The Japanese self-defense forces (military) took a photo of a whitish 50m by 3km spot in the Pacific (Japanese only, but if you click on the image you can see a video) that they think might be where the missile went down.
Oil and gas account for much less than 10% of Dubai's GDP nowadays. (I don't have time to find a real source right now, so this will have to do for now.)
Second when using find. Firefox doesn't popup a big ass dialog in front of the web page you are trying to find stuff in. Safari also does a good job with this. Opera pops up a big ass dialog.
Type "." (period) for searching text and "," for links. Again, Opera had this feature for ages before Firefox introduced the pop-up-at-the-bottom search form.
If the Swiss banks didn't have the banking secrecy laws, at miserable (and laughable) 1.85% interest, it wouldn't be interesting to siphon money into Switzerland, so about four in five of your countrymen wouldn't have a job, and couldn't take their expensive vacations two to three times a year!
Okay, that was fun. Let's try actual statistics instead. According to the Swiss Bankers Association, "200,000 employees work in the financial sector. That represents 5.3% of the total workforce. Broken down, 3.2% of the total workforce work for banks, 1.4% for insurance companies and 0.6% for other financial services providers."
Which is just a little bit short of "four in five" Swiss citizens.
Repeating your mantra doesn't make you right. Forget Hillary, you are arguing against the very idea of universal healthcare, aren't you? (BTW, healthcare costs are usually tied to your income. So if you are really poor, you have to pay very, very little or nothing. As opposed to private insurance, which you wouldn't be able to afford. And no, not being insured is neither good for you nor for the community. Please, please look at working existing implementations before rushing to conclusions.)
Let me close this, ahem, interesting thread with a question: are you okay with me quoting you as: "Universal healthcare destroys liberty, which destroys justice."? (This is a direct quote from you.)
Cheers and EOD;-)
Let me ask you: do you oppose taxation to finance basic services and infrastructure in principle? You very well may, since it was supposed to be a temporary measure the US (at least on income). But if you're not, you may want to point out why healthcare is any different. (I refer you to my other posts as to why people who don't pay taxes generally don't pay for healthcare and as such isn't A TAX ON BEING ALIVE -- see, I can use caps too!)
Okay, so I may have a rather poor command of the English language, but as far as I'm aware, "elsewhere" doesn't mean "everywhere else." It's rather ignorant to claim that it doesn't work anywhere else.
If you are FORCED to have such insurance, then it is a tax on BEING ALIVE. It has nothing to do with being employed.
Where exactly is this the case? I just said that in every country I know you don't have to be insured if you choose to stay outside the system (i.e. aren't employed, self-employed etc.). Again: like other essential services that you have to pay for whether you want to or not. Not even Evil Hillary (tm) could force people who don't make money to pay for healthcare.
No. I have plenty of information about the rest of the world. That is irrelevant, as just because it "works" in one place doesn't mean it will work the same way here. It won't.
Oh well, sorry, your mentioning only Canada and the UK as examples of universal healthcare led me to believe that you get your information from mainstream media. I apologize. I still haven't seen a compelling argument why it could never work in the US. It works fabulously elsewhere. You should make money as a clairvoyant if you are so sure about future events;-).
I'm really amazed at how much time you spend on countering some dude who can't even write understandable English. Thanks for the entertainment;-).
If I want to not own a home, not have income... I am allowed to. And I won't pay any taxes.
Okay, clarification: pretty much like that everywhere. _If_ you are employed (or self-employed), however, you pay for health insurance (if you're on unemployment you don't pay anything and still have health insurance, much like the US I think). So see it as a tax if that helps. Like the fire department. A tax on being legally employed. It's not illegal not to be insured, it's just damn hard not to be. I just don't feel less free because of it; I would have to pay for that anyway (most likely more, if the US is any indication) if my employer didn't.
That's like saying someone's zealotry in attacking the government for wiretapping or torture doesn't help us catch terrorists.
Sorry, I don't follow. Let's not get absurd here. JFTR, I don't believe in the currently fashionable terrorism boogeyman.
I certainly accept your right to express your opinions and disagree. I am concerned, however, that some of your earlier statements (no choice of doctors, can't choose private healthcare, more expensive overall) stem from a lack of information about the rest of the world. When I showed you that this doesn't have to happen if done right, your only reply was "no, it won't work here, because we're the US, period." I don't take issue with you expressing your fundamental beliefs, I just think you should research the supposed facts you justify them with a little bit more.
