Koch Brothers own study says that Universal Healthcare is cheaper than current US system

[outlawauron]

Hiku said:

outlawauron said:

Europe and Asia would have a big problem with that though. Without the US to defend them, they'd have to spend some of their own money on military.

That said, I don't think people are really down for it. Even with the report above being about equivalent for Medicare/Medicaid + Insurance money, you'll be paying the same for worse care. I think I'm good.

They do spend some money on their own military, if they're allowed to have one. USA's protection is not the only factor though. NATO is obligated to defend any of it's members from attack. That's why we haven't had a war break out in Europe (Among EU & NATO countries) since NATO was established after World War 2.
USA is the biggest deterrent for Russia though. But USA can certainly cut some of it's insane defense spending, and still have a higher annual defense budget than the closest 4 countries combined, and still be able to protect a NATO nation.

Also, that $610 Billion is apparently going to be $717 Billion this year. Fantastic...
As for "paying the same for worse care", can you elaborate on that? Why would you get worse care? The idea is that the funds would be more efficiently spent on the hospitals and patients, rather than focusing on corporate profit. Which is an issue when USA is the only country on the list where the government isn't allowed to negotiate for drug prices with the pharmaceutical companies. Which is why your prices have skyrocketed, and you can buy the same US manufactured drug for up to 3-5 times cheaper, in Canada.

And just for clarification, the World Health Organization doesn't even rank USA's healthcare among the top 25 in the world: http://thepatientfactor.com/canadian-health-care-information/world-health-organizations-ranking-of-the-worlds-health-systems/
Although that was in the year 2000, but I heard they're ranked 36'th today. Which is one rank higher than their 2000 placing.

NATO defense spending is measured as a percentage of GDP. It's supposed to be 2% and nearly all of the NATO countries fall incredibly short of that. The US will never not be far out ahead in pure numbers unless the US economy collapses. Shutting down defense spending is synonymous with closing down bases and retracting the size of the military by recalling the hundreds of thousands of soldiers stationed abroad.

As far as paying the same for worse care, there isn't really any service that has been taken over by the government and had a positive impact in final product. The quality of service or product always gets worse. I have no reason to believe that the service would improve or even stay the same. The price of drugs or cost of the service doesn't impact the quality of the service. Hence the, pay the same for worse service.

As far as the WHO, they rank (appropriately) the overall mean of healthcare available in the US. The quality of care varies so much from city to city, not even to mention the jumps that can take place from state to state. The very best hospitals in the world are in the US, but that is a byproduct of the higher costs. The level of care that a very poor person receives (although free or nearly through Medicaid) is not near the level of care that someone who can afford the best receives.