Here is my column for The Progressive Populist on employer-provided healthcare.
Email me at grassroots at comcast dot net.
Author: hankkalet
Hank Kalet is a poet and freelance journalist. He is the economic needs reporter for NJ Spotlight, teaches journalism at Rutgers University and writing at Middlesex County College and Brookdale Community College. He writes a semi-monthly column for the Progressive Populist. He is a lifelong fan of the New York Mets and New York Knicks, drinks too much coffee and attends as many Bruce Springsteen concerts as his meager finances will allow. He lives in South Brunswick with his wife Annie. View all posts by hankkalet
Hank Kalet 
At risk of throwing gas on the fire, it\’s the gooferment\’s fault. For example, why are benefits tax-deductible to the employer and not to me if I buy my own? Why do corporations pay taxes anyway? (They just pass them along for people pay. Hidden from view in the cost of the product, taxes are buried.) The current benefits fiasco is all related to the WW2 wage and price controls that the gooferment winked on to allow companies to pay employees with other than money in violation of the \”rules\”. So the gooferment creates the problem, exacerbates it, and then everyone looks to them to \”save\” us from it! Argh!! \”barbara streisand\”
We need universal one payer health care now, not 30 years from now. All the other democratic industrialized countries have some form of universal health care except the US. This is just insane and getting worse. We have universal health care for those over 65, we have universal (but not free) Emergency Room care. If you have a medical emergency, a hospital cannot refuse you but they can and will bill you. You can\’t go to the ER for palliative care or for regular check ups. ER care is the most expensive kind of care and it is where poor people go when they are in extremis because they can\’t afford regular check ups. Of course libertarians have no empathy, no answers, no concern for the tens of millions in distress. If we had one payer, we would have a giant pool of insured which would lower costs and we would not have to pay CEO salaries or golden parachutes. Hospitals and doctors would remain private, PRIVATE, PRIVATE. Libertarianism is a menace, it is toxic and it is a threat worse than Islamic terrorism.