Reply #15: very good analysis

[iverglas]

This is in fact very clearly what was done by the Liberal government of Canada in the 1990s: funding of the health care system was slashed by billions. The effects are long-term and far-reaching. For instance, the shortage we have had in certain areas (radiation therapists, e.g.) resultes from the loss of skilled personnel due to those cuts, and they are not going to materialize out of thin air even if funding is restored to previous levels. (In our case, they could not move into a private sector, they had to leave the country or change occupations.)

http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/healthcare/

Once upon a time, there were few complaints about lengthy waits for treatment. It was a time when the federal government provided about a third of the money the provinces spent on health care.

But as government belts tightened to deal with record budget deficits in the early 1990s <note -- and significant income tax cuts for the well off were introduced once that was done, but health care funding was not restored>, complaints about access to health care increased. The federal government drastically cut the amount of money it transferred to the provinces to cover health-care costs.

By the time another former Saskatchewan premier - Roy Romanow - released his landmark report on fixing medicare in 2002, Ottawa had slashed its share to about 16 per cent of the total. Romanow recommended an immediate infusion of federal dollars, to bring Ottawa's share up to 25 per cent.

Never imagine that they are stupid. The best way for them to get what they want is to get the public to demand it, and the way to do that is to make the public unhappy with what it has now ... and persuade the public that the only way to solve the problem is for somebody to make a profit ...


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