[DonQuigleone]

Originally Posted by Ithekro

Another part of the resistance to Universal Healthcare is the average income of an American. Using percentages to show how much it costs a Europeans verses and American id not helpful without knowledge of how much money that is. European gas prices are also much higher than American gas prices, but what percentage of eaches income is spent of gasoline each year? From what I remember, The average income is higher in Europe, and thus a higher tax on something doesn't get as noticed. Use the same tax on an American that has a lower average income, and the American will be effectively broke after things mount up.

I don't think that argument works as European countries are actually on the whole poorer than the US, and the majority of the European population is worse off then in America, and that's even if you look at Northwestern Europe the most prosperous part. Southern and Eastern Europe is far poorer then the United states, countries like Italy or Spain.

Also, all goods are cheaper in the US, particularly due to a lack of high sales tax or VAT (in Ireland, for instance, it's ~25%), I'd say provided they got higher social welfare, Americans could easily take higher taxes. And anyway, the point is moot, as Properly implemented Universal Healthcare would not require an increase in taxes (European governments spend about the same raw amount on healthcare as the US), and would save all households substantial amounts of money, as they would no longer need to shell out so much on health insurance or drugs (drug prices in America are also overpriced).

The other piece of resistance is that Americans do not like being forced into anything. The whole freedom to do as I please thing is strong in places...as is the anti-monopoly mindset from back in the early 1900s. The belief that competition is good and keeps the prices down, is an old economic idea that continues to be passed around the nation. It doesn't work if the companies are all working together anyway to keep the prices up...or if the prices of services are kept high to to fear of lawsuits.

That is something to consider, but how much of this is due to industry run propaganda, and how much is due to genuine opposition? I think all americans know their health bills are too high, but due to wide ranging industry campaigns they think the alternative is "socialist" and beyond the pale. Do Americans realise that health costs aren't nearly as significant an issue anywhere else in the world? Anywhere else it's not the cost of the healthcare that's an issue, but the quality of it's delivery.

Originally Posted by Bri

Governments can do very little against bubbles in the economy, only central banks can act by raising interest rates. It's also notoriously hard to detect a bubble when it is in progress. You only know for sure that there was a bubble after it bursts.

The Bush administration shares only limited responsebility for the financial crisis. They can be blamed for waging two wars on credit and lowering taxes which increased the national debt, but that did not cause the melt down of the financial sector and the resulting recession.

The legislation that laid the foundation for the current crisis in the financial sector can be traced as far back as the Reagan adminstration. That is when the whole mess started with the Depository Institutions Deregulation and Monetary Control Act of 1980 and the Garn–St. Germain Depository Institutions Act of 1982. The last major deregulations were completed during the Clinton years with the repeal of the Glass–Steagall Act and the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000. These were all instrumental for allowing financial instutions to merge to become "Too big to Fail" which in turn induced excessive risk taking by their managements at the taxpayers expense.

For a while the financial deregulation did seem like a good idea as greater efficiency in the financial system *does* allow the economy to grow faster. Few if any experts at the time realised or appreciated the trade off between faster growth and increased systemic risk. In the end it was a bipartisan effort (backed by some very effective lobbying from the financial sector). Greenspan recently suggested a very old (and effective) medicine, standard oil style breakup of large financial conglomerates.

I think that governments can be aware of bubbles. There were industry analysts who were spotting that subprime lending was a problem, and it doesn't take a genius to realise that lending to people who can't pay their loan back is a bad idea. So really, the government at the time should have spotted it. But you are correct that the root of the problems started way back under Reagan. But I was speaking about the deficit specifically, and while certainly the recession plays into it (particularly where Obama is concerned), that deficit existed prior to that, and no government besides the Clinton Administration did anything to fix it. Reagan, Bush I and Bush II both presided over huge deficits. Obama may yet be judged to make the situation worse, but as of right now, it's too soon to call, particularly as the Obama administration is in the midst of several expensive things that were not present previously.

The other thing the republican administrations failed to do was tackle the time bomb that is Social Security and Medicare liabilities as the Baby Boomer Generation now begins to retire. They all knew it was going to happen, and they did nothing to try and fix it (in fact Bush II increased Medicare liabilities...). At least Clinton tried to enact Healthcare reform...

Originally Posted by Grifis

There was a surplus? We can have a deficit and surplus at the same time?

Yes there was. American Debt began to rise in 1980 under Reagan, fell for a while in the latter years of Clinton, and rose again Under Bush and Obama.