The coronavirus crisis is a classic example of how weâre all in it together. What good is it if you have good healthcare if youâre surrounded by contagious people who do not?
Paying Higher Taxes for Healthcare
Ted Rall
Ted Rall is a syndicated political cartoonist for Andrews McMeel Syndication, WhoWhatWhy.org and Counterpoint. He is a frequent contributor to The Wall Street Journal, a graphic novelist and author of many books of art and prose, and an occasional war correspondent. He is, recently, the author of the graphic novel "The Stringer."
9 Comments. Leave new
I guess the size of the cartoon limited the speakers actual thoughts: “Come to think of it, only a total fool*** would object to paying more in taxes to be able to drop, altogether, private health insurance premiums, for a likely overall reduction in cost …. for no-hassle medical insurance coverage.”
Re: the text below the cartoon. Are we assume “good healthcare” means “good healthcare insurance”? They are two different things. I think that a “good” one of neither exists in the US of exceptional, premium sub-mediocrity. Only a government health insurance program could possibly lead to severly needed changes in the healthCARE system. See for example
Link
————–
*** a fool is one who thinks that government taxes are justified ONLY for the uses enumerated below BUT CLEARLY NOT FOR the 99.99% of the rest of the residents of the country that government “governs'”
a) perpetual war and, thus, global enemy production
b) society-wide, domestic, electronic surveillance
c) subsidies, tax breaks, hand-outs, “public-private partnerships” etc., etc., etc. to the extremely rich and the
trans-national corporations they control
This MAY be the second version of this post. If you find the duplication annoying, please refer to the
persons(s) who control the “Your comment is awaiting moderation” torment. It seems more likely,
however, that no one will see either version, during the time the cartoon is “front page,” in which case
you won’t know there is anything to do, much less, how to do it!
————————————————————————————-
I guess the size of the cartoon limited the speakers actual thoughts: “Come to think of it, only a total fool*** would object to paying more in taxes to be able to drop, altogether, private health insurance premiums, for a likely overall reduction in total cost …. for no-hassle medical insurance coverage.”
Re: the text below the cartoon. Are we assume “good healthcare” means “good healthcare insurance”? They are two different things. I think that a “good” one of neither exists in the US of exceptional, premium sub-mediocrity. Only a government health insurance program could possibly lead to severely needed changes in the healthCARE system. See for example article at following address: tinyurl.com/vtqofv2
————–
*** a fool is one who thinks that government taxes are justified ONLY for the uses enumerated below BUT CLEARLY NOT FOR the 99.99% of the rest of the residents of the country that government “governs’”
a) perpetual war and, thus, global enemy production
b) society-wide, domestic, electronic surveillance
c) subsidies, tax breaks, hand-outs, “public-private partnerships” etc., etc., etc. to the extremely rich and the
trans-national corporations they control
No, no, Ted – eliminating taxes – for everything but the military (so «we» can kill people abroad) and the police (so «we» can kill people at home) – is far more important than so low-priority an item as (other peoples’) healthcare. Surely the taught you that in Economics 101, during your brief stint at Columbia ?…
Henri
And, somehow, Sanders is in second place in a de facto two-person race. I don’t know if the Sanders people read the comments section, but if they do, Bernie has got to stay in this thing all the way to the end. Biden’s dementia, the real risk of him Coviding out before the convention. Both could render second-place the winner after all.
Further, I don’t see anyone addressing the hissing time bomb in the room. What happens when Covid starts going through the prison systems? Subpar healthcare, close quarters, poor sanitation, people who smoke. And most of them are non-violent offenders. Where exactly do you put a million people? How exactly do you put them there? How do you ration ventilators to them?
This will turn uglier and uglier for Biden. And Sanders is the one whose been saying the correct things all the way along. SANDERS MUST REMAIN IN THE RACE.
Higher taxes for health care YIPE !!!
Higher taxes could drive me and my spouse into poverty
How you ask, won’t you save on healthcare?
No I won’t save a thing.
