Why doesn't the United States have a strong national healthcare system?

Question

Why is the US the only highly industrialized country without a national healthcare system? I know that the US has medicaid and medicare, but I am talking about the more extensive types of programs like the ones that exist in Canada and many European countries.

Answer 1

well.. .apparently it's because of all the lies that are out there... just look at them all on here...

first off... America is about 2 to 5 times more expensive than any other country as far as costs...

it does have better health care, slightly, for those that can afford it...

and they pay for it in taxes, which are expensive... but my health insurance is tremendously expensive... especially considering I'm hardly ever sick...

the answer is... they are making too much money...

Answer 2

The US is the only highly industrialized system in the world without Universal health insurance because of the pharmaceutical lobby that exists in Washington DC that refuses to let it happen. It's been shown that it is far cheaper for the government to run the healthcare system that it is for private enterprise, which is kind of ridiculous to say because healthcare in this country isn't very private anyway with the heavy regulations the government imposes on in anyway they should just make it universal. It has been proven that businesses and corporations would also favor it because it would be less of a burden to them. Proven fact: Chrysler spends more on employee health insurance than it does for the steel to make their cars. The Veterens clinics in the US were some of the worse places to go a few decades ago, but with a little government care they became the best place for people to go and the have the lowest administrative costs of any other clinics in the country. The US is by far not the best healthcare system in the world which is shown by our life expectancy compared to those of other highly industrialized countries. Of course, with a new universal healthcare system taxes would need to be raised but it would probably be a smaller amount of money than what people would be paying now for health insurance because the government would be able to control the prices of drugs and other related health services. Healthcare shouldn't be a privilege, it should be a right and just like this country has a duty to protect everyone from the evil in the world, it should also have the duty of making sure everyone has available healthcare. Government is not efficient at a lot of things, but they have proven themselves to be the most efficient way to provide healthcare. Just because this country should have universal health insurance doesn't mean that we are a socialist country...it is a step towards making this country a better and more attractive place to live.

Answer 3

Government officals from around the world come to the U.S. to get patched up. I think the most recent example was a German politican this week. Canadians and Europeans come to the U.S. for medical work, because they don't want to wait. In Russia it's cheaper to go to the emergency room for a band-aid than buy a box at the store. Many patients have to wait several months for surgery in Europe while U.S. patients might be able to get surgery that day if it's serious or a couple of weeks at most for elective surgery.

Europeans also pay 80% of their wages in taxes and have a small police force and a small military. Their unemployment is 8% (Mexico is 3.7%) and if the EU was a state of the U.S., it would rank around Mississippi, Arkansas and West Virginia economically. So basically Europe is giving up everything else for shoudy healthcare.

Answer 4

because in the experience that they did medical doctors does not get wealthy, insurance businesses would lose money, all of it about the personal sector making extra money. And once you seem at each plan the gov. got here up with the plan in touch some kind of insurance coverage.we are the basically industialized u . s . that would not have social health care basically the very detrimental or the rich could have the funds for health care. that's basically yet in a unique thanks to seperate the teachings and they get down on India's type equipment a minimum of whats up have health care as crude because it may nicely be a minimum of htey making an attempt

Answer 5

It's hard to disagree with USMCstingray. The U.S. health care system is definitely the best in the world.

What most people don't realize is that the Canadian system can survive only because they can send their overflow to the U.S.

And the British system is probably not as bad as it used to be, but for decades the punchlines of many jokes were based on how terrible their system was.

The Scandinavian countries have a socialist system that works pretty well. But it's not one that could work in the U.S. It requires extremely high income taxes, and is accepted by the public only because they are a very homogeneous, close-knit society that are willing to give up some of their individual rights for the good of others like themselves (and they really are like each other, blond and blue-eyed).

To paraphrase Winston Churchill, "America has the worst possible healthcare delivery system ... except for any other."
That's not to say that we can't make it better, but socialized medicine is not the path to better health care.

Answer 6

Because it's all part of the Capitalist design.

The fact is that the US government profits off of public sickness/health. What else do I need to tell you? The US government sees that it can suck about $300-600 a month from each citizen (or most) and so it does it. The greedy US government would never do something because it's solely good for the general welfare of society. It only does things if it can get some type of profit/benefit out of it.

Answer 7

Canada and many European countries are socialist, where as the United States is capitalist. In Canada, the person who decides to sit home all day and do nothing, get the same exact medical care as does the person that strives to succeed..the person who goes to college and excels get the same benefits as does the person that sits home and plays PS2 all day. Fair? Hardly.

The US is capitalistic...you get what you earn. Yes, we have medicare and medicaid to help those who need a helping hand, but outside of that..sorry.

Answer 8

The reason for this is because the US is a CAPITALIST society. Most of Europe is SOCIALIST. For example, Germany has state-controlled health care. Over here (my husband and I are stationed here), there is an 18% sales tax, called VAT.
Now, I don't know of ANY Americans who want to pay that.
Things are EXPENSIVE here in Germany. Gas is almost $8 a gallon. The roads are horrible, and there are NO streetlights on the autobahn.
Therefore, even though our system is flawed, it's better than others!

Answer 9

Great question. The reply....because America is too busy giving away tax dollars (by the billions) to other countries. Are we trying to buy their love? Even with 2 billion dollars a year to Egypt we have learned that they letting Al Quaeda use their satellite to bounce TV propaganda programs to a world audience. Have we bought Egypt's respect and friendship? Bull!

Answer 10

Its mainly because it costs about $400-600 a month to get private health insurance, but it costs several thousand in socialist countries(through higher taxes). The government intervention adds enormous costs.
Otherwise, we would have it.

Before I was a pilot, I made about $1500 A month and had full health paid in cash, and still had enough to pay car payments, car insurance, rent, and had about $500 left each month.
Its not unreasonable, but I can imagine why some people cant pay, especially since alot of people get stuck in credit traps.