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The US scores poorly for healthcare quality and effectiveness.
We actually *got* an incredibly inefficient and expensive mess with many hands in the til.
Just an example below. There are many others.
HC is expensive and inefficient everywhere, so not everywhere is corrupt. HC is so inefficient because so much is face to face, with little efficiency or cost gains from volume. And technologies haven't improved costs or efficiencies like manufacturing, but more likely added new expense with new treatments not even existent a short time ago.
We've made huge inroads. Many patients today would have dead if born the previous generation. My wife would have died several times already since 2004 without new medical/surgical technologies.
It's an illusion. If you have a big business, you could possibly loan a large amount of money from banks and use that money to buy another company, buy stocks, etc. Then you can sell the company or stocks and make a profit. you pay the money back to the bank plus interest and still have a profit.
Now the most important question is, What did you create? where is the real value? It doesn't exist. All you have done is add numbers to accounts, numbers that don't represent anything in the real world. The scam continues until people realized the pie is too small for all the shares, the game collapses and reality sets in. However, after a while the games start over.
Long term investing has worked for a very long time. Even with the 2008 crash, most only lost a portion of gains. And then came back even more since. I make enough from passive investment income, that I haven't needed to work for some time, and don't even spend as much as my passive gains. Sure there are risks. But I won't instead be creating a new business, as that is very risky, complex, and too much effort and work! lol
If we get hit by an asteroid then all that might then go to zero.
Long term investing has worked for a very long time. Even with the 2008 crash, most only lost a portion of gains. And then came back even more since. I make enough from passive investment income, that I haven't needed to work for some time, and don't even spend as much as my passive gains. Sure there are risks. But I won't instead be creating a new business, as that is very risky, complex, and too much effort and work! lol
This sums it all.
Why work when you can put money in a certain stock? Imagine if everyone would stop working, and do what you do.
If they be honest and say: We extract the wealth out of the people who create it. Of course the 10% that has 82% of all shares want us to believe their "investment" is fundamental to the economy and paralyze the whole system when the extraction is no longer sustainable.
Why work when you can put money in a certain stock? Imagine if everyone would stop working, and do what you do.
If they be honest and say: We extract the wealth out of the people who create it. Of course the 10% that has 82% of all shares want us to believe their "investment" is fundamental to the economy and paralyze the whole system when the extraction is no longer sustainable.
The owners and the rich have always extracted from labor. Only now it is more lucrative to passively invest. Certainly to a large extent this is needed. But now overboard. There is no easy solution, aside from more taxes on the rich which I do not support. If I were king I'd provide more supports for the middle class through deficit spending. HC benefits for instance.
@Hoonose
Since we agree the rich extract wealth from the labor of people, [most people don't even recognize this much] I'll like to add:
The fundamental purpose of our economy is not to make money for rich people, duh, it is to support us in creating our means of living in a balance relationship with earth. So if that's our goal, we must be evaluating the performance of our economy against how is it doing in supporting life...
If we were really concerned about the real performance of the economy we would not be evaluating the economy based on financial indicators like gdp or even worst how is the stock market doing which is essentially index of how fast the rich people getting richer relative to the rest of us.
@Hoonose
Since we agree the rich extract wealth from the labor of people, [most people don't even recognize this much] I'll like to add:
The fundamental purpose of our economy is not to make money for rich people, duh, it is to support us in creating our means of living in a balance relationship with earth. So if that's our goal, we must be evaluating the performance of our economy against how is it doing in supporting life...
If we were really concerned about the real performance of the economy we would not be evaluating the economy based on financial indicators like gdp or even worst how is the stock market doing which is essentially index of how fast the rich people getting richer relative to the rest of us.
David Korten
IMO the key point is the standard of living of our middle class. Not an easy to determine point, but very relevant.
The US scores poorly for healthcare quality and effectiveness
How are you drawing the line on the cutoff between acceptable and poor? In your graph the US scores a 78.7, while Denmark has an 80.1 and Belgium and 80.4. Is Denmark considered good and the US poor?
I'm not even sure life expectancy is a good measure of healthcare quality when you're talking about average lifespans that close. I'd guess that people in the US have a lot more deaths from accidents involving cars (we drive a lot more) and violence compared to other developed countries. That would put more people dying at the hands of lifestyle/culture as opposed to how well the healthcare system functions.
It would be more interesting to note survival rates for cancer, stroke, heart disease as a barometer to judge healthcare quality and effectiveness.
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