Can Any Rightwinger Give Me A Solid Argument Why Private Industry Instead Of Government Should Run..

[Wry Catcher]

Are those on the far right sane? I don't believe so.

 

[Wry Catcher]

Looks like those lemmings on the right have cut and run. Whose surprised?

 

[TemplarKormac]

Looks like those lemmings on the right have cut and run. Whose surprised?

If you keep bumping your post, perhaps the right wingers think it's pretty stupid to say government should run industry rather than privately owned manufacturers and retailers. I think you've gotten enough attention anyway. And just to answer the title, private industry is more streamlined than government. So, what you want is Communism. Government run industry is a cornerstone. So, tell me, what has government run efficiently? Give me five examples. And why do you think government should run anything?

Healthcare? Nope. They can't even get a website going.
Welfare? Nope.
Foreign policy? A snowball has a better chance in hell than Obama's foreign policy does with Russia, China, Iran, or North Korea.
Border management? Nope. If the White House can't keep a lunatic from jumping the fence, our government can't protect a 1200 mile swath of our border.
Jobs? Nope. 47 million people on some form of welfare program.
Education? Don't make me laugh. Common Core? Seriously?
Defense? Well, other than bombing Syria and Iraq; playing Bush III, the man in the White House wouldn't swat a fly if he needed to.
The national debt? $17 trillion and counting.

Your turn.

 

[MrDVS1]

...our healthcare system?

Already there is a big money in healthcare. If corporations run our healthcare system, they can charge whatever they want. Seriously what good is having state of the art healthcare if poor people can't afford the most basic of cancer treatment?

Why would it not be better to create a system that insures proper treatment for everyone? Sure it wouldn't be perfect, but if you take away profit as an incentive you are less likely to have corruption. Let's stop wasting billions a year on useless defense expenses and focus that money on socialized medicine.

Here's a fun fact: polls show 92% of Canadians prefer the Canadian healthcare system over the US system.

It cost me over $5,000.00 just to get a yes or a no on whether I was or was not having a heart attack, I wasn't.
5000.00 to do practically nothing.\
How come doctors don't know anything anymore, my doctors used to know things, now they don't know what day of the week it is without a test report......that's where the money is. I think most of them couldn't find their ass with both hands behind their backs if they didn't have a medical degree.

 

[Boss]

Everything the federal government touches turns to shit. Privatization produces a better product and a cheaper price. Cost of health care had went up since the 1960's because hospitals will bilk the system. I wish we could go back to the days of the family doctor getting paid with a chicken.

Are hospitals bilking the system? You see, I believe this plays into the liberal anti-capitalist myth. I don't think capitalists naturally "bilk" anyone. As I pointed out before, there is no room for greed in capitalism, the greedy capitalist will quickly find himself displaced by a less greedy capitalist. So I don't think hospitals are inherently bilking the sytem. What is more than likely the case is, the hospitals are trying to maintain financial viability.

Okay, imagine if you were a capitalist who owned a store or restaurant. Half of your customers walk out of the store with merchandise or leave without paying their check. What does this mean for you as a capitalist? You have to charge twice as much as normal to the people who do pay. They are making up the difference for those who failed to pay. This is what is happening with hospitals.

 

[Mathbud1]

Some societies drown female infants.
The biggest burden facing the US and Greece, for example, is the greed of their richest citizens:
"Life in Greece has been turned on its head since the debt crisis took hold. But in few areas has the change been more striking than in health care.

"Until recently, Greece had a typical European health system, with employers and individuals contributing to a fund that with government assistance financed universal care.

"People who lost their jobs still received unlimited benefits.

"That changed in July 2011, when Greece signed a loan agreement with international lenders to ward off financial collapse.

"Now, as stipulated in the deal, Greeks who lose their jobs receive benefits for a maximum of a year. After that, if they are unable to foot the bill, they are on their own, paying all costs out of pocket."

While the rich get richer.

Health care insurance lessons from Greece - PNHP s Official Blog

Yeah dude. That's what I've been talking about. Socialism works until you run out of other people's money to spend. Greece setup their own disasters.

