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Socialized medicine benefits the middle class

Middle class people get more from government programs than poor people.
Written by Dana Blankenhorn, Inactive

Civitas logo UKA Conservative think tank in the UK called Civitas has today's "duh" study, a "duh" study being an expensive piece of work which proves the blazingly obvious.

Middle class people get more from government programs than poor people.

The subject in this case is the UK's National Health Service, its single-payer health plan, which Republicans here deride as "socialized medicine."

The author's study, Nick Seddon, said that "middle classes were more assertive, articulate and confident in dealing with health professionals." He used the results to argue for more private competition in British health care.

Here's some news for Nick. Private competition wouldn't change a thing. People accused of wealth, and guilty of education, will always be more forthright in this area, more demanding, and thus get better results.

I'm presently getting a personal lesson in this, in the area of mental health. What I've treated as medical many poor people, and the state, would treat as a discipline problem. When I felt hard done by, I got a lawyer. My kid is going to college. A poor kid would go to jail.

It's hard to question authority if you're poor, very hard. If you're middle-class, if your education and wealth are equal to that of the person across from you, you'll question away. And you'll get answers.

This is true no matter how a health system is structured. The Civitas study says the English poor actually made more use of primary care than the middle class, which is amazing, although they were less likely to get the advanced care referrals wealthier folks might demand as their right.

In the American system the poor don't even get the primary care. The only care many get is critical care. Very soon, they might not even get that.

The real question is, if you're poor, where would you rather be?

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