Health Care Reform Idea...

[Old Rocks]

My answer would be "Why is it that you cannot afford to pay for the services" ?
Do you waste money that could go to medical bills on things you really don't need ? Do you not save money every month to go for medical needs ? Do you live a healthy life style to keep you from needing medical care ? etc etc

Let's say that they can't pay for the services they need because they don't earn a lot of money. Now what?

there are government programs for those truly in need. No one is calling for an end to those programs.

the point here is the government should not be telling those of us, including businesses that provide insurance benefits, what is acceptable coverage.

Sure. Let the insurance companies determine that. Then when you cost the insurance company a few pennies on the dollars you have paid them, they throw you onto a government program that has been cut to the bone by the Conservatives eliminating "welfare".

We have been down that path. Time to join the rest of the industrial Democracies, leave the 19th Century, join the 21st, and adopt a Universal Health Care System for all citizens.

 

[Diuretic]

Universal Health Care is a form of social insurnance. It would prevent a major illness from wiping out all that one had worked for all their lives. It would also do away with the excuses for not covering someone after they had such an illness.

Yes, it must be paid for. So how do the other Democratic nations pay for it? Which of the ways that they do would work best for us?

We see nations in Europe that have standards of living that now exceed ours providing all with health care, we see none of their citizens going bankrupt because of medical bills. And they have much better results for their systems than we do for ours, even though ours is costing twice as much, per capita.

But all we hear is that we cannot do it. Are the Europeans and Asians that much smarter than we are? That they can do it, and provide a standard of living that is the equal, or even better than ours in some nations, says that we are not doing something right.

The thing that should scare the crap out of someone when they're told they have a serious illness is the knowledge they have a serious illness - not the prospect of bankruptcy.

 

[editec]

Why cant' people pay for health care ? Is it too expensive or do people not make enough money ?

Yes...both

 

[editec]

Universal Health Care is a form of social insurnance. It would prevent a major illness from wiping out all that one had worked for all their lives. It would also do away with the excuses for not covering someone after they had such an illness.

Yes, it must be paid for. So how do the other Democratic nations pay for it? Which of the ways that they do would work best for us?

We see nations in Europe that have standards of living that now exceed ours providing all with health care, we see none of their citizens going bankrupt because of medical bills. And they have much better results for their systems than we do for ours, even though ours is costing twice as much, per capita.

But all we hear is that we cannot do it. Are the Europeans and Asians that much smarter than we are? That they can do it, and provide a standard of living that is the equal, or even better than ours in some nations, says that we are not doing something right.

The thing that should scare the crap out of someone when they're told they have a serious illness is the knowledge they have a serious illness - not the prospect of bankruptcy.

Of course people are quite rightly scared by both things.

Their health is failing them and that means they will likely go broke in the process.

 

[Diuretic]

Universal Health Care is a form of social insurnance. It would prevent a major illness from wiping out all that one had worked for all their lives. It would also do away with the excuses for not covering someone after they had such an illness.

Yes, it must be paid for. So how do the other Democratic nations pay for it? Which of the ways that they do would work best for us?

We see nations in Europe that have standards of living that now exceed ours providing all with health care, we see none of their citizens going bankrupt because of medical bills. And they have much better results for their systems than we do for ours, even though ours is costing twice as much, per capita.

But all we hear is that we cannot do it. Are the Europeans and Asians that much smarter than we are? That they can do it, and provide a standard of living that is the equal, or even better than ours in some nations, says that we are not doing something right.

The thing that should scare the crap out of someone when they're told they have a serious illness is the knowledge they have a serious illness - not the prospect of bankruptcy.

Of course people are quite rightly scared by both things.

Their health is failing them and that means they will likely go broke in the process.

Double whammy. But okay if you can afford the health care, single whammy.

 

[toomuchtime_]

Sometimes you just have to wipe the whiteboard and start again.

Is it - and please accept this as a question/suggestion/idea that isn't borne out of a partisan political view - the case that perhaps now is a good time to work out how health care should be paid for? I know that's a really simplistic question but sometimes simplistic questions have to be asked. Call it the curse of the naive if you wish.

If you were given the power to devise a model for health care for your citizens what sort of model would you favour?

That's a good question, and another good one is, what sort of model would your citizens favor?

