COVID-19 & US healthcare system - thread relapse

[Labster]

What will be really wild is what may come of this after the next federal election, in which the new Democratic president could use the strong federal powers that Trump could get the Supreme Court to agree to to enact gun control, abortion rights and antidiscrimination rules that overrule state governments.

Okay, I get that you're really smart Cory but this is almost incoherent in terms of political understanding.  Politicians are always in favor of central powers when their people are in and devolved powers when their people are out.  Like, sure, a Democratic president could get strict gun control with a conservative Supreme Court and a rich, vocal minority who opposes?  They will cry violation of states rights so fast and loud your ears will hurt, since no one cares about logical consistency.

I have been paying attention to Canada as well. It's certainly more functional than the U.S.

The thing that both Canada and the U.S. are getting wrong, most of all, is being too timid with stimulus. They are sovereign currency issuers whose debts are denominated in their own currencies. They should be conjuring up TRILLIONS more, and nationalising the payroll of every struggling business, keeping those workers employed so they can return to work when the crisis ends. This should come with conditions for employers (good conduct orders that ban discriminatory conduct, structured bankruptcies, dividends, stock buybacks, etc), and should be capped at a sum sufficient for payroll employees to pay rent/mortgages and buy groceries and other necessities. The inflationary risk is minimal: it won't raise the cost of labour, nor will it put more dollars into circulation to bid up the price of goods — it will simply replace the dollars that have ceased to circulate in order to pay for goods that are still being produced and debts/liabilities (mortgages/rents) that are still owed.

This, on the other hand, makes lots of sense.  You can't cause inflation in a liquidity crisis.  You can't cause inflation in a liquidity crisis, really.  The economy wants more dollars, give it more dollars.  This, of course, will still never happen because it's still a massive transfer of wealth to the middle class, and America is not a communist country or something.

“I feel guilty about surviving,” he says. “There’s a sense of ‘why me?’ Why did I deserve all this? Looking at the incredible cost of it all definitely adds to that survivor’s guilt.”

See?  We're so anti-socialist that people feel guilty about getting their health care paid for when they get a disease by accident.  This is the whole point of insurance, to spread risk, and here's a person who feels bad about simply surviving.