The short version: As a disabled vet I get free government healthcare and my spouse gets low copay government health care from my military retirement (disability payments reduce retirement checks)
so a National health system that taxed middle class families $500 a month sounds like a deal. Drop the $800 dollar plan private insurance and its copays and go with a national system save 300 a month even if it has token co payments. Over at my place an extra 500 a month in taxes, turn off lights and live on ramen…cut the net and basic cable. National income numbers don’t matter when the local prices and rents are so high but the one job I could find is here and I want make it seven more years until I retire.
A year after I retired from the military the 2008 mess hit, I couldn’t find work so I went back to class and earned a science degree. despite the 3.8 GPA I still couldn’t work so the VA hooked me up with a lab technician position in government lab in silicon valley. My entire lab check covers the rent and utilities in a old rent controlled studio apartment, we don’t eat out and we only take staycations and still we wouldn’t make it without my retirement and disability.
The backers of national health care need to realize many people won’t back a plan sight unseen.
They need to come up with a plan ASAP let everyone read it and try to knock off the rough edges, then marshal a wider base of supporters.
P.S. what about national dental care?
Only 100% disabled vets are eligible for that, I pay for insurance with copays and caps.
I am a vet too.
I was exempt from paying Obamacare’s uninsured penalty to the IRS because I was already insured through the VA.
If you are already insured through government agencies such as the VA, I can’t see how you would have to pay an extra tax for Medicare.
Mandatory payments to medicare and penalty payments to the IRS are not happening now for veterans who are covered by the VA.
That is why I want details on a plan before decicing if I would back any politicians essposing National Health Care. I emailed several politicians and organizations and received no replies so the topic makes me warry.
One person was talking about funding health care through a national sales tax, that would be hard to avoid.
A payroll tax that came back for working disabled vets and military retirees after you filled out the 1040 at the end of the year …that would very hard to survive.
Never having a healthcare salary tax taken out your pay would work for me.
A high earners tax for very the very successful including vets, I am good with that. Veterans would take their standard veterans deduction and then kick in some from their success to keep society healthy.
There are 87 million people who are uninsured and under-insured in the US.
Capitalism demands that overcapacity be eliminated in order to maximize profit. Over-staffing and empty hospital beds cost money that hit a hospital’s bottom line negatively.
The profit system does not require that there be capacity to treat these 87 million under-insured and uninsured.
The 87 million uninsured and under-insured are now free to live or die with systemic indifference.
It makes no difference if those 87 million people live or die to hospitals and insurance companies as long as their profitability remains maximized.
But profits will now be affected because the corona virus contagion will have an economic effect on the parasitic insurance companies in treating their insured who become infected by the under-insured and uninsured.
So the lives of the uninsured and under-insured will soon matter, but only for the financial reasons of those who regularly profit at the expense of the insured while leaving other millions to die.
But the capitalist health care system will soon be bailed out by the government so they can again resume their indifferent stance toward the lives and deaths of 87 millions.
Unless we get single-payer, Medicare-for-All, which will cost less, in part by eliminating the cost of paying 2 or 3 million office staff salaries whose job is now to selectively administer and deny health care in order to maximize profit.
Speaking of being surrounded by the sick.
I’m wondering what happens when all of or most of the remaining primaries get postponed. I attempted to post something about this on reddit. Big mistake.
Am I late to the party in noticing that the people who have “control” of these public fora are very much of the “Oh, don’t say that!” variety? Timid little milquetoasts. Everything upsets them. Everyone must use their indoor voice and company manners at all time. Bernie Sanders said a swear word, and that’s the lead story now.
We’re looking at 750,000 to 2 million dead in the U.S. with an average hospital stay of maybe as much as two weeks, and the hospital system that cannot take that amount of people, nor will there be enough personnel, even if there were enough beds, and the economy is in freefall and lots of people are already unemployed, and while all that’s happening, and when the primaries get pushed back about a month, people are going to look to the politicians for some answers. I don’t think Biden’s slick shit-eating grin is gonna cut it. Not once the bodies start piling up.