OMG, YES! I am terrified of Hillary making me pay for health insurance! Why, that'd be almost like making people pay for car insurance.
You only pay for car insurance if you have a car that you drive on the road (put at risk). If I do not do things that put me at risk of needing a hospital visit why should I have to pay for health insurance? Will we be forced to buy life insurance next too?
Hmm . . . sounds suspiciously like a . . . TAX. Nothing like that has ever been tried before. I'm'a skeert.
We already have a series of health insurance taxes: Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security. Do we really need one more? Why should my wages be garnished to pay for something I do not want, use or need?
The free market will work if you let it. Price something too high and people will stop buying it.
Your mother/father analogy is about as deep as a wading pool and disturbingly misogynistic, but if you insist on using it, I'd say that we're in dire need of a social worker to to come take us away from the neglectful/abusive household if our father acted in such a manner.
The american health care is by far not the best health care in the world. The life expectancy in the U.S. is lower than in most countries with universal health care
Ahh... confusing association with causation. Don't forget, we're really fat over here. The fact that we have a life expectancy greater than 55 means that our health care must be pretty darned amazing.
The american health care is by far not the best health care in the world. The life expectancy in the U.S. is lower than in most countries with universal health care
Ahh... onfusing association with causation. Don't forget, we're really fat over here. The fact that we have a life expectancy greater than 55 means that our health care must be pretty darned amazing.
That's actually a good point... as compared to Britain, for example, we've got about 10% more obese people, but we live only about a year shorter, on average.
Question: Would you rather give the money you spend on health insurance to a private run for profit HMO or the same amount as a tax to the government?
@ HMTKSteve: Health Insurance is not about damage prevention as in your mother/father example, but for damage repair. Even your father will (hopefully) give you a band aid when you cut your finger.
Question: Would you rather give the money you spend on health insurance to a private run for profit HMO or the same amount as a tax to the government?
False dichotomy. There are other options for health insurance besides HMO. I use to have a PPO, now I have POS. Also, what if someone decides that they personally just do not want health insurance?
False dichotomy. There are other options for health insurance besides HMO. I use to have a PPO, now I have POS. Also, what if someone decides that they personally just do not want health insurance?
First, you didn't answer my question. Yes, I am not absolutely familiar with the american healthcare system, but the HMO is the most common solution for health insurance as far as I can tell. It wasn't necessary a dichotomy.
Second, if some person doesn't want health insurance, I declare that person to be a moron. They are only human. Sometime in life they will get hurt and they will get sick and there is no way to tell when. I hope for them it will be nothing severe, but still.
Ahh... confusing association with causation. Don't forget, we're really fat over here. The fact that we have a life expectancy greater than 55 means that our health care must be pretty darned amazing.
That would be true, if every single person in the U.S. would be overweight which is thankfully not the case yet. Also severe, life threatening obesity is not yet the common case with the fat people. The need for health care doesn't dictate it's quality and health care in the U.S. could certainly be better and more affordable.
Second, if some person doesn't want health insurance, I declare that person to be a moron. They are only human. Sometime in life they will get hurt and they will get sick and there is no way to tell when. I hope for them it will be nothing severe, but still.
So Bill Gates should be forced to buy health insurance, even though he can pay all his hospital bills without insurance? That makes him a moron? Very interesting.
What if I decide that I hate insurance companies, and I want to boycott them? Instead of buying health insurance, I invest my money wisely. In the event of an expensive health problem, I use that investment. Instead of giving my health insurance premiums to some company to invest for themselves, I invest it for myself and make money instead of losing money. Apparently that is a moronic plan?
Even if a very poor and sickly person was offered very inexpensive health insurance, and they denied it, what's wrong with that? It may make them stupid in your eyes, but it is their right. If we really pride ourselves on freedom, that includes the freedom to be stupid.
So Bill Gates should be forced to buy health insurance, even though he can pay all his hospital bills without insurance? That makes him a moron? Very interesting.
What if I decide that I hate insurance companies, and I want to boycott them? Instead of buying health insurance, I invest my money wisely. In the event of an expensive health problem, I use that investment. Instead of giving my health insurance premiums to some company to invest for themselves, I invest it for myself and make money instead of losing money. Apparently that is a moronic plan?
