re: #860 Existential_Donuts

It seems clear that this bothers many conservative minded people. I can totally understand that. “Bothered” would barely describe the Bush years from my point of view. The truth seems to be that health care IS all the terrible things people are talking about. But many people feel like that is the price for helping people. Another thing that boils down to point of view.

Heh. I guess we all get to trade who’s bothered form time to time :)

The promise of capitalism is that everyone benefits even when the few benefit extremely. Just ask the Chinese if income disparity is better than uniform poverty and squalor. Europeans have been wasting away in a state of inebriated government largess for the past couple decades. Even after our burst bubble, our standard of living continues to surpass theirs.

Now the counter argument to that claim is that health care for all is a standard of living marker that we don’t match. But the truth is, Americans choose other thing than health insurance to spend their money on. Food, clothing, and electronics, and just about everything else costs less in the US than in European countries. Americans could choose to spend more on health care and forgo other things that are luxuries to Europeans, but we don’t.