giuliani wrong on medicine

We know Rudy Giuliani, like many a politician, doesn't let truth get in the way of a good statistic to make his point. Rudy, flip-flopping from his mayoral era support for taxpayer funded medical care, is not opposed to it - no doubt wanting to keep the donations from big insurance companies rolling in.

Eugene Robinson has a good column pointing out some of the facts about the vaunted American private medical system and the "socialized" (such a bad word) ones in places like Germany and Britain.

You probably already know that we pay more per person than any country in the world for medical care. You'd like to at least think that if we're paying Cadillac prices, we're getting the best care possible.

But, as Robinson writes, "...here's the bottom line: The United States ranks dead last in life expectancy, at 77.9 years, among the countries surveyed. Britain is next to last at 78.7, while Australia is first at 80.6. The United States also has the worst infant mortality by far, at 6.89 per 1,000 live births; second-worst is New Zealand at 5.7. We're paying more and dying more, or at least sooner."

So - pay more, die earlier. You don't need to be an economist to realize you aren't getting value for money on that.