Do you know how much money we spent to rebuild Japan? I’m gonna guess no.
Crude, but wrong?
Not entirely wrong lol. But how does a country recover from centuries of being ■■■■ on and held back if not oppressed? Not saying they were the Garden of Eden before, but independence after subjugation is a double edge sword.
By trying.
You think they’re not?
Yes…
I might do some digging…
About 2.2 billion dollars, which amounts to 18 billion via today’s rate. Do you know how much we spend on foreign aid each year? I’m going to guess no. I’ll give you a clue, it’s a lot more than 18 billion. I would have to assume that we have been doling out foreign aid for probably a few decades now to many of the countries at the bottom of these types of lists. I’m also certain that we are not the country that has been doling out foreign aid to these countries either. How has that worked out?
You used Google to get the amount of foreign aid to Japan, yet used unsubstantiated opinion for the rest of your post.
It’s about fifty billion annually, about half of which goes to five countries: Israel, Iraq, Afghanistan, Egypt and Jordan.
The point of the post I was responding to was to the efficacy of foreign aid. I simply pointed out that many of these other countries have received foreign aid as well. Finding the amounts for numerous countries is a more time consuming task. Foriegn aid has been going on for decades for many of these countries and none of them are remotely close to Japan on any of these lists.
I wonder how many of the people so enamored of these other countries have ever lived in one of them for more than a year on their economy. I’m sure there is one or two…
Are you talking about the countries at the top or bottom of these types of lists?
At the top. The ones they want us to emulate.
Yes,
Because it is much easier to provide the things that people are looking for when the nation only has a population of a few million people. Hell, in a conversation earlier in the week regarding Nordic healthcare…we are trying to say that the US with a population of some 300+ million people could pull off the same or similar health care system as Finland. A nation with the population the size of Minnesota. I don’t care how much we spend currently vs how much we spend under a Nordic system. It will collapse. We would not have enough people paying into the system to afford the system. It is not sustainable.
Our current system is also not sustainable.
So… what is the solution?
The solution is to find a way to lower the costs of health care. I just had the insurance company refuse to pay over $500 for two epipens for an individual in my program that is deathly allergic to bees. $250 per pen. That is why our system is not sustainable. When I started working in 1988 I had a $20 a pay premium in an HMO that I could use damn near anywhere, where a CT of my kidneys cost about $250 and I had a $20 co pay.
The issue is that Medicine has become big business and loopholes come in the form of religious organizations running hospitals and urgent care clinics and specialty centers…They make money hand over fist…but…and here is the issue. They have tax exempt status as a religious non profit. All that money they make goes back into the organization…to buy the newest equipment, build the biggest and baddest hospital, bring in the best doctors from other hospitals, and etc. The down side of it is. They have to treat people in the ER who can’t pay…instead of paying for that with the money they make. They pay for it on the backs of the insurance companies…today that IVP Kidney CT would cost upwards of $1000 or more. The technology has increased a bit in 30 years, but the cost has increased exponentially. If they wanted to do anything with health care in the OBAMA admin…they needed to find a way to force the NFP medical companies to stop paying for the indigent on the backs of the insured and find a way to reduce costs of services, all while maintaining the medical services. Our local Franciscan Sisters Hospital system has a full on hospital in my town, and two or three other clinics or specialty centers. They provide great care, but instead of lowering the costs of services, they keep spending all this money they make on more and more facilities, either new or remodeling. Upgrading to the newest and bestest equipment…and etc. And all the while the costs for all this new stuff is passed on to us the consumer.
That is where health care needs to be fixed. Create laws that tell NFP medical groups that they have to spend 30% of their Revenues over expenses (it’s not called profit) ON lowering the cost of goods and services. Spend another 30% on providing free services to those who can’t afford or aren’t covered. That leaves 40% to put back into your system of health care provision for upgrades and facilities.
I worked for a community mental health center…Not For Profit back in the late 80s and early 90s. Every two year, our program a satellite program got all new (slightly used) furniture, computers, office equipment like copiers and the like. Why. Because every two years the CFO had to spend massive amounts of money on remodeling of the main center…We frequently got 7-10 % raises and bonuses during these times because he was extremely fiscally responsible. They were raking in money. But it seemed like such a waste to me, that they made so much money that every two years they would get rid of perfectly good equipment and furniture just because they had to spend it. That could have gone toward human resources (staff) as opposed to supplies and equipment.
My point is that the medical field has learned to take advantage of the NFP status and loopholes which have made our system fundamentally unstable. I think that there should be a system in place that if a NFP health center/system makes more than X % in profit, they would have to pay taxes on that overage. This way these huge Not For Profit conglomerates at least start trying to cap what they make in Revenue over Expenses (Profit) or they pay taxes on a portion of that. Those are just my suggestions.
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Like an Act making Care Affordable?
I was in Japan six months and Germany for seven months, not quiet a year.
I will get back to you when I have some time… and internet that doesn’t suck.