Now, I get it... you leftists never want to accept that your system fails, and instead you need to find someone to blame. So of course, it's not the fact socialism fails that caused this.... no it's "poor get poorer and rich get richer", it's the typical universal class warfare argument from the left.

If you really believe that the problem wasn't the system, but rather this loan deal, then why not just refuse to accept the loans??

"Because their would be fiscal crash and the economy would be ruined, and Greece would have collasped!"

Right, but how did they get into that position?

Because they engaged in socialism, and ran out of other people's money to spend.

Your system doesn't work. Greece is proof.

Greece proves Wall Street turns everything it touches into shit. It's a textbook case for how bankers, bondholders, speculators, and politicians can offload the cost of bad assets onto the shoulders of the non-rich, crushing their medical system and their society for the benefit of a few rich parasites.

Wall street didn't have a thing to do with Greece's current predicament. Public Sector unions and outrageous benefits are the reason Greece can't pay its bills. The government made promises it couldn't possibly keep and now the bill has come due. In typical fashion the appologists for socialism are all looking for a scapegoat they can blame when the blame belongs with them.

Wall Street had everything to do with the previous Greek government's secret debts and the 2008 global debt crisis. Despite the fact that thirty years of neoliberalism resulted in the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, bankers and their useful idiots continue to push austerity and privatization as solutions to a problem they created and continue to profit from.

What solution do you propose for the problem of being too far in debt other than spending less?

don't you know what his solution will be? More taxes!

 

[asterism]

The VA scandal is not evidence that government can't effectively run our healthcare system. You cons have this ongoing fallacy in your simple minds that government is inherently useless. Private businesses fail and are riddled with controversies all the time. Should we abolish capitalism? Of course not.

You people also struggle with statistical relevance. HOW MANY Canadians come here for our healthcare? How much money do they make a year? These factors matter.

Scandal doesn't matter, we will always have scandal in public or private systems, it's a fact of life. Most of the time, in a government system, there is more scandal and potential for scandal because scandal can so easily be hidden behind politics.

The VA itself is evidence the government can't effectively run a health care system. Veterans waiting for months to have urgent surgeries or not being seen in a timely manner. Subpar treatment in subpar facilities, not even to the standards of the rest of the health care system. Now, their doctors and surgeons make a lot of money. If you check in your state, the highest paid federal employees are the surgeons at VA hospitals. The job pays about $300k per year.

It's not like one way is about the same as the other and just a matter of how we pay for it. In a private capitalist system you have the element of competition. Because capitalists can compete for business, this effectively controls costs. Note, I didn't say it makes it cheap, I said "controls costs." Health care is very expensive because of what it is. In a government system, there is no means of cost control, things operate on an appropriated budget. This budget is granted by politicians who don't want to be the guy who cuts funds to sick people.

With a government health care system, like a mail and parcel delivery system, you end up with a system that is bloated and wasteful, full of overpaid employees and redundancy, offering a sub-par service to the private sector and expecting you to be grateful for having the privilege to be listened to by an official government employee.

There are no options... "Single Payer" basically means Monopoly.

Ok here is not what you aren't getting. Both private industry and government have scandalous problems. If the VA was privately funded, what is to stop those at the top exploiting their patients for profit?

Competition and choice.

What would stop them from denying expensive treatment for chronic illnesses for the sake of saving money? Have you not heard of the word greed before? Evil breeds more in private industry than in government.

If the patients were the customers they'd have a choice and would not accept such activities.

The VA just needs reforms with the right people at its leadership.

I've heard that same story for 25 years and I'm still waiting.

After the failures of GM, should we let government take a who at running the company? No. Of course not.

When it comes to basic human services, they must be run by the government with the right people involved.

That appears to be the problem. You seem to think the government is the only entity that can do this while disregarding all the evidence to the contrary.

