While I agree that significant funding comes from the public sector, what you just cited was a list of privately held businesses. I don't feel that this supports your claim that my argument to innovation is vacuous, because under a single payer system, the government would not be subsidizing the business, it would be the business's only customer. That distinction is very important.
This distinction is meaningless in the context of your post. You imply that a single payer (government payer) system would stifle innovation. I provide data supporting the conclusion that innovation is driven by government spending. Government spending permits innovation which is then introduced to the market. The distinction largely does NOT arise until government subsidy has made a technology commercially viable.
I do not think that all health care should be dropped for the elderly. However, given the amount spent on futile treatment and our current understanding of the benefit (or lack thereof) to both the family and the patient, I think a lot of funding could be dropped from this area and put towards more useful things, such as insuring people who are poor. Not quite sure why we spend billions of dollars extending the lives of elderly people by a couple of months to the detriment of their families and don't provide anything for the lower middle class, but there it is. Hopefully that will change with the new health care bill.
You'd think all this informed oppostion would know what quality adjusted life years are, and their importance in managing the costs of socialized medicine.
Why should a person who has a lot of money be made to pay a higher percentage of their income? That's not really fair, and while I agree that there would be no feasible way to drop income tax to a flat percentage, I differ from you in one way: I am grateful that they pay so much to make our country continue to work. The lack of gratitude is kind of ridiculous - no one is entitled to the money of a wealthy person, and yet it is given anyway. We should all be saying "thank you," instead of, "you should be paying more."
You continue to be clueless, big surprise. Despite the grandiose delusions of the rich, their wealth is not self-made. It is often a matter of circumstance, matter of the exploitation of the environment and their fellow man, and the permissive environment provided by society. Our wealthy owe far more to society, because far greater societal resources are utilized to permit, secure, and perpetuate their wealth.
Furthermore, wealth has marginal utility. Despite a larger percentage of total wealth taxed, and a considerably higher gross value, the quality of life experienced is far, far, far, ..., far, far, far less impacted by reduction in wealth resulting from taxation.
Aside from the exploitative means by which wealth is often acquired, its marginal value, etc, the use of money of the classes differs significantly. The majority of the lower classes incomes are immediately funneled back into the economy, stimulating production. If a sufficient percentage of the population cannot afford the goods and services its economy produces, there will be collapse.
In what way was that necessary? We were having a pleasant, albeit heated debate. I enjoy that, what I don't enjoy are personal attacks, even when they're not against me.
A pleasant debate is implying the plight of the poor is the result of their own personal failings? Nice. To suggest that a redistribution of social services (wealth) to the poor is unjust and unfair to the rich is laughable. Anyone who would suggest such is overwhemingly ignorant of history or a despicable con.
