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This is a front-burner topic in the U.S. and we've been dealing with it in our own household, where we have to pay full costs for health insurance. For those who aren't familiar with fees for 50-somethings like my wife and I, you can expect to shell out around $6,000 a year for high-deductible, HSA-qualified policies while a good, medium-deductible policy can easily cost $8,000 -- and that's if you're healthy! Granted, employees in a group policy pay less, but that's because their employers are pitching in.
There's an estimated 46 million uninsured people in the U.S., but this figure is misleading. Almost half of these are young adults who don't see the need for it; many others are illegal immigrants; others are between jobs and insurance policies. Still, there are many who just can't afford health insurance and don't qualify for Medicare or Medicaid. You can find good info on this topic at the National Coalition for Health Care. - http://www.nchc.org/ A UK newspaper has also recently published a scathing critique of U.S. health care. Apparently, the UK has been a bit peeved at how their system has been portrayed by some on the Right. - http://www.independent.co.uk/n...lthcare-1772580.html
So, what's to be done? It's a complicated issue, I know. Later . . . |
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Phil,
Will I get in trouble if I throw a little humor in the mix here? Gail The American Medical Association has weighed in on the new health care proposals. The Allergists voted to scratch it, but the Dermatologists advised not to make any rash moves. The Gastroenterologists had sort of a gut feeling about it, but the Neurologists thought the Administration had a lot of nerve. The Obstetricians felt they were all laboring under a misconception.. Ophthalmologists considered the idea shortsighted. Pathologists yelled, "Over my dead body!" while the Pediatricians said, "Oh, Grow up!" The Psychiatrists thought the whole idea was madness, while the Radiologists could see right through it. Surgeons decided to wash their hands of the whole thing. The Internists thought it was a bitter pill to swallow, and the Plastic Surgeons said, "This puts a whole new face on the matter...." The Podiatrists thought it was a step forward, but the Urologists were pissed off at the whole idea. The Anesthesiologists thought the whole idea was a gas, and the Cardiologists didn't have the heart to say no. In the end, the Proctologists won out, leaving the entire decision up to the ******** in Washington . |
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Hey gail, no problem. Actually, the sad thing is that I didn't know it was a joke as it sounded so much like what's really happening in Washington these days.
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So here's my plan:
Expand Medicare so it includes everyone -- the U.S. government thus becomes our major medical provider. Raise the Medicare tax on paychecks to pay for it. Let the insurance companies back off of major medical coverage, which they don't like paying for anyway, and provide "supplemental" insurance, as they already do for Medicare recipients. If they want to sell major medical coverage, too, fine -- I'm sure some people would buy it and some hospitals would honor it. Letting Medicare be the primary major medical provider would allow the government to set limits on those costs, which have sky-rocketed, driving up private insurance premiums. Medicare already sets limits on what they will pay, but hospitals and other providers pass on the additional cost burden to private insurance holders. That would come to an end if private insurance holders were in the minority. Of course, none of this is really possible without Tort reform, as malpractice lawsuits have also driven up health care costs. That's a whole other topic, however. |
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I totally agree, that is the simplest plan. And that would give Medicare the clout to negotiate, forcing costs down. As it is, the USA is paying an astonishing amount for health care/health insurance. And the American people are NOT getting a reasonable return. As a percentage of the GDP, US health care/health insurance has been steadily rising, and this bleeding of America is simplynot sustainable. An unseemly portion of that ends up as "profit" -- while tens of millions are effectively denied reasonable health care plans. -- HeartPrayer |
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Yeah, it really shouldn't be that complicated if Medicare is expanded to include everyone. Of course, that would mean politicians would have to stand up to strong lobbying from the insurance industry. Private insurance could still make money with Medicare for all, however, and control their payouts a lot more as well.