BTW, I've just seen your videos on YouTube. Very funny. That being said, I just can't get into that Republican mindset. Let's just accept that. No disrespect indented whatsoever. And don't shout so much please;-). Have a good night.
For now. I know the Obama and Clinton plans do not go there. But the ultimate goal is complete government control.
Oh, paranoid much?;-).
Mandatory health insurance OF ANY KIND is evil. And I do not use that word lightly. It is literally a tax on BEING ALIVE. We have nothing like that in our society now, and I will fight against it with all I've got.
Okay, you call it a tax. Fair enough. Time to privatize the fire brigade then? Some things, like healthcare, prisons and law enforcement just don't work that well if they're privatized.
I kind of like not having to step over sick people in the inner cities like I do when I visit the US. I don't think your zealotry in this regard does anything to help the poor get health insurance; but if that's not your goal, fair enough. I think a little bit of pragmatism would go a long way.
But let's leave it at that, seeing as we won't ever agree;-). Thanks for responding and I'm glad you understood me despite my terrible English.
And here's the rub: the government, not you or your doctor, in such cases, decide what types of procedures have wait times of days, and which have wait times of months or years.
Well, what you're talking about is shortage of hospital staff I assume? Of course the "goverment" (many (most?) hospitals here are owned by the municipality) has some influence concering the hospitals it owns. But my point is: government-mandated medical insurance does not mean that there aren't private doctors and hospitals (there are) as well as (probably slightly more expensive) private insurance. I really don't know where this either - or mindset comes from (well, I've seen old US commercials that say that you can't choose your doctor if there's universal healthcare, so maybe that's it).
If I wanted to set up a new healthcare system, I'd try to pick the best bits from all over the world. You don't have to dream up theories and doomsday scenarios, just look at what's out there.
I'd also urge you to look at countries where mandatory government-established insurance was privatized and as a result became much more expensive (e.g. The Netherlands). Unfortunately, healthcare doesn't always follow the same rules of supply, demand and private-sector efficiency as other commodities.
Sorry, I screwed up, the numbers are wrong. My point still stands, however: In 2004, the US spent 15.4% of its GDP on healthcare.
In response to your opinion that universal healthcare would increase waiting times and limit your choice of doctors and hospitals: this is simply not what I've experienced here. I've never waited more than a few days for anything. I can freely choose from government-owned and private hospitals and I can freely choose my doctor.
It loses because it ruins healthcare for those of us who have it already, destroys liberty, and costs more money.
Pudge, on the off-chance that you're still following this thread: According to Novick, around 20% of the GDP go towards Medicare/Medicaid alone. In my (Western European) country, overall healthcare expenditure (public and private spending, including mandatory and supplementary private insurance) is about 10% of the GDP. In light of this and other successful examples around the world, how can you claim that universal healthcare would be more expensive? Thanks.
It is if you're travelling by bus and are close to (and by that I mean 300 miles or so) to the Mexican border. Lots and lots of "ID please" requests by "border patrol." And now try that if you're from a small EU country that most policemen in the US haven't ever heard of.
Well, except that there are "US citizen" and "non-citizen" lines, with the former usually being much shorter (when arriving on international flights). But I guess that's the same everywhere; except here the lines are called "EU/EEC citizen" and "non-EU citizen", respectively.
NOBODY would EVER spend 13 hours to go from LA to London
Seeing as there are about a bazillion non-stop flights from LAX to LHR, I'm not sure why anybody would; 13 hrs means that it isn't a non-stop flight (which would be 10 to 11 hours in my experience).
Still, I think that the price in the US is a result of the free market economy. Low demand = High Price.
If that were the case, those textbooks would be really cheap in the US because millions of people need them.
No, it's US colleges requiring students to buy certain textbooks (and always the latest edition); publishers know this and charge what they can. So from the publisher's point of view it's a free market in both the US and Europe. American students just happen to absolutely need those books and thus have to pay (almost) whatever it costs.
Are you sure that textbook prices aren't kept low because of German Laws?
Fairly sure.
I mean, there isn't all that much demand for complicated Tanenbaum books, now is there?
Dunno, there are smaller markets; tens of thousands of CS students probably need a book like this in Germany. And like I said, professors outside the US are more willing to find alternatives or roll their own if a textbook costs too much. There's a reason that there are US versions and identical international ones that cost half as much. And it's not because every country except for the US mandates price ceilings;-).
