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An honorable goal, health insurance for every American. This has been the promise of every political candidate. In the next breath we hear that Medicare and prescription drug programs are becoming one of our biggest monetary problems. These great social welfare programs that serve so many of our nation's needy are facing dire financial strains, but leaders continue to promise national health insurance for all. How?

Should we believe these promises or is this like a P.T. Barnum promise?

Leaders remind us that other industrial nations do it, so we should and we can. What they don't tell you is how other nations do it and that's the secret they don't want you to know.
In England, gasoline costs $6.13 a gallon and of that amount $4.03 is tax. Our tax is 38 cents. In England, a one-earner family with two children pays 8.1 percent of his income in taxes. In the U.S.A. that same wage earner pays 2.4 percent of his income in taxes.

In France, gasoline costs $5.80 a gallon and is taxed at $3.65 a gallon. The family of four pays 7.1 percent of income in taxes.

In Italy, gas is $5.91 and tax is $3.57. The family of four pays 11.9 percent of income in taxes.

Tax rates for a single wage earner with two children in some other nations are - Australia, 24.3 percent; Belgium, 15.2 percent; Denmark, 25.4 percent; Finland, 24.2 percent; Sweden, 24 percent; Norway, 18 percent; and New Zealand, 20.7 percent.

Are you getting the message? Taxes, much higher than we now have, give reason to health insurance for all. Nothing is "free."

Another reason why some nations are able to provide health care for all is their Social Security rates - France, 35 percent; Belgium, 28 percent; Sweden, 24 percent; Finland, 19 percent. In the U.S.A. our rate is 13 percent.