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Depository for off topic / political posts (NO brexit related posts please)

Arguably post 2019 UK will become even more of a clientist state, you only need to see the contractors who funded Brexit.

Oxford (EGTK), United Kingdom

That’s an interesting statement coming from you, @Peter

It is obvious that paying child benefit at £20.70 / £13.70 is a total waste of taxpayer funds, when paid to people to whom these sums are basically the square root of minus zero. The average wage in the UK is such that these amounts are just silly. And as our collective heroine Greta would be the first to say, one should not be encouraging population growth anyway

And, further up the scale, it is the same for the basic state pension which is a tiny amount for a retired civil servant (perhaps a CAA employee :smile) who retired after 40 years’ service with a 100k final salary.

But in reality none of this can be touched, for various political reasons. Also a lot of stuff is not worth means testing (paying only to low income people) because the apparatus for implementing the means testing costs an amount comparable to the payments. And there is a huge amount of fraud in this whole area which would need to be tackled more rigorously (more expensively).

The “free NHS” issue is probably more complicated. Many feel that the reason why the NHS is so overloaded is because it is “free” and it is human nature to not value something which is free. There is certainly a strong national psyche along the lines of “let me enjoy the greasy fatty sh*t food because if I bugger up my health I will see a doctor and the NHS will fix me”. There is a lot of stuff which is free on the NHS but which would be much more appreciated if people had to pay for it – small things like a box of pills for say £10. Dentistry went “private” many years ago, somehow… to qualify for NHS there, you need to be on benefits, AFAIK.

Every “modern” country has these issues, to varying degrees. Nobody has any solutions. There are things which could be done but governments don’t last long enough, and whatever you do there will always be new losers who kick up a massive stink. The whole modern world is basically socialist

Re NHS IT systems, these failed for various reasons but the biggest one was an almost total lack of buy-in from NHS employees. They just didn’t want it.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

It’s almost as if large government isn’t good.

It’s s almost as if large government isn’t good.

Strange then that those countries with the highest standards of living typically have high tax rates…it’s not the size of the government, it’s what you do with it – to paraphrase a different adage…

The USA, which seems to be the model you advocate, does not provide a decent standard of living for the vast majority of its population. The fact that a few people are better able than elsewhere to live their lives (“freedom”) does not make it a great country. On the contrary, it seems to screw a large part of the population in exchange for ever increasing wealth for the “1%”.

I prefer a strong government that is able and willing to break up monopolies and ensure an adequate distribution of wealth and opportunities…

Low-hours pilot
EDVM Hildesheim, Germany

I’m not sure what you mean about the highest standards of living? Do you mean having the most things provided by the government? Arguably, Singapore, Switzerland, Saudi Arabia, Quatar, Monaco, Luxemburg, are all low tax states with pretty decent standards of living for its citizens.

I’m not quite sure how you say that the living standard for the vast majority of americans is not decent, that means you think 200+ million people have a poor standard of living? If so why do so many people want to get into the country? Lower fuel prices, and cheaper goods also help increase standard of living for similar income.

I think I saw some statistics saying something like the top 1% in the US pay about 40% of the income tax, the top 10% pay about 70% of all income tax. Surely that ticks your progressive boxes?

MedEwok wrote:

I prefer a strong government that is able and willing to break up monopolies and ensure an adequate distribution of wealth and opportunities…

This is somewhat tongue in cheek, but sounds very much like the attitude of a certain national socialist from the mid part of last century. Perhaps it’s a cultural thing to want the group rather than the individual.

One issue with taxation at present is that it is distorted for people in the middle classes. e.g. take the child benefits allowance of £20.70 a week for the first child. Over a year this is c. £1080. If you earn £60K you are taxed at 40% so this is worth 1080*1.4 = £1500 which is a fair sum of money in my book – 2.5% of your total salary and a much higher proportion of one’s discretionary income. Add an extra child or two and you are talking up to 5% of your salary. As most of one’s earnings go towards mortgage/transport/heating/food this sum may reasonably represent 20-50% of your yearly discretionary income depending on where you live and what your costs are.

