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other factors that have not been discussed so far:
what i saw from reading the links posted earlier that surprised me is the average doctors salary in the states, in 2000, was 191k.
the average.
191,000 dollars/year.
that is about twice the average from countries with universal health care.
i would imagine that something would have to be done about the massive amounts of loan debt that people acquire to pass through med school...that the problem would arise at the point of instituting the system. but it would have to be addressed.
the other major cost in the american system that i have so far been luck enough to not know about first hand is per-day rates in hospitals, which are outrageous. and far far above what is charged in other countries.
insurance carriers. i expect that a combined system, one that would leave space for private carriers, could be forced onto the insurance industry without much problem. what i do not know is the size and power of the industry lobby at the moment. that would have to be broken.
pharma---i do not see why these corporations could not function just as easily in either kind of system. for research funds, thje state could direct resources at them. japan for example has used highly focussed state funding of important industrial sectors for years as a spur to r&d--not to mention as a spur to job creation,etc. it does not seem to have induced anyu radical inefficiency in japanese industrial organization.
as for social benefits, i see no plausible argument against universal health care. folk above have said it better than i could.
o, thanks for the links art--they were informative.
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a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear
it make you sick.
-kamau brathwaite
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