European-style welfare states are lovely!

[WilmywoodNCparalegal]

8. Even in that decrepit pit of debt known as Italy

(sarcastically speaking), there are some things that I love: health care (usually one of the top in the world) is great. In my own city of Bologna, you can book appointments for regular tests online and you can have some basic lab tests done at the local pharmacy - no wait, no cost. I remember never having to wait more than a day or two to visit the doctor, even for routine exams.

I remember my doctor - who was the same one who attended my birth - coming to my own home in the middle of the night because I was so sick and my fever was running high. I was young (6 or 7 then), but home visits were/are nothing exceptional. My grandmother - who passed away recently at a ripe old age in her 90s - had a live-in assistant because she was partially blind. This allowed her to remain active (she was a passionate Wagner opera fan) and keep her German and English lessons going.

To this day, my dad - who lives in the US as I do - receives a hefty stipend (about 2200 Euros) for his disability (bladder cancer). This is the same amount he'd receive if he lived in Italy (it's already taxed so that's what he gets net - every month on the dot) - he has to provide proof of his condition every year, of course, and if he were to be in remission the payments would stop, but this is part of what the taxes he paid all the years he lived and worked in Italy got him.

There is one facet that is almost absent in the U.S. - and that is the belief that we all come together as members of the society and as a whole we help one another. It doesn't matter if I may never need help, but I still feel like I contribute to the betterment of society.

In the U.S., instead, it's a lot of 'I'll never need that, so why should I pay for someone else to have it?' - it's a very self-centered attitude, probably due to how this country came to be. There are a lot of selfish people who don't understand that everyone plays a part in this country - no man is an island, so to speak.

In my current city of Wilmington, NC, we are facing tremendous infrastructure issues - a sewer line just spilled gallons and gallons of waste in a creek, which is a major problem because we are so close to the ocean and our area is full of basins and marshes flowing to the ocean. Yet, people complain when the water/wastewater utility has had to raise rates to cover all these infrastructure issues that have been neglected for over 50 years (no joke). And the arguments are all based on selfish principles. It's sad, really.

I was reading commentary on new regulations proposed by the technocratic Italian government to increase revenue. One of them was to increase the cost of the most expensive medications (the ones that are brand and are very costly, which are not subsidized and that the consumer has to pay on her own) from the average of 167 Euros per year for a family of four to almost 200 Euros per year for a family of four.

Note that this is for a family of 4 (Four - quattro) - 167 Euros a year????? I bet most Americans would jump up and down to pay $200 a MONTH, much less a year.... and this is for the most expensive tier of medications - while the rest is even cheaper and some are even free.