How Paul Ryan Would Decimate the New Deal - Go Paul !

[Listening]

The "Nuns on the Bus" are driving it in. Sister Simone is really critical and vocal about Ryan and his failure as a Catholic.

Great...a Catholic who does not understand her doctrine.

Just what we need...another moron making policy.

Oh really? Why don't you tell us what information about her doctrine that Sister Simone is missing. She's concerned with feeding the hungry and caring for the sick...you know, shit that fellow Jesus used to talk about all the time.

Maybe the Catholic bible does not have Matthew 7 where it clearly states that you don't judge others. She may not like Paul Ryan, but calling him a failure as a Catholic is in conflict with her doctrine.

BTW: I believe Matthew 7 is the last chapter from the Sermon on the Mount. So Jesus said that too.

So yes....really.

She missed that.

 

[Mr. Peepers]

Maybe the Catholic bible does not have Matthew 7 where it clearly states that you don't judge others. She may not like Paul Ryan, but calling him a failure as a Catholic is in conflict with her doctrine.

BTW: I believe Matthew 7 is the last chapter from the Sermon on the Mount. So Jesus said that too.

So yes....really.

She missed that.

Wow, I thought the Sermon on the Mount would be the equivalent of garlic to a vampire for you corporatists...

 

[flacaltenn]

WOW, you sure get excited about punishing the elderly don't you Listening. Why is that? Are you a sociopath?

Nothing punishes the elderly more than keeping interest rates at NEAR ZERO when MOST of them planned to stretch their retirement savings by living on interest..

Nothing punishes the elderly more than STEALING the premiums from Soc Sec FICA taxes so that Obama can play Robin Hood.

Nothing punishes the elderly more than BORROWING money to write soc sec checks because current taxpayers are paying interest TWICE for the same dollar that goes to Grandma. Because before Obama invented STEALING THE PREMIUMS, the COngress invented stealing the surplus. From WHO --- the current "elderly".

Nothing punishes the elderly more than playing loose and fast with all the Medicare providers and presenting them as sources of graft and fraud and inefficiency.

Nothing punishes the elderly more than keeping all aspects of the economy hostage to indecisions on budget, spending, energy, healthcare, and taxes -- thus reducing the ability of their retirement funds to grow.

And speaking of retirement funds -- nothing punishes the elderly more than PROMISING outrageously generous govt pensions that are unsustainable and only MANAGING that problem when it gets to crisis proportions..

'bout covers it -- don't it?

And FDR, New Deal and the 30's??? NONE of that is relevent. We don't live in that world any world anymore. Those tactics aren't even a CHOICE anymore. Get over it...

If the concepts and policies of the New Deal are no longer relevant, then we face a very bleak future, not only for senior citizens but all citizens.

It invites the fate of Robert Frost's hired man, the fate of having "nothing to look backward to with pride, and nothing to look forward to with hope."

The biggest threat we face as a nation is privatization, and the religious like belief that private entities and only private entries can serve the interests of We, the People.

The American people are stakeholders in our economy and public policies. Private entities can only serve stockholders...BY LAW.

Sadly, the arguments for the New Deal public policies were made, won and agreed to by what was rightly called the Greatest Generation and the parents of that generation who lived through the Great Depression. We now live among an Ayn Rand social Darwinist generation that does not have even a shred of human understanding of why those policies were essential or the conditions that existed before the New Deal, not only for senior citizens, but all citizens.

There is but one law for all, namely that law which governs all law, the law of our Creator, the law of humanity, justice, equity - the law of nature and of nations.
Edmund Burke

Those who don't know history are destined to repeat it.
Edmund Burke

That's a fact of life.. You can't beat up on biz and expect it to cower in a corner.. They WILL leave to serve other markets that didn't exist when FDR became a tyrant. You can't stimulate an economy like feeding a squirrel and expect consumerism to create jobs HERE in this country. You can't pass MORE UNIVERSAL programs that turn into welfare in just one lifetime and go broke. You can't place bets on the markets that reflect policy -- not reality because the US is NOT an isolated market anymore. And the dollars invest don't just stay here or dissuade GLOBAL competition..

You can't repeat a history that doesn't exist anymore.

And I don't have a stake in this economy just because I vote for clowns to do my bidding and feed me Scoobie snacks.

We have become a nation of beggars and whiners. And your revolutionaries are carving us into competing factions. Our UNITY comes from a realization that MILLIONS of folks get up each morning to FREELY SERVE OTHERS..