What does that have to do with textbooks? Prentice Hall sells books for more than a hundred bucks in the US because they can and people buy it and they sell them for 50 bucks in Germany because Germans wouldn't buy them otherwise. That's your free market right there in both instances. There's no law that mandates price ceilings for books;-).
Slashdot Mirror
That's not really as absurd as it sounds. You couldn't really go shopping with Zimbabwe dollars in 32 bits.
The Japanese self-defense forces (military) took a photo of a whitish 50m by 3km spot in the Pacific (Japanese only, but if you click on the image you can see a video) that they think might be where the missile went down.
Oil and gas account for much less than 10% of Dubai's GDP nowadays. (I don't have time to find a real source right now, so this will have to do for now.)
Or use a decent browser and check "Stop executing scripts on this page" on the first dialog box ;-).
Not quite. Works for US IPs only.
Oh, sorry. Source.
According to the Swiss Bankers Association, "200,000 employees work in the financial sector. That represents 5.3% of the total workforce. Broken down, 3.2% of the total workforce work for banks, 1.4% for insurance companies and 0.6% for other financial services providers."
Which is just a little bit short of "four in five" Swiss citizens.
Repeating your mantra doesn't make you right. Forget Hillary, you are arguing against the very idea of universal healthcare, aren't you? (BTW, healthcare costs are usually tied to your income. So if you are really poor, you have to pay very, very little or nothing. As opposed to private insurance, which you wouldn't be able to afford. And no, not being insured is neither good for you nor for the community. Please, please look at working existing implementations before rushing to conclusions.)
;-)
Let me close this, ahem, interesting thread with a question: are you okay with me quoting you as: "Universal healthcare destroys liberty, which destroys justice."? (This is a direct quote from you.) Cheers and EOD
Good night.
I'm really amazed at how much time you spend on countering some dude who can't even write understandable English. Thanks for the entertainment
I certainly accept your right to express your opinions and disagree. I am concerned, however, that some of your earlier statements (no choice of doctors, can't choose private healthcare, more expensive overall) stem from a lack of information about the rest of the world. When I showed you that this doesn't have to happen if done right, your only reply was "no, it won't work here, because we're the US, period." I don't take issue with you expressing your fundamental beliefs, I just think you should research the supposed facts you justify them with a little bit more.
BTW, I've just seen your videos on YouTube. Very funny. That being said, I just can't get into that Republican mindset. Let's just accept that. No disrespect indented whatsoever. And don't shout so much please
I kind of like not having to step over sick people in the inner cities like I do when I visit the US. I don't think your zealotry in this regard does anything to help the poor get health insurance; but if that's not your goal, fair enough. I think a little bit of pragmatism would go a long way.
But let's leave it at that, seeing as we won't ever agree
If I wanted to set up a new healthcare system, I'd try to pick the best bits from all over the world. You don't have to dream up theories and doomsday scenarios, just look at what's out there.
I'd also urge you to look at countries where mandatory government-established insurance was privatized and as a result became much more expensive (e.g. The Netherlands). Unfortunately, healthcare doesn't always follow the same rules of supply, demand and private-sector efficiency as other commodities.
Okay, to clarify: the US spends about 15.4% of GDP on healthcare, Western Europe about 10%.
Sorry, I screwed up, the numbers are wrong. My point still stands, however: In 2004, the US spent 15.4% of its GDP on healthcare.
In response to your opinion that universal healthcare would increase waiting times and limit your choice of doctors and hospitals: this is simply not what I've experienced here. I've never waited more than a few days for anything. I can freely choose from government-owned and private hospitals and I can freely choose my doctor.
It is if you're travelling by bus and are close to (and by that I mean 300 miles or so) to the Mexican border. Lots and lots of "ID please" requests by "border patrol." And now try that if you're from a small EU country that most policemen in the US haven't ever heard of.
Well, except that there are "US citizen" and "non-citizen" lines, with the former usually being much shorter (when arriving on international flights). But I guess that's the same everywhere; except here the lines are called "EU/EEC citizen" and "non-EU citizen", respectively.
No, it's US colleges requiring students to buy certain textbooks (and always the latest edition); publishers know this and charge what they can. So from the publisher's point of view it's a free market in both the US and Europe. American students just happen to absolutely need those books and thus have to pay (almost) whatever it costs.
What does that have to do with textbooks? Prentice Hall sells books for more than a hundred bucks in the US because they can and people buy it and they sell them for 50 bucks in Germany because Germans wouldn't buy them otherwise. That's your free market right there in both instances. There's no law that mandates price ceilings for books ;-).