This one is really up to the Democrats. They have their man as President and control both houses, even with a filibuster-proof Senate. So what's the problem? |
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Take a look at this ad being promoted by moveon.org
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...ture=player_embedded It's a perfect example of how the Left views capitalism and the role of government. Note how all the insurance companies are supposedly in cahoots, not in the least interested in competing with each other (wonder why they have so many ads on TV?). What to do break the gridlock? The government, which is always the answer to our problems. Yessirree, government health care promises to be so good and so affordable as to set the standard for the fat, lazy, private sector companies. Without the government as a competing player in the economy, things just don't work right. So, what's wrong with this scenario? Think about it. |
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It seems the House bill contains a provision that mandates funding for abortions be provided by those who enroll in the government "public option" plan.
- see http://republicanleader.house.gov/blog/?p=666 That part needs to be changed. |
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O, Phil, Yes, yes and amen... The whole stinking bill needs changing. Geesh, what is the rush? Thank's for posting your pov and different links. |
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It seems an amendment sponsored by Democrats and supported by Republicans wiped out the abortion provision, which is a good thing. Now the Left is clamoring that the amended bill is practically worthless.
Of course, the House bill is doa in the Senate. I only hope that, in the end, they manage to come up with at least something helpful, but I have my doubts. I think this will probably end up like the comprehensive immigration policies the Bush admin. tried to push through a few years ago -- dead in the water, with not even any incremental improvements. |
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I'm not in favor of government spending being the solution to every problem, either.
At the same time, it seems odd to me that such a wealthy country should have so many who get left out when it comes to healthcare. About 20% of U.S. households have annual incomes of under $20,000: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H...in_the_United_States I can't imagine that many of those are in the market for an $8,000-per-annum insurance policy. |
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Now this:
- http://www.rasmussenreports.co...9/health_care_reform Seems only 38% of the public favor what they're hearing about the various health care bills coming down the pike. That bodes ill for health care reform, as Democrats eyeing 2010 elections aren't likely to stick their necks out too far. Would that they could break it up into pieces and pass some of the most common-sense pieces. My fear is that, in the end, this whole thing will go the way immigration reform went a couple of years ago: nowhere! |
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So something is about to crack open, one way or another, and it seems that abortion is the sticking point. Why? The House could easily pass the Senate bill then work out some of the bugs later, but there are enough pro-life Democrats to prevent passage of the Senate bill, which provides for federal funding of abortion. As the Senate bill cannot be amended by the House before passage, the Dems are facing the prospect of failing in this round of healthcare reform because of their general pro-choice tendencies. The sad thing is that U.S. citizens are the losers, here, as we really do need health care reform, and there's much in the Senate bill worth recommending.
- see http://blogcritics.org/politic...-relies-on-abortion/ for more info. - also: http://newsbusters.org/blogs/t...n-coverage-its-there |
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This Wall Street Journal article provides an excellent summary of the dilemma facing Nancy Pelosi and House Democrats.
- http://online.wsj.com/article/...113292688090292.html |
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Bart Stupak is a pro-life Democrat Representative from Michigan who pulled together a coalition of 12 House Democrats to insure that abortion funding was struck from the House bill on health care reform last summer. As the Democrats did not have the votes without this coalition, they caved and struck the language from the bill.
As mentioned above, the Senate bill provides for abortion funding, and the House is under great pressure by Obama to approve the Senate bill. Stupak is resisting because of the abortion provisions, but is finding it difficult this time to gain a hearing. It seems that a number of his pro-life Democrat colleagues have indicated they'll sign on, leaving Stupak and a few others under great pressure to go along. Listen to what he says now about what's become of the Democrat Party.
- http://corner.nationalreview.c...ZjYzYmE3Y2ZlZDQ5NTY= |
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Health care "reform" as proposed by the Democrats is little better than a scam. It doesn't reform. It merely takes control over the industry. This is particularly ironic (and dishonest) because it is government control, government mandates, and government-insurance company collusion (as opposed to free and open competition) in the first place that have lead to the rising costs. Making health care a "right" does nothing to reduce the costs, nor will access be materially increased. (You can't get something for nothing, a conservative timeless truth. There will be rationing of this "free" health care.) Giving it over to government can only increase costs, and is the record of every other government program. Obama is being blatantly dishonest when he says it will reduce costs by half a trillion. As Thomas Sowell succinctly says "It's not about care. It's about control."
