Comments by "Xyz Same" (@xyzsame4081) on "The Jimmy Dore Show"
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+ nash984954 The cap for income was there btw, it's called taxes and good wages plus restrictions on the international "moving" of capital aka tax flight resp. the vultures chasing the quick and speculative buck in poor countries:
in the New Deal era FDR proposed a 100 % income tax on everything over a few million USD. That was more a symbolic move, but they were high (for the wealthy and rich !!) from 1933 on , were raised several times, peaked with 94 % - around 85 effectively with some exemptions - in 1944. For everything over 2,7 million USD (todays value !) you had to give away roughly 90 cents per dollar.
Folks that had to pay those taxes were NOT soldiers - and they profited from the booming war economy - so they knew better than to complain about their tax "burden".
HIGH taxes, GOOD wages are an automatic "safety valve" against the amassement of such insane unearned wealth. Morevover it promoted more ethical practices (what's the use of violating the law when you pay 80 or 90 or 70 % on the gains).
And it made entrepreneurs INVEST and think longterm (investing was a way NOT to pay taxes). Of course then the machine builders, etc. were happy with the orders. So were their employees who had wages to spend for consumer goods. Someone always paid taxes in the end.
That means that the money OSCILLATED between businesses, workers = consumers, and the state. Businesses were also buyers and taxpayers, the state had the role of employer, tax collector and investor.
Money FACILITATES the EXHCHANGE of goods and services. IT MUST REMAIN IN CIRCULATION. That happened until the early 1980s. (Kennedy and Nixon in a presidential debate argued about 72 5 effective highest income tax. - in the 1940s it was for 2,7 million USD in todays purchasing power ! - that changed - but the highest tax rate always applied to a few million USD, it was not like that kicked in only with100 millions - on Wikipedia there is a good article income tax (or history of income tax), you must scroll down for the table.
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@quekumber the "agents" (or mercenaries) do not go after rioters. they go after peaceful protesters. it is on video. If they wanted to keep the peace they would stay nearby federal property (they have no RIGHT to be elsewhere), the constitution is clear: policing is the job of the city or the state - not right of the feds to meddle.
They can investigate individual cases (think FBI) and they can do mass control ONLY to protect federal property.
They wandered off and harassed peaceful protesters in an attempt to escalate the situation.
They attacked a vet that was obviously not aggressive, stood there, arms to the side (also not nearby any federal property). Why ? because they want to provoque a violent reaction.
They teargassed the wall of mums. WHY ??? these were obviously NOT violent women. Middleaged, the soccer mum types. so let them stand at a public space (of Portland NOT federal property) as is their constitutional right. but the "agents" / mercenaries WANTED to start something they are there to escalate.
That is the Trump strategy to maybe have a chance to win.
Trump or his supporters do not like how they handle it in Portland? - none of their business. Most of those who complain about what is going on are are not in Portland.
The locals have to handle that - or the state. Not federal government. the protests are going on since 60 days or whatever ? It is still not Trump's business. If the local business community are unhappy they can seek out the protesters, the police, the mayor, the council. Addressing their grievances. It is their local government.
If biz wants to calm down the protests - they better start kicking the mayor so he will come up with some meaningful reforms. Not lip service - for real. The police is paid by the city, about time they are accountable to mayor and city council. Not the other way round.
Politicians and council are typically fearful of police unions (they fear they organize against them in elections, and they want their donations). Not sure if that is a problem in Portland but it sure is in Minneapolis or Baltimore. The police unions call the shots. Even if a scandal requires some window dressing regarding accountability. The city council kow tows before the unions. Every "reform" must be approved by the unions.
If they would do a good job to monitoring themselves there would be no major scandals. So obviously no reform is going to come from the unions, on the contrary they will stand in the way. As long as cowardly politicians / sellouts collude with them - the citizens have to annoy the heck out of them to remind them whom they work for.
