Thursday, July 26, 2007
Newsweek
Jane Bryant Quinn wrote a good essay on universal health care. But without a really strong leader pushing this, I just don't see it happening. And without it, we will cease to be an economic force in the world, because our health care costs are keeping us from being competitive. I think that this is a way to explain it to the right wingers - since compassion for the sick doesn't work, let's put it in terms they can relate to - corporate profits and America's place as an economic power. See, we can find common ground here!
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4 comments:
If it hits Time, we're good to go.
Bigfoot has issues. He became unable to work on a Monday, after putting in a few hours. After having things done all week (BIG TIME things) he found out his insurance was cut off as of Monday, because he couldn't work. And then found out the company had taken out for his insurance that day.
But this is a good, workable system.
Good article. As an uninsured person, I avoid going to get things checked out because I can't afford it. I do have catastrophic coverage, but the deductible is very high, and so, I skip things that may cost more than I have. It sucks. And part of my house proceeds, when it sells (please St. Joseph) will go to mammogram, colonospcopy and new glasses. I would be completely willing to pay a payroll tax for coverage. I don't expect something for nothing, I just can afford to pay $500 a month for crap coverage.
You know, the entire concept of tying one's health insurance to employment is deranged, and yet we accept it as the norm and don't demand the standard of the rest of the industrialized world, because we are brainwashed by the shrieking harpies on the right: "Socialized medicine!" And we are complacent and aren't rioting because most Americans think they are "safe" because they have employer provided health insurance. Until they get the rude awakening: If you are too sick to work and you are really in need of medical care, and your employer has been taking money from you paycheck for years for your contribution so you assume you will get what you've been paying for, that's when, oh, I'm sorry, your employer lets you go because you can't work, and cancels your insurance via a form letter. So the sick person is treated like a burden and a deadbeat because s/he dared get sick. That's compassionate conservatism. The American way: You only deserve medical benefits when you are too healthy to really use them, if you get sick, screw you.
I should add: your employer's form letter will include, by law, a gracious invitation to spend astronomical sums to extend your insurance for, I believe it is 6 months, maybe 12, via COBRA. Which costs more than you ever imagined possible, at a time when you are not working, because you are sick. Yeah, that's fair and reasonable. My husband took two years to die of cancer, if not for my coverage his illness would have taken everything we had. So I felt "lucky" because we didn't lose everything he'd worked for all of his life. Imagine that - beating the odds by not filing bankruptcy after terminal cancer in the family is "lucky."
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