The general level of ignorance on this thread is discouraging. Let us first dispell some easy misconceptions.
Single-Payer vs. Socialized Medicine
Single-Payer refers to a funding mechanism that will financially provide funding for universal healthcare coverage. This is collected from employees, employers, and governmental entities. Socialized medicine can include a single-payer system but does not necessarily need to. The biggest difference between socialized medicine and single-payer is that under socialized medicine hospitals are owned by the government and physicians, nurses, etc are employees of the govenment. With a single-payer system hospitals and health care workers retain the same autonomy that they do now.
In any case, all industrialized countries place higher than us on all health indicators. We are last in maternal mortality, HIV/Aids prevalence, infant mortality, U5MR, preventable death, etc. All of the remaining industrialized countries either have socialized medicine or a single-payer system; all have universal health care coverage for their citizens.
We spend 2.2 tril on healthcare through our current corrupt privatized/public system. The world, as a whole, spends 4.1 tril. Yes, we spend more than the rest of the world and comparatively recieve the results of third-world medicine.
Do I blame this on undereducated doctors, nurses, and subsequent inadequate care? No. This is because the hands of health care professionals are tied by health insurance companies and their managed care system. You would like to think that as a person who has been through medical school, residency, and beyond that you might be in a position to make a decision related to the well-being of your patients; your opinions are great but they are subject to insurance company oversight which supercedes your obviously worthless stance.
1 in 7 hospital claims are denied. Insurance companies give bonuses for canceling policies. Policies are canceled when limits on stays, medication and procedure costs are considered too much. Meanwhile companies see 300% profit increases when American wages have remained virtually stagnent.
Oh, and about us not needing to cover the lazy people, drunks, druggies etc. They aren't the ones who are the largest victims of this; studies show that title belongs to women and children. Furthermore, it's been known for years that in the US the main indicators of being able to obtain health insurance lies directly along the lines of race and gender.
Don't feed Cold War mentalities, Fox, O'Reilly, and the other mantras into forums. Do some research, take your mind off of a potential paycheck, and wake up. If not, go into business or IT.