National Health Care System In Japan And Taiwan – Would It Be Possible For Us?

Every society is affected by any national changes or new movement introduced; therefore, an issue one may think is unrelated to his environment can very well affect him through chains of cause and effect.Health care is an immediate issue that concerns all of us. We all experience it and need it. Let’s serious ask ourselves if the current health care system is satisfactory and available to everyone. Should health, medicare and treatments be available to only selected groups? Many people are voting for the presidential candidate who can restore the present health care system or who can pioneer a better healthcare distribution for our country. Personally, I hope to see a change that health care is available and affordable to everyone.Being able to receive basic health care is a fundamental need of all people. Fulfilling this fundamental need makes people feel secured, and it makes sense that people with better health can contribute more to the society. A realistic and reachable standard of health should be set for all people. This effort needs a non profit driving entity to establish and to maintain it. People’s life and health should not be compromised for the profit of few organizations.Before moving to Japan, I was covered under my parents’ insurance policy in the United States. Their policy covered children of the family until the age of twenty-four. Upon graduating from university, I moved to Japan and started my first job there. I joined the Japanese national health insurance through the company I worked for. There are basically two types of health insurance in Japan: national health insurance and employer-sponsored health insurance. Usually, under employer sponsored insurance, the insurance premium is calculated according to income, number of dependents, and the company’ subsidies. For someone who is self-employed or unemployed, the national health insurance costs a minimum of 13300 yen, or about $110 per month plus a small percentage of income for those who are self-employed. In other words, everyone can get insurance from around $100 dollars a month. Unlike the Medicaid program in the U.S. which is only available to certain low-income groups with specific requirements for eligibility, the Japanese health insurance is available to every citizen and legal residents. There is a ceiling to what the Japanese National insurance covers, but it covers all the basics and beyond.In most cases in Japan, patients choose their doctor and hospital. There is no limitation to the doctors or hospital they can visit. This is a true competition among the clinics, hospitals, and medical practitioners, not for profit, but for quality. The same insurance that people have in Japan gives them the freedom to get second opinions and naturally eliminates those doctors whose practices are in question. The doctor visits, treatments, and medicine are not free; one is responsible for thirty percent of their medical bills. Japanese health costs are much lower than the costs in the United States. Thirty percent of the medical bill is still a reasonable amount one can afford. There are also special cases or categories of illness for which the insurance would give more coverage. If one is late on his payment, his insurance will not automatically be invalid. The insurance will still cover the person as long as he makes up the missed payments. After all, some people do run into difficulties in life at one point or another. Sounds to good to be true? Well, It’s real.Taiwan, a place with no world recognition politically, has one of the top public health care system in the world. After moving to Taiwan due to my husband’s transfer a year a go, I learned and appreciated the system where universal or national health care is available to all more than ever. When speaking of universal, national, or pubic health insurance, people often turn their attention to the well-debated and discussed health care system in Canada. There are those whose views are negative, claiming that the medical service in a single-payer insurance system may not perform at its ultimate, and those whose views are positive, saying that they do not live in fear of ever having to face bankruptcy for outrageous medical bills. From my informal inquiries, more Canadian I came across favor their national health care system. Most of those who favor their national health care system commented that people of Canada are more secured in having their basic physical and psychological needs met.In Taiwan, there is also government-sponsored universal health care for not only their citizens but also for foreign residents who live in Taiwan. Foreign residents can apply for the government-sponsored insurance after proving their legal status of residing in Taiwan. The insurance fee starts from the basic 600NT, or around $18 a month. For people in higher income brackets, their insurance is calculated based on a percentage of their income over the 600Nt. Fees are waived for retired soldiers, those who are physically challenged, and people who have economic disadvantages.Interestingly, Taiwan’s national health insurance has only been established for little more than two decades, since 1985. The government policy-makers studied health care system from different foreign countries and composes the first Taiwan national health care from the ideas and methods of the system of other countries. It was said that Taiwan’s national insurance system is like a completed puzzle made from pieces of which fit its country and people. This insurance now covers the entire population, including foreign legal residents. According to research funded by Taiwan’s National Health Research and Taiwan’s Bureau of National Health Insurance, the cost of health care did not rise after the universal coverage was established (Jui-Fen & Hsiao, 2003.) What does that tell us?A basic health care program can greatly reduce the consequences of illness left untreated. Basic health care does not mean free of charge or mindless spending without control. To build a healthy nation, we should take a closer look at the current U.S. health insurance. After all, a sound nation starts with the health of its people.

Creating Websites Like E-Commerce Sites

You might want to create a website of your own, with a common example being a business or e-commerce website. E-commerce stands for electronic commerce, and refers to Internet sites that buy or sell products or services directly, including both physical products and services and virtual products and services. Exchanging financial data is also an important part of e-commerce in the context of online payments. E-mail and mobile phones are also often involved with e-commerce.

Aspects of E-commerce

E-commerce is made possible via electronic funds transfer, online transaction processing, electronic data interchange, automated data collection systems, inventory management systems, supply chain management and Internet marketing. Most commercial entities are at least somewhat involved in e-commerce today.

