Here comes your socialized health care...sort of...

[unclemick]

Yep

The guy actually backed a 48 foot tractor down our suburban cul-de-sac. 2100 lbs in 75 lb boxes of Bellawood flooring - Australian Cypress. Had room in the truck - they could have tossed in a free kayak for the price - but they didn't.

Rats!

Heh heh heh - Do you think a Buddhist could relate this to MA Health insurance?

 

[kramer]

From the more thorough WSJ article (and I didn't see this point in any of the earlier links which is why I point it out). This clause, requiring payments for emergency care in some cases, seems like a massive new source of unpredictable liability for a small business.

In another provision that stirred unease among some businesses, the proposed law would require companies with 11 or more employees to provide health coverage or pay a per-employee annual fee of $295. In addition, employers whose uninsured workers make multiple use of emergency room care -- "free riders," in the bill's parlance -- would have to pay between 10% and 100% of the portion of those medical bills exceeding $50,000.

This might also incentivize discrimination against older, part-time workers in lower paying jobs.

Kramer

 

[laurence]

Does anyone here object, I mean seriously object, when a poster, me for instance, points out the obvious?

Tell me REWahoo is there the slightest danger of this thread being derailed if one were to look at the posts made so far.

Yes or No?

And where, pray tell, are these (imaginary) trolls?

Mike-1 is not easily dissuaded, it seems....

 

[wabmester]

The guy actually backed a 48 foot tractor down our suburban cul-de-sac. 2100 lbs in 75 lb boxes of Bellawood flooring - Australian Cypress.

Good choice!   Very pretty stuff.    But a 48-ft truck?   I just had them dump a pallet of maple flooring in the back of my F350.   Loading was the easy part.   My back still hurts from unloading that sucker.

To keep this thread on topic, I'd just like to say thank gawd for WalMart, Lumber Liquidators, and Exxon.    And who cares about universal health insurance?   Doctors still can't do a damn thing for me when I hurt my back carrying 2000lbs of flooring into the garage.    Just give me a good back-support belt and keep my taxes low.  

 

[sgeeeee]

It'll never work!  When has gov regulation ever solved a problem.

. . .

Well . . . government regulation solves a lot of problems. FDA does a lot to keep food and drugs safe, for example. It's not perfect. But without it, I don't know how we would be as well off. OSHA regulations have made the workplace safer for many workers. Again, there are inefficiencies, but the option is worse.

And in this case, you may not believe that gov regulation will solve the healthcare problem, but it should be clear that what we are doing now sure as he!! isn't working.

 

[lets-retire]

Socialized meidcine is not good. I've had it. It's called the military. They treat the symptoms until they go away. It was only when I became a civilian that many of the problems resulting from substandard treatment were corrected.

 

[sgeeeee]

Socialized meidcine is not good.  I've had it.  It's called the military.  They treat the symptoms until they go away.  It was only when I became a civilian that many of the problems resulting from substandard treatment were corrected.

You don't have to focus only on socialized medicine to find cases of ineffective and inadequate medical care.

 

[yakers]

You don't have to focus only on socialized medicine to find cases of ineffective and inadequate medical care.   

Like SG said, and in my life about the best medical care I've had was from Navy doctors. No time limits, worry about expensive tests and the like. Of course, being 25 helped a lot.

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

If you read through the info, it appears some funds are being put aside for both proactive health care and a big chunk to reduce obesity. So it seems it might be premature to slide this program, as its intended, into the "HMO role" of just fixing the symptoms when its too late. At least at this point...if and when the funding shortfalls, I'd expect the "good proactive" stuff to buy the farm first.

As far as the quality of service...the poor get none or pay through the nose for it when they get sick and have no coverage...even for those WITH insurance, unless you're picking your own doctors and paying for what the insurance companies wont...you're getting reactive symptom suppression whether you're in the military or not.

Socialization and government regulations arent my bag either, but its possible that health care falls into the same bucket as roads and schools. If you leave it to the market to resolve, the rich and well employed will continue to do well at the suffrage of the unemployed and lower class, with the middle class getting slowly squeezed. The hospitals arent going to solve the problem.

The insurance companies arent going to solve the problem. In fact, they're making the problem worse. A while ago I proposed that excessive overhead and paperwork were a considerable drag...this program seems to support that...IIRC they're looking for a $2.2B cost savings from paperwork efficiency against a $10B total program cost? Jeez Louise!

SG is right. Without some government controls we'd all be driving 10mpg cars. People arent smart enough to make good long term decisions and the companies that enable them sure as hell arent going to step in and fix that problem.

Now, let's talk about boobs or something...

It appears the boobs have already spoken.

