Taxes used to cover basic services. Now they don’t even cover inflated salaries and pensions
Ask HN: Why can't tax pay for universal basic utilities?
21–30 of 51 posts
Re: Ask HN: Why can't tax pay for universal basic utilities?
#22Universal health care is not controversial in developed countries outside of the US. Universal basic utilities wouldn't work because it would need to be means-tested, and that's not easy to do. A household with $0 of income might have a secret $100M fortune somewhere. Should they get free electricity? It makes much more sense to have affordable utilities and just give people cash. If they want to use 10% of the elect…
> Universal health care is not controversial in developed countries outside of the US. I'm canadian and our universal healthcare system sucks. It's very controversial here. Universal often means universally bad - picture your typical interaction with the government bureaucracy and imagine that for something important. It's the same reason you wouldn't want government run utilities (which Canada also has)
California…the state that brings you the DMV will also bring you your medical care. Sounds horrifying.
Re: Ask HN: Why can't tax pay for universal basic utilities?
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Universal health care is not controversial in developed countries outside of the US. I'm canadian and our universal healthcare system sucks. It's very controversial here. Universal often means universally bad - picture your typical interaction with the government bureaucracy and imagine that for something important. It's the same reason you wouldn't want government run utilities (which Canada also has)
I'm in NZ and our universal healthcare system sucks too. For example don't have a medical emergency here. You'll wait more than 8 hours to get seen. https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/nearly-all-nz-hospitals-failin...
> For example don't have a medical emergency here. You'll wait more than 8 hours to get seen.
This is the same as the US. When you go to the emergency room, you're triaged. If you don't seem to have an immediate, life-threatening emergency, you often wait hours to be seen.
I think this is pretty typical. You can't scale medical staff and facilities rapidly by demand, and it's not sustainable to have the staff required for peak demand all the time.
On top of that, there's a shortage of medical professionals in most countries.
Re: Ask HN: Why can't tax pay for universal basic utilities?
#24Universal health care is not controversial in developed countries outside of the US. Universal basic utilities wouldn't work because it would need to be means-tested, and that's not easy to do. A household with $0 of income might have a secret $100M fortune somewhere. Should they get free electricity? It makes much more sense to have affordable utilities and just give people cash. If they want to use 10% of the elect…
Well, in socialized healthcare, you have some procedures which are covered, and then some, like cosmetic surgery, which aren't. An equivalent to that for power would be to cook up a baseline kWh usage for a household, maybe something that is a function correlated to the number of residents, and then charge for every kWh above that.
> An equivalent to that for power would be to cook up a baseline kWh usage for a household
This just couldn't work in a fair way.
People live in old houses, new houses, condos, etc. There are massive variations between households in terms of insulation, heating/cooling equipment, etc.
In fact, I would wager that it's often cheaper to cool a wealthier person's 1,000 sqft home than a poorer person's 1,000 sqft home, just because the weathier person is more likely to have a recent, energy-efficient HVAC and better insulation.
Re: Ask HN: Why can't tax pay for universal basic utilities?
#25People will use (waste) more energy and water when they are not paying for it. Do you want to encourage huge homes with high heating and cooling bills?
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Re: Ask HN: Why can't tax pay for universal basic utilities?
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Universal health care is not controversial in developed countries outside of the US. I'm canadian and our universal healthcare system sucks. It's very controversial here. Universal often means universally bad - picture your typical interaction with the government bureaucracy and imagine that for something important. It's the same reason you wouldn't want government run utilities (which Canada also has)
I'm in NZ and our universal healthcare system sucks too. For example don't have a medical emergency here. You'll wait more than 8 hours to get seen. https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/nearly-all-nz-hospitals-failin...
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Re: Ask HN: Why can't tax pay for universal basic utilities?