Even if a very poor and sickly person was offered very inexpensive health insurance, and they denied it, what's wrong with that? It may make them stupid in your eyes, but it is their right. If we really pride ourselves on freedom, that includes the freedom to be stupid.
First, Bill Gates probably has health insurance because if he is insured he can probably get the treatment through the insurance company cheaper than paying it out of his own pocket. But ah well, let's measure a proposal that is meant to be beneficial to the average person on the extreme cases.
You do realize that I am talking about the government providing the money for the health coverage with the money you and many other people paid as a tax, not a private company. In fact, you yourself and many many others are already doing just what you said by spending money on health insurance from HMOs, PPOs, POSs or whatever, private companies who take your money and maximize the profit margins by investing the money themselves and providing only the cheapest of treatments if they don't deny it outright.
and health care in the U.S. could certainly be better and more affordable.
Pick one, because you aren't going to get both. (Not that I share your gloom and doom opinion about the quality of health care in the United States.)
Question: Would you rather give the money you spend on health insurance to a private run for profit HMO or the same amount as a tax to the government?
This is too funny. You do realize that if health care becomes an entitlement, it's going to be run as an HMO. Services will be rationed. Just talk to Canadians about that.
So insomuch as you are taking choices away from me, I'll pass. Are you really arguing that a government run bureaucracy will be more efficient than those run by corporations?
National health care is good for those who are too lazy to get a job that provides a health care benefit. It's bad for everyone else.
Health service can be cheaper and better as proven by other countries.
There is no bureaucracy involved with universal health care! The government, unlike private HMOs, does not decide if you get a treatment or not or if it is payed by them or not. It is solely in the perception of your doctor. In a country with universal health care, such as the one I live in, if you get hurt or sick you go to a private doctor or a hospital. The doctor will assess your situation and schedule procedures and/or write you a prescription and/or will send you to or call in another doctor who is more specialized into the problem you have.
If you get a prescription for a medicine, you go to a pharmacy and give them the prescription. You pay a uniform prescription charge (currently about 5€ in Austria) and you get your medicine. People with low income, such as many old people, don't even have to pay that.
You don't have to call your insurance company or the government and still get your treatment from any hospital or doctor. The only bureaucracy that is there is between the hospital or doctor and government, which is in fact easier for the hospital than in America where the have to deal with dozens of HMOs and try to get the money back from them.
National health service here can not be denied and premiums you pay as a tax will not rise because you actually called on the service that you are granted. And of course, if America would have national health care, there wouldn't be a need for companies to provide health care benefits and you wouldn't need to look for it.
About the article you provided: I am not really sure about what to belief from that article since it is more than three years old and by an american newspaper. Anyways, the reason they give is Canada basically having outlawed private health care.
This is not what I mean. There can be a dual system where if you really want it also have an additional private health care provider, which is in fact the system here in Austria.
If you have enough money (Bill Gates) why would you even bother with health insurance and dealing with a company to get the care you need? With car insurance you have the option of having a policy or having a bond. You do not HAVE to have car insurance in the USA.
If it is up to the doctors to decide if you need an operation or not how do you keep costs down? If it is up to the doctor (who gets paid based on the care you need) what is to keep him from signing you up for services you do not need to line his pockets?
As for the government providing the money... Government does not generate money/income/etc. Government can only take as it does not produce anything. That money you are talking about is the people's money. So, why should I be forced to pay for your bad choices? If you decide to eat at Burger King for your three meals a day and become obese and require expensive medical care why should I be forced to support these bad choices of yours?
chaos99, you realize that the only reason health care is so cheap in your country is because we pay so much for it. The people in the US pay out the ass for health insurance because it is in the US that they are conducting all the pharmaceutical research. We pay for the research, then you get the rewards on the cheap. If all the drug companies were in your part of the world, things would be much different.
The cost is kept down because doctors aren't necessarily paid measured by the expenses of the operations they schedule and they are kept in check with the procedures they schedule by peers and superiors.
