Saturday, May 21, 2005
Single Payer and the Sales Tax
Clinical psychologist and long-time personal friend Gail Price had the following reaction to the Whipkey piece on single payer:
………….
“The idea of funding health care through a national sales tax is interesting; these tax revenues would no doubt be diluted by all the other special interests, however. From my own experience, the huge costs of medical education are one of the reasons for the bits of corruption that exist and are dealt with not only by ordering tests that are unnecessary, but also by charging for tests not ordered. (I've had both, and by reputable physicians.) The other is the desire for status over service. I think physicians need both, but in balance. Also, the more research I do, the more I am convinced that various forms of pollution (air, water,food quality especially) are responsible for many more illnesses than we now acknowledge. Money needs to go to cleaning up these life essentials. A third cause of medical illnesses is over-medication.
I do not think anything will change until the profit motive is removed from medicine. We can see almost daily how tax revenues are being misused and purloined. Why would this be any different with health care funded by tax money?”
Clinical psychologist and long-time personal friend Gail Price had the following reaction to the Whipkey piece on single payer:
………….
“The idea of funding health care through a national sales tax is interesting; these tax revenues would no doubt be diluted by all the other special interests, however. From my own experience, the huge costs of medical education are one of the reasons for the bits of corruption that exist and are dealt with not only by ordering tests that are unnecessary, but also by charging for tests not ordered. (I've had both, and by reputable physicians.) The other is the desire for status over service. I think physicians need both, but in balance. Also, the more research I do, the more I am convinced that various forms of pollution (air, water,food quality especially) are responsible for many more illnesses than we now acknowledge. Money needs to go to cleaning up these life essentials. A third cause of medical illnesses is over-medication.
I do not think anything will change until the profit motive is removed from medicine. We can see almost daily how tax revenues are being misused and purloined. Why would this be any different with health care funded by tax money?”
