Incentive to get a job: That is what American health insurance is. It's a rotten carrot on a stick. Have you wondered why there is so much resistance to the idea of socialized healthcare? It's because corporate America fears that if we are given free health care the workforce will diminish. The pharmaceutical companies fear their drugs won't sell as much, and the government worries that fewer employees mean fewer tax dollars. Drug companies and corporations line the pockets of politicians for the express purpose of keeping the working class stuck right where we are.

Our taxes, premiums, deductibles and co-pays are swirling down the toilet bowl of greed. The sheep of our country listen to fear mongers who demonize the idea of social healthcare, and parrot what they see on tv. Fanaticism!

We have to be careful not to get sick by watching our government push pharmaceuticals on us with their steeply bought bills. The hardest pill to swallow is not getting the life-saving treatment we need because we can get $4 dollar prescriptions.

Here's an example of our caring health situation: A production worker goes to work for company X for the great healthcare plan that costs $110 dollars a month. The specialists are $25 dollars each visit, the primary care physicians (pcp) are $15 dollars each visit, and the yearly deductible is $100 dollars. These aren't fixed amounts because each year the employee's premium rises.

While working at company X, the employee lifts 75 lb. boxes, 60 a day for three months until she begins having groin pains to the point where she's having to lift her left leg into her car. That's a $15 dollar co-pay to the pcp. The pcp refers her to an OBGYN, which is a $25 dollar co-pay. The OBGYN says there is a small cyst on the left ovary and removes that ovary. The pain persists so another $25 dollar OBGYN says there are fibroids on the uterus and performs a complete hysterectomy. The pain persists so that's another $15 dollar copay to the pcp, and he sends you to a bone specialist, and a $25 dollar co-pay.

The bone specialist maneuvers the left leg out of place, causing the pain to desist for three seconds till he puts the leg back in place. The bone specialist orders half a dozen tests with follow-ups after each test, totaling $150 dollars, and tells the company X employee there is nothing he can do for her. He tells her to see someone about a hernia, and that's another $25 dollars. This doctor pokes his finger into the groin area where it hurts. He schedules surgery the following week, cuts a nerve and tells the employee to follow-up in six weeks. That's another $25 dollars. Nothing is resolved.

Back to the $15 dollar pcp to ask for assistance. Now it's off to two pain specialists for $50. One pain specialist guesses this is a back situation because of the heavy lifting and orders three sets of stem blocks and a rizotomy wtih check ups six weeks later for each procedure, totaling $100 dollars for co-pays.

The other pain specialist orders two sets physical therapy for three week intervols with follow-ups after each session of physical therapy, costing $50 for those visits. This pain specialist writes a script for light work duty. company X won't honor the suggestion by the pain specialist, and puts the employee who hurt herself at company X on short-term disability. If this doesn't get resolved by the time the long-term disability takes effect, company X will discharge the employee who hurt herself lifting company X's heavy equipment. By now, seven years of misdiagnoses have gone by and it's too late to file for compensation benefits. The employee has 120 days to report a work-related injury.

Depression sets in, and in come the anti-depressants, Tramadol, Darvoset, Percocet and anti-infamatories. Here's the good news though: These medications only cost $4. dollars each.

Finally, pain specialist number two decides to test for a torn labrol; that's the socket area of the ball and socket of the hip. There is a follow-up for that and another $25 dollar co-pay. At the end of all of this, it comes down to whether company X bought into enough healthcare to cover repair to the hip socket area. Also, there may be insurance and company set rules that a person isn't allowed hip surgery until they are 50 years old. If the company decided to go with a cheaper plan, even though the employees are paying more premiums every year, the employee is told by the pain specialists and pcp that she'll have to live with the pain, and remain on meds for the duration of her time spent at company X. If the employee needs these meds, she will continue to work there for this alone.

Here it is seven years later and no resolve. Lets add up the cost to company X's employee. Seven years of premiums are $15,840 dollars, the deductibles came to $1,200 dollars and copays were $580 dollars. The total for seven years of seeking answers from professional doctors came to $17,620 dollars out of the employee pocket. Then there are the second opinion specialists at $25 dollars each, who sat and told the employee about their wives ailing situations and sends the employee on her way, and then files claims for $250 dollars for consultation fees. The doctors are getting paid not to treat us.

This is the American way. The companies that get incredible tax reliefs from the government, to which each American pays, retains its employees using healthcare as bait. People are getting hurt on the job, and the government and corporate America are so busy funnelling money back and forth that the employees get lost in the shuffle. The working class are nothing more than a commodity, that is until we actually need the healthcare for which we pay; then we're a burden.

Watch Sicko by Michial Moore. We really need to open our eyes and stop allowing the politicians to drum their programme into our brains that social healthcare is evil. Look around, see and think. France, England and even Cuba, to name a few countries, don't use healthcare as a bargaining chip to make sure their corporations and pharmacies get fat wallets.

Then again, maybe it's too late for our country. How many years has our government been drugging the working class into lazy submission? Screw it: where's my prozac?