Politicians also want donatons from biz - well biz usually is not harrassed by the police, so they do not mind if policing does not work for the low(er) income citizens. They better figure out that it has to work for all, if they want to have undisturbed conditions and quiet in the city (conditions as good as it is possible during a pandemic).
btw the feckless fake Democratic mayor in Portland obviously did not push for police reform. he just told the police to show restraint. That is better than nothing, but only the beginning. The protests would have gone away if they had worked on reforms. But they all thought they could let the protesters do their thing and then it will go away.
if they would make meaningful plans for accountability and shifting of budgets (social workers instead of police handling things, think wellness checks) - then people wouldn't protest. The mayor thinks he can make some gestures and the citizens will believe it and go home.
Trump wants to make political hay: he would love to have an escalation and a pretext to declare martial law or to somehow interfere with elections in November (the motto is: he better start now with stirring up shit so it will be a full blown chaos in late fall - for the upcoming election).
He does not care about the preventable corona deaths - of course he would also not mind to escalate if he thinks it could help him.
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No initially, at least the Taliban paid the farmers better prices for regular crops so they would NOT grow poppies for heroin. (The Taliban were against it for religious reasons. Which COULD of course be done by Westrern governments, we grant you a better price for the regular crops (which are hard enough to grow, WATER), but if they find any poppies the field is set on fire and you get nothing at all. The farmers had a deal with the Taliban, then the heorin production dropped considerable. This has only changed after the US war of aggression - and thee are the photos on the web with U.S. soldiers PROTECTING the poppy fields, the explanation was that the farmers would side with unwanted forces and that they needed the money (well why not give them subsidies).
1000 USD go a long way in Afghanistan, and it would save a lot of indirect costs if no such hard drugs would reach the Western countries.
I asssume the CIA uses the heroin of Afghanistan to "earn" themselves some "extra budgets" (no approval of congress necessary), after all they did exactely that under Reagan in Latin America. Maybe some U.S. military leaders are making money of it. Michael Moore once saide that there is relative "stability" (that was some years ago) because the U.S. tolerates the drug trade, where the brother of the president is the big guy.
As for the war in 2001: Cheney / Bush prepared it since SUMER 2001, so 9/11 was a pretext (and that is the friendly assumption). In hindsight this is very obvious; how could we not see it: Such a large military operation needs more than 4 weeks, the U.S. was bombing there 1 month after 9/11.
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+ Bonny right Poverty breeds crime. The only exception is poor communities that stick together, with intact families, faith groups etc. And no, I do not mean to slash single parent households - a 2 parent family can be completely dysfunctional while a single parent family can be healthy and nurturing (escpecially when there are friends and extended family or faith community involved who can assist the single parent. Government welfare can be very helpful too to keep such families going on reasonably well).
the wealthy Europeans do not villify single parent families as much (meaning mostly single moms). They had a lot of that after WW2, widows having to raise their children when the father had fallen. And now they provide enough welfare, public non-profit healthcare and education that the children of these single parent households are not left behind - and can join the middle class later (never mind the status of their family). And it does not matter if these kids were born out of wedlock or if the parents are divorced.
The "village" that is necessary to raise a child is no more - so "big bad" government steps in.
The access of such families to education or good childcare institutions etc. is not limited if and to what extent the father can PAY alimony. Nor will they have to live in a dangerous environment (inner cities, ghettos) when they are at the bottom of the income ladder (many single parent families are low income families - even in Germany or Sweden or France)
Unfortunately our modern lifestyle and the requirements of employment and education undermine the former close-knit family bonds (that is IF they were nurturing, some of them were dysfunctional).
In the black community additionally to the trauma of slavery there was always an assault on their families and to keep them awayy from building wealth. In the South resulting in laws that only applied to black people (black code). If slavery has been outlawed let's find another way of put them in chains - especially the men who could otherwise stand up to white supremacy.
The Clintons also helped with the effort to break up the families of People of Color (Bill as president, Hillary was all for it and advocated them publicly).