If this health care "reform" does little to reform anything, then what is it about? It is about nothing less than fundamentally changing the relationship between citizens and the state. If we socialize medicine, then we change from free citizens to a type of indentured servant. Again, they actually have bureaucrats in Britain going through people's refrigerators taking note of what they eat. When the government provides "free" health care, then anything that effects the costs will be brought to the level of government policy. They own your body and your every choice. And if health care can be "transformed" by this current crop of Marxist-socialists, what is next? Why not take over the entire food production industry since there are undoubtedly some people who go hungry in this country? If the only standard of what the government should take over and run is the fact that life is imperfect, then welcome to 1984. They will want to run everything. Their excuse will be the self-serving delusion that they can run it better than private industry, which has never, eve been shown to be the case. And they improve nothing. They will turn everything into a low level gray of mediocrity. The only way to save costs when you make something "free" is to restrict access to it. Mark Steyn was talking about this subject this morning. There was a case in Canada where someone sued the government because they couldn't get treatment. The courts ruled that being on a list was all that you had a "right" to. Getting actual care was something else. Free market solutions are the remedy for the problems that ail us, as well as tort reform. None of this is offered in the Democrat's bill. This is a scam. It's meant to make us all consumers of government. This will indeed fundamentally change who we are as a people. We will become sheep. We are becoming sheep even now. |
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Brad, I don't follow. It's not reform, but it takes over the industry? That's surely reform, of a sorts. Note in my comments above that I don't really have a problem with a national Medicare-like program that we all pay for, as we do social security and lots of other programs. The plain fact is that, problems notwithstanding, seniors LOVE Medicare and rise up in arms every time they hear that it might be cut. We're talking conservative seniors, Republican seniors, Democrat seniors, liberal seniors, etc. It's not perfect, but it's generally considered a well-run program. I agree with your point, in general, that if something can be done in the private sector, it's better to do it there than in the public. But the private sector hasn't been such a great success story when it comes to health care. A Blue Cross policy we signed onto in August 09 has increased its monthly fee to us 27%, starting in April, and with a larger deductible. That's pathetic. Furthermore, they stated they might have to raise rates again, despite reporting record profits in 2009. Something's got to give. We pay almost twice as much for our healthcare (as percentage of GDP) in the U.S. as most western countries. What's with that? Government-run programs aren't always a disaster, and a citizenry opting for government to do something to meet a need doesn't imply a movement to Marxism. We don't consider the government socialistic because they run the military, build highways, staff our police forces, train firefighters, operate schools, and provide Social Security. Maybe the private sector could do all these things better, but that wouldn't necessarily entail the removal of these services from political influence. It can get pretty dicey bidding for government contracts; the lobbying efforts alone are disruptive of good governance, and I note that many conservatives and Republicans (no longer the same thing) oppose restrictions on lobbying in the name of "free speech." This is all complicated, but from where I sit, I'm not seeing the present bill as a move toward socialism, nor, less, the angel of death for insurance companies. They're providing supplementary policies for seniors with Medicare and are, presumably, making money at it. They'll adapt to whatever Washington does . . . if Washington can decide what it wants to do . . . and actually does it. |
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I heard Rush discuss this topic once. You would certainly think that if the government runs healthcare that you can't sue the government. But apparently the trial lawyers are very much for this health care take-over by the Democrats.
The plain fact is that Medicare isn't paying for itself. It's losing money and by some estimates will be bankrupt within a decade. There are similar realistic forecasts for the unsustainable entitlement of Social Security. It too is in deep trouble. Medicare's deficit is made up by passing those unpaid costs onto the premiums paid by others in private insurance. What the Democrats want to do is make everything a Medicare. That's not going to work because it's not working now. We'd have to take money from Martians or something. As Margaret Thatcher said, "The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money." And, Phil, whatever is being done now is done with the mind for government to be the only and single ensurer. That is the goal of the left. It really doesn't matter if it looks like this is something that just does insurance a bit differently. There's are several reasons that health care costs have gone up. One is that we actually have the best health care in the world, and that costs money. The other is that state and Federal governments have added so many mandates to health care coverage. It used to be that you could buy a bare-bones "catastrophic" coverage where you pay for sprained ankles and the flu while the insurance would pay for major stuff. You could buy that for, say, $150 or so. But now government has added so many other minimal requirements that starting insurance is at least $500 a month. And this situation is exacerbated because in many states (most states) you're not allowed to buy from all the insurance companies out there. This restricts competition and is yet another thing that adds to the cost. In some states you can choose from only 3 companies.
