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ORIGINAL: Aswad
If the USA would implement something similar, step by step, that would become a pretty damn utopian place, without some of the drawbacks we have up here (cultural issues not present in the USA). And to those worried about people growing soft or lax, that doesn't seem to happen in any of the countries that have stuck with the Nordic model. Indeed, most people do whatever they can to avoid welfare, and crime isn't the least bit appealing for the vast majority of citizens. Note that we spend 30% more per capita on welfare to achieve what you see in that clip, and far less per capita on police, prisons, courts, healthcare and the like, so it's just a shuffling of money in the budgets to get more for less, not a question of throwing more money at people.

• A Conservative interpretation of the US Constitution
  
• Personal Responsibility
  
• Help for the truly needy
  
• Limited Government
  
• Consumption Tax (non-profit charities and food exempt)
  

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ORIGINAL: tazzygirl

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Who says that those who will be new additions to the subsidized receivers will go for the preventive care?

Who says they wont?

• A Conservative interpretation of the US Constitution
  
• Personal Responsibility
  
• Help for the truly needy
  
• Limited Government
  
• Consumption Tax (non-profit charities and food exempt)
  

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Are they doing it now? If they are doing it now, then there will be no cost-savings by their switching to preventive care. That cost will shift to the Government where it wasn't before. If they aren't doing it already, where is the incentive for them to start, that they aren't already ignoring? That cost shifts from the employer/employee to Government.

Where is the cost savings?

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Where is the cost savings?

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ORIGINAL: tazzygirl

Oh the cost savings are plentiful... if you wish to look.

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ORIGINAL: tazzygirl

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Where is the cost savings?

In discovering the diabetes before the renal failure/high bp/ketoacidosis/stroke/.
In finding the creeping bp before the stroke/renal failure.
In finding the cancer before it metastasizes.
Oh the cost savings are plentiful... if you wish to look.

• A Conservative interpretation of the US Constitution
  
• Personal Responsibility
  
• Help for the truly needy
  
• Limited Government
  
• Consumption Tax (non-profit charities and food exempt)
  

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Want the same folks who review SSDI applications examining an early cancer diagnosis?

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but single payer is only an invitation to fraud

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If they actually go through with the preventive care.

Where is the incentive for them to do so? It won't be their money on the line.

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I wonder what would happen if the Feds forced insurance companies to one specific annual payout limit, with no lifetime limits, and the Federal Government taking on those that pass that annual limit. For instance, my ex's employer is self-insured and they have a $70k/yr. stop-loss/employee, after which the insurance company covers 100% of the medical care. What if that $70k annual stop-loss didn't go on to the insurance company, instead shifting over to the Federal Government? The risk to the insurance company associated with stop-losses would disappear, which should allow premiums to drop, too. That could make insurance actually more affordable, allowing more people to buy in. And, that could very easily lead to fewer people getting bankrupt from medical costs.

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ORIGINAL: DesideriScuri

Where did your citizenry start from?

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We already have those who don't do what they can to avoid welfare.

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I would state that the majority of Americans don't want to be on welfare, and will do what they can to not be on it. I will also claim - with no links to support my belief - that the majority of Americans on welfare don't want to be on welfare.

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Crime, for the vast majority of Americans, isn't appealing, either.

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Are the Nordic people as consumption-driven as Americans?

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If consumption isn't King, there is a huge ethos difference that could very easily lead to huge differences in outcomes.

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ORIGINAL: TheHeretic

The problem with that logic is that it's much cheaper when people DON'T live to a ripe old age.

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ORIGINAL: DesideriScuri

If they actually go through with the preventive care.

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Where is the incentive for them to do so? It won't be their money on the line.

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ORIGINAL: DesideriScuri

We already have those who don't do what they can to avoid welfare

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ORIGINAL: Aswad
There will always be some. In terms of cost efficiency, it's cheapest to ignore them.

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ORIGINAL: Aswad

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Where is the incentive for them to do so? It won't be their money on the line.

It'll be their health on the line. That's usually a pretty big incentive.
IWYW,
— Aswad.

• A Conservative interpretation of the US Constitution
  
• Personal Responsibility
  
• Help for the truly needy
  
• Limited Government
  
• Consumption Tax (non-profit charities and food exempt)
  

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ORIGINAL: DomYngBlk
I will ask you again. Why do you hate and mistrust your fellow countrymen so much. Why not just move.

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ORIGINAL: Aswad

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ORIGINAL: DesideriScuri
Where did your citizenry start from?

