Sixty-six years ago, Prince Otto von Bismarck's Germany set up the first national "Sickness Insurance" plan, covering industrial workers. Kaiser Wilhelm I had proclaimed: "The cure of social ills must be sought not exclusively in the repression of Social Democratic excesses, but simultaneously in the positive advancement of the welfare of the working classes." This state assumption of responsibility has been interpreted by some as farsighted statesmanship, by others as the embryo of the totalitarian state. In any case, it caught on. Today more have some form of public health insurance. In...
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