The only way to minimize the opportunity for people to take advantage of a system is to reduce its size. The US is already set up to do this, which changing our system at all. We have a representative government that is collected to form "Congress." Any state and local area should have the freedom to set up something similar to what small European countries like Norway. However, this requires getting rid of most of the Federal government--not expecting the Federal government to accommodate something like this.
This is what the Libertarian party supports. In reality, the US is already set up so that if Wisconsin wanted to implement communism, they could, if we didn't have a Federal government. This is what makes most of these discussions ridiculous. We are debating illusions that are handed to us to like bread, and we are taking them like we are unable to make our own.
The only reason we are "united" in the United States is because individual states accept the same constitution. That is what is uniting us. Otherwise, we already supposed to be able to have independence in our local areas.
San Francisco actually has a city health insurance program called Healthy San Francisco that is not connected to Obamacare or Medicaid programs. It is an interesting thing to consider especially when every politician and their spouse are spewing this nonsense about what they are going to get the Federal government to change if they become elected. This is bandwagon doublespeak and unfortunately, many people don't seem to know how our government system is supposed to work, so they are jumping on.
"California is in a unique and historic position to make universal health access a realityand become a model for the rest of the nation,” Newsom said in an email. “And I know from firsthand experience that it can be done.”
Healthy San Francisco, the brainchild of then-San Francisco Supervisor Tom Ammiano, is available to all city residents, ages 18 and older, who earn up to 500 percent of the federal poverty level — $60,300 for a single person — and who have no other health coverage option. Undocumented residents are also eligible."
In the US, we have a state property tax already on all of our homes. The rate varies by state because individual states are able to set their own tax rate.
Here is a
link to a chart that shows how much each state is taxed throughout the country. If San Francisco is able to implement a local health insurance plan in a city with a lower state property tax rate than Texas and New York, both states should be capable of doing the same. What people should be doing to accomplish things regarding healthcare and education, is making their complaint at the state level. The problem with this is that our tax laws support the Federal government more than the state government and essentially make the Federal government more powerful than the individual state.
So comparing capitalism with communism and debating which one is going to create utopia is somewhat ridiculous. Our government system should already be able to do more if people could spend more time understanding the system we have instead of complaining about this or that and thinking their idea for the future is the most brilliant and everything anyone else says makes them greedy, stupid, selfish, or whatever.