Now I do not think harming black people was their motivation. They just used some dog whistling to get the "white more conservative vote". And if it harmed POC - so what. The Clintons (and their ilk) could resign themselves quite easily to the unintended consequences. Which is the reason they never spoke up after they had left the White House to point out that their Crime Bill and their Welfare reform etc. maybe did have some unintended consequences (it is fair to lump in the former First Lady, she might not have prevented those measures - but she was all for them anyway).
Same with "free" "trade" agreements. The North where many Blacks had gone (leaving the close-knit communities of the South behind) was especially hit. The automobile and steel industry was already on the decline - and then they were hit by the Clinton assaults on the blue collar middle class (white AND minorities).
Many black people had made it to the middle class in the first generation in the 1960s. and the decline started in the mid 1970s.
So they were late to the party - their white peers had made it into the middle class since the 1950s. And before that of course white people got free land when the settlers took over from the natives - so another way to build property and wealth that would benefit future generations.
The large Northern towns are usually mentioned as having a high crime rate (meaning black crime). Well they didnt't have that problem, when there were good and enough jobs.
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Her military performance is secondary (and it was up to her former superiors to assess her performance - she wasn't a public figure then, so no bonus and favors like for McCain or Bush *) - She beats most politicians and media shills - simply for having enlisted when that could have been dangerous. Plus she has SEEN war and its effect on civilians.
Tulsi Gabbard is more impacted when soldiers gets killed - or commit suicide later. For her it is not only an abstract number, name, report. She knew some of these people or feels more connected to them even if she does not know them personally.
"That could have been me" is powerful to influence your opinions. As opposed to the cheap and generic "We all support our troops"
She served in a time when there was a realistic chance to get into dangerous situations. It is easy and interesting to be a soldier in a base in Germany, France, Japan, Italy, .... you get to know another country and the army provides the base for that lifestyle.
It's another thing if you may be sent to Iraq or Afghanistan.
* Bush went AWOL. - John McCain - father and grandfather were admirals. He would never have been accepted as pilot and the influental connections spared him a military tribunal when he caused the death of at least 80 sailors.
Also: the CIA "misfiled" the audio he made for the Vietcong that they played in the POW camps.
Not that I blame him - he needed medical attention, he had a broken leg. However, it seems that fellow POW's were bitter that his cooperation got him (slightly) better treatment.
In any case that would not have warranted to pass him off as war hero after he had returned to the U.S. (I think he also got a medal). It would have been an obstacle to his political career. And maybe the young, very rich heiress - his second wife, for her he divorced the woman that had waited for him - would not have been so impressed with him either.
In short he still would have had the McCain wealth and connections and would have been better off than most Vietnam veterans - but he would have been less privileged.
Side effect: he was open for blackmail by the deep state - the media blackout about the accident he caused by reckless behavior could have been "lifted", and the misfiled audio could have been "found" and talked about.
In the veteran community the knowledge was always there - but they had no public platform. Only with the internet those informations are easy to find.
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Nicholas Frechen The French healthcare is good, or you could try Sweden, Germany, Austria, Belgium, Netherlands, Denmark, .... In Italy it depends - the South is poor, the middle and the North can be compared to the wealthy nations.
I would not be afraid to end up in a Spanish hospital.
And would not have a problem cost-wise - the national non-profit public agencies deal with each other and accept the patients of the other nations.
Not sure about Russia - but Russia is not a wealthy country, I would compare the U.S. to Germany, Switzerland, France - not Russia.
In the U.K. the Tories have defunded over 10 years the fully public non-profit NHS (one of the most cost efficient systems in the world, they had lean but sufficient budget - and THEN they were defunded).
It is true that they are struggling NOW - but if they had only HALF of what the U.S. spends per person on healthcare * the NHS would run like a charm.
