What universal healthcare could do for our economy:

Right now many people stay in crappy jobs that don’t pay enough because they fear losing their health insurance. If people felt free to quit such jobs and start their own businesses, they could end up not only doing better financially (and thus being able to afford to spend more money), but also even create jobs for other people, which would also help to fuel economic activity.

Also, businesses would have a better chance of succeeding if they didn't have to worry about providing health care to employees.

which is exactly why the corporacrats want to keep the status quo.

That's the whole key. Keep people enslaved to the corporate machine.

That is why this will be one of the major stuggles of our times. This is We the People vs The Corporate Machine.

(If We the People fail, say goodbye to Democracy and hello to Fascism.)

And cannot afford it for them, their families and any employees.

We used to have some small businesses. One reason for closing them was that as we got older we needed health insurance and could not get individual policies. So now my business is effectively closed and my husband is working at a low paying job that has good benefits.

My BIL had a profitable cabinet building business but closed it since he could not get affordable insurance for his family. So he closed his business and went to work for a large corporation for the benefits. Then he got treated badly at the end of his life, having to work up until two weeks before his death to hang onto the benefits that were paying for his cancer treatments.

incredible engine for fueling our economy. I wish some of ou political "leaders" would make this very capitalism-friendly argument!

Many people go on Medicaid because they have medical issues and can't get private health insurance. People on Medicaid can only make a certain amount to remain eligible. If they could buy into a public option, they could earn more money and this would help the economy.

stimuli with a fantastic multiplier effect.

A lot of people in Canada stay in crappy jobs even with the government sponsored health system. Entrepreneurialism isn't something everybody has in them. My brother has stayed as an underpaid sheet metal journeyman for 21 years because he doesn't want to get tied down to the area he lives in but doesn't want to leave it either. I even offered to bankroll a portion of his business if he went out on his own and he refused. He is almost 55 and doesn't have a pot to piss in. But at least he can get health coverage as long as he pays his $72 per month to the BC government.

But there are plenty who would like to try but cannot because they need to make sure their families can get care if it is needed.

Single Payer Health Care—a Stimulus for Economy with 2.6 Million New Jobs, $317 Billion in Business Revenue, $100 Billion in Wages
New study sponsored by the California Nurses Association


Full study: http://www.calnurses.org/research/pdfs/ihsp_sp_economic_study_2009.pdf

Establishing a national single-payer style healthcare reform system would provide a major stimulus for the U.S. economy by creating 2.6 million new jobs, and infusing $317 billion in new business and public revenues, with another $100 billion in wages into the U.S. economy, according to the findings of a groundbreaking study released on January 14, 2009.

The number of jobs created by a single-payer system, expanding and upgrading Medicare to cover everyone, parallels almost exactly the total job loss in 2008.

These dramatic new findings document for the first time that a single-payer system could not only solve our healthcare crisis, but also substantially contribute to putting America back to work and assisting the economic recovery," said Geri Jenkins, RN, co-president of the National Nurses Organizing Committee/California Nurses Association, which sponsored the study.

I'll get back to you as soon and Rush, Glenn, Hannity and O'Reilly tell me what those downsides are.

Seriously, at best, universal health care will have a neutral cost (by comparison with our current, flawed system) and, without the mega-corps taking 40% of every dollar (and raising the administrative costs for doctors and hospitals), would be far less expensive than what we're paying now.