#27Universal health care is not controversial in developed countries outside of the US. Universal basic utilities wouldn't work because it would need to be means-tested, and that's not easy to do. A household with $0 of income might have a secret $100M fortune somewhere. Should they get free electricity? It makes much more sense to have affordable utilities and just give people cash. If they want to use 10% of the elect…
> Universal health care is not controversial in developed countries outside of the US. I'm canadian and our universal healthcare system sucks. It's very controversial here. Universal often means universally bad - picture your typical interaction with the government bureaucracy and imagine that for something important. It's the same reason you wouldn't want government run utilities (which Canada also has)
Universal health care needs to be funded. If your country elects politicians who underfund health care, then you should expect negative consequences on the system.
Or, you could privatize your healthcare like the US, and pay multiple times more than the amount you've saved on your tax bill.
And, expensive privatized health care does not mean better health outcomes; e.g., the US has worse infant mortality than either New Zealand (a sibling comment) or Canada (or most of Eastern Europe / all of Western Europe).
https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/field/infant-mortalit...
Re: Ask HN: Why can't tax pay for universal basic utilities?
#28Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, in socialized healthcare, you have some procedures which are covered, and then some, like cosmetic surgery, which aren't. An equivalent to that for power would be to cook up a baseline kWh usage for a household, maybe something that is a function correlated to the number of residents, and then charge for every kWh above that.
> An equivalent to that for power would be to cook up a baseline kWh usage for a household This just couldn't work in a fair way. People live in old houses, new houses, condos, etc. There are massive variations between households in terms of insulation, heating/cooling equipment, etc. In fact, I would wager that it's often cheaper to cool a wealthier person's 1,000 sqft home than a poorer person's 1,000 sqft home, ju…
Well, heating/cooling aren't essentials in many places. You could subsidize the cost of running a fridge and appliances but stop short of climate control. Alternatively, in places that are now reaching 50+ degrees celsius with high humidity at times, maybe subsidizing climate control is desirable to save lives?
Re: Ask HN: Why can't tax pay for universal basic utilities?
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
> there'll still be a 1% who does because money is nothing to them I recently heard someone well off describe fines like parking as "the cost to park here".
Some countries set fines based on the individual's income level, to dissuade this attitude.
But that makes people no longer equal in the eyes of the law. A better solution to that problem is to make sure there's some non-monetary component to the punishment too, e.g., towing the car, which then takes time and inconvenience to retrieve, or community service for worse things than parking tickets.
Re: Ask HN: Why can't tax pay for universal basic utilities?
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm in NZ and our universal healthcare system sucks too. For example don't have a medical emergency here. You'll wait more than 8 hours to get seen. https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/nearly-all-nz-hospitals-failin...
> For example don't have a medical emergency here. You'll wait more than 8 hours to get seen. This is the same as the US. When you go to the emergency room, you're triaged. If you don't seem to have an immediate, life-threatening emergency, you often wait hours to be seen. I think this is pretty typical. You can't scale medical staff and facilities rapidly by demand, and it's not sustainable to have the staff require…
I'm no expert on the US system but it seems to be much better.
From this article. https://hbr.org/2019/02/to-reduce-emergency-room-wait-times-...
"Patients who arrive at EDs with broken bones wait a painful 54 minutes, on average, before receiving any pain medication."
That sounds like a dream to me. 54 minutes is nothing. My friend's wife waited over 8 hours to be seen after cutting through nerves and tendons in her hand. Then she waited 3 days for surgery. After being seen, the doctors told her not to eat. They told her to drive 3 hours to the next City as the local hospital could not perform the operation. When she got there she waited days. Her husband had driven down with their two toddlers and had was not allowed in the hospital due to Covid restrictions. She was pregnant and went days without food waiting for care. This was a little over a week ago.
I had a suspected aneurysm almost a year ago. I woke up with an incredible headache. I waited over 6 hours for a CT scan. That was a high priority triage. I still waited for hours.
I'm not saying the US system is perfect. I don't even know if it's better but I do know our system is broken.