This process began with broad bipartisan consensus that our health care system needed to be improved, but the WH and Congress squandered that consensus by putting politics ahead of policy. Instead of beginning the process by examining all the ways we might address the things we wanted to change and crunching the numbers to see what benefits each approach might bring us and what each would cost, the President and the Congress decided the important thing was to get the House and Senate bills finished before the summer recess so the law could be signed just before the 2010 campaign season began. Those in Congress who agreed this was the proper way to go about changing our health care system are receiving the treatment they deserve from their constituents at the town hall meetings.

That seems like a pretty fair point. I'd be more fulsome but I don't fully understand the competing policy positions in depth. Could it be though that the proponents of change realised that my suggestion of clearing the decks to start again would be impossible in practice? Could it be that they've decided to work with what they have and to try to achieve a policy position in full acknowledgement that they have to do what's both possible and practical?

I suppose my theoretical suggestion of wiping the board was directed to people who post here rather than putting it as a a position that could possibly be adopted by the legislature. In essence I'm asking if posters here could remove the competing ideologies from the issue of health care, what would it look like?

Speaking of the real world process going on, the polls show that most Americans are still proponents of change to achieve broad health care goals, such as reining in costs, increasing affordable access to health care, increasing portability of health insurance coverage, etc., but the polls also show most people now oppose the House bill and they show that opposition is growing. The point is that almost everyone is a proponent of change, but only a minority, a shrinking minority at that, are proponents of the particular change the President is espousing and which is embodied in the House bill.

The real world debate about this bill, which can fairly be said to represent the President's positions regardless of how cagey his answers to questions are, is all about ideology on both sides at this point and not at all about the benefits and costs involved. How could it have been otherwise since the President and Congress were only willing to discuss achieving changes in our system by adopting elements of a welfare state? From the beginning the process launched by the President and the Congress was motivated by ideological and political ambitions and that is why the opposition it has engendered is also political and ideological. It neither preserves the system we have nor replaces it with another that can efficiently address our needs and goals; rather it is a jumble of disparate elements that is too expensive, impractical and so confusing that its advocates for the most part can only respond to criticisms by mumbling something about private insurance companies being bad.

As for the debate on the message board, if we put ideological biases aside, what is there to debate? Without first crunching the numbers to cost out the relative costs and benefits of the various ways in which we might change our system, we simply don't know enough to decide which way might be best. However, even if we had done all the cost benefit analyses possible, we could still not project very far into the future how these various changes might work out or what effect they might have on our economy with any justifiable confidence, so I would argue that we should only proceed through incremental changes that would first attempt to lower costs and increase access by such discrete measures as allowing health insurance companies to sell national health insurance policies, allow workers to use the company contribution to purchase individual health insurance policies and tort reform in malpractice cases that would cap awards for emotional distress and do away with punitive damages in favor of suspending or revoking medical licenses on a national basis, etc.

To the extent these measures failed to reduce health care costs and health insurance premiums sufficiently to allow everyone to buy health insurance, we might then consider government assistance for those who still couldn't afford it, but to the extent these measures did lower costs and premiums, it would be less expensive for us to offer this aid than it is now. Only after all these measures left us still unsatisfied with the system should we consider making fundamental changes in it.

 

[Skull Pilot]

the mandates in the minimum "acceptable" coverage will include a lot of things that a lot of people don't want or need and for which they shouldn't have to pay

seriously if a woman is not planning to get pregnant, why should she pay for insurance that covers in home prenatal visits?

If i don't need substance abuse counseling or mental health counseling, why should I pay for a policy that covers those things?

What if the woman above becomes pregnant? Would she be able to get coverage at that point?

then purchase a policy that covers it when and only when she needs it. Jesus if you plan on getting preggers then change policies. Is it too much to ask people to think for themselves or do we have to mandate contingencies for every possible outcome and then pay for them even if we never use them?

What if i all of a sudden become a heroin addict, or an alcoholic or get clinically depressed, I guess the government should mandate that I pay for all that coverage even if I will never ever use it.

And how about you...if something happened suddenly that necessitated that you have mental health counseling? Would you be able to get it then? Or would you never be able to get that coverage as you would now have a "pre-existing condition"?

If I choose to forgo coverage mental health counseling because in my time on this earth I have never needed it, that should be my choice should it not?

what if all of a sudden I become a criminal, should i be put in jail now?

 

[Emma]

suggestion 2 allow insurance companies to sell health insurance across state lines.

Do you agree with the Health Insurance Exchange that was proposed? I think that is an excellent idea.

 

[chanel]

These are excellent suggestions but I have a far more cynical view of what HR3200 is about. It's just another nail in the coffin of capitalism.

