Canadians...

[Nethila]

you are wrongly misinformed..
privatizing health care system will come in play when the government don't have the money to support it anymore.. simple

[Hero*]

Liberals are the way to go..:P
I don't want to see an American flag instead of Canadian flag on my lawn..so screw the Conservatives, but im sure the Americans would love it..
I wouldnt vote NDP because they talk a lot of shit :P. They are living a dream, it will never happen.

[Troll King]

It's E-day folks. If you're an eligible voter, I suggest you go out and make your vote count today. This looks to be the closest election since Trudeau-Clark in 79, so every vote becomes just a little more important this time.

[Hero*]

True Troll King. Be a GOOD citizen, get off your lazy B-hind, and vote!

[Toasty]

Personally, im gonna vote NDP.

I agree with Troll on the minority government issue.

Cook

[Bob (SRB)]

goddamnit.

i hate when people talk about how their biggest concern is health care, education, and all that babble. how many people honestly care? i think u guys just wanta look smart when being interviewed by 680 news.

like 90% of canadians, i dont have problems with health care or education. so fuck both parties... who really cares.

btw, go conservatives, i want tax cuts. screw the liberals and spending my money for me.

haha another example of a misinformed dummy who is going to vote conservative and fuck up Canada.

Epi also brings up some good points.

And not only is privatizing health care a badf political idea. It's also bad morally. You wouldn't hand over stuff like.. social security to companies, why would you put them in control of our healthcare. And think about it, they would be making money off the suffering of others.

[Toasty]

I'm voting for conservatives

[Toasty]

Actually i'm not old enuff to vote but my mom is voting for conservatives

[InCure.]

I think Canada should invade Greenland and Iceland and take her rightful seat on the international thrown....then we Americans can invade Canada and all her spoiler conquests.

what about belgium?

[duel pasta]

what about belgium?

LET THEM COME TO BELGIUM, WE'LL KICK THEIR ASS :up:

[Jerome Scuggs]

Throne*

edit: i thought canada did own greendland? or something?

[Eric is God]

Eric I don't understand how you can claim to be an economist on one hand and be so grossly misinformed about things on the other.

1) The Conservatives want to lower taxes and increase spending. In fact their economic plan has them spending on MORE new programs than the Liberals, yet unlike the liberals they want to cut taxes and thus cut government revenue. How are they going to make up the difference? The answer? It'll just be like in America where they are running record deficits thanks to increased spending (on mostly military matters) and greatly decreased tax revenue thanks to tax cuts.
For a more local example, it will be like the Harris government which too cut taxes and also increased spending. A lethal combination.

With what the Conservatives want, the natural increase in revenue from a growing economy won't offset things at all.

2) Your family has private health insurance sure, but think of how much more the premiums would be if we didn't have public health care in Canada. The Americans pay more for their healthcare overall than we do, because it is privatized. Believe or not, some things really are more effectively run by the government because when there is only one agency controlling health care, costs don't have to spiral upwards too fast, and also unlike private insurance companies the government isn't trying to make a profit.

Obviously tough for me to support overall if I was completely self-interested because I enjoy living in Canada and making more money would be good too, but hey I care about people

3) I've never heard of it being standard for grade 7 kids to go to Ottawa :P Maybe at your school it was (yah un-economic related point).

4) Privatization can be good or bad I agree. But when it's bad there's little you can do afterwards to patch it up because it may be too late. Look at the idiotic idea of privatizing our power systems... it didn't work in Britian, it didn't work in California and it certainly as hell didn't work in Ontario.
-Epi

1) I fully expect the Conservatives (and every other party) to break their promises once they are elected. The Conservatives are most likely to break their promises of increased spending in favor of stabilizing the economy, which is what I would prefer. The Liberals would likely lean towards increasing spending and the running a large deficit, which is what I don't want.

The Harris government ran an extremely well balanced budget .... right up until they gave into the trend of increased spending before an election. Basic economic theory of government spending: tax when things are good, spend when things are bad. Very few governments follow this because it wont get them elected. And yes the Harris government cut things because they needed to be cut, they still need to be cut more. Health care and education are not areas you can wittle away at over 15 years in order to make changes. Every single special interest group will fight you at every step. The best thing to do is come down hard with sweeping cuts to inefficient areas and then redistribute the money where it needs to go. The problem is that governments no longer even have the power to make necessary changes. Tell the teachers to take a 10% pay cut and see just how powerful our government is.

Anyways, I voted against the Harris government last provincial election simply because of how badly they handled the 407. I actually wrote a 3rd year paper on the issue.

2) ARGG! you people don't even read what I say I am not in favor of privatizing all or even most of health care. You are completely right, some things are better run by the government and in general, health care is one of them. The problem lies with specific services that our health care system is not providing well. If you look at waiting lists for cancer treatment, our system is not even close to keeping up and it never will be because the government simply does not have the money. In this case, it would be better to allow private companies to offer treatment only to those who are willing to pay for it. Everyone else will still be able to receive the treatment via the public system and the wait lists will be shorter. Right now you have the wealthier patients flying down to the US to receive treatment, which takes money and doctors (specialists) out of Canada.

You are studying to be a doctor Epi, so you should know that doctors and medical students in Canada are leaving at an alarming rate because they can make a lot more money elsewhere. By allowing the private sector to offer an alternate choice (which is much different from allowing them to run anything) for patients, we can keep doctors and money in this country.

3) Meh, it must have just be in our area then

4) You are right again, privatization can be a good or bad idea. The tough part is deciding in which instances to regulate the area you let the private sector run. Privatizing the power sector is a GOOD IDEA. The only reason it didn't work is because the government regulated it too much. You can't allow private industries to operate and then tie their hands. What they did was force the private companies to charge a price for electricity that was below their costs. Of course it will fail if you force them to sell at such a low amount. The only way they can afford to stay in business is by cutting things like staff and maintainance, ie balckout time.

Ontario Hydro was costing the government millions a year Epi. Who do you think ends up paying for that? We do as taxpayers. If the government let the private sector have free rein of the power industry, we would all be paying more for power, but it would be a fair price and the government would save millions a year that could go somewhere else. In this case, it would be best to allow the free market to work out it's own price and not interfere.

When it comes to allowing the private sector into health care, government should regulate it. Even if it is just the wealthy using these premium services, the government has to ensure that the companies are adhereing to standards worthy of health care in Canada (not sure if that's a joke or not atm). In the case of something like cancer treatment, you can't dangle hope in front of someone and then ask for an exhorbinant amount of money. The government can step in here and help regulate prices that are more or less fair.

I am not misinformed Epi, I just really don't have nearly enough time to explain how I see things. I'd love to have a discussion/debate with anyone about this because it's what I've lived and breathed for the last 5 years. It's just extremely difficult for me to provide a theoretical background for my point of view, provide historical examples, and then move to current, real-life systems. I'm not saying my view is correct because economics and especially politics are rarely black and white. I was just taken aback when you claimed I was grossly misinformed. The problem as I see it, is most people get all their information from the media, which is obviously biased. It's like only watching Fox News, which is extremely right wing or even the Toronto Star, which has always favored the Liberals.

P.S. I apologize for all the spelling and grammatical mistakes. I'm at work and don't have the time to write well or correct myself

[Jerome Scuggs]

VOTE CAPTAIN CANUCK 2004