 

[asterism]

Ok here is not what you aren't getting. Both private industry and government have scandalous problems. If the VA was privately funded, what is to stop those at the top exploiting their patients for profit? [You mean, other than the law?] What would stop them from denying expensive treatment for chronic illnesses for the sake of saving money? [You mean, other than the law?] Have you not heard of the word greed before? Evil breeds more in private industry than in government.

What is your basis for this? Greed is greed, it's found in government or private sector. Law breakers need to be punished, we need to vigorously enforce the laws against the graft and corruption you are claiming. But capitalism doesn't operate on greed. In fact, greed is the antithesis of capitalism. Now think about this... every capitalist has as their objective to capitalize on something and make a profit. If they are too greedy in the amount of profit they want to make, another capitalist will come along who is less greedy and put them out of business. So the capitalist walks a very tight line between being too greedy and making as much profit as possible.

The VA just needs reforms with the right people at its leadership.

After the failures of GM, should we let government take a who at running the company? No. Of course not.

When it comes to basic human services, they must be run by the government with the right people involved.

Well the government DOES run the VA, it's a government entity. So I'm not sure what you mean here. We're debating whether our health care system should be turned over to the government or remain in the hands of the private sector for the most part. We already have several government health care assets, the VA being one of those. We also have Medicaid and Medicare and all kinds of government run health clinics, hospitals, etc. Every state has at least one state hospital.

Government doesn't do anything more efficiently than private sector capitalists. Your hooting and hollering about the possibility someone might break the law and be corrupt is priceless... as if to honestly claim that you believe a government run system would have none of this. You have this naive trust in the government that is almost infantile.

Lol how does a less greedy person put a greedy person out of business? What the fuck? As long as a super greedy person has a profitable market, it doesn't make a piss difference how greedy they are. Here are some actual statistics for you: 1% of the top earners in this country own 40% of the nation's wealth. People continue to buy their products regardless. I suppose your point is that another business will come along and be more fair to these veterans. What sort of transition will happen? More than likely those veterans would be under some sort of contract. How much more fair is this new company? For how long would it remain fair? Wouldn't it be easier to just let a government agency with strict laws oversee it? Corporations just do whatever the fuck they want. A gov agency has a set of rules where no one is making gross profit. Sure that didn't stop the VA scandal, but at least there were still limitations on how these corrupt individuals operate. What needs to be done now about the VA is make reforms. Fire those involved in the scandal and make new LAWS that will protect veterans from further exploitation. It's that simple.

I don't understand your logic behind privatising the VA becaus it was run by government. Again your logic would apply to giving government a shot at running GM because private industry can't handle it. You see how that works? Like I said, just make reforms in the VA. Privatising it will inevitably lead to more corruption. Why wouldn't it?

You know what corrupts gov the most? Powerful lobbyists.

Veterans died in the queue while VA bureaucrats were manipulating the benchmarks for bonuses. This is proven, but no government worker has been charged with a crime.

Corporate crime prosecution is terribly low but Ken Lay really did die while on appeal for an effective life sentence. When has a corrupt VA employee ever done that? Nobody died for Enron's money. How many died for the VA bonuses?

 

[asterism]

Yeah dude. That's what I've been talking about. Socialism works until you run out of other people's money to spend. Greece setup their own disasters.

Now, I get it... you leftists never want to accept that your system fails, and instead you need to find someone to blame. So of course, it's not the fact socialism fails that caused this.... no it's "poor get poorer and rich get richer", it's the typical universal class warfare argument from the left.

If you really believe that the problem wasn't the system, but rather this loan deal, then why not just refuse to accept the loans??

"Because their would be fiscal crash and the economy would be ruined, and Greece would have collasped!"

Right, but how did they get into that position?

Because they engaged in socialism, and ran out of other people's money to spend.

Your system doesn't work. Greece is proof.

Greece proves Wall Street turns everything it touches into shit. It's a textbook case for how bankers, bondholders, speculators, and politicians can offload the cost of bad assets onto the shoulders of the non-rich, crushing their medical system and their society for the benefit of a few rich parasites.

