Sweden is infamous for having some of the highest taxes in the world, and yet the country’s tax agency is still one of Sweden’s most trusted institutions.
The Swedish attitude towards tax contrasts sharply with many countries where taxes can be a deeply divisive issue. We investigate what this says about Swedish society and how the popularity of the welfare state might survive growing challenges in the future.
Americans actually pay more per capita towards public healthcare than most Europeans, but it just covers so much less (Medicaid and Medicare) because of insane healthcare prices.
Two word to solve this: Public Healthcare.
Iinm medicaid/medicare is a government health insurance scheme that only given to selected individuals, and care is provided by private owned hospital, while Europe(and a lot of other place in the world) practice universal public healthcare, where the hospital is owned and run by government. This way, the government wouldn’t get squeezed dry by the exorbitant cost of private healthcare, while at the same time wouldn’t need to pick and choose who is eligible. Private hospital is there to provide value added service for people who can afford it.
In many places in Europe, they have a so-called “treatment guarantee,” which means that if the wait is longer than 30 days for non-emergency treatment and procedures referred by a doctor, you can elect treatment at the private hospital instead of a public hospital. No charge.
For emergencies, you are always treated immediately at either a public or private hospital.
E: I’m mentioning this because I’ve encountered a large number of uninformed Americans who always start crying about “people dying on wait-lists in Europe and Canada unlike in America.” No.
What country is that? Definitely not the UK.
E.g. Denmark.