Now I agree that healthcare in this country is in the shitter, but why change it just change it? Would it not make sense to actually make it better in the process, not throw everybody under the medicare umbrella? Do you really want the governement to decide what care you can and cannot get?
It is my opinion that the government’s job is to govern; every time it tries something that is beyond that scope it’s a colossal fuck up. The government cannot run businesses better than the businesses, because they don’t know how. They cannot run healthcare better because they don’t know how…But hell, let’s not let a lack of know-how stop them from doing it anyway.
Gubba-Mint healthcare has been tried no than once and everytime it always fails. I argee with you 100%. Less gubba-mint in healthcare would make things alot cheaper because it would less of a burden on tax payers.
The fantasy is that THE GOVERNMENT Is all-knowing, preternaturally competent, and fundamentally “fair” - every time someone around me says something like “the government” should “reorganize healthcare,” I politely ask them to replace “the government” in their language with “the department of motor vehicles,” and ask them it if still sounds as reasonable.
Yup, just go to the tag office and ask yourself if these are the type of folks you want deciding your coverage? Not only that, but with absolute power.
I know that there is going to have to be some governement involvement. I love the free market, but you have stooges who will not act honorably with anything including health care. But the gov. needs to do what it’s good at, make laws and enforce laws. Legislate to curb the abuse and let the market work.
And if you really want to scare the living shit out or pharmaceutical companies, allow foreign drug and equipment competition. Just saying it would have an immediate effect on prices. We don’t have this mandate on any other segment in the economy, why do drug companies get freedom from foreign competition why not do the same for toy makers?
[quote]pat wrote:
Yup, just go to the tag office and ask yourself if these are the type of folks you want deciding your coverage? Not only that, but with absolute power.
I know that there is going to have to be some governement involvement. I love the free market, but you have stooges who will not act honorably with anything including health care. But the gov. needs to do what it’s good at, make laws and enforce laws. Legislate to curb the abuse and let the market work.
And if you really want to scare the living shit out or pharmaceutical companies, allow foreign drug and equipment competition. Just saying it would have an immediate effect on prices. We don’t have this mandate on any other segment in the economy, why do drug companies get freedom from foreign competition why not do the same for toy makers?[/quote]
What, you think that patent protection applies only to pharmaceuticals?
And when the government creates burdens so severe that it costs a billion dollars to bring a new drug to market, what, a company is going to invest a billion so they can net $1 or $5 per bottle?
[quote]pat wrote:
Yup, just go to the tag office and ask yourself if these are the type of folks you want deciding your coverage? Not only that, but with absolute power.
I know that there is going to have to be some governement involvement. I love the free market, but you have stooges who will not act honorably with anything including health care. But the gov. needs to do what it’s good at, make laws and enforce laws. Legislate to curb the abuse and let the market work.
And if you really want to scare the living shit out or pharmaceutical companies, allow foreign drug and equipment competition. Just saying it would have an immediate effect on prices. We don’t have this mandate on any other segment in the economy, why do drug companies get freedom from foreign competition why not do the same for toy makers?[/quote]
More gov’t involvement looks great for the intelectually lazy. These people are uninterested in the cause of the problems they seek cures for. Most issues Americans have with heath care have been cuased by the gov’t intervention.
Health care was not alway so expensive. Choices were not always so restricive. The biggest problems with healt care can be broken down pretty easily and non of it has to do with not enough gov’t envolvement.
Mandated third party payer
Mandated insurance options
Mandated insurance offerings from employers
AMA - an enormous amount of power granted to an unelected body with an agenda.
Huge costs and risk to offer new drugs
Consumer not able to chose life saving drugs and treatments not approved by some uninvolved bureaucracy.
Activist courts and jurys unfairly punishing doctors and raising insurance rates
Edit : summary
restiction of supply (FDA,AMA,Overly burdensom law suites,limited insurance and care options) + increased demand (third party payer, mandatory insurance offerings) = high prices
Add high cost of doing business and it is very easy to see how we got to where we are.
[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
pat wrote:
Yup, just go to the tag office and ask yourself if these are the type of folks you want deciding your coverage? Not only that, but with absolute power.
I know that there is going to have to be some governement involvement. I love the free market, but you have stooges who will not act honorably with anything including health care. But the gov. needs to do what it’s good at, make laws and enforce laws. Legislate to curb the abuse and let the market work.