A few years ago I was in the position of earning about this sum, but as my partner earned nothing our household income was only slightly above the national average. We claimed it then paid it back because that will enable my partner to claim a state pension when she is older. Some relatives who have a considerably higher household income than we do (both working part/full time but neither paid more than 50K), were paid child benefits in full. It would be a lot simpler and in my view fairer if they just paid it to everyone with kids and had done.

There are further anomalies around the 100k mark e.g. where medical consultants have to be careful not to earn too much otherwise their take-home salaries go down. I don’t mind paying tax. I would be happy to pay more tax as I agree that high taxation economies are generally more pleasant places to live. But it ought to be simple and progressive.

~~~~~~~~~~

The NHS is collapsing and it’s getting to the point now where I am continuously aware of people who are being grievously let down. Corridors are filled with people in beds who are overflowing from the wards. Operations are being cancelled. Surgeons and theatre staff still come to work and are paid, but there are no beds to put the patients in so they can’t operate. Psychiatric services for kids are nearly non-existent. It’s pretty distressing for both patients and staff.

Paradoxically the NHS is a victim of its’ own success – It did a good job of prioritising preventative medicine in recent decades and now, so to speak, it’s reaping the rewards. People are living longer and enjoying happy and fulfilled retirements, but they also collect chronic diseases and spend progressively more time in outpatient clinics, then as inpatients, before they finally die. As they get older the ratio of money and effort expended for the amount of benefit (improvement in quality of life) obtained increases exponentially. Yet people have to be in a pretty bad way before you can claim that they do not benefit at all or even significantly from medical care that you can offer them. I wish we could get better at palliating rather than actively treating the very frail, but even this would only dent the problem of rising healthcare costs. I do not know what the solution is. Perhaps (tongue in cheek) a moratorium on medical research, as it’s difficult to deny an existing and beneficial treatment, but easy to deny one which hasn’t been invented.

One thing the NHS does do well, is to offer people the treatment they need rather than the treatment they think they need. I fairly often see patients who have had unnecessary surgery and scans abroad – and sometimes see them suffer for it. Traditionally in the NHS, a doctor has only ever had to ask the question ‘what does my patient need?’ rather than ‘what can my patient afford?’ or ‘what will make me the most money?’ or ‘what does my patient want?’ (even if it would be bad for them). At present waiting lists are rising and people are not getting the treatment they need in a timely manner. However as a general rule I don’t believe people are being refused treatment that would clearly be good for them, unless it is exorbitantly expensive.

Last Edited by kwlf at 24 Dec 03:00

The problem with a valuable thing (healthcare) being free is that demand tends to infinity.

I don’t have a solution. We are living too long and with the last quarter of our lives generally requiring a lot of very expensive healthcare. The economics of the situation just don’t stack up anymore, same as the pensions problem.

EGLM & EGTN

kwlf wrote:

However as a general rule I don’t believe people are being refused treatment that would clearly be good for them, unless it is exorbitantly expensive.

Sorry, have to disagree. I have a few personal examples where it does not work. Doctors tell us what needs to be done and NHS says no.

EGTR

I’m not disagreeing because there always will be exceptions. And delayed healthcare (beyond a limit) is also healthcare denied. But speaking personally it’s not something I see on a regular basis. If you were to send some specific examples (by PM if necessary for confidentiality) I would be interested.

Silvaire wrote:

In reference to the various comments above on the US, the difference in the US is that government does not play as large a role in life

I think whatever it is an “average” American knows about politics in Europe, it is exclusively on top level (national level, government). The same is probably true the other way also. The reason this is important for Europeans is health care and pensions/care for the old. The other reason is international matters. Europe is a continent with an insane number of cultures and languages, and war has traditionally been the status quo since for ever.

But, in most of Europe, at least Northern Europe it is the local democratic processes that play a part in everyday life, not the governmental. And I mean local as in towns, villages and counties. We pay about roughly the same amount of tax to the state and local community. It is the local community that handles school, health care and care for the elderly, while the state handles the funds and national matters.

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway
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