E-commerce Applications

E-commerce transactions tend to be either business to business or business to consumer. There are many common e-commerce applications. These include supply chain and logistics document automation, enterprise content management, group or collective buying, domestic and international payment systems, instant messaging, newsgroups and automated online assistants.

More on E-commerce

Other aspects of e-commerce include online banking, online shopping, online order tracking, online office suites, teleconferencing, online tickets and shopping cart software. Some aspects of e-commerce tend to be regulated by governments. These often include online advertising, commercial e-mails and consumer privacy.

E-commerce Distribution

Some e-commerce practitioners exist only over the Internet, with an e-commerce website and perhaps other websites but not physical storefront or location. There are also more traditional commercial entities with storefronts or physical locations that also have a web presence that include an e-commerce website both for direct sales and for drawing more business to physical storefronts.

Making E-commerce Websites

Professional web designers can create e-commerce sites, but amateurs and laymen can use such applications as website builder tools, website design software and e-commerce software to do so as well. The best e-commerce sites are often simple and efficient in design, and it is generally not difficult to plan, build, launch and maintain an e-commerce website given the appropriate tools.

E-commerce and E-business

E-commerce is a subset of e-business, which is business conducted more efficiently with the use of information technologies. Internally within a business this can mean customer relationship management, human resources management, content management, enterprise resource planning, document management systems and communications systems such as digital audio, voice mail, e-mail, web conferencing and digital work flows.

Examples of E-commerce Products and Services

Software, electronic books and streaming media are some examples of online goods and services. E-commerce retail services can include travel, banking, food ordering, online pharmacy, online flower delivery and DVD-by-mail. Examples of mobile commerce include banking, ticketing and payment services. Some e-commerce marketplace services include advertising, auctions, online wallets, trading communities, price comparison services and social commerce.

Does Unlimited Web Hosting Really Mean Unlimited Web Hosting?

Unlimited Hosting Is Limited HostingImagine a web host has a server with 600 gigabytes of hard drive space and 3000 GBs of total bandwidth (3 terabytes) per month. They offer plans that are “Unlimited” and 250 customers are already on the server, so that a total of 550 GB of space and all 3TB bandwidth has already been used this month.And the web host is still selling accounts on that server! How is this possible?OversellingThe answer is that the actual amount of space and bandwidth used by a hosting account is often much lower than the resource cap. Most web masters use only a small fraction of their allowed limit (if there is one). If the drives are full, a new one can be added. Bandwidth can be purchased to cover a small overage. This is what is known as “Overselling.”Most web hosts that oversell services do not take CPU resources into consideration. Processor resources are finite – you can’t just add in another on demand. And you, the hosted user, are stuck on a server that is constantly running all out just to keep up because of the sheer number of accounts hosted alongside you.Overselling is why there are are so many web hosting companies out there and why so many seem to open up or shut down every day. Existing companies oversell to the point that the service tanks, the user gets fed up and finds an new host that is also overselling – a big plan at a crazy price is hard to pass up. As more and more clients jump ship, the old hosts pick up speed and the new ones get crushed under the load.Overselling Sucks!Now, overselling and unlimited hosting plans are not universally bad. For most users, this kind of shared hosting is perfectly fine. However, some sites are more CPU intensive, relying heavily on databases and PHP. WordPress sites are a common example – as sites become more popular, larger, or add more features and plugins, it’s not necessarily the disk space or bandwidth that becomes strained, it’s the server’s RAM and processors.Many web hosts consider excessive use of these resources to be cause for canceling your hosting account. This is commonly called “TOS’ing” an account. Unlimited Hosting does not cover CPU resources. Having a popular site can actually be a violation of your Terms of Service!
How Do I Know How Overloaded My Server Is?Log into your cpanel. Click on “Service Status.” You should now see a table of stats and a row of colored circles. Here are some signs your server might be overloaded:1. Any of the status lights are NOT green
2. Any of the services are down
3. Server load is constantly over.90 (1 means NONE of the processors has cycles to spare)
4. Memory or Disk usage is consistently above 80%These are not signs that your site is a resource hog, only indicators of how hard your server is working to serve all the hosting accounts. Just because your site is not a CPU hog doesn’t mean someone else’s site isn’t making yours slow and unstable.What Can I Do To Limit My Resource Use?Here are some ideas to keep your account from getting canceled:1. Use a cache. There are several different cache plugins available for WordPress. Caches store data that can be reused for multiple users, instead of having the site reload data from the database every time a visitor makes a request.2. Use a CDN. Content Delivery Networks store your site’s most commonly used files offsite and deliver them directly to your visitors.3. Make fewer database calls. Using fewer WordPress plugins, or forum extensions will easy the load on your database server.These tips will will also make your site faster.Help! My Web Host TOS’d Me Off My Unlimited Hosting Plan!If your site gets shut down for resource abuse, you have a few options:1. You can rent a virtual private server or dedicated server. This can be expensive, especially if you are not an experienced server administrator and need a “managed” solution.2. You can try signing up for another unlimited plan at another web host, but be sure to limit your resource use from now on, or you’ll probably get in trouble again.3. Find a shared hosting provider that does not oversell. Web Hosts that do not oversell are rare and usually charge higher rates than more popular oversold web hosts, but are far cheaper and easier to use than dedicated or virtual servers.