Monday, May 18, 2009

Some thoughts on Single Payer......

Well....first off...sorry it's been a couple days since my last post, but I've been busy and haven't had much time. Also, I'll try to get another video posted in the next couple of days.
As for what's been going on lately...one thing I'm curious about is the healthcare situation. I know it was a hot topic on the campaign trail, and leading up to election day for President Obama. And now they're going over what to do. One topic (and arguably the ideal topic that many of us bleeding heart liberals would love to see) is Single Payer, which is basically the ultimate idea of universal healthcare, of which I myself would love to see some variant of this type of plan in effect. A recent article in Democracy Now covered a resident of New Mexico asking President Obama:

My question is, so many people go bankrupt using their credit cards to pay for healthcare. Why have they taken single payer off the plate?
And President Obama's answer was:

If I were starting a system from scratch, then I think that the idea of moving towards a single-payer system could very well make sense. That’s the kind of system that you have in most industrialized countries around the world. The only problem is that we’re not starting from scratch. We have historically a tradition of employer-based healthcare. And although there are a lot of people who are not satisfied with their healthcare, the truth is, is that the vast majority of people currently get healthcare from their employers, and you’ve got this system that’s already in place. We don’t want a huge disruption as we go into healthcare reform, where suddenly we’re trying to completely reinvent one-sixth of the economy.
I don't know where many others stand on this issue, but I for one am saddened to see Single Payer brushed aside so quickly. And even though I can understand why President Obama answered in the way he did, I would really like to see this issue discussed more, or at least left on the table for a while longer....

No comments: