The USA supposedly has fully paid medical care for the needy, but the
government here sets the income limits to receive any kind of financial help
(Medical care, food assistance, housing assistance, etc) so artificially low
that no one can qualify without hiding assets or lying about income.
The "Poverty Line", for example, the income level at which one is considered
poor in the USA is set at $13,000 a year for a family of four and something
like $8000 for a single person. The problem with that is that no family of
four can live on less than $30,000 a year in my hometown which has an
extremely low cost of housing and other living expenses compared to most of
the country. In places like Santa Fe, New Mexico (where I lived till
recently) a family of four needs a BARE MINIMUM income of $60,000 a year to
just survive (housing for said family would cost about $3500 a month there,
compared to $800 a month in Fort Wayne, Indiana).
So, the poverty line is bogus for even the lowest-cost areas and is
laughably cruel in areas with high housing costs. Here in Indiana you cannot
get Medicaid (the government health program for the poor) unless you are a
pregnant woman (she loses the coverage after the baby is born), or you are a
child under age 18 whose parents make less than $15,000 a year. That's an $8
an hour job, but a man or woman needs to earn $15 an hour to support
him/herself and a child in Indiana, and most people earning less than $15 an
hour do not have insurance because they cannot afford it. Men cannot get
medicaid at all no matter how poor they are.
Mi familia es de Espana (my family is from Spain). If I could habla Espanol
(speak Spanish) better I'd go back! It can't be worse than it is here. Hell
Mexico might not even be that bad. There are jobs for educated people there,
unlike here, and I have a university degree (and have been told more times
than I can remember that I am totally unemployable...I have applied for 800
jobs in 9 years and gotten only one interview and no job!).
If you believe in God, Andrew, THANK HIM that you live in Australia. How
ever bad you think it is, it is NOT that bad.
--
Chris Crawford
Photography & Graphic Design
Fort Wayne, Indiana
http://www.chriscrawfordphoto.com My portfolio
http://blog.chriscrawfordphoto.com My latest work!
http://www.plumpatrin.com Something the world NEEDS.
On 5/25/08 12:52 AM, "Andrew Fildes" <afildes@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> In my limited experience, those countries that provide automatic
> mediacal care to all citizns often do it rather badly - to the point
> where my parents in the UK took out private insurance on top (BUPA)
> to avoid long waits for what the government had decided were non-
> urgent elective procedures - like hip replacements.
> I favour a mix as we have here of voluntary private insurance, partly
> tax deductible. heavily underwritten by government subsidy and with
> full welfare provision for the needy and indigent - seems to work
> rather well. People still complain about it though. Of course.
> Andrew Fildes
> afildes@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
>
>
>
> On 25/05/2008, at 11:28 AM, Chris Crawford wrote:
>
>> Now, fuel is getting as costly as
>> everywhere else but on top of that we have to contend with being
>> screwed on
>> things like medical care that other countries provide for all
>> citizens.
>>
>> And, no, the USA is no longer a democracy...it is a Plutocracy.
>
>
>
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