It's the strangest thing to watch the American news media try to cover the health care debate. It seems so straight-forward to me. Maybe because of my Canadian background. It's like they just don't get it.
My company (which is the same as saying my business partner and I) pay our HMO (fancy name for health care provider) around $1,500 a month for my wife, son and I. Yes, I typed that correctly -- one thousand five hundred dollars per month. That is $18,000 a year for those of you too lazy to do the math. Looking a little closer at that number I figure that if I worked 8 hours a day, 5 days a week every week of the year (which I assume many poor people might very well do), I would be working about 2,080 hours per year. Divide that into how much I pay for health care and you get $8.65 per hour.
Um ... California's minimum wage is $8 per hour, and that is higher than most States.
Man, that is totally whacked.
And wait ... there's more! That $18k comes with co-pays. Yep, every time I go to see my doctor I pay $20. If I go to emergency it's $100. And it's $100 a day for a hospital stay. All to a maximum of $3,000 a year.
Now let's look at the debate. The health care providers are working a hard as they can to stop the Obama administration from getting the government into the health care provider business. They are waving around flags that say stuff like unfair competition and warning people about how terrible it will be for them if they go the route of universal health care.
Excuse me but aren't these the people who are sucking people dry? Why the hell would anyone give them any serious consideration in the matter. I don't think there is any inalienable right to make money off of the sick and dying. Somewhere America has to draw the line on capitalism.
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