Iraq, Walmart, Exxon and why america sucks are clearly right on topic and of course not designed to irritate. Like I said last week...it makes no sense to unload a gun when there are still good solid targets in view.

 

[Cool Dood]

If you read through the info, it appears some funds are being put aside for both proactive health care and a big chunk to reduce obesity.

Oh I get it, this is the first step to banning fast food. Smoking's been done, MA wants to beat CA, this looks kinda innocuous and "for the greater good," should be no objections to the first step.....

Like slowly boiling a frog. I guess that's the big problem with massive gov't stuff; not wasting a billion here or a billion there, not a few bozos who take a bit more out of a service than they're entitled to, but the way the gov't has at least a third of the population so tightly by the balls that they can gradually introduce anything they want, and not only will people let it slide, there'll be enough support for whatever good intentions they faked that most people will just thank the gov't for taking their money and blowing it, or restricting their freedoms, and anyone who doesn't go along is a "right-wing nut job"....

Really it's a lot like an advance fee fraud -- especially when the victims go looking around for other people to project the blame onto than the perpetrator of the fraud.

Oh well, it's not my MA...

 

[unclemick]

Hmmm

Bernstein postulated (Birth of Plenty) - it took King's need to finance wars via bonds to get 'free capital markets' really to rock.

The central difficulty to craft a health plan to reward 'good preventitive health practices' is still elusive. Other than the extent to which healthy individuals can comparison shop for rates.

To us true believers in Deming's Red Bead Experiment:

MA lastest shot at a solution will come down to red beads, white beads and the law of unintended consequences.

We'll know when we know - may take some time.

Out shopping - rates in MO beat LA - so I actually bought $5000 deductible BC/BS at the ripe old age of 62.

heh heh heh

 

[setab]

Martha,

I love Minnesota. When we used to live there, my wife and I always said we would move back there someday. However, it's gotten too expensive and it is definitely too cold in the winter. Plus, the older I get, the less I can think about moving again. So, great services or not, I think we will just visit, especially during walleye season!

setab

 

[lets-retire]

sgeeeee--You're absolutely correct. However, if the doctor I go to in the civilian sector proves to be an idiot, I can choose to go to a different one and the insurance still pays. In the military you are pretty much stuck with whoever they give you. You can go to a civilian doc, but unless the military referred you it comes out of your pocket.

 

[Eagle43]

I think all of y'all should move to MA. Take advantage of that free guvmint health coverage!

 

[Martha]

You guys that don't support a national healthcare system or more regulation of the insurance market, what do you propose?

Do you think things are fine the way they are?

Are you concerned about healthcare for the poor? If so, how would you provide the care?

What about those who are uninsurable? How would you address that problem?

 

[MasterBlaster]

Martha:

Let me turn it around...


How much of the relatively high quality/high access health care are YOU willing to give up so that others may have care ?

 

[Cool Dood]

You guys that don't support a national healthcare system or more regulation of the insurance market, what do you propose?

I don't have all the answers, but living under a healthcare system that's about as broken as one can be, I think pretty much anything else is at least less bad.

Do you think things are fine the way they are?

No, but I think it's misplacing the blame to believe the U.S. system needs more government involvement.

Are you concerned about healthcare for the poor? If so, how would you provide the care?

Yes. That seems to me what one of the useful purposes of government is. I don't think most free marketeers object to government providing services and products to the poor, for which everyone else pays individually. I support providing food and shelter and others to the poor free of charge, but that doesn't mean I think it's a good idea to make all farming, supermarkets, construction, and so on, produced and consumed solely through a socialized monopoly. That's kind of insane, and I think it's just as insane to do that with medicine, which surely is as important as food and shelter.

What about those who are uninsurable? How would you address that problem?

Well, somebody who can't get the money or the financing for a residence still needs shelter, and qualifies for government assistance. Wouldn't being uninsurable be one usable benchmark for whether someone qualifies for government healthcare?


You asked a bunch of questions, now can I ask one? Why is it so shocking and unthinkable that some people should advocate a free market in health care? I'd imagine most people have no similar problem with free markets that exist in so many other areas of life, for things that are more important than health care, less important, equally important, similar in a thousand ways, different in a thousand ways, etc. Many, like food, are also matters of life and death. So why is healthcare alone sacrosanct? Just curious...

 

[Martha]

Martha:

Let me turn it around...


How much of the relatively high quality/high access health care are YOU willing to give up so that others may have care ?

I asked first.

I am not sure I have to give anything up. Money? I am ok with some more tax dollars going to healthcare. Waiting periods for certain procedures that don't have serious consequences? OK. I can have my bunions fixed later. Given the amounts we spend as compared to other countries, I think we could do this without costing us a lot more.

