You Must Buy Health Insurance or We Will Fine You
You must buy health insurance or we will fine you. If you don’t pay the fine you will go to jail.
Watching President Barack Obama defend the concept of forcing people to purchase health insurance, or fining them if they do not, feels a little odd. This is a very heavy handed and brutal approach to solving the problem.
The implicit assumption to this approach is that the people without health insurance are just worthless bums who choose to spend their money on cell phones and junk food rather than buying health insurance for themselves and their families. The reality is that the majority of people who are uninsured are just plain too poor to pay the rent/mortgage, put food on the table, and still have enough money left over to buy health insurance.
There also are many people in America who have lost their jobs because they got sick. So not only are they struggling financially, they have an illness which the insurance companies call a pre-existing condition, so that they are currently uninsurable.
This is entirely the wrong approach that the government is taking. This is the right wing fascist approach. This way of dealing with the problem says: “These poor people and people of color are all just bums and losers.”
All employers, say again 100% of all employers, must be required to provide health insurance to all of their employees both full-time and part-time workers. The company pays 100% of the expense. If their employees have dependents like a spouse or children, they would have to be fully covered too. If we cover all workers, their children and spouses, this leaves a fairly manageable group of uninsured people to deal with. All health insurance would need to provide the exact same benefits, and the cost would be the same for all people regardless of age or health.
The proposed Baucus approach is cumbersome and inefficient. The British solution makes much more sense. Every person in the country has full coverage. And the government funds it. Period. No discussions about visitors or temporary workers or even illegal aliens. EVERYONE is covered.
Health care is a basic human right, not a privilege mostly for the whites or the upper classes.
LINK: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090920/ap_on_go_pr_wh/us_health_care_overhaul
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