Wall street didn't have a thing to do with Greece's current predicament. Public Sector unions and outrageous benefits are the reason Greece can't pay its bills. The government made promises it couldn't possibly keep and now the bill has come due. In typical fashion the appologists for socialism are all looking for a scapegoat they can blame when the blame belongs with them.

Wall Street had everything to do with the previous Greek government's secret debts and the 2008 global debt crisis. Despite the fact that thirty years of neoliberalism resulted in the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, bankers and their useful idiots continue to push austerity and privatization as solutions to a problem they created and continue to profit from.

What solution do you propose for the problem of being too far in debt other than spending less?

Taxes, not cutting essential services which you would want.

But, let's do cut the fat. First, the salary and benefits of members of Congress who work less hard than every fast food/minimum wage earner (how many hours per day does your member of the H. of Rep. spend raising campaign donations? If you don't know, look it up). How many days did your member of Congress actually work? It seem Boehner has the House not in session more than in session.

Next, let's look at corporate welfare. Is it a myth, or is it real? If Corporations are people too, why don't they pay the same rate on their profits as do people? And why is it that members of Boards of Directors don't go to prison? When the corporation is found criminally guilty of a crime (if you or I poured oil into a storm drain, wouldn't we serve some time?) it seems if the Corporation is people too, people ought to go to jail/prison and pay restitution - not the stock holders (you do understand "duty" do you not?).

The executives of Adelphia went to prison.

Adelphia s John Rigas and son report to prison in N.C. - ABC News

 

[asterism]

Your written words in the last phrase are pretentious and missing the direct object in your run-on sentence. You may have had something to offer, sadly you were unable to convey it.

Looks like those lemmings on the right have cut and run. Whose surprised?

Grammar cop just self pwned.

 

[Boss]

Kaiser Permanente is, "a system that insures proper treatment for everyone" and IMO seems to be a good example of a single payer, not for profit health care system.

The only reason the issue of health care in America has remained a politcal football is because health care is the Golden Goose for many of the well-healed, and Plutocrats have funded massive campaigns against reform for over a century.

Well, KP is very much a for-profit entity. In 2011, they reported an income of $1.6 billion. They are an HMO (Health Maintenance Organization) who have been around since 1945. To explain this for young "abstract thinkers" these guys got together and said, what if we combine the insurance, hospitals and doctors all under one closed group? We can ensure the greater interest of the entire organization would remain at the forefront, and it eliminates the problems associated when these three entities are only looking out for self-interests. In theory, it's not a bad idea.

The problem KP has had is in the area of transplants. Twice as many KP plan members died waiting for a kidney from another KP member than were saved. So that didn't fly. Also, they have been in trouble for "patient dumping" ...that's where they transfer a homeless person to another non-KP facility to avoid the cost of care they are obligated to provide. This system takes care of problems between insurance, hospital and doctor, but not between consumer and provider.

...health care is the Golden Goose for many of the well-healed, and Plutocrats have funded massive campaigns against reform...

Well-healed? You mean, not sick? Aww.. damn! It's such a surprise the non-sick wouldn't care about paying for the sick. Seems they'd be grateful not to be sick. They should appreciate all those poor sick people who take it upon themselves to be sick so they don't have to be! Plutocrats! They've got all the money, never have to get sick, and they just don't care!

Look... you have this great big giant PIE! It's huge! ...Each entity, insurance, doctors, hospitals, pharmaceutical companies, drug companies, HMOs and government... is getting a big huge slice of this big huge pie. Now us consumers, we have to make the pie, so we are needing to cut down the size of this pie, but we can't eliminate the quality of what we get from the various entities. By dumping this problem onto government instead of private market capitalists, you ensure the pie forever continues to increase in size for an unmotivated product as a result. Government simply doesn't care about consumer satisfaction, a capitalist always does.

There isn't an easy solution. It's a very complex problem. But one thing is certain, attacking free market capitalism and the competitive pricing elements associated with it, is not a solution. In fact, it could be the key to understanding an answer...

