Comment by macintux
2 years ago
Those safety nets have huge gaps. The government doesn't want to be accused of harboring freeloaders (or, perhaps more accurately, a significant chunk of the population would rather people be homeless than a few "welfare queens" be permitted to cheat the system), so many who are genuinely in need can't get it.
That’s true of most rich countries. The big difference between the US and most rich countries is universal healthcare.
Life and death kinda difference innit
Wikipedia suggests 0.01% of the US population dies each year (30-40,000) due to lack of health insurance. I’m sure the real number is at least double.
That is a very, very big difference.
It is, although it disproportionately affects people who are poor but not broke. If you’re truly broke, there’s Medicaid, if you’re old there’s Medicare, 4% by some form of military healthcare, many people covered by their employers, and so on. 90% of Americans are insured.
As a Britisher, obviously I’m in favour of universal healthcare, and I think the US system would benefit from it. But let’s not pretend it’s perfect there either
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