<p>this is not what I said. I said it should not be free. My point was that you are entitled to receive your free emergency care if you choose to forgo insurance, but be prepared to pay for it later.</p>
<p>P.S. And maybe this act is not controversial in your neck of the woods, but in states like AZ it is very controversial. I will leave it as that. Because it is completely another can of worms.</p>
<p>ETA: Now the first part of my message does not make sense to anyone but Polarscribe, because Polarscribe removed the first part of the message addressed to me.</p>
<p>How many people here are willing to have their taxes raised to ‘help’ students get a college education…to keep the status quo at State flagships, taxes will need to be raised,fairly signifcantly…good luck with getting people to subscribe to higher tax rates.there are plenty of affordable colleges,however,many people who can’t afford the dream,then complain that they haven’t gotten enough ‘free money’…</p>
<p>Someone who makes $25,000 a year will never be able to pay more than a tiny fraction of the cost of treatment for a serious illness or injury. You can send all the collectors you want - they’ll never have, say, $250,000 in disposable income in their entire life.</p>
<p>Hospitals write off billions of dollars in bills every year that they know they haven’t a prayer of collecting on. Those costs get passed along to everyone else.</p>
<p>If the system was universally tax-supported, everyone would be contributing into the pot their entire working lives.</p>
<p>I think there is a misunderstanding here. Did I or did I not mention that there should be sliding scale for paying insurance. My point is that if everyone has to contribute, even if it is a little bit - to insurance. Or be prepared to pay for the rest of the life full freight for the surgery (without insurance). </p>
<p>And not in a current system. In a revamped system.</p>
<p>“Teaching people a lesson” doesn’t really solve the free-rider problem. Sounds all well and good to come down with a punishment sledgehammer against those freeloading welfare cheats, but you’re not changing anything.</p>
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<p>And if they’re working-poor, choose not to buy insurance and still require an expensive surgery… then those costs get written off because “teaching people a lesson” by garnishing their $10-per-hour paychecks forever and a day doesn’t result in any significant cost recovery. (You can’t garnish poor people very much given that they’re living on the edge already.) Or they just go to a cash economy and evade the system altogether.</p>
<p>I’m mystified by your assertion that the system used by every other Western nation on the planet is somehow doomed to failure. Looks like it’s working a hell of a lot better than our system is.</p>
<p>I’ve had one friend say that her first three years were fully covered by financial aid, and that she will only have to take out 5k during her senior year. Basically a full ride.</p>
<p>Polarscribe: I would too but with caveats. I would contribute so that anyone who qualified for a Regent’s Scholarship would get a full ride to a UC. But not just for ‘college education for everyone’ which would include illegal aliens, tuition to privates or to for-profit art institutes, C students, or for those who take an occasional class at a CC.</p>
<p>I absolutely would not want my income taxes to be raised. Sorry, but at this point almost half of my paycheck goes toward (federal and state) income and payroll taxes. I think I contribute enough.</p>
<p>I have a different question. How about redirecting Earned Income Credit from the folks who do not pay INCOME taxes to begin with to education? Would this be fair?</p>
<p>P.S. Earned Income Credit is received by lower-income population for working. It goes to people who do not pay any taxes. It is above and beyond (and independent of) tax refund.</p>
<p>The Earned Income Tax Credit encourages low-income families to work rather than try to get by on welfare programs.</p>
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<p>This is false. The EITC goes only to people who pay taxes. By definition, you have to have earned income to be eligible - it’s a partial offset of the payroll tax, which is paid by everyone who works, regardless of income.</p>
<p>How about raising taxes on capital gains, or restoring the estate tax on wealthy families?</p>
<p>But this is going way off the subject, so I’ll stop here.</p>
One of the problems is that the costs of services have skyrocketed in part due to the expensive treatments and options available with technology. MRI machines and the like cost a great deal. S had an accident which in the great scheme of physical traumas was relatively minor (not for us, mind you :(). If we had had no insurance and had to pay the gross billing amount it would have totaled nearly $35K. As it was, we ate through our high deductible in a matter of hours. </p>
<p>People keep trying to make these ridiculous analogies to broccoli and such, but no one is going to suddenly need $35K worth of broccoli that they can’t afford to pay for. There really is no comparable.</p>
<p>OP, I hope you find a way to attend a UC on a Regent’s Scholarship. Qualifying for a Regent’s means you must be one of the brightest students in the state. I think it’s a crying shame that our state which wastes so much of the taxpayer’s dollars, doesn’t have a fund that the 1,000 or so who are awarded Regent’s Scholarships every year could get a free ride.</p>
