Britain, Italy show us what to expect

Missing, so far, in the debate over health care is a realization what government health care does to the host country. In Great Britain, Canada and France, entrepreneurial spirit, self-motivation is dead or dying.

Killed by confiscatory taxes and the realization that no matter how smart or hard one works, at the end of the day the rewards go to someone who didn't earn them.

High taxes not only deter the creation of wealth, high taxes cause the wealth producers to hide or defer income, and also spending, in efforts to retain wealth. For example, in Italy, despite the signs and trappings of success, most famous restaurants consistently report operating at or near a loss in order to avoid the confiscation of profits by the state.

Taxes are not collected, spending soars, deficits abound, governments repeatedly collapse. Labor negotiations in critical public sectors begin and end with damaging strikes.

What little successful private industry remains can only protest its fate to the uncaring politicians beholden to their real constituencies, government workers and beneficiaries who have plenty of time and motivation to loudly campaign for their interests.

All of this results in a weakening of the entire country's economy and damaging the country's reputation.

Read the proposals closely, very soon every worker, not only high earners, will be paying more for less health care. This supposedly protects us all from being uninsured. Since when was health insurance an entitlement in this country, at the expense of the taxpayer? Talk to any Brit, and whether they are happy or not with their health care, they are very unhappy with the expense of government and their income taxes.

Many Brits have moved to the U.S. and elsewhere in an attempt to keep the fruits of their labor. Why turn the U.S. into another U.K. or Italy?

Thomas Roth

Arlington Heights