And if you really want to scare the living shit out or pharmaceutical companies, allow foreign drug and equipment competition. Just saying it would have an immediate effect on prices. We don’t have this mandate on any other segment in the economy, why do drug companies get freedom from foreign competition why not do the same for toy makers?
What, you think that patent protection applies only to pharmaceuticals?
And when the government creates burdens so severe that it costs a billion dollars to bring a new drug to market, what, a company is going to invest a billion so they can net $1 or $5 per bottle?
[/quote]
No, no not patent protection, protection from foreign competition.
The answer to the second question is they won’t, but a global market should male R&D cheaper too.
In any event, it beats the governement running it. I am willing to take suggestions. I don’t have all the answers. I know what we have can’t continue, I know obama’s way isn’t any better and in fact worse than what we have.
It isn’t about changing things just for the sake of changing them. We all know that something is broken. I’m sure just about everyone here has had an insurance company refuse to pay for something a doctor ordered because they don’t agree with the treatment. This has happened to me many times with blue cross blue shield.
I’m pretty well insured, yet still have paid out over $5k this year for relatively minor medical situations. I can’t imagine what would happen if god-forbid someone in my family get something serious. People with insurance go bankrupt everyday. This isn’t right when they are paying into a closed system in good faith.
I don’t think that handing health care to the government is the answer, but the medical insurance game needs drastically overhauled, and only the government can do that. Medical insurance is not as simple as car insurance, and making med insurance part of the free market will not magically fix things. I’m sure they’ll take a page from cell phone and cable companies and get to charge 20 separate fees a month that adds up to something outrageous. Will they have the cheaper “We’ll cover anything but cancer” package at a lower rate? I pity the person with the “minimum coverage” health insurance. It isn’t right to let them die or be in pain.
Abolishing the FDA, the war on drugs, mandated employer health care, and medicaid/medicare would resolve a lot of health care issues especially related to cost. Patents/copyrights should also be abolished so that good ideas will flourish in the market – this is key to competition.
It’s funny that so many liberals are quick to jump on the bandwagon when it comes to “freedom of choice” in matters concerning a womans womb but not in health care. As if limiting choices makes us better off in the long run.
[quote]borrek wrote:
I don’t think that handing health care to the government is the answer, but the medical insurance game needs drastically overhauled, and only the government can do that. Medical insurance is not as simple as car insurance, and making med insurance part of the free market will not magically fix things. I’m sure they’ll take a page from cell phone and cable companies and get to charge 20 separate fees a month that adds up to something outrageous. Will they have the cheaper “We’ll cover anything but cancer” package at a lower rate? I pity the person with the “minimum coverage” health insurance. It isn’t right to let them die or be in pain.
[/quote]
The problem here is that what you are calling insurance isn’t really insurance – it’s coverage.
Insurance should be used used for catastrophic events only. Routine health care needs to be covered separately to keep costs down. In fact regulation prevents this from happening in the market.
[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
borrek wrote:
I don’t think that handing health care to the government is the answer, but the medical insurance game needs drastically overhauled, and only the government can do that. Medical insurance is not as simple as car insurance, and making med insurance part of the free market will not magically fix things. I’m sure they’ll take a page from cell phone and cable companies and get to charge 20 separate fees a month that adds up to something outrageous. Will they have the cheaper “We’ll cover anything but cancer” package at a lower rate? I pity the person with the “minimum coverage” health insurance. It isn’t right to let them die or be in pain.
The problem here is that what you are calling insurance isn’t really insurance – it’s coverage.
Insurance should be used used for catastrophic events only. Routine health care needs to be covered separately to keep costs down. In fact regulation prevents this from happening in the market.[/quote]
Exactly right. I’d go further: routine health care should be paid out of pocket. This is how it was always done. That’s the only way a pricing system will evolve - which is the only way consumers can make informed decisions, the true cost of procedures will be known; and the only way prices will either come down - or, some procedures will simply be prohibitively high to be viable at present.
Whenever I’ve had to go without “health insurance,” I’ve been very careful to ask doctors/nurses how much this or that cost, so I could make an informed choice as to whether a procedure, test, whatever … was worth it. Guess what? No one - not even the administrators - had any idea “how much” anything was. Eventually, they could tell me - but what was obvious is that there was no market price signals of ANY sort.