One thing the young mush-brain hipster will notice about today that wasn't around back in my day, is the presence of many Primary Care centers. They are all over the place, some people call them "Doc in a Box." Now these didn't even exist when I was young. They have come about due to a need for such a service and a capitalist who was willing to provide it. You get reasonably-priced health care for non-emergency health problems without the hassle of going to the medical park. Now, there is free market capitalism at work. The "government" version is the free clinic.

Here is the key, with capitalists, there is an emphasis on pleasing and satisfying a customer. That leads to a success as a capitalist. A happy customer is a profitable one. With government, there is no emphasis on profit, you've said so yourself. The emphasis in government is on process. You must be processed through the system. Forms must be complete, records must be updated, bureaucrats contacted, questionnaires answered, interviews done, did I mention the forms? You are a number on a piece of paper to some government worker who is thinking about their weekend plans to raft down the Colorado.

 

[Wry Catcher]

Kaiser Permanente is, "a system that insures proper treatment for everyone" and IMO seems to be a good example of a single payer, not for profit health care system.

The only reason the issue of health care in America has remained a politcal football is because health care is the Golden Goose for many of the well-healed, and Plutocrats have funded massive campaigns against reform for over a century.

Well, KP is very much a for-profit entity. In 2011, they reported an income of $1.6 billion. They are an HMO (Health Maintenance Organization) who have been around since 1945. To explain this for young "abstract thinkers" these guys got together and said, what if we combine the insurance, hospitals and doctors all under one closed group? We can ensure the greater interest of the entire organization would remain at the forefront, and it eliminates the problems associated when these three entities are only looking out for self-interests. In theory, it's not a bad idea.

The problem KP has had is in the area of transplants. Twice as many KP plan members died waiting for a kidney from another KP member than were saved. So that didn't fly. Also, they have been in trouble for "patient dumping" ...that's where they transfer a homeless person to another non-KP facility to avoid the cost of care they are obligated to provide. This system takes care of problems between insurance, hospital and doctor, but not between consumer and provider.

...health care is the Golden Goose for many of the well-healed, and Plutocrats have funded massive campaigns against reform...

Well-healed? You mean, not sick? Aww.. damn! It's such a surprise the non-sick wouldn't care about paying for the sick. Seems they'd be grateful not to be sick. They should appreciate all those poor sick people who take it upon themselves to be sick so they don't have to be! Plutocrats! They've got all the money, never have to get sick, and they just don't care!

Look... you have this great big giant PIE! It's huge! ...Each entity, insurance, doctors, hospitals, pharmaceutical companies, drug companies, HMOs and government... is getting a big huge slice of this big huge pie. Now us consumers, we have to make the pie, so we are needing to cut down the size of this pie, but we can't eliminate the quality of what we get from the various entities. By dumping this problem onto government instead of private market capitalists, you ensure the pie forever continues to increase in size for an unmotivated product as a result. Government simply doesn't care about consumer satisfaction, a capitalist always does.

There isn't an easy solution. It's a very complex problem. But one thing is certain, attacking free market capitalism and the competitive pricing elements associated with it, is not a solution. In fact, it could be the key to understanding an answer...

One thing the young mush-brain hipster will notice about today that wasn't around back in my day, is the presence of many Primary Care centers. They are all over the place, some people call them "Doc in a Box." Now these didn't even exist when I was young. They have come about due to a need for such a service and a capitalist who was willing to provide it. You get reasonably-priced health care for non-emergency health problems without the hassle of going to the medical park. Now, there is free market capitalism at work. The "government" version is the free clinic.

Here is the key, with capitalists, there is an emphasis on pleasing and satisfying a customer. That leads to a success as a capitalist. A happy customer is a profitable one. With government, there is no emphasis on profit, you've said so yourself. The emphasis in government is on process. You must be processed through the system. Forms must be complete, records must be updated, bureaucrats contacted, questionnaires answered, interviews done, did I mention the forms? You are a number on a piece of paper to some government worker who is thinking about their weekend plans to raft down the Colorado.