I gave you a succint list of the harm that current policy is doing seniors above.. You ignored it.. Don't think you have the ability to claim a higher moral ground anymore --- just because you live for the past...

 

[flacaltenn]

Ryan is a diciple of Ayn Rand and should not be allowed within a heartbeat of the Presidency.

Yes, Ayn Rand - the person who had to live under the very communism your spoiled and free ass thinks is "cute" and "cuddly".

Ayn Rand knew what the fuck she was talking about, and that has never been more obvious than the nightmare maxist in the White House named Obama and his Obamacare....

The same Ayn Rand who had to get Social Security and Medicare at the end of her life, because she wasn't nearly as good at Capitalist thing as she thought she was.

No evidence for that assertion.. She took those programs because she believed she was coerced into paying for those programs (and her money mgrs decided for her). And to allow the govt to profit on that coercion would be immoral.. Besides, she died with a reasonably high estate value and had a large royalty stream..

I'm sure as hell gonna EXPECT a return from my UNIVERSAL coverages --- aren't you? If the govt had offered me an out in exchange for renouncing benefits ten years ago (when SS was still in surplus) -- I probably would have opted in...

 

[Bfgrn]

Nothing punishes the elderly more than keeping interest rates at NEAR ZERO when MOST of them planned to stretch their retirement savings by living on interest..

Nothing punishes the elderly more than STEALING the premiums from Soc Sec FICA taxes so that Obama can play Robin Hood.

Nothing punishes the elderly more than BORROWING money to write soc sec checks because current taxpayers are paying interest TWICE for the same dollar that goes to Grandma. Because before Obama invented STEALING THE PREMIUMS, the COngress invented stealing the surplus. From WHO --- the current "elderly".

Nothing punishes the elderly more than playing loose and fast with all the Medicare providers and presenting them as sources of graft and fraud and inefficiency.

Nothing punishes the elderly more than keeping all aspects of the economy hostage to indecisions on budget, spending, energy, healthcare, and taxes -- thus reducing the ability of their retirement funds to grow.

And speaking of retirement funds -- nothing punishes the elderly more than PROMISING outrageously generous govt pensions that are unsustainable and only MANAGING that problem when it gets to crisis proportions..

'bout covers it -- don't it?

And FDR, New Deal and the 30's??? NONE of that is relevent. We don't live in that world any world anymore. Those tactics aren't even a CHOICE anymore. Get over it...

If the concepts and policies of the New Deal are no longer relevant, then we face a very bleak future, not only for senior citizens but all citizens.

It invites the fate of Robert Frost's hired man, the fate of having "nothing to look backward to with pride, and nothing to look forward to with hope."

The biggest threat we face as a nation is privatization, and the religious like belief that private entities and only private entries can serve the interests of We, the People.

The American people are stakeholders in our economy and public policies. Private entities can only serve stockholders...BY LAW.

Sadly, the arguments for the New Deal public policies were made, won and agreed to by what was rightly called the Greatest Generation and the parents of that generation who lived through the Great Depression. We now live among an Ayn Rand social Darwinist generation that does not have even a shred of human understanding of why those policies were essential or the conditions that existed before the New Deal, not only for senior citizens, but all citizens.

There is but one law for all, namely that law which governs all law, the law of our Creator, the law of humanity, justice, equity - the law of nature and of nations.
Edmund Burke

Those who don't know history are destined to repeat it.
Edmund Burke

That's a fact of life.. You can't beat up on biz and expect it to cower in a corner.. They WILL leave to serve other markets that didn't exist when FDR became a tyrant. You can't stimulate an economy like feeding a squirrel and expect consumerism to create jobs HERE in this country. You can't pass MORE UNIVERSAL programs that turn into welfare in just one lifetime and go broke. You can't place bets on the markets that reflect policy -- not reality because the US is NOT an isolated market anymore. And the dollars invest don't just stay here or dissuade GLOBAL competition..

You can't repeat a history that doesn't exist anymore.

And I don't have a stake in this economy just because I vote for clowns to do my bidding and feed me Scoobie snacks.

We have become a nation of beggars and whiners. And your revolutionaries are carving us into competing factions. Our UNITY comes from a realization that MILLIONS of folks get up each morning to FREELY SERVE OTHERS..

I gave you a succint list of the harm that current policy is doing seniors above.. You ignored it.. Don't think you have the ability to claim a higher moral ground anymore --- just because you live for the past...

You gave me a list of excuses, obfuscation and accusations that are not directed at the guilty parties.

Social Security is not very difficult to fix. Medicare will be more difficult. But it MUST be fixed, and burdening the elderly with a lot more out of pocket costs is not acceptable or moral.

