If you really subscribe to a special brand of American exceptionalism that holds that Americans are uniquely awful then I don’t know how I’d argue otherwise. I think that people’s actions are usually very strongly influenced by the situation they find themselves in, and a better system would lead to better results.
15 Likes
Yeah, he’s a real winner.
7 Likes
Establishment Dems don’t have the guts to force this issue, although, I believe it will beneift them greatly along with the citizens of this nation. Progressives will have to drag Est Dems by the scruff to get them onboard.
5 Likes
My conservative friends like to say things like “name one thing the government runs more efficiently” .
I could point out how efficiency as they define it is based on revenue and not outcomes. But often within a few breaths they are discussing their love of Top Gear or Dr. Who. 
6 Likes
That one’s easy. I can get a uniformed government employee to transport something from my corner mailbox directly to somebody’s house in rural North Dakota or Alaska or Guam for less than 50 cents.
23 Likes
Utilities, the military, education for the masses, prisons, public infrastructure…
Show me private/privatized versions of these which aren’t complete fusterclucks for the public.
16 Likes
YES! It’s unbelievable when the U.S. Postal Service is held up by conservatives as some kind of broken, inefficient clusterfuck. It’s not and never has been, despite the efforts of same conservatives to make it so. Anyone who has endured postal systems in other nations, or the lack thereof, appreciates the post office. it’s one of the only things the US does right. Public libraries are another.
18 Likes
So, executives of our major health insurance companies: what nationality do you think most of them are?
14 Likes
Everyone loves to rag on the post office and the DMV, but overall, they’re actually both remarkably effective and well-run, especially given the resources that have been made available to them. Meanwhile I’ve never seen anyone use the fact that a grocery store never has all of its checkout lanes open as valid reasoning for declaring that the entire notion of private enterprise is devoid of value.
21 Likes
In addition to the questions of cost and how it’s paid for, any health care system must be judged on its outcomes. The right continually promulgates the lie that any socialized, or semi-socialized, system would sacrifice the alleged unsurpassed quality the present rent rewarding scheme provides. By any number of quantifiable health metrics, the U.S. system performs abysmally given the gross resources thrown at it.
13 Likes
Well, that depends on where I am in the queue.
2 Likes
or
By (insert such and such year) Social Security will run out…
The US will not be able to pay for it.
You will never hear, by X year, the US will not be able to pay for the US Army…
(Never mind the fact that Roosevelt specifically made Social Security to be funded by a payroll tax
so that people know they are paying into it
10 Likes
Or that I have to stand in line to donate unpaid labor to the grocery store’s owners and check myself out. The magic of the market.
6 Likes
Our healthcare costs more and delivers worse results, but doing it this way is somehow mandated by god almighty.
Yes, American tech is awesome. And I’m sure American doctors and nurses are awesome. American hospitals are well maintained and equipped. All of that is true. And? We’re getting less than the rest of the (developed) world and paying more.
7 Likes
Indeed. No Americans ever accomplished anything because of “corruption and cronyism and ass-covering” in America somewhere.
5 Likes
Do what Fox does and misrepresent the concern trolling by just reporting the part before the “but.”
1 Like
I read somewhere, that the only reason the Post Office is in financial trouble is that they are statutorily required to fund their pension obligations for the next 75 years… Something that FedEx, UPS, DHL etc. obviously don’t do.
6 Likes
Let alone efficiencies that arise from not duplicating the same work—e.g., EMR handling systems, receivable accounting systems, etc,—across X number of providers.
To be fair, the current system is very efficient at producing wealthy pharmaceutical company owners, hospital CEOs and owners, M.D.s, and insurance executives…
“A liberal says the [health care] system is broken. A radical says the [health care] system is functioning exactly as intended by the system’s designers”—My friend Amanda
8 Likes
Interestingly, almost the opposite incentives are in place for private insurance companies.
The more incompetent and overworked the clerical staff are, the longer it takes to get a bill paid, and money in the bank plus time equals profit. But if their incompetence causes an overpayment or mispayment, that money can be recovered (or in the worst case, written off) very easily.
I work for a company that actually has specialist staff for dealing with insurance company representatives who are mind numbingly incompetent. Not lying!
9 Likes
IIRC, no other gov’t. agency is required to “pre-pay” pensions like USPS does, either.
6 Likes