No, not all things are a disaster, but most are when it tries to do something best left to the private sector. But Social Security is surely socialistic. And it's authoritarian. You have no choice but to pay into it even though you would almost certainly do better investing elsewhere. And those (like me) who are paying into it now will likely not see much of that at all. The numbers just don't add up. Social Security apparently was not meant to be a retirement program for America. It was meant to avoid absolute destitution because of old age. But it has gone way past that and no longer is a sustainable program. And now we have the government wanting to take over health care? I think it's just crazy for it to do so. And malignant. When existing entitlement programs are imploding they want to add another? |
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Lobbying is most certainly free speech. We're all a special interest of one variety of another. There's a small business lobby group that helps me. There are those that help farmers. I wouldn't doubt that many church groups have people looking out for their interests in Congress. There are many who want to take the separation of church and state thing WAY too far, and they are right to make sure that religious liberty is protected. Where it gets dicey is when there is nearly quid pro quo. A lot of attempts at campaign finance reform have been attempted and many, such as McCain-Feingold, have actually made things worse. I think it was in George Will's book "Restoration" (which is all about the benefits of term limits in regards to breaking up the cancer of career politicians and the network of quid pro quo) where he points out that after the passage of McCain-Feingold that incumbency retention rates went up. It reformed nothing. All it did was give the career politicians more influence. And any law the restricts speech will just tend to give someone else (like our dishonest Pravda-like mainstream media) an advantage. It's a difficult and big subject, but I most certainly do think lobbying is free speech. The remedies needed are: 1) Term limit amendment to the Constitution. 2) Balanced budget amendment to the Constitution (some prefer limiting Federal spending to a percentage of the GDP, but why not have both?) Note that both of the above are additional limits on government which fits right in with the general conception the Founding Fathers had. We are entitling ourselves to death. Look at the State of California or, (worse yet in terms of debt per capita) our pathetic State of Washington. These people just can't and won't say "no" to more and more entitlements and spending. |
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Here's a pretty good article by Obama's second cousin, of all people, for some of the health care reforms that are actually needed:
Obama family health care fracas by Dr. Milton R. Wolf |
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Right, and that's because the Medicare tax hasn't increased in years even though the demographics have changed dramatically. If you add more health care consumers to the program without increasing its funding, well, it eventually runs out of money.
I don't doubt that the Left wants socialized medicine, but that's not what the current bill is. The Left couldn't pass that agenda, and they might not even be able to get a bill through that provides funding for abortion. Yes, there are many factors contributing to the rise in health care. - see http://archive.ahrq.gov/news/ulp/costs/ulpcosts.htm for a good summary of the reasons why. It's not all about government, socialism, Democrats, the Left, etc. It's complicated. |
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For their $7,290, Americans get a life expectancy of 78 years. For only $2,992, the British get a life expectancy of 80 years. Good value for money! |
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Derek, what's your opinion/experience with the Canadian health care system?
Last year, my in-laws treated the family to a cruise to Nova Scotia, and I talked to one of our excursion guides for awhile about health care. She was very pleased with the system, stating that she'd had no trouble seeing doctors, having tests run, and even scheduling a major surgery. Her sense was that most Canadians were happy with their system. |
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I haven't been to see a doctor for years, but any time I have gone, I've had no trouble getting an appointment.
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Derek!!! Get your annual physical exam, please?
 - - - Here's a summary of what's in the current bill. - http://www.examiner.com/x-5738...lth-care-reform-bill |
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