"Founded in 1945, Kaiser Permanente is one of the nation’s largest not-for-profit health plans, serving approximately 9.5 million members, with headquarters in Oakland, Calif. It comprises": - See more at: Kaiser Permanente Share Fast Facts Fast Facts about Kaiser Permanente

 

[Boss]

"Founded in 1945, Kaiser Permanente is one of the nation’s largest not-for-profit health plans, serving approximately 9.5 million members, with headquarters in Oakland, Calif. It comprises": - See more at: Kaiser Permanente Share Fast Facts Fast Facts about Kaiser Permanente

I understand their health plan is not for profit. It is a closed system. A microcosim of Marxist socialism, if you will. On paper, it should work flawlessly, but it doesn't in practice, as is always the case with socialism. The various entities involved are very much, 'for profit' institutions. The doctors are getting paid, the hospitals are getting paid, no one is doing anything out of goodness of heart. In 2011, they reported $1.6 billion in income.

The thing is, you have to be one of their members, you have to go to their doctors, use their hospitals, deal with their insurance providers. This is all pretty hunky-dory until you up and need a kidney or heart, then you discover the major flaw with the idea. Or... heaven forbid, you should actually NOT be eligible for care of their services and need it. They have video of KP hospital staff, walking homeless patients down to the shelter in hospital gowns!

 

[Rikurzhen]

Everything the federal government touches turns to shit. Privatization produces a better product and a cheaper price. Cost of health care had went up since the 1960's because hospitals will bilk the system. I wish we could go back to the days of the family doctor getting paid with a chicken.

Are hospitals bilking the system? You see, I believe this plays into the liberal anti-capitalist myth. I don't think capitalists naturally "bilk" anyone. As I pointed out before, there is no room for greed in capitalism, the greedy capitalist will quickly find himself displaced by a less greedy capitalist. So I don't think hospitals are inherently bilking the sytem. What is more than likely the case is, the hospitals are trying to maintain financial viability.

Okay, imagine if you were a capitalist who owned a store or restaurant. Half of your customers walk out of the store with merchandise or leave without paying their check. What does this mean for you as a capitalist? You have to charge twice as much as normal to the people who do pay. They are making up the difference for those who failed to pay. This is what is happening with hospitals.

You're both missing the mark with your analysis. How? You don't account for the fact that healthcare is what economists calls a superior good. A superior good is a good/service which you want more of or one of higher quality as you get wealthier. A Mercedes is a superior good. A Yugo is an inferior good. Caviar is a superior good. Spam or Kraft dinner is an inferior good. I doubt that Bill Gates has ever served his children a box of KD or a spam sandwich.

In America we don't really have a quality gradient for medical care like we do for cars, for homes, for clothes, everyone wants the best quality of care. There doesn't exist a heart attack treatment on the budget plan versus one for the gold plated plan, no Mercedes plan for cancer treatment versus a scooter plan for cancer.

The wealthier a society, the greater the proportion of spending to health care and other superior goods. Look at house sizes today, when we have smaller families, compared to house sizes in 1955, when we had larger families.

Society is wealthier and so we spend more on superior goods. The days when you could pay Dr. Welby with a chicken were also the days when the only diagnostic test available was an X-ray. Forget ultrasound, CAT-scans, MRI, etc. Health care was cheaper to offer because it was less sophisticated.

Now we could introduce a varied market where quality of care was connected to price. We could bring Dr. Welby out of retirement, he'd never use post-1970 techniques, he'd use the old, already fully expensed, X-ray machine, and you could get health care on the cheap.

America pays more for healthcare than does Germany or Canada because we're a wealthier society and we want the best available. Even lower middle class people who get hit with big medical premiums don't want to cut costs by shopping for care provided with older technology and techniques, so in this respect these families are like those who scrimp so that they can buy a Mercedes while their co-wokrers are driving Civics. These folks want the best car that money can buy and that hurts their family budget.

So it's not hospitals who are gouging the system, it's patients who want the best but are upset at paying for the best.