 

[dilloduck]

These are excellent suggestions but I have a far more cynical view of what HR3200 is about. It's just another nail in the coffin of capitalism.

And competition.

 

[veritas]

what if all of a sudden I become a criminal, should i be put in jail now?

That's an option that will get you free gov't health care.

 

[Skull Pilot]

suggestion 2 allow insurance companies to sell health insurance across state lines.

Do you agree with the Health Insurance Exchange that was proposed? I think that is an excellent idea.

My main problem with this bill is that it mandates minimum coverages which will include some things that a lot of people don't need but will have to pay for and that if you have a policy that you like and are comfortable with, the government can deem it unacceptable and tax you because you don't buy what they tell you to buy.

An exchange would not be needed if health insurance was sold across state lines like every other insurance.

 

[Skull Pilot]

what if all of a sudden I become a criminal, should i be put in jail now?

That's an option that will get you free gov't health care.

lol not to mention a free college eduation

 

[toomuchtime_]

what if all of a sudden I become a criminal, should i be put in jail now?

That's an option that will get you free gov't health care.

Would that include periodic end of life counseling?

 

[Harry Dresden]

what if all of a sudden I become a criminal, should i be put in jail now?

That's an option that will get you free gov't health care.

lol not to mention a free college eduation

and free Health Club Membership...

 

[Meister]

That's an option that will get you free gov't health care.

lol not to mention a free college eduation

and free Health Club Membership...

Not to mention an "open" relationship with Bubba

 

[Harry Dresden]

Procrastination at its finest. Given that attitude, would anything ever get accomplished. This is eighty years of 'we can't.' Weird how the European nations are doing it and no one is running on a platform of repeal.

Sorry folks, if everyone had your attitude we'd still be in caves howling at the moon. Actually a few of town hall participants are still there.

http://www.usmessageboard.com/healt...241-answers-to-all-your-questions-on-uhc.html

"Teddy Roosevelt first called for (health care) reform nearly a century ago."


PolitiFact | Obama invokes Republican icons on health care

so folkes this whole thread was a waste of time.....Midcant....the smartest guy in the world just said so.....your all a bunch of procrastinators and cave dwellers...with a bad attitude....Midcant the Sphincter dweller has spoken....

 

[The T]

Procrastination at its finest. Given that attitude, would anything ever get accomplished. This is eighty years of 'we can't.' Weird how the European nations are doing it and no one is running on a platform of repeal.

Sorry folks, if everyone had your attitude we'd still be in caves howling at the moon. Actually a few of town hall participants are still there.

http://www.usmessageboard.com/healt...241-answers-to-all-your-questions-on-uhc.html

"Teddy Roosevelt first called for (health care) reform nearly a century ago."


PolitiFact | Obama invokes Republican icons on health care

so folkes this whole thread was a waste of time.....Midcant....the smartest guy in the world just said so.....your all a bunch of procrastinators and cave dwellers...with a bad attitude....Midcant the Sphincter dweller has spoken....

And of course that poster cites the EU? (And how many times have we pulled thier collective asses out of the fire for Liberty sake)?

Yeah the EU is a fine example to follow, isn't it? And the Statists here in this country want to mirror their high unemployment, and long lines for Healthcare?

But then too, the Statists want to be "liked" by emulating them...

Great post sir.

 

[Diuretic]

Procrastination at its finest. Given that attitude, would anything ever get accomplished. This is eighty years of 'we can't.' Weird how the European nations are doing it and no one is running on a platform of repeal.

Sorry folks, if everyone had your attitude we'd still be in caves howling at the moon. Actually a few of town hall participants are still there.

http://www.usmessageboard.com/healt...241-answers-to-all-your-questions-on-uhc.html

"Teddy Roosevelt first called for (health care) reform nearly a century ago."


PolitiFact | Obama invokes Republican icons on health care

so folkes this whole thread was a waste of time.....Midcant....the smartest guy in the world just said so.....your all a bunch of procrastinators and cave dwellers...with a bad attitude....Midcant the Sphincter dweller has spoken....

And of course that poster cites the EU? (And how many times have we pulled thier collective asses out of the fire for Liberty sake)?

.....:

The EU? None.

 

[midcan5]

The EU? None.

Diuretic, you'll confuse them if you mention facts. Also I think in WWII they forget Russia's role but that sort of thinking confuses the wingnuts who get their information from the likes of Palin and Limbaugh.