Economist told a packed state House that a single payer plan would be 25% cheaper

[cleduc]

17. I live in Canada

Here are the health care costs per capita for 2009
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_health_expenditure_(PPP)_per_capita
United States $7,960
Canada $4,363

Life Expectancy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_life_expectancy
United States 38th, 78.2 years
Canada 12th, 80.7 years

Population of United states: 311,591,917, Jul 2011 U.S. Census Bureau

Canada is a single payer system where everybody is covered from birth until death that I think works pretty darn well. I've used it for comparison because many of the laws between the two countries (like labor & environment regs for example) are similar as are the geography, economic structure, and other common circumstances. And I've used it because members of my immediate family also use the US system - mainly through Johns Hopkins, a very good US hospital. So I have a reasonable sense of how they compare. I sincerely don't think Canadians give up much in health care quality.

From those 2009 numbers:
US Health care costs using existing US system before Obamacare
= 311,591,917 people x $7,960 per capita = $2,480,271,659,320

US Health care costs using Canada single payer system
= 311,591,917 people x $4,363 per capita = $1,359,475,533,891

The difference is the United States paid roughly $1.12 trillion dollars more per year than they would have using Canada's single payer system and that over payment delivered a life expectancy of 2.5 years less than Canada. Over ten years (like the budgets Romney & Obama are talking about), that's a $11.2 trillion dollar difference that could cover 70+% of the current deficit.

Now whether the government or an insurance company or a health care institution like a hospital collects money to pay for health care, one way or the other, it comes out of the pockets of those who use the system. If you pay more for it, you have to be paid more to do your job to afford it - which unfortunately, not everyone can afford in the US. But being unable to afford it hasn't reduced US health care costs.

Ignoring the obvious health benefits for a moment, do you think that Americans could have more jobs if they cost $3,597 per year less to employ while taking home the same dough? I think so as would the laws of economics. Or one could split the difference, giving half of the savings to the employees and half to the employers. Whatever. It would be a gigantic win for everybody in the United States except the health insurance/private health companies. You could even leave some money in to insure the US has the best health care system and life expectancy in the world and still have mega bucks left over.

Romney complains about the US corporate tax rate being higher than the rest of the world. When your country spends 45% of what the entire world does on military, the only way to pay for that is with higher taxes. These corporations enjoy the security the US military provides them. After all, according to Romney, "corporations are people" too. So the quality and security of life comes at a cost to Americans and their corporations. But I do wonder how long America should continue to take it on the economic chin so that their health insurance companies can make out like bandits at the great expense of everyone else in the country. If Romney wants the US to compete with the rest of the world, he should step up and address these health care costs like much of the rest of the industrialized world already has because the difference in those costs are dramatically higher than the the differences in world corporate tax rates and they affect ALL Americans directly - not indirectly through corporate profit & loss.

Obamacare doesn't get America all the way to where it needs to be but it's a significant step in the right direction. I agree that the sooner the US gets single payer, the better off the US will be - and not just financially.