When on “insurance” for one’s entire “health care,” everything seems “FREE” and there is no sense of the relative worth of anything << THAT is the problem.
Free indeed. May the new wave of ridiculous taxation begin!![/quote]
haha I actually think they might be on to something, provided the tax could go straight into health subsidies, and not used to patch budget holes.
Why not have a health tax on something like cigarettes, which we know without a doubt to cost every taxpayer money? If you want to smoke, that’s fine, just don’t expect everyone else’s costs to go up because you made that choice.
Free indeed. May the new wave of ridiculous taxation begin!!
haha I actually think they might be on to something, provided the tax could go straight into health subsidies, and not used to patch budget holes.
Why not have a health tax on something like cigarettes, which we know without a doubt to cost every taxpayer money? If you want to smoke, that’s fine, just don’t expect everyone else’s costs to go up because you made that choice.[/quote]
Dude theres a massive tobacco tax for this already. Congress crooks are now considering a big tax on soda for the same reasons but for obesity. However there are a lot of moderate “users” out there who will never get fat or in endangered health because of soda.
Free indeed. May the new wave of ridiculous taxation begin!!
haha I actually think they might be on to something, provided the tax could go straight into health subsidies, and not used to patch budget holes.
Why not have a health tax on something like cigarettes, which we know without a doubt to cost every taxpayer money? If you want to smoke, that’s fine, just don’t expect everyone else’s costs to go up because you made that choice.[/quote]
Or don’t force others to pay for their treatment.
According to the article this would about to a very small portion of the funds needed. This is going to lead to the ole gubament taxing anything they think is unhealthy. Eggs and red meat cause heart disease right? Tax that a bunch. Alcohol causes liver problems? Lets make a bottle of jack cost 200 bucks (most liquor cost is already tax same with cigarettes). This just in, McDonalds hamburger prices rise to 10 bucks for a single (if we apply the same logic to this as tobacco). What about taxing people based on BMI. A lot of healthy athletic people on this board would be screwed. Maybe they can tax cholesterol levels too? Blood pressure? Other risk factors?
In addition healthy people supposedly cost more in the long term anyway. Nursing home costs until your 90 are expensive. In other words, smokers and the â??unhealthyâ?? are already paying more than their fair share.
When you force others to pay for medical treatment everyoneâ??s life becomes everyone business. You are opening the door to all kind of ridiculous regulation of peopleâ??s personal life. This is fucking insane. Iâ??m becoming ashamed of being an American.
It is difficult to free fools from the chains they
revere
Voltaire [Francois-Marie Arouet]
I was looking for the quote that is along the lines of â??there is no one more oppressed than the slave that thinks heâ??s freeâ?? but I canâ??t find it. People still believe that we are a free countryâ?¦. Guess again.
[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
borrek wrote:
Why not have a health tax on something like cigarettes, which we know without a doubt to cost every taxpayer money?
???
How do you know everyone is affected by those people who choose to smoke?
People should only have to pay for what they use.
/thread[/quote]
They are paying for what they use. Cigarettes and eventually health care.
If the government would stop raiding the coffers of Social Security and Medicare, we probably would not be having this issue. It all boils down to government being to big to support and to many people getting entitlements they don’t deserve.
Free indeed. May the new wave of ridiculous taxation begin!!
haha I actually think they might be on to something, provided the tax could go straight into health subsidies, and not used to patch budget holes.
Why not have a health tax on something like cigarettes, which we know without a doubt to cost every taxpayer money? If you want to smoke, that’s fine, just don’t expect everyone else’s costs to go up because you made that choice.
Dude theres a massive tobacco tax for this already. Congress crooks are now considering a big tax on soda for the same reasons but for obesity. However there are a lot of moderate “users” out there who will never get fat or in endangered health because of soda. [/quote]
Yep. Mandate insurance coverage and then tax the hell out risk factors you mandated out. Makes perfect sense. If they would just stay the fuck out, people would be charged for what the used. Kind of like a good driver discount, increases for getting tickets, etc. Hmmmm what happens when you apply for a big fat life insurance policy. They check the risk factors and charge you accordingly. Oh wait, that’s not mandated or heavily regulated by the gov’t.