Submitted by Corbulo2526 t3_zulbez in space
Comments
Dark-Myst t1_j1kdy45 wrote
Hey, you know what would be better than Space Force?
United Healthcare For All Force.
sporksable t1_j1m02h6 wrote
Last estimate is universal care in the US would cost about 4 Trillion 1.5 Trillion a year more than what we spend now on healthcare (which is substantial). You'd need 4.5 1.5 DoD budgets to cover that, and I ran out of fingers and toes counting how many space force budgets.
Sufficient_Matter585 t1_j1mb9b4 wrote
Thats if you pay health care providers the rate they ask for. We can strong arm em.
sporksable t1_j1mbo1h wrote
Actually that cost figure assumes present medicare rates, which are 70% of private insurance reembursement.
Health policy is extremely complex, and there are trade offs for everything. But I do not believe it's realistic to assume providers will take a 30% reduction in payments and not have that have knock-on effects through the industry. Again, trade offs.
Sufficient_Matter585 t1_j1mfxjf wrote
Well we nationalize health care. This is what happens when you free market everything. only the rich can afford. They make more money treating then curing
Gen_Jack_Ripper t1_j1n3v34 wrote
We don’t have a free market economy.
Dark-Myst t1_j1mbta3 wrote
I would think that's a bloated amount considering insurance costs.
sporksable t1_j1mdanw wrote
People smarter than you or I have crunched the numbers. The costs assume present Medicare reimbursement rates, which are already around 60-70% of private insurance rates. Naturally, such a reduction would have knock on effects. If you wanted to reimburse more to better cover that gap, costs would probably increase.
Dark-Myst t1_j1me0sq wrote
People smarter than you or I.....I'm going to go get some coffee. Merry Christmas to you.
pugofthewildfrontier t1_j1m2qc0 wrote
Gonna need to see your estimate that shows universal health care (not public option) would cost 8-9 trillion per year, since we’re already above 4 trillion per year.
A recent study by Yale epidemiologists found that Medicare for All would save around 68,000 lives a year while reducing U.S. health care spending by around 13%, or $450 billion a year.
Medicare for All spending would be approximately $37.8 trillion between 2017 and 2026, according to a study by the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. That amounts to about $5 trillion in savings over that time. These savings would come from reducing administrative costs and allowing the government to negotiate prescription drug prices.
Other studies by think tanks and government agencies have analyzed single-payer proposals at the state and federal levels. Most found Medicare for All would reduce our total health care spending.
Even a study by the Koch-funded Mercatus Center found that Medicare for All would save around $2 trillion over a 10-year period.
sporksable t1_j1mb4ft wrote
I was wrong, it was about 1.5 Trillion/yr over present spending, an average of 3 Trillion a year (we spend about 1.5 trillion already to cover around half of residents, so that jives fairly well). Which is substantially less than 4 trillion/yr.
The fact remains, though, that DoD budgets, even with the bloated one we have right now, doesn't begin to cover the expenses accrued under the M4A proposals. And that also does not take into account the fact that purely medicare (without medicaid, CHIPS, Tricare, IHS etc) is responsible for more than half of the deficit we have right now (with social security making up the rest). FedGov runs a surplus without these mandatory programs.
But that is getting in the weeds a little bit. Point is, the entire DoD budget doesn't begin to cover M4A. There would need to be substantially more offset.
Oh, and the Mercatus Center study is a really poor one to use, since the author himself states that cost savings are unrealistic. It pretty much assumes that providers will take a 40% cut to reimbursement rates with no knock-on effects.
To be clear here, I'm not saying that M4A or universal healthcare is a bad thing. But I am saying that "stop buying bullets, buy bandages" isn't a realistic way to look at healthcare policy, or paying for universal care.
SkipDisaster t1_j1n4r58 wrote
We would have that if we taxed the 1%
bojackhoreman t1_j1n9vqo wrote
The EU spends about 11% of its GDP on healthcare for 447M people at 16.6 trillion GDP. US gdp is at 22 trillion at 332M people. Equivalent cost would be between 1.4 -2.4 trillion for universal healthcare which is nearly half of what Americans pay now at 4.3 trillion.
WonToTwee t1_j1m1vkg wrote
But that probably 1000x more expensive
anurodhp t1_j1knwel wrote
You know what sucks? When Vladimir Putin force invades random counties to expand empire
slax03 t1_j1l60l0 wrote
You know that both of these things can be true right? It's fair to say that there's always money for war and believing helping Ukraine is absolutely necessary.
anurodhp t1_j1m0fly wrote
Have you looked at how Western Europe unilaterally disarmed and now is entirely dependent on the us?
The help ukraine is getting now is technology and techniques developed in peacetime. Things like he poster above would consider wasteful. Tech doesn’t develop overnight. It takes years or decades (usually in peace)
Rynox2000 t1_j1kop0k wrote
What exactly are we paying for? I don't see any Space Force battleships anywhere.
bookers555 t1_j1kt25b wrote
One day, for now they have this.
