Letters: Readers discuss the minimum wage, single-payer health care and Roy Blunt’s op-ed column
Teens, wages
Employment during the summer is very important for high school students.
It provides the opportunity for early job experience. They can learn time management and how to balance a job with extra activities, such as hanging out with friends. They are put on a schedule and have something to occupy them during the summer.
A summer job helps students build their resumes and gives them an idea of what working will be like in the future. Also, it helps pay for expenses such as activities with friends, gas or shopping — all luxuries that teenagers like to have. Not to mention, many teenagers have to be saving for college.
Even though I support raising the minimum wage, I am afraid for the effects it might have on a teenager’s ability to get a minimum-wage job.
Kate Turnage
Kansas City
Single-payer time
I have always wondered what the difference is between an insurance premium and a single-payer tax for insurance. You could say my employer-paid insurance is a tax on my wages, just as a tax for single-payer insurance is.
The challenge would be getting the percentage of tax for single-payer health insurance right. Would it be part of the Medicare system? And who pays — employees, companies, corporations or a combination of all?
Why can’t Congress set minimum insurance standards that the insurance industry must meet to do business, like Medicare standards, instead of a hodge-podge that makes it impossible to understand what’s covered?
Copays and deductibles need to be low to encourage people to take care of their medical needs. I don’t believe low deductibles and copays (which I have) increase the use of medical services.
Of course, that may be because I am a man and tend to delay until I get a list of needs, the need becomes urgent or my wife says, “Go.” Missed work or lost wages are a greater deterrent.
Now is the time for actual better health care and standards for all. Single-payer Medicare for all.
Richard Cook
Overland Park
Not partisan
After reading Sen. Roy Blunt’s guest column about gutting the Affordable Care Act (March 14, 9A, “Missourians deserve a better health care system”), I would like to know when Republicans are going to start thinking about the people they were elected to represent.
The GOP plan to gut Medicaid is a death sentence for low- and middle-income Americans. People will no longer be able to afford to go to doctor, get the surgeries they need or get the medications that keep them alive.
Health care should not be a partisan issue; this is about taking care of people. As a health professional, it makes me sick that our health-care system is driven by profit.
It doesn’t have to be this way. We live in one of the wealthiest nations in the world. We can ensure that every person living here has access to quality, affordable health care.
We should be building on the foundation of the ACA and finding ways to improve it. Instead, Republicans like Blunt are proposing a giant leap back and putting people’s lives at risk.
Margie Hoffa
Kansas City
Fix the streets
I think the streets in Kansas City need to be fixed.
I keep driving over pothole after pothole. I’ve already broken one of my tires. I’ve come to wonder, why is there no money being put into fixing this problem?
All around the Kansas City area I see project after project, so it seems as if money isn’t an issue. Why is money being poured into these large renovation projects but those small one-day projects aren’t being completed?
It appears to me that it would be worth the city’s time and effort to fix the potholes that plague our city.
Sebastian Huguez
Kansas City
Medical policy
The March 15 story, “Kansas bill would add to restrictions on doctors who perform abortions” (4A) singles out one set of doctors performing a surgical procedure.
Why wouldn’t one want the same information on any physician performing any surgical procedure on a patient?
Debbie Turner
Leawood
I would like to suggest that Kansas’ bill targeting abortion providers apply to all physicians doing vasectomies, because this procedure is also an “abortion” of sorts.
How absolutely ridiculous. Kansas representatives, don’t you have something better to do with your time? Why in the heck are all these men involved in my health care?
I believe a woman is quite capable of handling her own health.
Susan Tozier
Olathe
This story was originally published March 18, 2017 at 8:30 PM with the headline "Letters: Readers discuss the minimum wage, single-payer health care and Roy Blunt’s op-ed column."