Socialized medicine is an abysmal failure

I'm not saying that the socialized programs of other countries are perfect just that they aren't an abysmal failure. There are certainly pros and cons to any program. The cons in our system is that many people are uninsured and many more are constantly treated poorly by the insurance companies which make massive amounts of money off screwing over sick people. If you're ill and do not have insurance, you're going to go bankrupt or die. You can't get insurance and you can't afford care. For non-critical care people have to wait a couple months. I'm not sure what your definition of "abysmal failure" is but I don't think that exactly qualifies. It is actually over-reported how problematic they are, they wait in lines a couple months for a hip replacement. We let people die for three times as much! The United State System: - Pros: The United States has some of the best health care in the world. If you're rich. - Cons: Most people aren't rich. Sick people get screwed over. Insurance companies increase costs across the board. It costs three times as much. Socialized medicine: - Pros: Costs are kept low. Covers all citizens. - Cons: You sometimes need to wait a bit for non-critical services. Yeah, if you keep millions of people from having access to services you can get access to those services faster... assuming you can get access at all. You see some "amazing under reporting" when, in fact, actual surveys of satisfaction show that they are quite happy with their services and you're just cherry picking some nonsense from right wing news sources. Yeah, there are certain things which the US has a major edge in. We have more MRI machines than anybody else, though the for most things even a normal old X-ray works fine. We often use a lot of fancy stuff when even a family doctor could do right by you in about ten minutes for most problems. 1. You argue that they don't give enough care. However at least they have care. Our system suffers from a problem of giving people no care and letting them die. Letting problems fester until they need to go to the ER after it's too late. 2. At most with insurance... if you can get insurance. There's a rather major caveat with our system. Many people don't have insurance and can't get insurance. And you don't have virtually unlimited access to care. Apparently somebody hasn't read their information. 3. America has been quite successful. Competition does drive the creation of better technology. However, that's not what we have. Insurance makes money but selling insurance. The care they give all comes out of the bottom line. It is in the insurance companies best interests to take your money and give you no care whatsoever. If raising bogus claims for a couple months gives you a couple months more to die and forgo that quarter million dollar surgery they are inclined to do it. In fact, according to a number of company insiders... it's company policy. Furthermore, the aspect you cite as good and capitalistic still exists! The technology innovation isn't going to stagnate in a socialized system, because the socialized system isn't producing medical technology. If you invent a new machine which can easily and successfully predict heart problems better than an EKG then you can still sell it. They emphasis of our capitalism in the system isn't getting the cheapest care for the people because everybody has insurance. They are already getting their money whether you're sick or not, to maximize profits they need to minimize care. Now, what if rather than rely on insurance we simply cover the care directly. Insurance companies make money from people who might get sick. They are best helped by finding the people least likely to get sick and making them pay their money forever and never getting sick or using any services. As well as dropping anybody who is already sick. There's no actual capitalistic forces pushing down the prices and pulling up the services. They just want to do the least they can. 5 (my numbers are reflecting my opponent's numbers and he skipped 4, not I). Yes, the health care is being paid for by taxes rather than being produced magically for kicks. The services are being paid for by the people. The problem with this argument is that it lacks nuance. You could pay almost nothing in taxes and receive nothing in services. No roads, no fire department, no police, no military, no health care... nothing. You could also pay a nice chunk in taxes and pretty well cover everything you'd need to the point where every cent you earn can be spent on luxuries. Let's say that rather than having a highway system we simply have a large system of toll roads. Sure, you aren't pay the money in taxes but you're paying it in tolls (and then some because toll road systems are making a large profit). Then the fact that you are paying little in taxes for the project is of little concern to you. Similarly look at the current medical system. We pay huge amounts to the insurance companies as well as paid by employers. Medical costs are astronomically high and we're paying roughly three times as much Canada or other socialized systems. Now, consider that about 16% of US medical costs go to health care. http://www.parapundit.com... If we were to change the current system we have but change all the insurance company fees and call them taxes then our taxes would skyrocket from the 26.8 (your wikipedia link) to 44.8% (26.8% + 16%). This would put us just above France as #5 on the list. This is without changing anything at all. Just calling the healthcare costs taxes makes us pay as much as France in taxes. You know how much France pays for medical? 10.8% of GDP. http://www.soulcast.com... They rate as having the best medical care in the world and pay 60% as much as we do. Simply taking any program whatsoever, even if completely needed, under the auspices of government is going to make the taxes look exceedingly high as any money they take is taxes, even if we pay more for the private program. The end result is you're going to get the same service and pay less money for it... but because that money is paid to the government the program is terrible and evil? The end result is you keep more of your money and it is a bad thing. ----------------------------------------------- This debate topic is not that the US system is good or even that the US system is not an abysmal failure itself. The topic only refers to universal health care programs by pretty much all the rich westernized countries in the world and the question as to whether or not those are abysmal failures. So far, my opponent has pointed out that they result in increased taxes and longer lines. 1) Taxes are the funds we pay the government. Yes, the healthcare would be paid for by the government out of our taxes dollars. But, in reality this isn't any different than having the healthcare paid for by the insurance companies out of our insurance dollars. Save the massive difference that the government wouldn't be making massive amounts of profits and would be giving services exactly equal to the money taken in. 2) There are lines for non-critical services. It's true, there are lines for non-critical services. These are, however, non-critical services. As much as they would like getting you in for surgery the same week you come in, sometimes it can take a couple months. We pay about 60% more than France which has the best healthcare in the world. So, if we simply tossed some excess money at the problem of lines it would go away. I mean, we're tossing a lot more money than other countries at healthcare and getting screwed over... certainly we could fix these problems as well. Abysmal failure? I don't think so.