Letters to the Editor: Letter on health care misguided

Mark Twain once said that there were "lies, damn lies, and statistics."

This has once again proved to be the case in Matt Johnson's Jan. 22 letter.

Johnson proposes that 300 million Americans should give just an additional $33.33 on top of their regular income tax to pay for national health care coverage. Unfortunately, 300 million is the estimated population of the entire country--according to the IRS, only an estimated 132 million taxpayers will be filing 2003 1040 forms this year. This would adjust his $33.33 figure to around $75. How many of those extra-$75-taxpayers are the teenagers making a few hundred dollars at McDonald's over the summer or the seniors greeting people at Wal*Mart?

Mr. Johnson also points out that "more than half the country has no coverage at all right now." Again, his numbers are off wildly; the U.S. Census Bureau reports that an estimated 15.2 percent of the population were without health insurance coverage during the entire year in 2002. One wonders how much of this 15.2 percent consists of college students, no longer covered by their parents' plans, not yet covered by an employer plan, and, due to their fairly good health and the availability of campus medical services, not interested in pursuing a personal Blue Cross policy.

When it is no longer in a person's financial interest to be proactive about their small, inexpensive problems because Uncle Sam will pick up the bill when it becomes a big, expensive problem, will liposuction, plastic surgery and liver transplants become the order of the day?

OIT Customer Support Analyst