You mean to tell me that America, the 'city upon the hill', the most prosperous nation on this planet CAN'T offer a minimum social safety net for it's elderly citizens? While other industrial nations with much smaller economies offer a more comprehensive social safety net than America? Then what this country stands for is truly in question. 'City upon the hill'? Hardly.

People like Paul Ryan are a fraud. If he is truly interested in 'saving' Medicare, then the first step is admitting that the efficiency of the current public enterprise can't possibly be matched by private insurance corporations. There is no 'invisible hand' that can fix Medicare. At the time Medicare came to be in 1965, about half of the elderly had no health insurance—they were too old and too likely to get sick, so the private market simply wouldn’t insure them.

Here is a history lesson from the father of Reaganomics.

Wall Street Targets the Elderly
Looting Social Security
by PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS

Hank Paulson, the Gold Sacks bankster/US Treasury Secretary, who deregulated the financial system, caused a world crisis that wrecked the prospects of foreign banks and governments, caused millions of Americans to lose retirement savings, homes, and jobs, and left taxpayers burdened with multi-trillions of dollars of new US debt, is still not in jail. He is writing in the New York Times urging that the mess he caused be fixed by taking away from working Americans the Social Security and Medicare for which they have paid in earmarked taxes all their working lives.

Wall Street’s approach to the poor has always been to drive them deeper into the ground.

As there is no money to be made from the poor, Wall Street fleeces them by yanking away their entitlements. It has always been thus. During the Reagan administration, Wall Street decided to boost the values of its bond and stock portfolios by using Social Security revenues to lower budget deficits. Wall Street figured that lower deficits would mean lower interest rates and higher bond and stock prices.

Two Wall Street henchmen, Alan Greenspan and David Stockman, set up the Social Security raid in this way: The Carter administration had put Social Security in the black for the foreseeable future by establishing a schedule for future Social Security payroll tax increases. Greenspan and Stockman conspired to phase in the payroll tax increases earlier than was needed in order to gain surplus Social Security revenues that could be used to finance other government spending, thus reducing the budget deficit. They sold it to President Reagan as “putting Social Security on a sound basis.”

Along the way Americans were told that the surplus revenues were going into a special Social Security trust fund at the U.S. Treasury. But what is in the fund is Treasury IOUs for the spent revenues. When the “trust funds” are needed to pay Social Security benefits, the Treasury will have to sell more debt in order to redeem the IOUs.

Social Security was mugged again during the Clinton administration when the Boskin Commission jimmied the Consumer Price Index in order to reduce the inflation adjustments that Social Security recipients receive, thus diverting money from Social Security retirees to other uses.

We constantly hear from Wall Street gangsters and from Republicans and an occasional Democrat that Social Security and Medicare are a form of welfare that we can’t afford, an “unfunded liability.” This is a lie. Social Security is funded with an earmarked tax. People pay for Social Security and Medicare all their working lives. It is a pay-as-you-go system in which the taxes paid by those working fund those who are retired.

Currently these systems are not in deficit. The problem is that government is using earmarked revenues for other purposes. Indeed, since the 1980s Social Security revenues have been used to fund general government. Today Social Security revenues are being used to fund trillion dollar bailouts for Wall Street and to fund the Bush/Obama wars of aggression against Muslims.

Having diverted Social Security revenues to war and Wall Street, Paulson says there is no alternative but to take the promised benefits away from those who have paid for them.

Republicans have extraordinary animosity toward the poor. In an effort to talk retirees out of their support systems, Republicans frequently describe Social Security as a Ponzi scheme and “unsustainable.” They ought to know. The phony trust fund, which they set up to hide the fact that Wall Street and the Pentagon are running off with Social Security revenues, is a Ponzi scheme. Social Security itself has been with us since the 1930s and has yet to wreck our lives and budget. But it only took Hank Paulson’s derivative Ponzi scheme and its bailout a few years to inflict irreparable damage on our lives and budget.

Years ago with stagflation defeated and a rising stock market, I favored privatizing Social Security as a way of creating a funded retirement system and producing greater savings and larger incomes for retirees. At that time Wall Street was interested, not for my reasons, but in order to collect the fees from managing the funds.

Had Social Security been privatized, I doubt that Wall Street would have been permitted to deregulate the financial system. Too much would have been at stake.

After the latest crisis brought on by Wall Street’s dishonesty and greed, trusting Wall Street to manage anyone’s old age pension requires a leap of faith that no intelligent person can make.

