American Healthcare: a Hostage Crisis that's Killing our Economy

[dblack]

well, it often represents the will of the majority. but when the majority wants something that abuses the minority, that's where the high Court steps in. (well assuming someone starts a case...which they usually do). the right's problem is it doesn't like when the court rules.... unless of course, it enables right-wingers.

Readers note: a behavior is not a "legal minority"..

We're not talking about "legal" minorities. We're talking about actual minorities, i.e. people who don't agree with the will of the majority.

. All depends on the reason for disagreeing with the majority or the minority as to weather the nation should agree or not with either group no matter how large or small it is.

How should government decide which reasons are valid?

 

[Silhouette]

well, it often represents the will of the majority. but when the majority wants something that abuses the minority, that's where the high Court steps in. (well assuming someone starts a case...which they usually do). the right's problem is it doesn't like when the court rules.... unless of course, it enables right-wingers.

Readers note: a behavior is not a "legal minority"..

We're not talking about "legal" minorities. We're talking about actual minorities, i.e. people who don't agree with the will of the majority.

.

All depends on the reason for disagreeing with the majority or the minority as to weather the nation should agree or not with either group no matter how large or small it is.

How should government decide which reasons are valid?

Well a starting point might be whether or not we accept that the penal codes in every state exist as a tool of the majority to regulate behavior. Because if they do, then the 14th Amendment demands that all behaviors in minority that the majority find repugnant may have a chance to overthrow the majority.

And that my friends, ushers in a whole rat's nest of litigation nightmares we have only begun to see the insanity of.. "Transgender bathrooms" "Teaching anal sex as good in elementary schools" "Banning reparative therapy (banning free speech between a patient and his therapist)" etc. etc. etc. Polygamy will be next....well...according to the true interpretation of the 14th Amendment, polygamy is already legal. The 14th doesn't play "special repugnant sexual lifestyle...but not others..." favorites..

 

[Cecilie1200]

Did you not write: "Basically giving the insurance companies everything they get with ACA with nothing in return."

And my response was to show you how the insurance companies are NOT happy with ACA even though you wrote the above???

Still not sure how it relates to my post. My point was that Cruz, the rest of the Republicans, and the Democrats with the exception of Sanders, have no intention of making any meaningful changes to health care policy.

That is completely untrue. They don't intend to make any changes that you LIKE, perhaps, but that's not the same as "no meaningful changes". There is no reason whatsoever to believe that Cruz, for example, will not make every effort to keep his campaign promises, and one of his major promises is a repeal of Obamacare and institution of a free-market healthcare system. Again, it might not be what you like or want, but no one can say that that isn't "meaningful change".

No, I've read his proposals, and they don't make any meaningful changes. They "replace" the individual mandate with tax incentives. That's the same thing with a different name. The only meaningful change Cruz intends to make is getting rid of guarantee issue which is fine in-and-of itself (it's an irrational requirement). But guarantee issue is the justification for the mandate/tax-incentives. Without, there's no reason to gift the insurance industry with mandated customers.

Yeah, um . . . tax incentives are NOT the same thing as a mandate.

That would be the source of our disagreement then. Functionally, and financially, they are exactly the same thing. One just sounds better because it's framed as a 'discount'. But when you think it through, the net result is the same - people who don't do as they're told pay more in taxes.

No, they aren't "functionally and financially exactly the same thing". I can name one extremely major difference between the two: a mandate, by definition, is MANDATORY. A tax incentive, by definition, is not.

I think being voluntary and allowing free choice does a lot more than just "sound better", but maybe that's just me. But maybe if you just start from the assumption that the government has a right to your money whenever and however, then I'm probably not going to be able to make you understand.

Look at it this way: one gets tax incentives to own a home by way of mortgage tax deductions. Would you see that as different from a mandate that everyone MUST purchase a home or be penalized?

 

[Cecilie1200]

So let's take a look at what "insurance" is. Definition of any insurance is: a practice or arrangement by which a company or government agency provides a guarantee of compensation for specified loss, damage, illness, or death in return for payment of a premium.

How does a company determine the premium? Risk analysis done by professionals called "Actuaries".
So a $100,000 20 year term life insurance for a 40 year old smoker is $30.00 For a 49 year old: $60.00
Non-smoker: age 40 $15/month Age 49.. $25/month.
IT IS CALLED RISK ANALYSIS and what I've shown you is a very simple illustration of smoking as a health risk raises premiums.

So does that make sense that just a simple issue like smoking nearly doubles the cost as the "actuaries" having looked at the history of paying benefits
shows more deaths for a smoker versus non smoker.