In the U.K. they have only around 43 % of the U.S. per ** capita expenditures. Most of what is spent in the country is deliverd by the National Health Service. So higher expenditures per person would mean better funding of the non-profit public service.
** U.S. USD 9,200 U.K. 3,900 most other wealthy countries in Europe or Australia or Canada are in the range of USD 5,000 - 6,000.
(and that ** average includes uninsured persons in the U.S. !)
Wage levels (determined by the average cost of living in the country) are an important factor in healthcare - that is why one cannot compare wealthy and emerging nations with each other. Hungary for instance has lower expenditures and also much lower wages.
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Nicholas Frechen WE do set up the system ourselves. The cities !! run a lot of non-profit hospitals for basic care. These are towns with 5,000 - 20,000 people. (Admitted the 5,000 are in a more rural area and serve of course people outside the town).
A larger hospital might be more cost efficient BUT driving distance matters for emergencies.
The financial burden of these communities is relieved by money from the federal and state government. Which btw have all an interest that they are run as efficient as possible - given that they are small town units.
Another thing I observed. Many of these smaller city run hospitals stem from the 1960s and 1970s. (the church run hospitals are usually in the large cities and exist much longer, 100 - 200 years).
The mayors like to have them: Convenient for the population - jobs (the city gets wage related taxes from every employer and fed revenue for permanent residents. Having a stable employer like a hospital does help with both ;)
Now these country hospitals tend to have one department for plannable procedures. And they can be quite good, for eyes, for hip replacement, stripping of varicose veins .... so they attract patients from outside the region and can "fill the beds" to run the house more cost efficiently.
But of course the patients would sometimes need more specialized service or break their arm when they are elswhere. In single payer systems they are all IN the network. and there are concession made regarding the size to make sure the hospitals are evenly spread out over the country.
A hospital or a non-profit insurance ageny is like a clock work (with tasks like that government agencies can do a good and efficient job).
Once an operation is set up, and when it is reasonably funded it should happily jog on. It does not need creativity, entrepeneurship or marketing.
Good work ethics of the staff, decent treatment and leadership by middle management and common sense on top of the organizational skills that are typical for such operations - will do.
But on the other hand those systems had time to develop since the 1950s. So a citizen run hospital would need to hire experts - but be inexperienced in recruiting.
In other countries the goverment agencies are not perceived as a foreign occupying hostile force (Think Sheriff of Nottingham ;) - and when set up reasonably they can work well.
In what areas would you think you can beat the Medicare agency. Their overhead is 2 % - they beat many European agencies (while private insurers are plus 20 %)
That their budgets are kept down (they are not responsible for the medical services) they should negotiate, collect the contributions, pay the bills and be a facilitator.
That they are not even allowed to negotiate drug prices is not their fault. A private initiative would hardly be better.
But things have gotten more complicated a private initiative would need to catch up with the expertise grown in large system over decades.
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Nicholas Frechen The time when inequality shrank the most (The Golden Era - after WW2) was the time with a lot of government intervention / spening. And high taxes for high incomes and profitable biz.
Companies could invest, or pay workers extra benefits if they wanted to avoid taxation
Inequality but it also shrank in the U.S. during the FDR presidency. (during laissez fair capitalism in the 1920s and after Reagan it increased.
FDR introduced SS, unemployment benefits, jobs programs - all of that was desperately needed in 1933. and he made also those pay for it who were still doing well.
The oligarchs (some) were livid, they even considerd a coup (see Gen. Semdely Butler, 1934) but they could not get rid of FDR. Or the unions and left movements that gave FDR the leverage to DO SOMETHING:
You seem to have given up on Government Of For and By the People ! (You are right the government must be held in check - and they have been getting away with murder !)
I would not waste "hate" on Trump - I did not even mention him. he is not willing to give the U.S. citizens good an reasonably set up healthcare - nor did Obama - or most politicians in both parties. (The one and only Big Donor party). They all put Big Donor interests over the interests of citizens.