Wall Street has got away with its raid on the public treasury. Now, pockets full, it wants to pay for the heist by curtailing Social Security and Medicare. Having deprived the working population of homes, jobs, and health care, Wall Street is now after the elderly’s old age security.

Social Security, formerly an untouchable “third rail of politics,” is now “unsustainable,” while the real unsustainables–a pre-1929 unregulated financial system and open-ended multi-trillion dollar Global War Against Terror–are the new untouchables. This transformation signals the complete capture of American democracy by an oligarchy of special interests.

"The legitimate object of Government is to do for a community of people whatever they need to have done but cannot do at all, or cannot so well do, for themselves in their separate and individual capacities. But in all that people can individually do as well for themselves, Government ought not to interfere."
President Abraham Lincoln

 

[flacaltenn]

If the concepts and policies of the New Deal are no longer relevant, then we face a very bleak future, not only for senior citizens but all citizens.

It invites the fate of Robert Frost's hired man, the fate of having "nothing to look backward to with pride, and nothing to look forward to with hope."

The biggest threat we face as a nation is privatization, and the religious like belief that private entities and only private entries can serve the interests of We, the People.

The American people are stakeholders in our economy and public policies. Private entities can only serve stockholders...BY LAW.

Sadly, the arguments for the New Deal public policies were made, won and agreed to by what was rightly called the Greatest Generation and the parents of that generation who lived through the Great Depression. We now live among an Ayn Rand social Darwinist generation that does not have even a shred of human understanding of why those policies were essential or the conditions that existed before the New Deal, not only for senior citizens, but all citizens.

There is but one law for all, namely that law which governs all law, the law of our Creator, the law of humanity, justice, equity - the law of nature and of nations.
Edmund Burke

Those who don't know history are destined to repeat it.
Edmund Burke

That's a fact of life.. You can't beat up on biz and expect it to cower in a corner.. They WILL leave to serve other markets that didn't exist when FDR became a tyrant. You can't stimulate an economy like feeding a squirrel and expect consumerism to create jobs HERE in this country. You can't pass MORE UNIVERSAL programs that turn into welfare in just one lifetime and go broke. You can't place bets on the markets that reflect policy -- not reality because the US is NOT an isolated market anymore. And the dollars invest don't just stay here or dissuade GLOBAL competition..

You can't repeat a history that doesn't exist anymore.

And I don't have a stake in this economy just because I vote for clowns to do my bidding and feed me Scoobie snacks.

We have become a nation of beggars and whiners. And your revolutionaries are carving us into competing factions. Our UNITY comes from a realization that MILLIONS of folks get up each morning to FREELY SERVE OTHERS..

I gave you a succint list of the harm that current policy is doing seniors above.. You ignored it.. Don't think you have the ability to claim a higher moral ground anymore --- just because you live for the past...

You gave me a list of excuses, obfuscation and accusations that are not directed at the guilty parties.

Social Security is not very difficult to fix. Medicare will be more difficult. But it MUST be fixed, and burdening the elderly with a lot more out of pocket costs is not acceptable or moral.

You mean to tell me that America, the 'city upon the hill', the most prosperous nation on this planet CAN'T offer a minimum social safety net for it's elderly citizens? While other industrial nations with much smaller economies offer a more comprehensive social safety net than America? Then what this country stands for is truly in question. 'City upon the hill'? Hardly.

People like Paul Ryan are a fraud. If he is truly interested in 'saving' Medicare, then the first step is admitting that the efficiency of the current public enterprise can't possibly be matched by private insurance corporations. There is no 'invisible hand' that can fix Medicare. At the time Medicare came to be in 1965, about half of the elderly had no health insurance—they were too old and too likely to get sick, so the private market simply wouldn’t insure them.

Awww gimmeabreak.. That ship long since sailed. I told you that OBAMA is stealing the premiums RIGHT NOW from Soc Sec and you call that "excuse and obfuscation".. I tell you that CONGRESS has looted the Soc Sec surplus to the tune of a $TRIL and you call that "excuse and obfuscation".. And I point 5 other ways that current Admin policy is punishing seniors BESIDES mucking with entitlements..

OF COURSE I want Soc Sec/Medicare to succeed for current enrollees.. But there has been NO visible evidence that the FEDS can handle the administration of such programs without graft and incompetence. Current recipients SHOULD be covered. The future needs a different prescription.

If we had USED THE SURPLUS to defer future costs to the program as it was proposed -- instead of letting Congress CONTINUE THE LOOTING -- we'd have REAL tangible cash value today in the program. And that would be folks who VOLUNTARILY traded some future benefits for a little bit of economic freedom.