Why would you pay for things other people need? Because other people do the same. Because they would and do the same for you if you are in need. I can ask you the same question in the form of why you pay taxes that will be used for road construction in California but you live in New York.
@Scott: What the hell does pharmaceutical research to do with health care service. Pharma-companies make research to create a product and sell it. They aren't getting paid by the HMOs but by the people who by the medicine. In fact, pharma-companies will probably shadily pay doctors and hospitals to endorse the product and have more prescriptions for it given out. Oh, and pharmaceutical research is not just restricted to the U.S.
There is no bureaucracy involved with universal health care! The government, unlike private HMOs, does not decide if you get a treatment or not or if it is payed by them or not.
This is absolutely untrue. Every country that has national health care must ration that health care. Period. This is usually done by creating waiting times. The goal is to get people to opt out of services because it is a royal pain in the ass to get those services. Health care is also rationed by a government bureaucracy that decides what gets funding and what doesn't.
Are you now going to claim to know more than these experts? If you can't admit that there is rationing in countries with socialized medicine, then there is no point in debating you.
Yes there is rationing, because non-life threatening normally can wait a bit longer and there is a time and space limit on all of it and you can't tell me that you can get any treatment in any hospital in the U.S. at any time. I give you that Canada doesn't look like the best place for medicine, but it isn't the only place with socialized medicine.
Want to hear how socialized medicine works in Austria? About four years ago I broke my knee in physical education. I was brought to the hospital immediately and 30 minutes after my arrival my leg was scanned with an X-Ray and a doctor took a look at it and told me the situation. I had surgery two days later and three days after that I was back at home. I don't think that was too much of a waiting time, especially considering that the day before I had surgery another patient was flown in by helicopter from a nearby mountain after a skiing accident and he had almost split his humerus in half the long way and went under the knife immediately, at eight o'clock in the evening.
Yes there is rationing, because non-life threatening normally can wait a bit longer and there is a time and space limit on all of it and you can't tell me that you can get any treatment in any hospital in the U.S. at any time.
Not any hospital but, if you have the money you can get any surgery you want at any time you want it.
I have heard horror stories about organ transplants (under Universal Health Care) where, if you are too old, you can not get an organ transplant no matter what. Those people save their money and fly to America for the transplant.
I have heard horror stories about organ transplants (under Universal Health Care) where, if you are too old, you can not get an organ transplant no matter what.
That's the calculus of universal health care. If I have a limited number of organs, and more than that number of people who need them, I need a system to determine who will get the organ and who will die. There is no way currently to provide organs to all who need them, so a choice must be made.
One way of deciding is to give them to whomever has the most money. Another way is to give them to whomever has the highest chance of survival or the best possible prognosis.
The fact remains that you have to choose who will live and who will die. I don't think money is the best determiner, and I tend to err toward giving them to younger people with better chances.
To be fair, whether health care is socialized or not, there are never going to be enough organs to meet demand.
I'm a big proponent of providing disincentives so companies won't game the system in order to deny health care benefits. For example, some companies hire 2x temporary workers with no benefits to avoid hiring 1 full time worker with benefits.
One way of deciding is to give them to whomever has the most money.
I'm sure that's the most appealing solution to some. If you don't have the drive, energy, and sheer got-damn manliness to pull yourself up by your bootstraps (or maybe just be lucky at birth), and make a boatload of money, then you don't deserve an organ! In fact, if you don't live up to the ideals of a rootin'-tootin'-manifest destiny-believin'-rugged-individualist-cowboy-billionaire, then you simply have no place in our society and you deserve to get sick and die.
One way of deciding is to give them to whomever has the most money.
I'm sure that's the most appealing solution to some. If you don't have the drive, energy, and sheer got-damn manliness to pull yourself up by your bootstraps (or maybe just be lucky at birth), and make a boatload of money, then you don'tdeservean organ! In fact, if you don't live up to the ideals of a rootin'-tootin'-manifest destiny-believin'-rugged-individualist-cowboy-billionaire, then you simply have no place in our society and you deserve to get sick and die.
What if you set aside 10% of organs to those who "have the money"? Unless you are born wealthy having wealth is a sign of success, why do you consider that so wrong?
