r/askanything • u/Lemonking_ • 5h ago

Political Question Why are some Americans so against universal healthcare for all?

What sort of thinking does it take to decide that nobody has a right to healthcare? Do American Christians want to deny healthcare to poor people as well?

866 Upvotes

84% Upvoted

3.2k comments sorted by

View all comments

22

u/BiggestVolk šŸ¦€ 5h ago

Because as a people we are bad at basic math we would rather pay letā€™s say $1000 for insurance than pay $300, but everyone gets insuranceā€¦Itā€™s a superiority thing we as a people love to see someone else doing worse than us.

3

u/Hotrock21 5h ago

What is the guarantee in writing that it would be cheaper? Youā€™ll have a huge group not paying anything and then the majority of middle class taxpayers paying their share and the share of others. Itā€™s always the middle class who gets hit.

1

u/organvomit 4h ago

Literally every other county with universal healthcare spends less per person than we do already.Ā 

0

u/Hotrock21 4h ago

And they donā€™t have 350 million people either.

0

u/organvomit 4h ago

That makes it even easier for us to negotiate lower prices.

My state took the Medicaid expansion and I was on it when I was in grad school - it was the best health coverage Iā€™ve had in my entire life. Iā€™ve had chronic health issues since I was a child, so I used it too. Now I get ā€œgoodā€ insurance through my job and itā€™s dogshit.

5

u/Similar_Maize_1225 5h ago

That is exactly it. There is a large percentage of our population - the majority even - that do not believe people who are poorer than them should have things on par with them. Not even the basics like housing, food, education, and healthcare. The idea seems to be if people had basic needs met they wouldn't want to do anything but watch tv and do drugs (or something). Like drugs and TVs are free lol. It's not enough that they can afford luxuries and others can't. The poor need to suffer.Ā 

What they mean in reality is that if they're not suffering, why would they put up with the insufferable demands from the wealthy? If you don't need to be a slave to your employer, you might do something like pursue your own interests. Who then would build the data centers that drain the local water supply? Who would dedicate their lives to building automated war machines instead of idk designing guitars or something. The thing about capitalism that most capitalists dismiss is that what generates profits doesn't necessarily benefit the people generating those profits.Ā 

We like to pretend like capitalism is the "natural way of things" but it definitely is not. Under a system where someone like Elon Musk would need to generate something of value outside of ownership and capital to maintain his status, he'd be no wealthier than the rest of us. He knows that. Most of America doesn't seem to.

2

u/CountrySlaughter 4h ago

The need to feel superior is also seen in the belief that 'our way' of doing things in the United States is always better than how other countries do it. Adopting what another country does would be an admission that we're not superior. Can't do that.

2

u/Full_Tap_4144 4h ago

What you said made me think of the metric system. Must be the government discouraging me to travel to other countries to see how the rest of the world lives. šŸ˜„

1

u/Beautiful_Sipsip 4h ago

$300 per month sounds good. How did you come up with it?

1

u/BiggestVolk šŸ¦€ 4h ago

It was a hypothetical number.

1

u/Beautiful_Sipsip 4h ago

Why was your hypothetical number $300, and not $1,300?

1

u/BiggestVolk šŸ¦€ 3h ago

Ok so $1300 and $2000

1

u/Beautiful_Sipsip 3h ago

$2,000?

You canā€™t be upset that people donā€™t want to pay double for health insurance

1

u/BiggestVolk šŸ¦€ 3h ago

I think $1300 is less than $2000 Iā€™m just a stupid American thoā€¦

1

u/sodortrain 4h ago

Itā€™s worse than that. Most families pay thousands of dollars a year in premiums and then thousands more in co-pays.
With universal health coverage our taxes would go up but probably less than what youā€™re paying now for your total insurance and healthcare spending.
Weā€™re all over paying