Man fired after notifying employer of wife's cancer.

[mrstickball]

Soleron said:

mrstickball said:

Soleron said:

Kasz216 said:

HappySqurriel said:
In the past when I have seen follow-ups to stories of companies firing employees in what seems like a heartless manner, it is usually pretty clear that the employee was fired because they were an awful employee and the incident gave the company the necessary justification to fire the employee without legal consequences.

Usually does seem that way,  Aside from which Mass has universal healthcare which the new US "universal" healthcare system is mimicing.

Wait. There's a US state with a UK/European-like health system?

Yes, and its a massive failure.

GOP nominee Mitt Romney was the governor that presided over the creation of the law. 98% of Massachusettes residents have insurance. Insurance that is teetering on destroying the state. I understand why Europeans want (or at least think its a great idea) for the US to adopt their health care system, but Mass is a shining example of why it doesn't work. Their costs are far in excess of the rest of America (33% higher than the American average), or about $10,000 per person. That is why adoption of a universal schema in America is such a difficult, if not damning activity - our system is so screwed up, adoption of a universal system is going to increase healthcare spending from 15% of GDP to somewhere between 25-30%.....Which is the exact opposite reason of why most would vouch for the system (as European nations spend far less on health care in comparison to GDP, not more).

Oh, insurance.

Private companies providing the care but the state paying for all of it is the worst combination.

What we have here is public ownership of hospitals, doctors, etc. Much cheaper in GDP terms.

America needs to realise they have a problem and commit to mass nationalisation without compensation. Same as the UK should do with public utilities and transportation. Not nice, but the outcome is overwhelmingly desirable.

We have systems like that in America. It is still insanely expensive. Its called the Veterans Administration (VA). Its for service veterans from wars. They have their own hospitals that do not charge monies for their services, and the government merely pays out for salary, and not services rendered. It is far more expensive than private care and even more expensive than medicare - about 90% higher than private insurances.

The problem with our health care system doesn't lie in the fact we don't have universal care, its a lot more complicated than that. Government laws that govern private care cause significant amounts of monies to be spent on paperwork and compliance instead of care. Doctors unions decide what is required to become a doctor in the country, which is far in excess of any other country in the world which drives up the cost of doctors (American doctors make twice on average what European doctors, because our doctors require nearly twice the amount of training before joining the field). Our laws promote businesses offering insurance which makes insurance not portable, and discourages competition because insurances only go after businesses, and not people. Our laws also restrict offering insurances across state lines which further restricts competition.

Do those things first, and I would imagine that if we did need universal health care, it'd actually work. But I don't believe we'd come to that point, as insurance would be so cheap, everyone could afford it, and we'd still likely have better hospital wait times than what Europeans and Canadians have to suffer through.