 

[Andylusion]

"Founded in 1945, Kaiser Permanente is one of the nation’s largest not-for-profit health plans, serving approximately 9.5 million members, with headquarters in Oakland, Calif. It comprises": - See more at: Kaiser Permanente Share Fast Facts Fast Facts about Kaiser Permanente

Do you know the difference between a "for-profit" and a "not for profit", company? Forget the stated, ideologue difference... do you know what the practical functional, difference is?

Trick question. There is no difference. Not in practical functionality. The one structural difference, is that a not-for-profit company, can't have public shareholders. But beyond that, there is no real difference. Both have to have profit. Both have to sell goods, for a price, higher than their cost. Both have highly compensated executive staff.

Bernard J Tyson, CEO of Kaiser Permanente, collected $2.3 Million dollars in salary according to tax filings.

Seems rather familiar.

Econtalk, had an interview with the CEO of a non-profit hospital chain in the mid-west. The first thing the CEO said, was they have to make a 20% profit. It's not different than a for-profit company.

Again, the only structural difference is, non-profit companies can't have public shareholders. Meaning, that if they want to expand, they can't sell stock in the company, to raise capital, to expand. Instead, all the capital to expand, must come from the profits off of premium payers.

Not-for-profit, companies are not the socialist utopia that the left claims. Most are completely ignorant of how little difference there is.

Worse, Kaiser Permanente, is actually made up of dozens of separate 'for-profit' companies.

 

[Boss]

So it's not hospitals who are gouging the system, it's patients who want the best but are upset at paying for the best.

What you are saying, I have no problem with, it's true. As a consumer, whether you can afford it or not, you want and expect the premium health care up to the highest standards. Since we are dealing with health, it's important to remember this is not like 'luxury' items, where we can have discriminating tastes and flaunt opulence, we all expect the best doc, the best treatment, the best health care. In fact, most of us agree that we should all have the best, and no person should be relegated to a lesser level of care.

Does anyone here know just how many forms of compliance you have to compete in order to do business in any field that can be considered part of the health care system? The level of governmental red tape and hoops to jump through are almost impossible. We keep idiotically adding MORE! Every time some liberal whines about something, another agency or department is born to bring the standards of health care up to compliance a little more.

Health care is expensive because it's important. We expect standards, we expect the best, and our laws and regulations are created to ensure we get that 100% of the time. If not, we can sue and we will win. We've created a system at liberals bequest, cost be damned, to provide almost flawless health care, but it's very expensive.

 

[Bush92]

Everything the federal government touches turns to shit. Privatization produces a better product and a cheaper price. Cost of health care had went up since the 1960's because hospitals will bilk the system. I wish we could go back to the days of the family doctor getting paid with a chicken.

Are hospitals bilking the system? You see, I believe this plays into the liberal anti-capitalist myth. I don't think capitalists naturally "bilk" anyone. As I pointed out before, there is no room for greed in capitalism, the greedy capitalist will quickly find himself displaced by a less greedy capitalist. So I don't think hospitals are inherently bilking the sytem. What is more than likely the case is, the hospitals are trying to maintain financial viability.

Okay, imagine if you were a capitalist who owned a store or restaurant. Half of your customers walk out of the store with merchandise or leave without paying their check. What does this mean for you as a capitalist? You have to charge twice as much as normal to the people who do pay. They are making up the difference for those who failed to pay. This is what is happening with hospitals.

Sure.$20.00 for an aspirin all because the bill gets turned into Medicare or Medicaid.

 

[Rikurzhen]

So it's not hospitals who are gouging the system, it's patients who want the best but are upset at paying for the best.

What you are saying, I have no problem with, it's true. As a consumer, whether you can afford it or not, you want and expect the premium health care up to the highest standards. Since we are dealing with health, it's important to remember this is not like 'luxury' items, where we can have discriminating tastes and flaunt opulence, we all expect the best doc, the best treatment, the best health care. In fact, most of us agree that we should all have the best, and no person should be relegated to a lesser level of care.