 

[MasterBlaster]

The way I look at it is that yes we can trade downward in quality and immediate access to get much better universal coverage.

Maybe that's what we should move to however everyone should know and understand the issue(s) before we jump into something.

For most people that have coverage now that's a very hard thing to sell.

 

[Martha]

Cool Dood, I am not quite sure where you are coming from. Are you suggesting subsidized healthcare for the poor and uninsurable? If so, I can live with that. I wouldn't be thrilled because subsidies are subject to whims of whatever government is currently in power. This is what Minnesota does and our Republican governor keeps trying to make cuts. The federal and state governments have cut back medicaid. You don't get coverage just because you are poor. Subsidies are not popular right now.

I would prefer to have everyone in the same boat. But my grandfather was a communist.

 

[Brat]

The real problem is that the cost of treatment of the uninsured is shifted to the insured or paying patients.  Hospitals aren't permitted to wheel the patient to the door when they can't pay, and govt isn't paying for the cost of care.  

Goes back to my plan for basic health insurance for all and if someone wants more coverage they can buy a higher level of coverage.

 

[Martha]

The way I look at it is that yes we can trade downward in quality and immediate access to get much better universal coverage.

Maybe that's what we should move to however everyone should know and understand the issue(s) before we jump into something.

For most people that have coverage now that's a very hard thing to sell.

I have seen nothing to indicate to me that quality would suffer. How about us educating more doctors and nurses?

It isn't a hard sell to me in any event and I am concerned a lot of the hard sell is not based on fact but supposition.

 

[MasterBlaster]

Well I'm not going to get in a point-by point debate on healthcare... So this is my last post on this matter (at least today)

Yes we could trade all that hospital duplicate effort, insuarance company burden, for a single-payer more efficient system that would insure everybody.

However that efficient system may require people to wait to get that cat-scan or that bypass surgery because that efficient system doesn't have much slack in it.

And then just maybe they'll say that for certain chronic cases or advanced illness cases that they'll limit how much of a burden they can put on the system's overall efficiency.

To suggest that there will not be trade-offs is not realistic.

 

[Cool Dood]

For what it's worth, if you take a broader view then even in Canada not all parts of the healthcare system are socialized, and in general there's no problem with the parts that aren't: there are no waiting lines for medical equipment produced by Canadian companies; there are no shortages of food and freely exchanged health items (e.g. herbs), which can be bought cheaply and universally across the country (food is one of the most essential aspects of anybody's health -- should we nationalize that, too?). It's only the stuff that's done through the government where everything costs too much, is unavailable, and generally operates the way they do things in North Korea.

Cool Dood, I am not quite sure where you are coming from. Are you suggesting subsidized healthcare for the poor and uninsurable? If so, I can live with that.

Well, yes, I think any civilized country should ensure that all of its citizens have access to basic life necessities.

I wouldn't be thrilled because subsidies are subject to whims of whatever government is currently in power. This is what Minnesota does and our Republican governor keeps trying to make cuts. The federal and state governments have cut back medicaid. You don't get coverage just because you are poor. Subsidies are not popular right now.

But then surely you wouldn't want to apply 100% subsidies to everyone and turn the whole system into something that's subject to the whim of a single provider? That's one of the benefits of everyone paying individually to individual providers (or insurers) instead of paying into one huge pot that pays one huge decision maker: if a provider in a multi-provider system makes dumb cuts that you think are idiotic, you can move to a different provider; in a free market, new providers can make a profit by providing service in a way you want more than some other provider.

There won't be a perfect solution for those who are too poor to cover their own expenses, and converting everybody else to the subsidy system is not something that will change that -- it will just subject millions more people to the whims of stupid politicians.

I would prefer to have everyone in the same boat. But my grandfather was a communist.

And I can sympathize with that feeling -- I think inside we all have at least a little bit of a communist, but good intentions don't necessarily make good policy...

 

[Martha]

Well I'm not going to get in a point-by point debate on healthcare... So this is my last post on this matter (at least today)

Yes we could trade all that hospital duplicate effort, insuarance company burden, for a single-payer more efficient system that would insure everybody.

However that efficient system may require people to wait to get that cat-scan or that bypass surgery because that efficient system doesn't have much slack in it.

And then just maybe they'll say that for certain chronic cases or advanced illness cases that they'll limit how much of a burden they can put on the system's overall efficiency.

To suggest that there will not be trade-offs is not realistic.

Yes, both you and I have gone through this debate before and it is hypothetical so we can't reach a conclusion. So if you agree to a system of subsidies so that everyone gets insurance, I'll agree to that as a compromise.