The tech boom would not have happend w/o massive and long and ongoing government spending - unfortunately a lot for war and an arms race too in the 1950s - 1970s. (Ethics aside, that generates the least benefits for the population). The GI Bill (college for returning soldiers) performed well, for every USD invested the gov. got 7 USD back in tax revenue.
Electronics, computer a part of the technology for smartphones, internet, satellites - all these technologies got a LOT of government funding money.
Also: malaria research. EPi Pen for the war in Iraq in 1991.
Streets for CARS - Interstate Highway (not much use to have a car if you do not have the streets outside the city). Rich pople had cars instead of carriages from 1900 on - but that would not have been enough for mass production.
The oligarchs then urged the govenment to build streets (and they "killed" railway so they could sell more oil and more cars).
see clip Noam Chomsky: the role of the military is misuderstood.
M.I.T. - where he was professor - was 90 % military financed. They had all the electronics companies on campus. Then they left and pharma came in. Now it is likely AI.
maybe battery research too !
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@PseudoProphet What could make Medicare (the administrative middle man) "inferior" so there would be even a role for the profiteers ? To be precise: Space being created by politicans so they CAN EXTRACT PROFITS:
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Politicians make rules that make it harder or more complicated for Medicare. In order to undermine them and to do favors to the donors. For instance the current law is that Medicare is forbidden to negotiate drug prices. Only VA is allowed to negotiate - and sure enough they brought drug prices down by 40 % (there should be more possible).
The private insurers could negotiate. How does that work out ? What value bring the for profit middle man regarding price negotiations of a highly standardized product ? _ (Drug prices are much easier to negotiate than services in hospitals because they are so standardized. Big pharma is the only _powerful for profit player in other single payer nations that plays a big role. But the agencies can contain them in price negotioations - because the product is so standardized and internationally comparable.).
Hint: Big pharma is a supplier from the point of view of insurance companies. We know that big corporations squeeze their supply chain - but not necessarily if the supplier is ALSO large, powerful and bribes a lot of politicians, too. Then they often decide to peacefully co-ecist, to avoid the battle of giants.
After all they have the market power to squeeze the consumers and THEIR politicians * make sure that the dysfunctional expensive system gets enough subsidies to stay afloat - at double the spending per person of other wealthy nations.
* That applies more to Corporate Democrats, that was the function of ACA: to protect the profits of insurance companies and hospital chains and making sure there is enough money in the overpriced system. The Republicans now defund the system.
The private insurers in the U.S. already have a cherrypicked pool. The most costly patient group (over 65) is covered by Medicare (in its current form). That is huge: 10 % of patients cause 90 % of spending. Age is a huge spending driver.
So private insurers can really shine with the offers they make (due to the advantage of the cherry picked pool).
Nope !
If they do the purges right in the age group under 65 (driving people out by raising premiums) they can rake in the profits. - They purge now whole companies if they are not "profitable" enough (interview Wendell Potter in spring 2019). Not GM or Boeing of course - but not too large companies that provide coverage and do not have much negotiating power.
How can ANYONE think that an industry with predatory practices and THAT TRACK RECORD would provide more value for a mere administrative task (but one that makes them the gatekeepers to a life and death service, a service that is highly complex and also unfortunately costly even under the best of circumstances).
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Another reason Medicare would be hindered to provide excellent administrative ! services at low costs
They do not have enough budgets to pay rates that are good enough to win doctors. If ALL the 330 million citizens / residents are covered by Medicare, and coverage is for ALL that is medically necessary almost all doctors MUST have a contract and must accept many patients with Medicare coverage.
Which of course makes it impossible to discriminate. (If they did that they would lose the contract). There go the patients necessary to keep the practice economically viable.
If the budgets of Medicare are not enought so that they can PAY ENOUGH to providers (remember they do NOT provide CARE) ALL 330 millions will be impacted. that would of course create a lot of political pressure.
