From: gld@cunixb.cc.columbia.edu (Gary L Dare)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.misc
Subject: Re: National Health Care
Date: 25 Aug 92 17:24:44 GMT
Reply-To: gld@cunixb.cc.columbia.edu (Gary L Dare)
Organization: Curious Goods (formerly Louis Vendredi Antiques)

<jbrow@glv.com> writes:
>In <1992Aug24.160347.3464@oneb.almanac.bc.ca> Ken MacVay writes:
>> 
>> It is not theft when a people determine to adopt a NHC system, as they have
>
>By this, I take it that *every* Canadian gave their consent to this
>system.  If not, then I suggest to you that calling it anything but
>theft is just to make the ones that wanted the system feel better.  Of
>course, if every Canadian gave their consent, then why did you need
>the government to enforce it?

We've had over 7 elections in the past 20 years, and no party has seen
fit to campaign against public health insurance ... in fact, everybody
considers doing so political suicide (a handful of extremist *former*
Tory MP's stand to bear mute witness to this fact) ... also, our voter
turnouts are in the high-80%/mid-90% voluntarily, so elections can be
taken as very reasonable plebescites rather than a sordid collection
of special interest and extremist groups who bother to go and vote.
One of the reasons for the success of Mulroney's Conservatives has
been to grab a moderate social market position when the post-Trudeau
Liberals (as in Churchill and Paddy Ashdown, if you are familiar with
any British references -- not Jerry Brown) nudged slightly left and
flirted with grabbing moderate leftists who traditionally supported
the New Democratic Party.  The federal Liberals have been fighting to
regain their old social-liberal/fiscal-conservative space from the
federal Tories since.

>Of course, the "severe economic downturns" might be caused by the
>"severe taxation" brought on by your social policies (and this is the
>same here, in the U.S.). 

Canada spends more on maintaining infrastructure ... if you ever go up
there, you'll see that much of it looks like it came out of the box
last week.  We have a skewed population distribution so to maintain
any semblance of a unified nation, there are tremendous costs to just
maintain contact between the different regions.  Our private sector
has not been as savvy, with few exceptions such as Northern Telecom,
and is only now grappling with freer trade.  You must really want to
think that all Canadians are communists on welfare, when 9 of our 11
governments are controlled by avowed pro-free enterprise parties ...

>I have to admit, though, I'm surprised you are suffering an economic
>downturn.  Given all the Canadian responses I've seen on the net, I
>thought you all were out working 100% of the time for the public good.
>And given that when you do this, your efficiency is so very high...
>what's the problem?  OK, OK, I know, but I couldn't help it :-))

Please see my articles on GATT and free trade outlining how Canadian
private enterprise must reconfigure to deal with more open markets.
We have been a more traditionally old world culture than the U.S.; but
as the old world is changing with EC and GATT, so are we looking after
the market side of our social market system (borrowing a German term
popular with Kohl, et al.).  We have a smaller population but a buck
is still a buck on this continent, so our overheads are higher.

>> Recently, here in B.C., the doctors have taken exception to the
>> government's plan to cap earnings ($300K/year) of doctors. The
>> dispute will be settled by the PEOPLE, who will have to either
>> support the government or the medical community, or find a middle
>> solution.
>
>In a free market, the PEOPLE *are* the ones that determine your 
>compensation.

I thought that American doctors are presented with take-it-or-leave-it
fee schedules imposed upon them by insurance companies, not real people.

>If by your remarks, you mean the PEOPLE will vote to determine doctor 
>wages...  

And now, a backgrounder to the news ...

Ontario and British Columbia are the first and second-largest English
speaking provinces, comprising ~40% of our population and both having
New Democratic admistrations.  The B.C. government is waging a political
dispute with B.C. doctors over their fee schedule by introducing a cap.
If you paid attention to my FAQ, Canadian doctors are private and paid
by fee according to a schedule that their guild (College of Physicians
and Surgeons, effectively provincial arms of the CMA (AMA)) negotiates
with the public health insurance office -- it is usually a rubber stamp
process.

What Ken means is that the voting public will determine whether they
will support the NDP for a second term after they make such a move to
true socialized medicine (right now, everything is market except for
basic medical coverage) or whether a more moderate party will take
over.  As further historical background, B.C. used to be polarized in
an extreme way such that provincial wings of the federal moderate
parties (Liberals and Progressive Conservatives) were ineffective
because their extreme right-wingers joined in a provincial coalition
called Social Credit while the party moderates were involved solely in
federal issues.  It was not much of a choice between them and the NDP
as the few provincial Liberals and Progressive Conservatives always
managed to neutralize each other, until the Socreds finally imploded
in scandal to give the NDP a deserved victory.  The happy news is that
the B.C. Liberals (Churchill/Ashdown) emerged to head the Opposition
in provincial parliament and would remove this heineous salary cap if
the NDP ever actually imposes it (I think it's a bluff), by winning
the next election.

gld
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Je me souviens ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Gary L. Dare				Elections 1992-93:
> gld@cunixB.cc.columbia.EDU		* Jean Chretien (Canada)
> gld@cunixc.BITNET			* Perot^H^H^H^H^H Elvis! (USA)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.misc