@33mhz
Retagging @keita @kdfrawg @dgold @streakmachine @blumenkraft in this thread
@33mhz what do you mean by "big". We have excellent world class huge quaternary hospitals serving our population, and significantly better life expectancy, maternal and neonatal mortality rates and many other population markers of health
@33mhz like, how good is someone who is somewhat poor and/or barely literate going to be at filling out a mass of incredibly complicated forms to acquire these benefits? They're not good at doing it. So those benefits discriminate automatically against those who need it most. Honestly probably someone you should read about who has been hideously affected by the cost of healthcare is Molly Holschzlag who has marrow failure post chemo for leukaemia. Among the many other accounts of the horrible inequities. The New England Journal of Medicine has a particularly poignant article about this. Doctors and patients alike will tell you about how unfair the US medical system is - and people here will tell you just how much better it is. These are well documented facts
// @keita
@33mhz people with very low incomes or on welfare don't pay tax here either. And the systems in the US to handle those debts and expenses are clearly terrible. For that matter it actually costs the US some 16.5% of gdp to maintain such an inefficient privatised health service with a life expectancy 5 or more years less than that of countries like Australia which spend 8-9% of gdp on health, but more efficiently.
// @keita
Nigel Farage’s love affair with Donald Trump’s America has taken another leap forward with news the former Ukip leader is to become a commentator on Fox News.
The world's billionaires have all gone bat-poop insane, haven't they?
@kdfrawg toxic capitalism. Except it's so crazy that it's no longer actually capitalism in some regards
// @keita