In the Sanders plan everyone with a wage is mandated to pay.
All single payer nations have that kind of mandate. No opt out, no public option. It is a crucial element of the system - _the whole country is in this together_. The wealthy cannot retreat to the equivalent of gated communities. The too have skin in the game (that the services for which Medicare can pay are satisfactory for all).
The mandated contribution (payroll tax as percentage of wage) must be affordable for the employer and the employee - so of course there must be extra funding by the government. (There is already a lot of funding - but all the money goes into a highly inefficient dysfunctional system).
If the affluent can escape from the negative impacts of underfunding they will show little willingness to support the system for all with their taxes. And Republicans and the Corporate media (bribed with ads) have it easy to play Divide and Conquer.
As for enough funding: Medicare should have the budgets to cover for instance basic dental. It IS a MEDICAL ISSUE. If Medicare is the big game in town when it comes to insurance of basic dental (no duplicative coverage so private insurance cannot cover basic dental) - most dentists will play along.
Or their patients must pay out of pocket every time. Private supplemental insurance could cover expensive dental - think braces (if there is no medical indication, in most cases it is about looks), ceramic implants, ....
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another solveable reason for Medicare to be "inferior"
That they are not well managed (that would be solveable, easier than for a normal company, Healthcare = systems, protocols, standards. There are blueprints how to set up the clockwork. That is the reason the public non-profits do an excellent job as insurers. There is no need for creativity, entrepreneurial spirit, product design, marketing, sales force.
Medicare has little overhead - even compared to other single payer agencies. They do the necessary paper shuffling at very reasonable costs.
The agency is already in place and can scale up (and they do not need to increase staff that much, a lot of it can be done with the use of software).
If Medicare offers basic dental in the future it is not as if they have to overhaul their organisation. Or if they pay for ALL of a surgery and not only a part of it (that would be a small alteration in their software and the software of the hospitals).
Adding dental:
They need to negotiate with the representation of the dentists. Enter the names of doctors that are willing to cooperate. Maybe set up a website where the patients can find doctors that accept Medicare for All in their region.
There is ONE kind of contract. The doctor has to accept all or nothing.
Medicare must alter the software accordingly - and the doctors also need alterations in their software (likely they already have Medicare in their system, so buying an update for the existing software should suffice). It is clear for the doctors what they get paid under the contract and if they go beyond that they have to tell the patient (which may or may not accept the extra). But they do not need to ask for approval in advance, it is very clear what is covered and what not.
Then Medicare has to pay the bills as they come in. The processing of billing by the providers and controlling / paying the bills can be automated.
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TheHomoludens FDR was sworn in in March 1933, and in spring 1933 the Nazis 35 % of the vote minority government completed their fascist peaceful takeover (enabled ! by the "conservative" pillars of German society). Many European countries had gone the far-right fascist route - or were soon to follow: Italy, Austria, Portugal, Spain, ... also Brazil. I think the government of Poland was quite to the right and nationalistic as well.
Hitler was well liked by the likes of Winston Churchill and the British aristocracy, he was seen as someone who could defeat the left parties and movements and was a staunch enemy of the Soviet Union and hated Communism - even more than he hated the other left movements (even if he had a strategic alliance with the Soviets to attack Poland in 1939).
If Hitler had stopped the annexations after scooping up a part of Czechia and then annexing fascist * Austria in March 1938, and would have toned it down a little bit regarding the Jews - the elites in all other countries and the industrial leaders would have been quite happy with a strongman like Hitler ruling an important industrial nation like Germany.
* Austro fascists (they oriented themselves after the Italian fascists under Mussolini) had already seized power in 1933, so THEY had suppressed the left movements, parties, unions, politicians - there was no one to oppose Hitler. The Germans first came with the tanks in March 1938 (the much smaller Austrian army did not fight them, they let the invasion happen, the Austrian fascists gave up) and then the Nazis then held a referendum to legitimize the annexation.
