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Comment by armanini_io | Hacker News Reader

Only in US.

There are different horror stories from different systems. Bottom line is that access to health care professionals and equipment is a scarce resource, and any resource management process whether through governmental regulation, or individual funding, insurance program, etc will be faced with managing access to that resource one way or another.

And in some systems, horror stories are way more common than others.

The simple fact is that I don't know anybody from my European family or friends who would willingly switch their system to the US one. And as a very well insured employee in the US, if, hypothetically, I had the option to use my European health care in the US, I'd switch immediately a well.

>> I'd switch immediately a well

I doubt it. Someone needs to pay for it, so this switch would have to imply a 20% tax increase. Unless you’re paid peanuts, it’s not worth the tradeoff.

Huh? Tax rates are not 20% higher in Canada than in the US, and we somehow muddle through.

That’s why I deliberately did not say income tax rates. They ream you in other ways. Canada’s taxes as percentage of GDP are 31.7%. US is 26%. And on top of that I was referring to Western Europe, where they are close to or above 50% GDP.

That's still 6%, not 20%. (It also pays for college tuition, childcare, and parental leave.) It's also a bit weird to do it as gdp percentage instead of individual percentage, which obscures the individual/business split.

But you would save more by not having to buy your own medical insurance.

I know an expat who moved to work for citi in the states from the UK and he was paying around 20% just for him -his wife kids are covered by her federal Job.

UK NI is about 13% and that includes state pension, unemployment and the NHS

>> But you would save more

I wouldn’t.

> Someone needs to pay for it

Or you could pay less for it.

There are many studies that show how the US system has incredibly high overhead that simply isn't needed.

Just an example: in the US, a primary care physician usually has a nurse and somebody who handles paperwork, insurance BS, and what not. Most European countries simply don't have this, mostly because there is no insurance BS to deal with.

There is insurance related overhead every step of the way.

And that's not including the free-for-all pricing of $500 saline bags.

Your 20% tax increase is ridiculous. It doesn't have to be nearly that high (and it isn't.) And even though I'm in the highest tax bracket, I'd gladly pay 5% more if it meant quality medical care for everyone without any risk of bankruptcy.

Once again, US share of taxes in GDP is 26%. Denmark: 50.8, Sweden 49.8, Germany 44.5, France 47.9, UK 34.4. So weighted by GDP it does cost quite a bit.

And how much of this additional cost goes toward medical cost?

The US health care issue can only be solved by higher taxes and lower cost (it’s currently at 2x the cost of developed countries.)

Doesn't have to be higher taxes, that's my point. It can be solved by lowering the cost through technology and regulation, which Obama chose not to do, because that would eliminate a ton of jobs. Switzerland has essentially Obamacare, and does cutting edge pharma research (unlike the rest of the world, except for the US), and doctors get decent, albeit not exorbitant, wages (again, unlike in the rest of the world except the US), and if you look at the cost, their insurance is not that expensive, and their taxes are, on the whole, lower than in the rest of Europe. Pumping trillions of dollars through the government only adds overhead, because we all know how terribly inefficient government spending is.

Yet the administrative costs of Medicare or the French healthcare system are much lower than private insurances. I'm not sure the government is that inefficient...

Why are you quoting figures for the entire tax take in a discussion about healthcare? To give you some perspective, the healthcare-only figures for those countries are US: 16.8%, Denmark: 10.3%, Sweden: 11%, Germany: 11.2%, France: 11.1% and UK: 9.9%. Data here:

https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.XPD.CHEX.GD.ZS?year_...

Because OP wanted to "switch" to European socialized insurance, without also "switching" to their levels of incomes and taxes as well. Of course their cost of labor is lower: they socialize a bunch of costs that would otherwise need to be recouped through the earnings of doctors, nurses, administrative personnel, etc. On top of that they get US drugs for a fraction of the cost, and don’t do any serious pharma research (because there’s quite literally no money in it, given the cost of drugs). It’s not a valid comparison. My point wasn't that US healthcare is not expensive, anyone with any brain at all can tell that it is. It was that you can't pick and choose, and on balance, even with the more expensive healthcare, the US is a "better deal" for the vast majority of people who comment on this site.

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