"Today even the poor will get antibiotics at the ER when dying of infection"
You're moving the goal posts a bit aren't you? For starters, those antibiotics will be followed by bankruptcy for the poor person in most cases. And most importantly, that alone isn't convincing me that quality of life for the poor is better than ever. I also didn't mention in my last comment that who is really seeing their quality of life decrease is the blue collar middle class, not the poor.
> For starters, those antibiotics will be followed by bankruptcy for the poor person in most cases.
So? Bankruptcy eliminates debt, which is a good thing for poor folks.
And yes, I've read the studies about "health care bankruptcies" - have you? They counted anyone who had health care expenses, and they included gambling and drug abuse as health care problems.
Right now my girlfriend and I are having a hell of a time with medical bills. She recently started her job, but they won't give her health insurance for the first 5 months. To cover the gap we bought our own individual plan.
So far she has gone to the hospital for an allergic reaction to food she has never been allergic to before, and also needed to see 2 doctors along the way. Total cost is around $1,000 in 2 months, and her individual plan doesnt cover any of it because it was extremely limited. I also needed surgery recently and I've racked up a total of about $1,000 in the same 2 months (thats after my insurance paid quite a bit).
We just graduated college, so we have a sum total of about $2,000 in the bank. We have around $2,000 in expenses a month to live in our apartment, buy food, pay for our cars, etc. Our income is pretty good for two fresh college grads, but we just started so there were the expenses of moving out along with waiting for the pay to catch up.
It wasn't pretty, but we made it through with a $4k loan from my parents (which we have since paid back). Without that, we would be bankrupt or riddled with credit card debt.
Considering we have no kids, our expenses are <$2k a month, and we make decent money, I don't consider us poor. Yet it was just one thing after another that was unusual and unplanned for. If one or the other of us had health issues, it would have been no big deal. If her insurance had kicked in earlier, it would have been no big deal. If she had been able to start sooner, it would have been no big deal. But with all of that screwing us, we got in a bad position despite being extremely frugal and planning really well (how many 22 year olds know to get an individual health care plan to cover the gap between when they are dropped off their parents and their employer one starts. Our only mistake as putting the deductible at $1,000 instead of $500.)
So this isn't an academic exercise. It's not just "poor folks" that you so readily dismiss. Our healthcare system is a freaking mess and anyone denying it hasn't lived through the rough edges. Right now we'd love to have real health insurance for my girlfriend. I would love to put her on my insurance but I can't. Her parents would love to put her on their insurance but they can't. She would love to buy an individual plan that covered more than just catastrophic hospital visits, but she can't.
So maybe you should stop reading the academic studies and start talking to people living in the real world.
"She would love to buy an individual plan that covered more than just catastrophic hospital visits, but she can't."
I am not that familiar with the US healthcare system. Why can't she buy a different plan for herself? Is it too expensive? Or would it also kick in too late?
You're moving the goal posts a bit aren't you? For starters, those antibiotics will be followed by bankruptcy for the poor person in most cases. And most importantly, that alone isn't convincing me that quality of life for the poor is better than ever. I also didn't mention in my last comment that who is really seeing their quality of life decrease is the blue collar middle class, not the poor.