Because you can't store organs for long! Oh yeah, there is the solution to put rich people higher on the waiting list, but where do you draw the line. At what yearly income does a rich person become more entitled to a new liver than somebody who already spent let's say three years on the waiting list. At what income do you condemn the other guy who needs the organ to death? When does money overpower severity of condition? Don't you think thats a bit immoral?
Or maybe if we keep health care expensive for long enough, researchers will use that money to find a way to grow organs, and we won't have a shortage anymore.
Given that no supplier of health care has unlimited resources, keep in mind the inherent problem with socialized healthcare: There is no market choice.
Private health care is a competitive industry. This forces companies to offer products that are attractive to consumers. Sure, politicians need to get re-elected, but they are accountable to numerous issues, not just this one.
Unless you are born wealthy having wealth is a sign of success, why do you consider that so wrong?
That's right. If you have money then you must have worked hard for it, and you must be a good American. Yeee-Haw! It's not like anyone ever made any money by engaging in fraudulent, evil, deceptive practices. No, no.
Or maybe if we keep health care expensive for long enough, researchers will use that money to find a way to grow organs, and we won't have a shortage anymore.
Or maybe if we keep health care expensive for long enough, researchers will use that money to find a way to grow organs, and we won't have a shortage anymore.
Second time around: Just like with the pharma companies before, medical researchers get their money through the hospitals or research facilities that conduct the research and they are employed by. In case of hospitals the money is generated by the money patients pay for treatment or the HMOs pay for the patients. If the state replaces the HMO, there will be no difference for them.
When I am talking about less expensive health care I am not talking about cutting research fonds or giving hospitals necessarily less money, although private run hospitals also try to make profit of course, but about cutting out the middle man of an HMO that unnecessarily inflate the price of a treatment in order to reap profits.
Comments
We already have a series of health insurance taxes: Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security. Do we really need one more? Why should my wages be garnished to pay for something I do not want, use or need?
The free market will work if you let it. Price something too high and people will stop buying it.
@ HMTKSteve: Health Insurance is not about damage prevention as in your mother/father example, but for damage repair. Even your father will (hopefully) give you a band aid when you cut your finger.
Second, if some person doesn't want health insurance, I declare that person to be a moron. They are only human. Sometime in life they will get hurt and they will get sick and there is no way to tell when. I hope for them it will be nothing severe, but still.
That would be true, if every single person in the U.S. would be overweight which is thankfully not the case yet. Also severe, life threatening obesity is not yet the common case with the fat people. The need for health care doesn't dictate it's quality and health care in the U.S. could certainly be better and more affordable.
What if I decide that I hate insurance companies, and I want to boycott them? Instead of buying health insurance, I invest my money wisely. In the event of an expensive health problem, I use that investment. Instead of giving my health insurance premiums to some company to invest for themselves, I invest it for myself and make money instead of losing money. Apparently that is a moronic plan?
Even if a very poor and sickly person was offered very inexpensive health insurance, and they denied it, what's wrong with that? It may make them stupid in your eyes, but it is their right. If we really pride ourselves on freedom, that includes the freedom to be stupid.
You do realize that I am talking about the government providing the money for the health coverage with the money you and many other people paid as a tax, not a private company. In fact, you yourself and many many others are already doing just what you said by spending money on health insurance from HMOs, PPOs, POSs or whatever, private companies who take your money and maximize the profit margins by investing the money themselves and providing only the cheapest of treatments if they don't deny it outright.
So insomuch as you are taking choices away from me, I'll pass. Are you really arguing that a government run bureaucracy will be more efficient than those run by corporations?
National health care is good for those who are too lazy to get a job that provides a health care benefit. It's bad for everyone else.
There is no bureaucracy involved with universal health care! The government, unlike private HMOs, does not decide if you get a treatment or not or if it is payed by them or not. It is solely in the perception of your doctor. In a country with universal health care, such as the one I live in, if you get hurt or sick you go to a private doctor or a hospital. The doctor will assess your situation and schedule procedures and/or write you a prescription and/or will send you to or call in another doctor who is more specialized into the problem you have.
