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<blockquote data-quote="3catcircus" data-source="post: 7828114" data-attributes="member: 16077">Again - everyone in Australia who keeps claiming that healthcare is &quot;free&quot; is being willfully ignorant of the fact that it isn't free - the costs are just shifted from point of service to prepay via taxes.In the US the indigent, in fact, do have health insurance via Medicaid (whether or not it sucks is a different conversation).&nbsp; Likewise retired people can apply for Medicare.&nbsp; The real problems with healthcare access in the US are that large corporations can self-insure their employees through various insurance companies.&nbsp; The insurance companies negotiate costs with hospital networks, state/fed govt, and pharmaceutical companies.&nbsp; It's essentially one big racket that is also negatively impacted by doctors and patients engaged in insurance fraud.&nbsp; Those who lose are people working for smaller companies or the self-employed who aren't part of the network of collusion.It isn't healthcare that is the issue in the US, it's the health insurance and big pharma racket that profits off of managing rather than curing or preventing illness.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="3catcircus, post: 7828114, member: 16077"] Again - everyone in Australia who keeps claiming that healthcare is "free" is being willfully ignorant of the fact that it [I]isn't[/I] free - the costs are just shifted from point of service to prepay via taxes. In the US the indigent, in fact, do have health insurance via Medicaid (whether or not it sucks is a different conversation). Likewise retired people can apply for Medicare. The real problems with healthcare access in the US are that large corporations can self-insure their employees through various insurance companies. The insurance companies negotiate costs with hospital networks, state/fed govt, and pharmaceutical companies. It's essentially one big racket that is also negatively impacted by doctors and patients engaged in insurance fraud. Those who lose are people working for smaller companies or the self-employed who aren't part of the network of collusion. It isn't healthcare that is the issue in the US, it's the health insurance and big pharma racket that profits off of managing rather than curing or preventing illness. [/QUOTE]

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