You can turn these programs from UNIVERSAL to WELFARE by raising the caps and taxes and means testing. Be my guest.. But realize it will be with FDR hunting your ass from the grave and GENERATIONS of Americans who won't fall for the promise of UNIVERSAL ANYTHING again for a LONG LONG time..

 

[Listening]

Social Security[/URL] is not very difficult to fix. Medicare will be more difficult. But it MUST be fixed, and burdening the elderly with a lot more out of pocket costs is not acceptable or moral.

Quite simply put.....nobody died and left you in charge.

The elderly were not always the elderly and Social Security is not the only way to deal with this issue.

it is plenty acceptable and moral in certain circumstances.

It is immoral to burden young families with the promises somebody else made.

 

[Bfgrn]

That's a fact of life.. You can't beat up on biz and expect it to cower in a corner.. They WILL leave to serve other markets that didn't exist when FDR became a tyrant. You can't stimulate an economy like feeding a squirrel and expect consumerism to create jobs HERE in this country. You can't pass MORE UNIVERSAL programs that turn into welfare in just one lifetime and go broke. You can't place bets on the markets that reflect policy -- not reality because the US is NOT an isolated market anymore. And the dollars invest don't just stay here or dissuade GLOBAL competition..

You can't repeat a history that doesn't exist anymore.

And I don't have a stake in this economy just because I vote for clowns to do my bidding and feed me Scoobie snacks.

We have become a nation of beggars and whiners. And your revolutionaries are carving us into competing factions. Our UNITY comes from a realization that MILLIONS of folks get up each morning to FREELY SERVE OTHERS..

I gave you a succint list of the harm that current policy is doing seniors above.. You ignored it.. Don't think you have the ability to claim a higher moral ground anymore --- just because you live for the past...

You gave me a list of excuses, obfuscation and accusations that are not directed at the guilty parties.

Social Security is not very difficult to fix. Medicare will be more difficult. But it MUST be fixed, and burdening the elderly with a lot more out of pocket costs is not acceptable or moral.

You mean to tell me that America, the 'city upon the hill', the most prosperous nation on this planet CAN'T offer a minimum social safety net for it's elderly citizens? While other industrial nations with much smaller economies offer a more comprehensive social safety net than America? Then what this country stands for is truly in question. 'City upon the hill'? Hardly.

People like Paul Ryan are a fraud. If he is truly interested in 'saving' Medicare, then the first step is admitting that the efficiency of the current public enterprise can't possibly be matched by private insurance corporations. There is no 'invisible hand' that can fix Medicare. At the time Medicare came to be in 1965, about half of the elderly had no health insurance—they were too old and too likely to get sick, so the private market simply wouldn’t insure them.

Awww gimmeabreak.. That ship long since sailed. I told you that OBAMA is stealing the premiums RIGHT NOW from Soc Sec and you call that "excuse and obfuscation".. I tell you that CONGRESS has looted the Soc Sec surplus to the tune of a $TRIL and you call that "excuse and obfuscation".. And I point 5 other ways that current Admin policy is punishing seniors BESIDES mucking with entitlements..

OF COURSE I want Soc Sec/Medicare to succeed for current enrollees.. But there has been NO visible evidence that the FEDS can handle the administration of such programs without graft and incompetence. Current recipients SHOULD be covered. The future needs a different prescription.

If we had USED THE SURPLUS to defer future costs to the program as it was proposed -- instead of letting Congress CONTINUE THE LOOTING -- we'd have REAL tangible cash value today in the program. And that would be folks who VOLUNTARILY traded some future benefits for a little bit of economic freedom.

You can turn these programs from UNIVERSAL to WELFARE by raising the caps and taxes and means testing. Be my guest.. But realize it will be with FDR hunting your ass from the grave and GENERATIONS of Americans who won't fall for the promise of UNIVERSAL ANYTHING again for a LONG LONG time..

What is your prescription for the future? You folks on the right will never tell anyone. Because your prescription for the future is social Darwinism. Survival of the fittest and the richest...let 'em die.

Is there any reason we can't start building a surplus to defer future costs to the program as it was proposed? Your graft and incompetence argument is standard issue right wing bullshit. The private sector is LESS efficient and just as rife with graft and incompetence. I will give you some reason: Republicans, Grover Norquist and their refusal to address our REVENUE problem.

Morally bankruptcy, raised by wolves right wing conservatives without conscience.