Hitler won that referendum (well they did the counting or monitored the frightened civil servants who did the counting) - so that gave the other nations the pretext to give Germany a pass (again a pass - after the annexation of a part of Czechia with a relevant German minority). That was the last time they could hope Hitler would give it a rest after that (that may not have been an unreasonable expectations, and why would the U.K., France ... the U.S. sacrifice their soldiers when in the annexed countries a part of the population really welcomed the Nazi annexation. With Poland it was an outright war - and the Poles fought bitterly and bravely against a crushing attack from two major military forces: the Soviets from the East and the Germans from the West.
In 1933 and the following years the U.S. had other problems than "sorting out" Europe. World War 2 started (in Europe) in September 1939. Nazi Germany had a top secret pact with the Soviets, they invaded Poland from both sides and divided it up and THEN it was clear that Nazi Germany would not stop the military attacks.
Hitler was a genuine enemy of the Soviet Union, so it shook the other countries that he had achieved such an alliance with Stalin (needless to say they did not trust each other one bit, and later the Germans attacked the Soviet Union - so then the Soviets became the allies of the U.K. the French provisory government, and later of the U.S.)
(U.K. declared war on Germany, but NOT the Soviet Unions (even though both had the war against Poland going on).
the Commonwealth nations followed or were forced into it, too. Some (I think NZ) at least had a vote in parliament if they wanted to get involved. - what had Australia and NZ or Canada to do with Europe ? Why were soldiers of India (brutally exploited by the U.K.) supposed to die in that war ?
At that time the U.S. of course expected that they likely would get more involved in the future. They did not jeopardize the lifes of American soldiers early on. They (cynically) let the Soviets do the fighting, FDR and Churchill delayed the invasion in France - to spare the U.S. / U.K. forces, very much to the anger of Stalin. (if the Germans had been busy in France, that could have spared the Soviets.
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@lazylady8591 The "freeloader" narrative (dual citizens "exploiting" the NHS) has been debunked. It is a "look over there" of the Tories to distract from their defunding/underfunding of the NHS.
Someone with dual citizenship could show up in every European country. considering the problems created FOR the NHS - I would go elsewhere. I am not sure if the Commonwealth membership still entitles to get care - Irish, Australians, Canadians, NZ citizens have a functioning system at home.
The occassional visitor that profits from an international treaty to mutually recognize insurance coverage does not make a dent in a country with 65 million people. (The same applies in the EU and associated countries. If a person from Spain is in Germany and happens to need treatment - they get it - the agencies send each other the bills.
the work migrants (from the EU and other countries) DO WORK and DO CONTRIBUTE. It was the decision of governments to deindustrialize (Thatcher) and to have a low-wage economy (neoliberal New Labour and the Tories). Including a gig economy, generation internship, etc. - and the laws to promote those models.
So the wage deductions that also go into the funding of the NHS are lower than in a country with lots of well paying manufacturing jobs. If a lot of migrants come (legally from the EU for instance) they are of course going to use the system. Like the retired U.K. citizens living in Spain and Portugal can use the national heathcare system there.
There are possibilities to reduce work migration - even under EU law and "free movement" rule - which neither New Labour (before Corbyn took the party back to its rots) nor the Tories used.
So they scaled up the population, the available workforce for companies. to a degree the consumer base. But not affordable housing or the NHS.
Someone PROFITS from the labour of all these people and the expanded consumer base - (modest but the effect is there).
The same class of people that extract rent (because the government decided to abandon affordable housing. The government also passed laws that give the landlords a lot of leverage over the renters. Short term contracts, they get away with neglecting repair, consumers that complain can be quickly "fired").
If they have a connection to Big Finance they benefitted from the bailouts - and rencently they got tax cuts, and after that the government declares they do not have the means (read: tax revenue) to fund the NHS.
So - some pocket the wins, they shifted the burdens of the GFC - and they do not contribute proportional to the advantages they are given.
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