RuinousRubric t1_j1kugg3 wrote
The Space Force operates the various military satellites. So GPS, military communications, missile warning/tracking, military weather satellites, etc. They also do a lot of work for the National Reconnaissance Office, which is the organization running all of our spy satellites. They search for and track objects in Earth orbit and make the data publicly available. They run space-related military facilities.
So no space battleships (yet, anyways), but they do handle a lot of infrastructure which is invaluable to both the US military and the civilian world.
cons_suck_balls t1_j1kwtid wrote
Who was doing it before them?!
RuinousRubric t1_j1l34h7 wrote
Literally the same groups, it's just that they've been put into their own branch like how the Air Force was split off from the Army after WW2. Mostly just means that they aren't stuck playing second fiddle to entrenched interests in the Air Force.
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Corbulo2526 OP t1_j1kosf8 wrote
How does GPS sound?
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cnuttin t1_j1nn2fx wrote
Maybe they know something we don’t?
TardisReality t1_j1k0wwx wrote
NASA could do SO MUCH more than whatever that Space Force subdivision of the military could...
Million2026 t1_j1k4rk3 wrote
This is great news for space. Like it or not, the US will never increase NASAs budget too far above what it is now. But for military applications money is unlimited. So basically instead of the $20 billion the US government used to spend on space, it’s now spending $50 billion a year!
TardisReality t1_j1k54et wrote
Yeah...saddens me that is the way it is. I cry when NASA loses a rover....when the military loses a plane...eh
Corbulo2526 OP t1_j1k346q wrote
NASA and the Space Force do different things, just like NASA and the Air Force do different things.
Joelmale t1_j1kxtg2 wrote
Yes but Space Force just does what the Air Force used to do except now they add in additional “staff” overhead. Really it just costs more to have a separate service do it. This needs a really good relook.
Corbulo2526 OP t1_j1kxw6a wrote
You can say the exact same thing about the Army and Air Force having done the same thing. But you don’t see any serious arguments for trying to merge the Air Force back into the Army.
Joelmale t1_j1kydmu wrote
You could except we don’t fight in space and have signed a treaty saying we won’t weaponize it. Space is a domain just as air is but air is a warfighting domain, I think we should be exploring/discovering space not conquering it. When we look at ways the US could spend on space I just don’t think the DoD is the best way to do it. ‘Merica and all that
Corbulo2526 OP t1_j1kygwm wrote
>have signed a treaty saying we won’t weaponize it.
No such treaty has been signed by any major spacefaring country.
Joelmale t1_j1kyto9 wrote
You are right it was an agreement to not place WMDs in space so an over simplification, and even at that not really binding. Countries will do what countries will do. Still doesn’t change my take… stupid way to spend money :D
Kamakaziturtle t1_j1mxjvh wrote
This paragraph makes me think you don’t actually know what the space force does
TardisReality t1_j1k3c68 wrote
Isn't Space Force just a branch of the Air Force anyway?
Corbulo2526 OP t1_j1k3r92 wrote
No. Both the Air Force and Space Force coequal military branches under the larger civilian-led Department of the Air Force.
TardisReality t1_j1k46zt wrote
Seems redundant and just bloats an already useless military budget. Like air force...would already deal with the space above
Corbulo2526 OP t1_j1k4c0v wrote
Much like the Army already dealt with air before 1947. Yet we have an Air Force today.
notataco007 t1_j1kibeg wrote
You in 1947: "air force? How redundant. Just keep it the US Army Air Corps"
Tommyblockhead20 t1_j1kif1j wrote
Question: do you have a smartphone? If so, have you ever used a feature that uses location, like maps, local weather, or photo locations? Guess what organization is in charge of that location data getting to your phone?
It’s not NASA. It’s the one you just called useless. The space force specifically. That’s just one example of the things the military does that benefits you. We can certainly debate exactly how much the military and NASA should be getting, but it’s just wrong to say the military budget I completely useless.
Kamakaziturtle t1_j1mxcm6 wrote
Other way around. Having all military branches in a single organization would be a nightmare and inefficient to properly manage. Splitting groups off when they get big enough aids in organization and makes sense both from a management and financial level
Kamakaziturtle t1_j1mx0d8 wrote
No they couldn’t, they do very different things.
The space force has effectively existed for decades now under the air force, operating our military satellites, gps, as well as identifying potential threats. NASA doesn’t do all that, they are more about space research and travel.
All that happened is the groups working on this got big enough to warrant them getting their own branch.
JimBeam823 t1_j1lyn2z wrote
When then Xaraxians come, it will be money well spent.
MacrosBlack16 t1_j1krvi2 wrote
So this is where that money for student debt relief is going instead?
StevenK71 t1_j1m12iu wrote
I think we will see a militarized version of Starship in a couple of years.
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FanaticEgalitarian t1_j1nh71x wrote
only 1.7 bil? What are they gonna do, buy new government issue mousepads?
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Corbulo2526 OP t1_j1jwnpr wrote
The bill provides $26.3 billion for the U.S. Space Force, which is nearly $1.7 billion more than the Pentagon requested and more than NASA's $25.4 billion budget.