 

[Listening]

You gave me a list of excuses, obfuscation and accusations that are not directed at the guilty parties.

Social Security is not very difficult to fix. Medicare will be more difficult. But it MUST be fixed, and burdening the elderly with a lot more out of pocket costs is not acceptable or moral.

You mean to tell me that America, the 'city upon the hill', the most prosperous nation on this planet CAN'T offer a minimum social safety net for it's elderly citizens? While other industrial nations with much smaller economies offer a more comprehensive social safety net than America? Then what this country stands for is truly in question. 'City upon the hill'? Hardly.

People like Paul Ryan are a fraud. If he is truly interested in 'saving' Medicare, then the first step is admitting that the efficiency of the current public enterprise can't possibly be matched by private insurance corporations. There is no 'invisible hand' that can fix Medicare. At the time Medicare came to be in 1965, about half of the elderly had no health insurance—they were too old and too likely to get sick, so the private market simply wouldn’t insure them.

Awww gimmeabreak.. That ship long since sailed. I told you that OBAMA is stealing the premiums RIGHT NOW from Soc Sec and you call that "excuse and obfuscation".. I tell you that CONGRESS has looted the Soc Sec surplus to the tune of a $TRIL and you call that "excuse and obfuscation".. And I point 5 other ways that current Admin policy is punishing seniors BESIDES mucking with entitlements..

OF COURSE I want Soc Sec/Medicare to succeed for current enrollees.. But there has been NO visible evidence that the FEDS can handle the administration of such programs without graft and incompetence. Current recipients SHOULD be covered. The future needs a different prescription.

If we had USED THE SURPLUS to defer future costs to the program as it was proposed -- instead of letting Congress CONTINUE THE LOOTING -- we'd have REAL tangible cash value today in the program. And that would be folks who VOLUNTARILY traded some future benefits for a little bit of economic freedom.

You can turn these programs from UNIVERSAL to WELFARE by raising the caps and taxes and means testing. Be my guest.. But realize it will be with FDR hunting your ass from the grave and GENERATIONS of Americans who won't fall for the promise of UNIVERSAL ANYTHING again for a LONG LONG time..

What is your prescription for the future? You folks on the right will never tell anyone. Because your prescription for the future is social Darwinism. Survival of the fittest and the richest...let 'em die.

Is there any reason we can't start building a surplus to defer future costs to the program as it was proposed? Your graft and incompetence argument is standard issue right wing bullshit. The private sector is LESS efficient and just as rife with graft and incompetence. I will give you some reason: Republicans, Grover Norquist and their refusal to address our REVENUE problem.

Morally bankruptcy, raised by wolves right wing conservatives without conscience.

What would you propose to build that surplus ?

 

[Bfgrn]

Awww gimmeabreak.. That ship long since sailed. I told you that OBAMA is stealing the premiums RIGHT NOW from Soc Sec and you call that "excuse and obfuscation".. I tell you that CONGRESS has looted the Soc Sec surplus to the tune of a $TRIL and you call that "excuse and obfuscation".. And I point 5 other ways that current Admin policy is punishing seniors BESIDES mucking with entitlements..

OF COURSE I want Soc Sec/Medicare to succeed for current enrollees.. But there has been NO visible evidence that the FEDS can handle the administration of such programs without graft and incompetence. Current recipients SHOULD be covered. The future needs a different prescription.

If we had USED THE SURPLUS to defer future costs to the program as it was proposed -- instead of letting Congress CONTINUE THE LOOTING -- we'd have REAL tangible cash value today in the program. And that would be folks who VOLUNTARILY traded some future benefits for a little bit of economic freedom.

You can turn these programs from UNIVERSAL to WELFARE by raising the caps and taxes and means testing. Be my guest.. But realize it will be with FDR hunting your ass from the grave and GENERATIONS of Americans who won't fall for the promise of UNIVERSAL ANYTHING again for a LONG LONG time..

What is your prescription for the future? You folks on the right will never tell anyone. Because your prescription for the future is social Darwinism. Survival of the fittest and the richest...let 'em die.

Is there any reason we can't start building a surplus to defer future costs to the program as it was proposed? Your graft and incompetence argument is standard issue right wing bullshit. The private sector is LESS efficient and just as rife with graft and incompetence. I will give you some reason: Republicans, Grover Norquist and their refusal to address our REVENUE problem.

Morally bankruptcy, raised by wolves right wing conservatives without conscience.

What would you propose to build that surplus ?

If you had READ the article by Paul Craig Roberts, the father of Reaganomics, you would KNOW the answer.