<p>I would be willing to pay more in taxes to make a college education available and affordable to everyone in this country who is legally here. I would want some things changed in the way they are currently done first, to see if enough funds are not freed up that way. I’ve outlined what I think should be done in many posts. I DON"T think a college education where ever one wants it is something I would subsidize for everyone. But I do think our world, and our country culture has changed enough so that college is something that should be accessible to anyone who wants it, just as high school now is. We don’t provide boarding schools at tax payers expense unless there is no public school available within commuting distance. So it should be with college.But yes, I would vote to raise taxes if there is a short fall after all private schools are relieved of federal/state PELL/subsidies and the like and the monies are funneled into the community and local state school system. I want to see more and better community colleges running more efficiently and having the classes needed to serve its population. There should be a direct connect between community colleges and state 4 year schools so that the quality of the courses, the depth and breadth covered are the same. For those who go to community college without wanting a transfer on to a 4 year school with an eye towards certificates and job training instead, there should be that track of courses too. </p>
<p>We can’t let people just die because they do not have insurance. Not the way it works here and hopefully it will never come to that. Or if they cannot pay for life threatening conditions to be resolved. It’s bad enough that non emergency care has financial gatekeepers. So we all do have that basic coverage and we all should be charged for it because we have it, like it or not. Part of being in this country. This is one thing that is to me a no dealing issue. </p>
<p>Right now, health care providers along with any services are hard put to be able to garnish much of anything for their debts. Under a federal system, those who get a service like that will be tapped for the insurance the person should have had, and the long arm of government can reach more effectively for the payment. Those who say this is a precedent are wrong since we have this happening for social security to pay for our retirement, garnishments for child support, income tax owed, and of course, payment of federally backed school loans.</p>
<p>Local school budgets are being voted down in huge numbers, so i think the chances of a majority of voters passing a tax increase to support college education is nil…i would favor using some tax dollars to pay for a college education, but not a ‘bells and whistles’ education…find a school that could be commuted to…using a nickel of taxpayer dollars to pay room and board is bad policy</p>
<p>I am not going to argue that it is tough to buy insurance on $10 per hour. At the same time, there should be some responsibility on people themselves. They have to contribute something. </p>
<p>In a current system, they don’t contribute. Making $10 per hour, people do not pay federal and state income taxes. You mentioned payroll tax - but this is their retirement - they will receive it back. Sales taxes? How much can they pay at those wages? In my state, they don’t even have to pay any sales taxes. Sales taxes are not levied on necessities, such as food and clothing. Property taxes? In my state, even when you rent and make less than certain amount, you get property tax refund.</p>
<p>How come you are not asking people at $10 an hour to get a second job? Should not it be their responsibility to take care of themselves?</p>
<p>I don’t think we can ever come to any agreement on this issue. You choose to ignore my suggestion of sliding scale. You choose to ignore that rights and responsibilities go hand in hand.</p>
<p>I think that the public school system should make it so everyone, middle-class and low-income students alike, graduates with relatively the same amount of loans. I don’t see the lack of fairness in that.</p>
<p>Look, I’m not saying that we should take all of the money away from poorer students and give it to the low-income students. I’m saying we should take SOME of it to help out the middle-class students, whose parents don’t make much after stupid Californian taxing.</p>
<p>Let’s say two students, Student A and Student B, hold the same bachelor’s degree in engineering from a school in California. Student A came from a low-income family, but Student B came from a family that made 85k a year, and so didn’t qualify for aid. They’re both on their own now, so the income they come from no longer has any effect on them. Why should Student B have to suffer more with loans when they’re both on the same playing field? </p>
<p>I really don’t see the inequity of that, but I guess romani does. A lot of middle-class students, who don’t qualify for aid from neither public nor private school,eventually go into careers that don’t earn a lot of money. My teacher, for example, is still paying back loans after 15 years because her parents happened to make 100k a year, but was still unable to provide for her education.</p>
cpt, I just took deductions for S’s (private school) tuition expenses on our income tax returns that amounted to a tax savings of about $3000. Isn’t that a subsidy also? Would you also eliminate those?</p>