He was clearly talking about social policy (and more than likely referring to more than just this one social policy).  Economic growth does not equate a positive social policy.  See China.

I'm not taking a side between you and the OP.  I'm just pointing out a fallacy. 

What's wrong with us all chipping in some money/ taxes to have socialised healthcare? Because of the inequality caused by capitalism, we NEED socialised healthcare. It is actually better as the health of the poor is much improved and surely if we are all healthier, the economy will benefit from fewer sick days.

I think your opinion is very backward and actually quite selfish, for just one major reason. Just look at the current American healthcare system, 35 million people have no health insurance and therefore "can't afford to get ill" because it is dominated by private companies who only care about profit rather than people's health. The profit motive has no place in healthcare. Fortunately, a disease can't tell the difference between a rich and a poor person and so infects anyone. Are you telling you would yet someone who can't afford to pay potentially die unneccesarilly despite all the medicine that exists? That's just wrong. And to prove further that private healthcare isn't efficient, 18% of US GDP is spent on healthcare. Come to the UK, where we have the NHS and we only spend 9% of GDP on healthcare according to World Bank (that % is similar across other countries with socialised healthcare). It's cheaper to have socialised healthcare and it is also moral, everyone just needs to dip into too their pocket for the greater good. And to think you get a free and decent service in return for slightly higher taxes. I don't see the problem here. 

For at least half of the pregnancy, the fetus (it's not a baby until it's born) wouldn't survive being born as it isn't developed enough to survive on it's own, so up until that point, it's up to the women who has to give birth to it. Which i guess is 5 or 6 months now (enough time to think about it by then). And how do we know what the fetus wants? it can only do basic communication like smiling and kicking. 

But my main problem with banning abortion is that it won't prevent abortion, making it illegal would just force it underground and could be a great way for gangs to make money alongside other activities they do, pushing up crime rates. 

Killing babies is wrong. It is selfish to abort your baby just cause you don't want to care for it. This is what is wrong with America. People are for the right to own guns and abort babies. While these issues may be supported by different sides they are morally wrong.

And keep lowering it, and lowering it, and lowering it right?

Until its illegal to jack off.

Thats the kind of world i want to live in

The amount of children who spend the first 18 years of their life either in and out of foster homes or simply being left to their own devices because the parents cannot cope is huge.

There are 2 things which can be done to help this;

1) Give people the right to choose whether they wish to be parents

2) Increase the child care and support system

Yeah but in the UK, you guys have notoriously horrible healthcare, same with all socialized health systems.  Longer times to see an actual doctor, meaning when you do actually get to see one, it might be too late to do anything about it.  Doctors get paid less, therefore there are fewer people who want to become doctors, and thus fewer specialists, hence why so many people fly to the United States and a select few other countries to see specialists, i.e. the best in the world.

The problem is that we already all "chip in some money", it's called Medicare and Medicaid.  Both of which are terrible systems.  Doctors hate them, there's too much backlog, bureaucracy, and it's so wasteful that many Doctors either don't accept them or they retire early just so that they don't have to deal with them.  To the detriment of the people you claim should be helped.

So your forceful way of dealing with all of this is never going to work.  Europe is bankrupt, they have nothing but pyramided debt.  They have low birth rates among middle and high income people, many of which are even below the replacement rate.   Your continent is literally dying, and as we're already seeing in France and elsewhere, eventually your entire society is going to be overrun with Muslims.  Muslims, once there are enough of them to be in power in Europe, are not going to support your socialized systems, and they're not going to support women's rights or a welfare state.  So, you talk about me "being backward", well, look in the mirror.  Also, look at the demographics in France.  I would prefer that that not happen here in the US.

Not to mention that you cannot force someone to be charitable.  If we had a healthy economy, and there were actual jobs in the US, we wouldn't even be having this conversation, because there wouldn't be so many people who can't afford health insurance.  So no matter how hard you try, or how much you want it, you cannot legislate poor people into prosperity.  It doesn't work.  It has never worked, ever.  All of these socialized programs that progressives and conservaties love to throw around "energy independence", "education", "food stamps", the common theme you hear is that "Well, if we just increased funding, this would all be solved."  The problem is, every time funding is increased, it makes the problem even worse than it was before.

The best way to handle these types of problems, and it's in line with the original intent of the United States, is to give people as much freedom as possible.  I don't think the tyranny of the government being the central provider of services is going to turn out well.  Quite the opposite, in fact.

(citation needed)

For my hypothesis about France and the changing demographics in Europe?  Do what I did... Google.

The birth-rate scare i tend to find a conservative boondoggle more than anything. Europe will transform the Muslim immigrants long before they have a chance at meaningfully transforming Europe, whatever Right-White alarmists may say on the matter. Even in the span of a generation, values radically change, so even if first-gen Muslim immigrants have no interest in assimilating with European culture and western mores, their kids will have some interest, and *their* children yet more.

Birth rates in general are a larger issue, but certainly not insurmountable. France is a bad example because they've just let the public sector become far too bloated in general, while Southern Europe is just silly with corruption, leading to large-scale tax-dodging and governments quite willing to cook the books, as in Greece, Italy, and Spain.

In Northern Europe you see a different story: functioning socialism through sane, trim governments that work with markets, and not against them.

And you certainly can legislate the poor into prosperity, but its a matter of how you choose to do so. Simply giving them cash will see no difference, but giving them the ability to better themselves, by having stable housing, enough food to eat, clothing, education, and health, then they'll be capable of seeking out the paths to prosperity.

A side note on comparative health care is that the American system has too much care. We're over-perscribed, over-diagnosed, and over-analyzed. A lot of time is wasted on giving care to people who don't need it.