Romney recently went to Israel and praised their healthcare system and especially it’s cost of only 8% of their GDP. We pay 18% of our GDP on healthcare. That’s 10% of GDP more! Every other major modern country has a healthcare cost similar to Israel’s. Why don’t we change our system? Look around, pick anyone’s system, or pick the best ideas from several. Why don’t the republicans rail against our uncompetitive system instead of trying to protect the status quo? Now Romney and Ryan want to make things worse by privatizing medicare and cutting the 700B in provider savings included in the Affordable Care Act.

Remember that individual income tax has been the largest single source of federal revenue since 1950, averaging 8 about percent of GDP. Corporate income tax is 1.3% of GDP. In other words, the penalty we pay as a % of GDP for our health care system is more than the ENTIRETY of our combined individual and corporate income tax burden!!!! Are we crazy? No wonder we are having trouble being competitive in today’s world. As Warren Buffet recently said, our healthcare costs are a tapeworm eating the country.

If we would cut our healthcare costs in half, we would not have a Medicare problem. The costs are the real problem, not medicare!

Note: Tax numbers from the Tax Policy Center
http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/briefing-book/background/number/revenue.cfm/

http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2012/08/22/158761170/health-law-gives-medicare-fraud-fighters-new-weapons

Private plans will weed out, or force high premiums. We will be at the mercy of private insurance companies without Medicare, after waiting 65 years to have an insurance plan that doesn’t discriminate against pre-existing conditions.