If you get a prescription for a medicine, you go to a pharmacy and give them the prescription. You pay a uniform prescription charge (currently about 5€ in Austria) and you get your medicine. People with low income, such as many old people, don't even have to pay that.
You don't have to call your insurance company or the government and still get your treatment from any hospital or doctor. The only bureaucracy that is there is between the hospital or doctor and government, which is in fact easier for the hospital than in America where the have to deal with dozens of HMOs and try to get the money back from them.
National health service here can not be denied and premiums you pay as a tax will not rise because you actually called on the service that you are granted. And of course, if America would have national health care, there wouldn't be a need for companies to provide health care benefits and you wouldn't need to look for it.
This is not what I mean. There can be a dual system where if you really want it also have an additional private health care provider, which is in fact the system here in Austria.
If it is up to the doctors to decide if you need an operation or not how do you keep costs down? If it is up to the doctor (who gets paid based on the care you need) what is to keep him from signing you up for services you do not need to line his pockets?
As for the government providing the money... Government does not generate money/income/etc. Government can only take as it does not produce anything. That money you are talking about is the people's money. So, why should I be forced to pay for your bad choices? If you decide to eat at Burger King for your three meals a day and become obese and require expensive medical care why should I be forced to support these bad choices of yours?
Why would you pay for things other people need? Because other people do the same. Because they would and do the same for you if you are in need. I can ask you the same question in the form of why you pay taxes that will be used for road construction in California but you live in New York.
@Scott: What the hell does pharmaceutical research to do with health care service. Pharma-companies make research to create a product and sell it. They aren't getting paid by the HMOs but by the people who by the medicine. In fact, pharma-companies will probably shadily pay doctors and hospitals to endorse the product and have more prescriptions for it given out. Oh, and pharmaceutical research is not just restricted to the U.S.
What happens when government creates shortages in order to ration health care? In Canada, 4-5 million Canadian's don't have a primary physician. In a country with 33 million people, that's pretty amazing.
But leave it to the experts who have determined that Americans have greater access to treatment for chronic health conditions than Canadians. Even more shocking is that the health-income gradient is slightly steeper in Canada than it is in the U.S.
Are you now going to claim to know more than these experts? If you can't admit that there is rationing in countries with socialized medicine, then there is no point in debating you.
Want to hear how socialized medicine works in Austria? About four years ago I broke my knee in physical education. I was brought to the hospital immediately and 30 minutes after my arrival my leg was scanned with an X-Ray and a doctor took a look at it and told me the situation. I had surgery two days later and three days after that I was back at home. I don't think that was too much of a waiting time, especially considering that the day before I had surgery another patient was flown in by helicopter from a nearby mountain after a skiing accident and he had almost split his humerus in half the long way and went under the knife immediately, at eight o'clock in the evening.
I have heard horror stories about organ transplants (under Universal Health Care) where, if you are too old, you can not get an organ transplant no matter what. Those people save their money and fly to America for the transplant.
One way of deciding is to give them to whomever has the most money. Another way is to give them to whomever has the highest chance of survival or the best possible prognosis.
The fact remains that you have to choose who will live and who will die. I don't think money is the best determiner, and I tend to err toward giving them to younger people with better chances.
I'm a big proponent of providing disincentives so companies won't game the system in order to deny health care benefits. For example, some companies hire 2x temporary workers with no benefits to avoid hiring 1 full time worker with benefits.
Oh yeah, there is the solution to put rich people higher on the waiting list, but where do you draw the line. At what yearly income does a rich person become more entitled to a new liver than somebody who already spent let's say three years on the waiting list. At what income do you condemn the other guy who needs the organ to death? When does money overpower severity of condition? Don't you think thats a bit immoral?
Private health care is a competitive industry. This forces companies to offer products that are attractive to consumers. Sure, politicians need to get re-elected, but they are accountable to numerous issues, not just this one.
Money = Virtue. Right? Right?
Problem (largely) solved.
When I am talking about less expensive health care I am not talking about cutting research fonds or giving hospitals necessarily less money, although private run hospitals also try to make profit of course, but about cutting out the middle man of an HMO that unnecessarily inflate the price of a treatment in order to reap profits.