Comment by johnnienaked

2 months ago

Your taxes would double, and don't even bother trying to say they wouldn't literally every country with public health care pays twice as much as we do in tax

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johnnienaked

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beej71  2 months ago

We pay more tax for healthcare in the US than virtually anyone else. Last I looked, only Norway had us beat in terms of taxes for healthcare.

  • johnnienaked  2 months ago

    The average cost per person is more in the US (quite a bit more), but as with all statistics the devil is in the details. In a public system like Canada, while the average cost for health care per person is lower, if you make above average income you are paying more than average in taxes, and hence more for (everyone else's) health care. Combine that with a far lower average income across the whole country than even the poorest US states, and the relative impact on you can actually be far higher. In my case my effective tax rate was about 45%, which meant I was paying 4-6x average taxes, most of which went to health care. I haven't lived in European countries, but it's virtually certain to be a similar story.

  • ArtemZ  2 months ago

    Then how our taxes are lower on average than most other developed countries?

    • beej71  2 months ago

      Because we pay less tax for other things; for example, making post-secondary education affordable. Our taxpayer-funded system for healthcare-over-65 costs us more than Germany's taxpayer-funded system for healthcare-over-0.

    • johnnienaked  2 months ago

      Our incomes are far higher too. Health care in the US isn't perfect, but public systems aren't either. The flaws of private health care seem to be a favorite target by people who are biased against the US.