Quote:
Originally Posted by Muta
I think its important to start moving away from the royalty teet. At some point, it had to happen. We need to start thinking long-term for the province, and start diversifying ourselves away from oil and more into other energies.
Gas tax sucks, but hey, it's still way cheaper than the $1.40 / L we were paying a couple years ago.
As for healthcare premiums - why not just implement user fees for showing up at a clinic or hospital? Too many people abuse the system by wasting our medical resources by coming in for a stubbed toe or a slight cough. Put a $20 fee on clinic / hospital visits and watch the unnecessary lineups disappear.
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When I look at the numbers, I don't see a savings by charging a $20 upfront fee. The big dollars are spent on serious illness. The kind of illnesses that can be caught early by frontline doctors.
A nervous mom comes in ER five nights a week with a baby experiencing minor illness -- cost to the system: nominally $75 a pop (I'm guessing). Nervous mom with sick baby can't afford 20 bucks and doesn't get symptoms checked out -- cost to the system: zero dollars.
However in the 1 in 3000 chance that the sickly infant has actually got a serious condition that was untreated at the early stage because of a $20 barrier, the health care system could be looking at $15,000-$75,000 in subsequent medical costs if the child is admitted to hospital.
Second viewpoint:
For that user fee to be effective, everybody MUST pay. Inconsistent enforcement of the fee would negate its effectiveness of keeping people away from the ER for their minor owies.
But there is a resource challenge to collecting, documenting and verifying that everyone paid their fee. It costs money to handle cash in an office and record it. And if this fee is to be used to offset health care costs... every $20 paid at the front door has to be accounted for public reports by our fiscally transparent provincial government.
I do not see much savings to the healthcare expense by charging a $20 fee for every meeting with a doctor. I only see a lot of opportunity for career bureaucrats.