the lost revenues from tax rebates.
And please don't start with the "glandular problem" excuse for obesity. That's largely a convenient excuse for too many nights on the couch watching "American Idol" and eating Domino's. I told myself that until I found out a year ago that I had very high blood pressure. Since then I've lost 55 pounds and am off any medication. Incentive works; self-deception does not. We as a country should stop deceiving ourselves.
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Let's talk brass tacks -- money, time, and treatment in a specific case -- and compare
I am a Canadian, and here's my story. Okay, two months ago I was out running in the early morning, caught my foot in a protruding tree root and hit the sidewalk with some violence: both knees scraped, both palms, left hand knuckles scraped down to the bone, bruise on my face, and what seemed to be a broken arm. Those are the injuries.
Following are the times and cost.
1) It happened at 6:30 am. I walk back home, clean myself up a bit, wait until 8:45 and head for the doctor's office.
2) Office opens at 9:00, I see the doctor at 9:30. He sends me down the street for x-rays.
3) By 10:30, I have had my elbow x-rayed in 6 different (painful) positions.
4) By 10:45, I am advised to go to St. Joseph's emergency room, where they are expecting me. They give me the x-rays to take with me.
5) I get to St. Joe's, am seen by the admitting nurse in 10 minutes, asked two minutes of questions, mostly about who my contacts are in case I should have a fit, go unconscious, or whatever.
6) I see a doctor at 11:30. He confirms I have a broken elbow and gives me a treatment plan. Then a nurse comes, disinfects and binds all of my wounds. She gives me two slings and a package of bandages to take home with me.
7) At noon I am back home, bruised, but treated.
Cost out of pocket: zero
Times I showed my medical card: zero (they had me on file at the doctor's office and simply sent the info ahead to the other care providers.)
What I want to know from one of the Americans in the thread is: how much would it have cost you and how long would it have taken you to get the treatment I got. I'm asking this in all sincerity because I have NO idea what the American medical is like.
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Clear but still nonsense
"KStone's claim that people who go after Moore aren't accused of being on the right is pure, unadultered, 100%, grade-A, knock a dog off a gut wagon, stink to high heaven bullshit.
Clear enough for ya, pal?"
Clarity was never your problem, pal. Btw, that wasn't my claim. YOU came into this letters section with your meme when none of the LWs here accused critics of Moore as being on the Right. It was just your lazy way of trying pre-empt criticism of the review by hysterically labeling folks. Bullshit is about right.