The problem which arises is that while society gets wealthier not everyone in society gets wealthier and so the poor of America might be middle class in Poland, and while the middle class in Poland can afford Polish levels of medical care, the Poles can't afford American levels of medical care and neither can our poor.

In a homogeneous population, where everyone is linked by blood/culture it's not seen as offensive to share the costs for everyone. Here in America that feeling doesn't exist. Some guy could get off a plane which just arrived from Tanzania and liberals expect me to treat him like a fellow citizen, someone I have deep ties to. That guy could drop dead and I wouldn't lose a moment of sleep over it, just like everyone else.

The problem in America is that redistribution is not a feasible solution - it's thievery and people resist being held up. The second problem is that we keep importing poor people to do work which really shouldn't exist in America. We're a high cost of living, high income society, so a no-skill worker who gets ill will consume some of the most expensive health care in the world and the cost of providing that care would take him 10 years to pay back whereas if he was in Poland or Mexico the cost would be more reasonable.

Our health care problem is really an income distribution problem. It's not that we have too many rich people, our problem is that we keep importing too many poor people and the social cost of supporting them gets passed onto the rest of us, meaning that our private insurance plans get dinged by high hospital costs where hospitals try to recoup what they spend on the poor by charging more than they otherwise would.

 

[Wry Catcher]

"Founded in 1945, Kaiser Permanente is one of the nation’s largest not-for-profit health plans, serving approximately 9.5 million members, with headquarters in Oakland, Calif. It comprises": - See more at: Kaiser Permanente Share Fast Facts Fast Facts about Kaiser Permanente

I understand their health plan is not for profit. It is a closed system. A microcosim of Marxist socialism, if you will. On paper, it should work flawlessly, but it doesn't in practice, as is always the case with socialism. The various entities involved are very much, 'for profit' institutions. The doctors are getting paid, the hospitals are getting paid, no one is doing anything out of goodness of heart. In 2011, they reported $1.6 billion in income.

The thing is, you have to be one of their members, you have to go to their doctors, use their hospitals, deal with their insurance providers. This is all pretty hunky-dory until you up and need a kidney or heart, then you discover the major flaw with the idea. Or... heaven forbid, you should actually NOT be eligible for care of their services and need it. They have video of KP hospital staff, walking homeless patients down to the shelter in hospital gowns!

60-minutes did a piece on patient dumping several years ago, it is common practice for private hosptials - in fact the private sector - to use public services (taxpayer money) whenever possible.

KP does organ transplants, why do you assert that they do not? If you want to be credible, and if the private sector is so much better, it's a good idea to tell the truth if you hope to prove it. The Internet is only a click away to verify nearly every assertion and what I've found to be true is the right wing - in which you seem to be a card carrying member - tend to lie or make up facts.

If I needed a heart or kidney, a liver or any tranplant it would cost me $10 (yes TEN DOLLARS) under the policy** my wife and I have with KP. Tell me oh wise one, what would it cost you with the (I assume) policy you have?

I'm retired and have life-time health care, my out of pockket monthly premium is $117.15 subsidized by Medicare and my former employer. A benefit I earned and one I consiously chose when choosing a career path in my early 20's [you are now free to call me a 'welfare' queen as part of your usual use of non sequiturs].

Calling KP a, "microcosim of Marxist socialism" proves nothing beyond putting you in the camp of those conservatives whose ability to problem solve is restricted, due to their unwillingness to think outside the box of dogmatic conservativism.

 

[mamooth]

The private company running the Indiana Toll Road declares bankruptcy.

Subscription Center ChicagoBusiness.com

Why? The article says traffic on the Indiana Turnpike was down 42% since 2006, when the private company took over the lease. They jacked the toll rates way up, so people living in the area simply chose other routes.

Indiana got the $3.8 billion for the lease up front, so the state isn't losing anything. The bankruptcy court will have to decide whether to screw the bondholders, or screw the people by jacking up tolls more. But that wouldn't be very productive, since it would just drive more traffic off the road.