>> In your case you believe your cost is only 1200€ a year, because your government has not made at all clear to you how much you’re paying from your other taxes into the healthcare system.
I absolutely do not believe my healthcare costs only €1200 a year. As I wrote, my top-up insurance costs about €1200 a year, and the healthcare costs more and that is why my taxes are so high.
However it’s still unclear how much you’re paying, as the problem with socialized services like healthcare is that you never know exactly how much you’re paying and if you’re overpaying or underpaying as there’s no free competition whatsoever.
There are of course also negative second order consequences. In socialized health care systems, where doctors and hospitals are payed the same no matter their performance, the economical incentives to provide modern treatments or provide better services do not exist, so best professionals need to leave the public systems if they believe they are being underpayed according to their value.
I’ve seen that happening in Germany and Spain a lot. Best doctors I had left their public healthcare position to open their own private business as that was the only way to be compensated economically according to the level of service they were providing.
> as the problem with socialized services like healthcare is that you never know exactly how much you’re paying and if you’re overpaying or underpaying as there’s no free competition whatsoever.
Also true in America, in which there is no socialized healthcare. (In any standard use of the term)
Hell, even Medicare ended up partially privatized. (At huge extra cost)
The worst thing about government-run monopoly services is there's little bottom-up incentive to optimize.
The worst thing about private-run services is there's little incentive for anything other than profit.
Given the fundamental realities of must-deliver services (e.g. healthcare, prison, etc.), I'd rather have them government-delivered than some bastardized free market without competition.
At least the former has a path to excellence. The latter just inevitably turns into a hostile hellscape for the end consumer.
Hot take - the private doctors tell you they are great but the public doctors can often be spectacular because their motives are not primarily economic.
For example, the absolute best diagnosticians in Houston are at the public hospital primarily serving Medicaid and Harris Health patients. Super evidence based, order tests for differential diagnosis not to make $$. Passionate about what they do. In a unexplained emergency my doctor friends would go there to be diagnosed and then the fancy privates to be treated.
Bro, try going to the doctor in America's not socialized services. You have zero idea how much that specific visit is going to cost, on top of the tens of thousands in insurance premiums paid on your behalf yearly.
I absolutely do not believe my healthcare costs only €1200 a year. As I wrote, my top-up insurance costs about €1200 a year, and the healthcare costs more and that is why my taxes are so high.