I got my first (part-time) job at age 16 as an office worker in a Fortune 500 company back in 1976. Even as a part-timer I got a Blue Cross card that entitled me to many benefits; when I went full time after graduating from high school I received the full "gold card" Blue Cross benefits. I never took advantage of what was offered because I was young and healthy. There were older employees who had heart attacks or who had kids with leukemia and such that truly needed such coverage, but they were the exception rather than the rule. I remember my one great extravagance during that time was using the company's eye care coverage to get a pair of designer Rive Gauche eyeglasses for only $30. But that was a time when CT scans were a major test ordered only by certain specialists and there was no such thing as an MRI. Many of our senior execs who suffered a sudden heart attack died because there wasn't the (very expensive) technology now available to keep them alive. I was fortunate for a time because once I was diagnosed with Lupus I still had that gold card coverage and all of my many expensive prescriptions only cost me a $2 co-pay. But that didn't last forever. As technology progressed and more and more people were being kept alive the costs increased. Eventually when I was job-searching it became a matter of what health care benefits were offered versus the salary.

And before anyone piles on with the Canadian model as a solution, let the record show that I live near Windsor, Ontario, and have (unfortunately) spent more time in hospitals and diagnostic offices in the last 10 years than I care to count, thanks to aging parents. While sitting in the waiting room at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit waiting for my Mom to finish her MRI I chatted with the many people in the waiting room. I was the sole American; all the rest were Canadians who were paying for the test on their own rather than undergoing the lengthy wait at home. At Henry Ford Bi-County Hospital in Warren I interviewed several staff members as part of an article (to kill time while trading bedside sitting duty for heart patient Dad with my siblings) and they estimated that 40% of the patients in that ward were Canadian.

kab: Moral of the story: Get a big boy job and you wont need to worry about insurance. I guess I'm pretty lucky

Thank Glob I'm a white male...

DIGITALgimpus: The real reason people are against universal health insurance is big businesses would have trouble retaining valuable employees.

Most successful startups aren't by 20 something college dropouts like Zuck and Gates. They are by 40 something's with kids. This demographic generally avoids such endeavors because the 9-5 provides health insurance for the family and is safe.

If the US suddenly had universal healthcare, experienced employees would suddenly be more mobile to go start their own companies, join small businesses who can't afford coverage for their employees, or even consult.

All the other reasons given are wharrgarbl for this one. That's the big fear. Millions of top employees suddenly free to go elsewhere. Potentially to competitors, or go out on their own and get hired back as higher priced consultants.


FWIW, this would be a huge boon to the economy. Even if 0.001% of those who went this route started successful businesses, we'd see hundreds of thousands of jobs over the next decade. Jobs in all different sectors, states, demographics. All employees would be in play. Even the ones who live in places with few other employers in their area.

That's also why we won't do it. An economic turnaround only benefits the party in power. It hurts the one who is not. Whomever is not in the whitehouse benefits by keeping the economy down.

THIS

Health insurance is the golden handcuff. If health insurance and employment were no longer tied together, employees would no longer have to work at a company just for the benefits. They would be free to, as you said before, start their own companies, hop to other companies or be independent consultants. The main reason people don't start, or go to work for smaller businesses, is because they can't afford health insurance on their own.

Employers could no longer use health insurance as a carrot to get and keep employees. They'd have to start to compete on other things, like salary and vacation time.

Would taxes increase to pay for single payer? Yes. But to counter-balance that, the amount people pay out of their paychecks for privately run health insurance would go down or be eliminated entirely. Also, as more people start businesses as they were no longer handcuffed by health insurance, jobs get created and those people would be paying taxes, too.

Of course, try explaining the economic effects of single payer and all you'll get in response is "SOCIOLISM!111!"

ricochet4: the federal government, specifically, congress, also has a responsibility to provide for the general welfare (US Constitution, article 1, section 3.1), i assume that is the "other things" that you are referring to?

The word is not "provide", but "promote". Or maybe you interpret those two words as one and the same, and the Bloombergs of the nation thank you for trusting them with ever-increasing state power as they chuckle all the way to the bank.