Obviously for something more complicated as the above illustration takes IN considerably MORE risk variables...including what specialists were in the area of the woman's back issues. But of course grossly ignorant people don't comprehend these variables and bitch and moan when the simplest solution is
TORT reform would reduce dramatically health claim costs which in turn would reduce premiums.
PLUS ignorant people don't seem to understand health insurance premiums are regulated by states. All companies have to justify what is called the
Medical Loss Ratio (MLR) which is the percent of premium an insurer spends on claims and expenses . So if the $850 Billion a year in "defensive medicine" costs is reduced by 2t0% this $170 billion in savings would mean lower premiums. That simple.
Proof this would work is the 1946 Federal Tort Act that prevents doctors under contract with federal government can't be sued. Therefore those doctors
don't practice "defensive medicine" i.e. ordering duplicate tests,etc...
Do the same Tort reform for non-federal physicians would save billions of phony claims that the insurance companies simply pay.

. I say let's cut out the middle man, and lets create a government non-profit pool of Americans that is so large, that what ever an Americans healthcare need is, that it will be taken care of...

No more worrying about private insurance having profits on their minds in which creates winners and losers, and in which causes the constant problems of who gets accepted, who gets better treated with quality care, or who is taken care of better, verses who gets poorly treated in the situation, and even mistreated because they don't have enough to pay for the quality of care that the next human being has in such a volital life and imperfect world.... And what all because of less money and/or the lack there of in ones life at any given time (on the roller coaster ride of life) that determines ones value over another in life ??

But that's not cutting out the middle man. It's replacing the middle man with government.

. If the government is of we the people, for the people and by the people, then it is not the middle man, but a mere extension of us.

we elect people. they vote for things. if you don't like that, vote for different people.

and we the people voted for this president twice.

i'll also point out that the government for and by the people was set up to exclude most potential voters.

The idea that government, even in a pure democracy, represents the will of the people is false. It represents the will of the majority. Which all too often will happily trample all over the will of the minority.

More to the point, when you have the government trying to replace personal responsibility with collective nannyism, you know the government has long since left that "by the people" crap in the dust, and become a completely separate entity.

 

[dblack]

Still not sure how it relates to my post. My point was that Cruz, the rest of the Republicans, and the Democrats with the exception of Sanders, have no intention of making any meaningful changes to health care policy.

That is completely untrue. They don't intend to make any changes that you LIKE, perhaps, but that's not the same as "no meaningful changes". There is no reason whatsoever to believe that Cruz, for example, will not make every effort to keep his campaign promises, and one of his major promises is a repeal of Obamacare and institution of a free-market healthcare system. Again, it might not be what you like or want, but no one can say that that isn't "meaningful change".

No, I've read his proposals, and they don't make any meaningful changes. They "replace" the individual mandate with tax incentives. That's the same thing with a different name. The only meaningful change Cruz intends to make is getting rid of guarantee issue which is fine in-and-of itself (it's an irrational requirement). But guarantee issue is the justification for the mandate/tax-incentives. Without, there's no reason to gift the insurance industry with mandated customers.

Yeah, um . . . tax incentives are NOT the same thing as a mandate.

That would be the source of our disagreement then. Functionally, and financially, they are exactly the same thing. One just sounds better because it's framed as a 'discount'. But when you think it through, the net result is the same - people who don't do as they're told pay more in taxes.

No, they aren't "functionally and financially exactly the same thing". I can name one extremely major difference between the two: a mandate, by definition, is MANDATORY. A tax incentive, by definition, is not.

I think being voluntary and allowing free choice does a lot more than just "sound better", but maybe that's just me. But maybe if you just start from the assumption that the government has a right to your money whenever and however, then I'm probably not going to be able to make you understand.

Look at it this way: one gets tax incentives to own a home by way of mortgage tax deductions. Would you see that as different from a mandate that everyone MUST purchase a home or be penalized?

No, I wouldn't. In both cases, you either do as directed by government, or face higher taxes as a result. The difference between the two is merely psychological.

It's like the "discounts" that grocery stores offer customers who agree to have their purchases tracked via loyalty cards. It's just as valid to see the regular prices as a surcharge on customers who don't want to sign up for the discount cards. The store still has a bottom line, and whatever discounts they give to card-carrying customers are made up for with higher prices on those who don't participate.

It's the same game with tax incentives. Whenever discounts are offered to some taxpayers, taxes are raised on the rest. This is often done explicitly, by raising taxes before or after the discounts to compensate. But even when they don't immediately raise taxes, they're simply defering them, pumping up the deficit and devaluing the dollar.

Offering tax discounts to people who abide by the wishes of government is every bit as coercive as issuing tax penalties to those who don't. The sooner we understand that, the sooner we can begin to reign in a huge source of illicit Congressional power.