Yankee ingenuity is dead. Sadly, it is other countries, without all the fossilized pride, that can make these things work.
Regarding #6, what if your hospital bills end up being $1 million, how do you expect most people to be able to pay $333,000?
Singles in Ca and the U.S. have near identical tax liability. Families in the U.S. at a hypothetical 30k pay around 11% in state and Federal taxes. In Canada the all in tax bill is 21%.
Hmm, seems pretty fair. A family of four, for example, has two earners but four possible draws on the healthcare system, and pay just 10% more in tax.
Fair or not fair, the point is, health care in Canada isn't the $43 a month gift from a Genie you portray it to be. The average Canadian family pays 3k a year in additional taxes to pay for it. And in other nations that are far more inept than Canada-which is a great country-gas taxes and the like (ala the U.K.) are downright punitive. You and other universal health advocates keep mentioning that "every developed nation, every G8 nation" etc but are ANY of those nations not in deep ass fiscal trouble? That my friend is the danger of U.S. deficits. Because EVERYONE is in debt, the electricity of global debt markets is very stretched. And a lot of that indebtedness is tied to the massive entitlements of Japan, Europe, the U.K. and the U.S. Even Canada can't gloat. Their debt to GDP is still half that of the U.S. Not exactly a bragging right.
My statement is they deliver more advanced health care services... I did not state their health care system is better. Cuban medical tourism is up largely due to experimental treatments and other services that are not available in the us due to our litigious nature in the practice of medicine. ie. Stem Cell treatments, organ harvesting, hyperbarics, cosmetic surgeries and other non FDA approved / non insured treatments. From the perspective of an uninsured or an underinsured their system would appear superior. From a large group participant their system would appear inferior until one experiences the insurance claims game. The fact that we have had an embargo in place for 50 years and they can even be compared to us should raise red flags warranting a closer look in the mirror. There is a world wide price gouging game being played by the pharmas. Drugs that cost $100 a pill here are exported to other countries at significant discount. In the US - Oxygen is classified as a drug, regulated by the FDA and can only be prescribed by a doctor. Maybe the intention of having an FDA was good but the system is gamed. For emergency care there are few places in the world that can deliver health care on par with the US.
I am sorry to say this to someone who had such a valid solution for how to deal with criminals. However this is flatout wrong. All of the richest people in the world flock to the U.S. for their doctors, provided they have the money, if you can afford to pay any price tag without insurance and you want to go to the place that has the best doctors in the world, you are going to the U.S. hands down. You are not going to Cuba. All you need to look at to prove this is how many billionaires in the U.S. fled to cuba for health problems, when i see buffest, clinton, or cheney flee to cuba to fix their health i will change my opinion.
Actually, I think most people travel to Switzerland. Since you're spouting an unsourced factoid, I don't believe that either one can be disproved. Actually the 9/11 firemen who had severe respiratory problems due to the dust after 9/11 were brought to Cuba and treated, for free as they couldn't receive treatment in the US. Political propaganda? Yes. But it made a point which is that America's heroes were ignored by the for-profit medical system. As well, your statistics of the tax burden in the US versus Canada is wrong. In Alberta, for example, the family of four with an income of 30,000 would pay less than $3000 in taxes (or less than 10%). You can estimate the pre-deduction tax amount here: http://lsminsurance.ca/calculators/canada/income-tax Then look up the Alberta child tax credit, which is over a thousand for two kids. I'm not sure why you can't seem to find these simple calculations yourself and are determined to get your information from editorials.
Cuba: I understand that they have the most educated hookers. hmm: now why would that be? ans: must be fans of omegapoint economics
"The documents revealed an economic system in which the sellers don't set the prices and the buyers don't know what they are. Prices bear little relation to demand or how well goods and services work. "No other nation would allow a health system to be run the way we do it. It's completely insane," said Uwe E. Reinhardt, a political economy professor at Princeton University who has advised Congress, the Veterans Administration, and other federal agencies on health-care economics" http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35726793/ns/business-your_retirement Yes, look at this free market. Is a game rigg? Is this the capitalism, or this is corruption? Sellers do no set the price, buyers they do not know the price? Ok.