Nationalized Single-Payer Health Systems

[J Scott]

First, this thread is NOT about the current legislation to create a national healthcare program. There are plenty of threads on here arguing the benefits and drawbacks of that specific bill, and I don't want this to turn into another one.

I'd honestly love to have a constructive discussion about this, and hopefully I can better understand views counter to my own...

Here's my premise:

Let's pretend there was a national healthcare bill that provided medical benefits to everyone, exactly like Medicare currently does for those over 65, but ALSO allowed those wanted to get privatized healthcare (at the current quality and costs) to continue to do so. In other words, if you didn't want to use the national healthcare system, you'd still pay for it through your taxes, but you could go about paying separately for your own healthcare (just like now) with absolutely no loss of quality or service, and at the exact same prices.

Please don't argue that this isn't possible...it's my premise, and I'd like to stick with it for this thread.

Given that, what are your specific issues with this idea?

I suspect two of the issues that will come up are "It's socialized medicine and we don't want that," and "It's going to be expensive."

For those who feel this is the reason not to implement this system, my follow-up question would be:

How is this system any different than any of the current single-payer nationalized (socialized) systems of health protection we have in this country today? And should we get rid of those?

What I meant there is that we already have single-payer nationalized health protection in this country.

From the Centers for Disease Control (which does health research on behalf of the whole country, health research on behalf of specific parts of the country, and medical treatment for individuals who require it); to the FDA (which provides generalized health oversight of our foods and medicines); to the police and fire departments (which protect our individual health and well being everyday), we already have extensive socialized health protection in this country.

Some might argue that those services are for the good of the whole, as opposed to healthcare which is targeted to individuals. But, that's not truly the case.

For example, MikeOH has stated many times (sorry, not trying to pick on you Mike!) that he's had the police come out to his properties many times; I, on the other hand, have never had to call the police or have them come to one of my properties. Yet we both pay the same amount in taxes to provide this service. He's benefiting more from my tax dollars than I am.

Likewise, my cousin only eats organic food and doesn't shop in grocery stores, so he gets less use out of the FDA than I do. Yet, just as much of his taxes going towards protecting my health as mine do. I'm benefiting more from his tax dollars than I am.

These are all single-payer nationalized (socialized, if you will) health protection systems created for our citizens. They exist today, and for the most part, I don't hear anyone complaining that they're too expensive or too socialized.

And, of course, there is one more BIG ONE -- Medicare. It's exactly what I'm proposing above, but instead of just for people 65 and over, it would be for everyone. Just like Medicare now, it's not mandatory; if you want to use your own private health insurance, go for it.

Not a single congressman or senator has stood up and said, "let's get rid of Medicare." And politicians on both sides have said, "If I were around in 1965, I would have voted for the Medicare bill."

So, clearly there is support for Medicare, which is also tremendously expensive and tremendously socialized.

For those who argue that the government can't effectively run a healthcare system, consider this:

Feedback from Medicare users is consistently very positive. People who use Medicare tend to be very happy with it. Additionally, the government runs VA healthcare programs which also tend to get very high marks from participants. So, clearly, given the priority, the government can manage a healthcare program.

All that said, I'd love to hear from those who are opposed to nationalized healthcare...what is your opposition?

Again, let's keep Obama out of this, let's keep the current bill out of this, let's keep all the specific idiots on capital hill out of this discussion. Let's stick to the idea, not the current implementation being discussed.

Thanks for the feedback...I'm honestly very curious!