Being so dirt poor we got hit worse by the Black Plague than most any other country, simply because people couldn't afford proper burials and even had to reuse the burial shrouds. Later, we were for a time a thrall state to Sweden and Denmark, until we ditched them. Then a time went by and the Nazi's occupied the place, messed it up pretty bad. Then the socialists held back economic growth for decades. And so forth. Pretty crappy track record: a tribe of warriors that later devolved into having a penchant for raiding monastaries for women and other loot before all that started. The last time we were badass was when the other major tribes of Europe banded together to get rid of us (which is why we settled up North, in the Blight (a liberal translation of Harð-angr; literally hard/severe suffering/grief)).
The non-socialist parties introduced most of our welfare and universalized healthcare, against the objections of the socialist parties, and it was at least in part a fiscal measure on their part. The socialist parties now claim the credit for it, but the actual voting records from the Storting (parliament) show otherwise.
There are about 4.5 million Norwegian-Americans in the USA by the last census, which is slightly more than there are in Norway.

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We already have those who don't do what they can to avoid welfare.

There will always be some. In terms of cost efficiency, it's cheapest to ignore them.
I don't know about you, but I prefer to get the most out of my tax money, and to have as low necessary living expenses as I can. I'm not overly concerned with whether the unfortunate receive a lot of help or not, just as I'm not overly concerned with whether some rich guy makes a ton of money; neither is my business. I don't care much whether crime is dealt with through welfare and healthcare, or through police and courts, so long as the net outcome is satisfactory for honest citizens and the cost efficiency of the solution is good so I don't have to pay too much to have a satisfactory crime rate.
In short, I care about efficient government that stays out of my way, not paying more to live than is necessary, and getting my money's worth. If some profit from me getting what I want, I don't really care, and I don't care much whether they did any actual work to get whatever benefits they might derive from the arrangement, so long as there isn't a lot of waste in the system that could be optimized away.

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Like you, I support help for the truly needy, so I do give to charities on occasion, or to worthy causes, or to citizens down on their luck that fall between the cracks in the system (no system is perfect). I don't feel like being forced to pay anything that I'm not paying for a well defined service toward a well defined goal that has to do with quality of life for me and mine, first and foremost, except for this. I'm happy to report that the current arrangement meets both goals quite well, at a modest net cost.

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I would state that the majority of Americans don't want to be on welfare, and will do what they can to not be on it. I will also claim - with no links to support my belief - that the majority of Americans on welfare don't want to be on welfare.

In my experience, universal healthcare is very effective in getting people off welfare and back to work. Mental and physical health issues are an increasingly common problem, and the modern workplace has increasingly less room for people with such issues. In a majority of the remaining cases, universal healthcare can at least enable them to work part time, which significantly diminishes the net cost.

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Crime, for the vast majority of Americans, isn't appealing, either.

I should've worded it better. The USA has far more crime in all categories, far higher recidivism rates, far higher prison expenses, far higher associated costs and losses, far higher contagion effects, far more hardening of criminals, and so forth. All of these have been effectively combatted in the Scandinavian countries by the measures we have undertaken. In Norway, our recidivism rate is about one tenth what it is in the USA, and murder is practically unheard of, with violence and other serious crime at a very small fraction of even the better neighbourhoods in the USA.

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This is part of why I prefer to solve the problems with crime in a different way than you do. Of course, all things being equal, I prefer the gentler handling, as I've seen firsthand how circumstances can be make-or-break for humans anywhere, but my main concern is having a good outcome for the rest of the population. Anyone stuck in jail is not just sucking up tax dollars for their stay, but also failing to produce any taxable income, which raises your tax even further by making you pay their share, too.

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Are the Nordic people as consumption-driven as Americans?

More.
And the average middle class teenager will be too ashamed to answer the phone if doing so would reveal to their peers that they have to wait for payday to buy the most recent version iPhone. Similarly, middle class parents would be mortified not to have gone on vacation to some nice country that year, a blemish that would stay with them for a long time. Or, having to put off hiring someone to do some work around their house. After all, who has time for maintenance? That's a service you buy, just like the kids' first home, right?

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If consumption isn't King, there is a huge ethos difference that could very easily lead to huge differences in outcomes.

I'm pretty sure our model would work better in the USA than it does here.
IWYW,
— Aswad.

• A Conservative interpretation of the US Constitution
  
• Personal Responsibility
  
• Help for the truly needy
  
• Limited Government
  
• Consumption Tax (non-profit charities and food exempt)