Why is anybody a modern day conservative/Republican if Democrats want to fix health care and everything that is broken with it can be attributed to Republicans? At least that's the vibe I get from reading here + Reddit on politics.
Seriously asking.
Seriously asking.
1. Healthcare is actually hard at scale.
2. The incentive structure in the US (read, follow the money) is one which is against the public good.
3. There are many many many landmines of technical debt within the current US system which cannot be papered over or solved easily even if you waved a magic wand and got full buy-in for single payer universal healthcare tomorrow.
It's true in some respect that Republicans have taken a general stance against universal healthcare in American politics, but the idea that Democrats have any meaningful and decent strategy for fixing it is a misnomer. At best, we have some politicians who have said the correct words to convey the right sentiments, but no meaningful plans.
As to why this issue is so much worse in the US than elsewhere, that's its own separate essay, but largely comes down to the structure of healthcare mandated by the government since the 1920s, especially after the formation of Medicare and the passage of Part D combined with first mover disadvantages as much of the rest of the world had the opportunity to radically structure their healthcare infrastructure differently post WW2 while rebuilding inclusive of the cost of rebuilding, while the US did not. In a fit of irony, the US footed the bill and drove economic levers to help cement universal healthcare into much of Europe while failing to implement it at home. Even now, part of the complication is that the outsized pricing of healthcare in the US acts as a partly disconnected subsidy on the cost of healthcare elsewhere in the OECD.
After having worked in this space and seeing how completely and utterly fucked the US healthcare system is internally from a technology/records keeping perspective, to the entire payment processing flow, to the way we track and report healthcare incidences, the entire system is broken badly and needs a total overhaul, but that's a much bigger ask than incremental improvements which don't really move the needle much. The US healthcare system is (literally) a legacy codebase written in an esoteric language held together with fears and sorrows because the hopes and dreams already died. The only feasible way to fix its myriad bugs is a complete rewrite, but doing so will form it's own set of technical debt and bugs.
People have different thoughts about economic policy with regards to healthcare. Additionally, there are some cultural concerns.
For one, conservatives feel that liberals are too idealistic and don't have a good plan for actually paying for socialized healthcare. This is most commonly used against Bernie Sanders. Liberals argue that "competition drives down cost" is equally, if not more, idealistic.
Second, in places with "socialized" healthcare, health is thought of as society's responsibility, not the individual's responsibility. This conflicts with the American notion of individuality. Conservatives argue that the US's culture makes socialized healthcare infeasible without costs ballooning out of control, because people are selfish and don't care to protect their health. There is plenty of debate on this matter.
I'm guessing that healthcare is not the most important reason that conservatives vote Republican. Although it seems like a huge issue, there are other issues that might make someone choose one side over the other, even if they disagree with their side's healthcare policy.
This particular problem is due to heavy regulation creating a moat for large pharmaceutical companies to arbitrarily set prices. Republicans generally want to de-regulate, Democrats don't. Republicans generally want the free market to work things out, Democrats generally want the government to work things out.
Each side has been taking turns and as a result, we have had the government prevent the free market from working things out. We want everyone to be able to get healthcare, but we don't (or can't) force anyone to pay for insurance. We effectively incentivize people to not get insurance until they are sick, then we force insurance companies to take them on when they've never paid into the system. Somebody has to pay for all of it, and it ain't the government.
They are basically both hampering competition where they can, and not allowing the gov. to be able to negotiate.
I am sorry but your comment doesn't hold water...
As for banning imported drugs, this is a bipartisan issue, both parties have called for allowing it, but both parties are effectively against it.
The Republican controlled Senate spent the other 7.5 years blocking most of the bills by the Democrats. They also attempted to repeal the ACA 70 times.
As to your "We effectively incentivize people to not get insurance", that was the point of the individual mandate which was repealed by the Republicans in 2017.
> As to your "We effectively incentivize people to not get insurance", that was the point of the individual mandate which was repealed by the Republicans in 2017.
There never was an effective individual mandate, but if there had been, it most likely would've been ruled unconstitutional. Whether you pay a small fine or no fine whatsoever, you are ultimately incentivized to defer paying the far higher insurance premiums.