Two Wall Street henchmen, Alan Greenspan and David Stockman, set up the Social Security raid in this way: The Carter administration had put Social Security in the black for the foreseeable future by establishing a schedule for future Social Security payroll tax increases. Greenspan and Stockman conspired to phase in the payroll tax increases earlier than was needed in order to gain surplus Social Security revenues that could be used to finance other government spending, thus reducing the budget deficit. They sold it to President Reagan as “putting Social Security on a sound basis.”

Along the way Americans were told that the surplus revenues were going into a special Social Security trust fund at the U.S. Treasury. But what is in the fund is Treasury IOUs for the spent revenues. When the “trust funds” are needed to pay Social Security benefits, the Treasury will have to sell more debt in order to redeem the IOUs.

 

[flacaltenn]

You gave me a list of excuses, obfuscation and accusations that are not directed at the guilty parties.

Social Security is not very difficult to fix. Medicare will be more difficult. But it MUST be fixed, and burdening the elderly with a lot more out of pocket costs is not acceptable or moral.

You mean to tell me that America, the 'city upon the hill', the most prosperous nation on this planet CAN'T offer a minimum social safety net for it's elderly citizens? While other industrial nations with much smaller economies offer a more comprehensive social safety net than America? Then what this country stands for is truly in question. 'City upon the hill'? Hardly.

People like Paul Ryan are a fraud. If he is truly interested in 'saving' Medicare, then the first step is admitting that the efficiency of the current public enterprise can't possibly be matched by private insurance corporations. There is no 'invisible hand' that can fix Medicare. At the time Medicare came to be in 1965, about half of the elderly had no health insurance—they were too old and too likely to get sick, so the private market simply wouldn’t insure them.

Awww gimmeabreak.. That ship long since sailed. I told you that OBAMA is stealing the premiums RIGHT NOW from Soc Sec and you call that "excuse and obfuscation".. I tell you that CONGRESS has looted the Soc Sec surplus to the tune of a $TRIL and you call that "excuse and obfuscation".. And I point 5 other ways that current Admin policy is punishing seniors BESIDES mucking with entitlements..

OF COURSE I want Soc Sec/Medicare to succeed for current enrollees.. But there has been NO visible evidence that the FEDS can handle the administration of such programs without graft and incompetence. Current recipients SHOULD be covered. The future needs a different prescription.

If we had USED THE SURPLUS to defer future costs to the program as it was proposed -- instead of letting Congress CONTINUE THE LOOTING -- we'd have REAL tangible cash value today in the program. And that would be folks who VOLUNTARILY traded some future benefits for a little bit of economic freedom.

You can turn these programs from UNIVERSAL to WELFARE by raising the caps and taxes and means testing. Be my guest.. But realize it will be with FDR hunting your ass from the grave and GENERATIONS of Americans who won't fall for the promise of UNIVERSAL ANYTHING again for a LONG LONG time..

What is your prescription for the future? You folks on the right will never tell anyone. Because your prescription for the future is social Darwinism. Survival of the fittest and the richest...let 'em die.

Is there any reason we can't start building a surplus to defer future costs to the program as it was proposed? Your graft and incompetence argument is standard issue right wing bullshit. The private sector is LESS efficient and just as rife with graft and incompetence. I will give you some reason: Republicans, Grover Norquist and their refusal to address our REVENUE problem.

Morally bankruptcy, raised by wolves right wing conservatives without conscience.

You're damn straight there's a reason we can't build a surplus for Soc Sec right now.. We can't even WRITE CHECKS for soc sec anymore without Borrowing money and paying interest TWICE on EVERY SS dollar benefit.. This is a problem we've KNOWN ABOUT for 30 years and you're not gonna tax us out of the problem.

You've got the Postal Workers running $MILL ad campaigns to convince us NOT TO FUND their pension accounts NOW -- so they can slip the bill to FUTURE taxpayers when they don't realize how out of control that "Trust Fund" is.

EVERYONE is angling to get "theirs"..

I told you what my proposal WAS.. And that was to use the Surplus in ways that WOULD HAVE added real dollar value to the Trust Fund. And you assholes persisted in villifying that as dismantling the system.

NOW --- my proposal HAS TO BE to turn SS into just another Welfare transfer. Grandfather in the grandfathers and mothers and means test the benefits for future reciepients while LOWERING the whole FICA tax structure. You BLEW IT.. There is no do-over here. The theft and incompetence is astronomically too huge.

No way I want to finance J.Z's retirement anymore. I'll contribute SOME for folks that need it in retirement. But you are gonna let me and my prodigeny OUT of the UNIVERSAL trap.

