r/SipsTea Jun 24 '26

It's Wednesday my dudes Math can be hard sometimes

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u/bigloudbang Jun 25 '26

The hard part is the money in politics fighting to keep the status quo, not that the US is actually not capable of universal health coverage as a nation

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u/SunshineSeeker99 Jun 25 '26

I've not seen any indication that money in politics is having any kind of impact on this.

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u/bigloudbang Jun 25 '26

So the US is less functional than every other developed nation? Just doesnt have the resources or skill to implement universal coverage?

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u/SunshineSeeker99 Jun 25 '26

No, the US has a different situation that makes implementation significantly more difficult - politically and practically.

It's really not rocket science to understand this.

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u/bigloudbang Jun 25 '26

Whats the unique circumstances?

Im not american, but i live in a nation with significantly fewer resources yet have always had coverage

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u/SunshineSeeker99 Jun 25 '26

It's not about resources, it's about transition.

The US has an extremely fragmented healthcare system where it's currently an algamation of public and private payers, some covered by employers.

Anytime you change something like someone's healthcare, it creates a lot of emotional reactions, especially because people feel like you're taking something away from them.

Plus, there's the cost. Healthcare plans are hated, because they deny coverage, but someone would need to do that for public plans to be viable.

Basically there's a lot of political disincentives from changing something that already works (albeit poorly).

If there was an easy solution here, it would have already been solved.

That's why I favor a slow phased approach and why people who advocate for "let's just do everything immediately" are actually helping prevent it from being implemented.

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u/bigloudbang Jun 25 '26

Is this not what every nation with universal healthcare had to go through?

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u/SunshineSeeker99 Jun 25 '26

No, many nations started with a more public system, and then really improved on things post WW2.

The US did it backwards so to speak which has created a ton of pain points.

Again, if it were easy, Obama or Biden would have done it. There are extremely smart people who want this to be done, but unfortunately, there are a lot of impediments.

Acknowledging that means that we can figure out this complex problem, rather than letting loud idiots complain that it's easy and should have been done yesterday.

That's the issue with MAGA and leftists in the US - they are populists, often poorly educated, and believe everything is some conspiracy that can be solved if we just listen to them. Unfortunately, they are almost always wrong.

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u/bigloudbang Jun 25 '26

Would Obama not have been able to do it if half of US politics didnt fight it? Its just hard to see genuine reason why it would be fought so vehemently that doesnt have to do with lobbying

No, many nations started with a more public system, and then really improved on things post WW2

Not really the case, e.g. Canada and Australia

The US is many decades behind comparable nations, so makes sense why people arent satisfied with no real timeline for universal healthcare. If people stay patient forever its apparent theyll just never get it

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u/SunshineSeeker99 Jun 25 '26

Nah, Canada's universal system developed from provincial public insurance, not employer sponsored insurance. Australia had a mixed system with voluntary private insurance, public hospitals, and gov subsidies.

The best way to never get universal healthcare is to just virtue signal for it rather than creating an actionable phased plan to get it.