As for Medicare -- deep shame. I told you it killed my Dad.. Once in an accounting error. Once for real. One concept is to develop "payed up" policies, where coverage is taken at an early age and accrues value so that you can take a "payed up" option at age 66 or so.

You are in the process of killing one of the most brilliant plans for lifetime medical care which is the Health Savings concept. NO PROVIDERS have the foggiest idea of what stuff costs anymore. When I went shopping for medical services -- the money folks in the Doctor's office thought I was off my rocker asking how much for a procedure.. We need to RESTORE a market in Medical Care. There IS NO MARKET in medical care for you to bitch about because govt interference has killed it. Stashing $thousands a year in Medical savings (away from the insurance companies) would allow you to acheive the same "payed up" effect at retirement. Where you could comfortably achieve a $20K or $40K deductible that YOU controlled with a $100K+ nest egg to back it all up.

NOTHING gets fixed in retirement medical care that doesn't start with a WORKER at a YOUNG age. That's how life really is... It's NOT risk-free living. Just ask those public servants that are gonna see their pensions whittled down in the near future.. Just when they're all ready to retire..

 

[Bfgrn]

Awww gimmeabreak.. That ship long since sailed. I told you that OBAMA is stealing the premiums RIGHT NOW from Soc Sec and you call that "excuse and obfuscation".. I tell you that CONGRESS has looted the Soc Sec surplus to the tune of a $TRIL and you call that "excuse and obfuscation".. And I point 5 other ways that current Admin policy is punishing seniors BESIDES mucking with entitlements..

OF COURSE I want Soc Sec/Medicare to succeed for current enrollees.. But there has been NO visible evidence that the FEDS can handle the administration of such programs without graft and incompetence. Current recipients SHOULD be covered. The future needs a different prescription.

If we had USED THE SURPLUS to defer future costs to the program as it was proposed -- instead of letting Congress CONTINUE THE LOOTING -- we'd have REAL tangible cash value today in the program. And that would be folks who VOLUNTARILY traded some future benefits for a little bit of economic freedom.

You can turn these programs from UNIVERSAL to WELFARE by raising the caps and taxes and means testing. Be my guest.. But realize it will be with FDR hunting your ass from the grave and GENERATIONS of Americans who won't fall for the promise of UNIVERSAL ANYTHING again for a LONG LONG time..

What is your prescription for the future? You folks on the right will never tell anyone. Because your prescription for the future is social Darwinism. Survival of the fittest and the richest...let 'em die.

Is there any reason we can't start building a surplus to defer future costs to the program as it was proposed? Your graft and incompetence argument is standard issue right wing bullshit. The private sector is LESS efficient and just as rife with graft and incompetence. I will give you some reason: Republicans, Grover Norquist and their refusal to address our REVENUE problem.

Morally bankruptcy, raised by wolves right wing conservatives without conscience.

You're damn straight there's a reason we can't build a surplus for Soc Sec right now.. We can't even WRITE CHECKS for soc sec anymore without Borrowing money and paying interest TWICE on EVERY SS dollar benefit.. This is a problem we've KNOWN ABOUT for 30 years and you're not gonna tax us out of the problem.

You've got the Postal Workers running $MILL ad campaigns to convince us NOT TO FUND their pension accounts NOW -- so they can slip the bill to FUTURE taxpayers when they don't realize how out of control that "Trust Fund" is.

EVERYONE is angling to get "theirs"..

I told you what my proposal WAS.. And that was to use the Surplus in ways that WOULD HAVE added real dollar value to the Trust Fund. And you assholes persisted in villifying that as dismantling the system.

NOW --- my proposal HAS TO BE to turn SS into just another Welfare transfer. Grandfather in the grandfathers and mothers and means test the benefits for future reciepients while LOWERING the whole FICA tax structure. You BLEW IT.. There is no do-over here. The theft and incompetence is astronomically too huge.

No way I want to finance J.Z's retirement anymore. I'll contribute SOME for folks that need it in retirement. But you are gonna let me and my prodigeny OUT of the UNIVERSAL trap.

As for Medicare -- deep shame. I told you it killed my Dad.. Once in an accounting error. Once for real. One concept is to develop "payed up" policies, where coverage is taken at an early age and accrues value so that you can take a "payed up" option at age 66 or so.

You are in the process of killing one of the most brilliant plans for lifetime medical care which is the Health Savings concept. NO PROVIDERS have the foggiest idea of what stuff costs anymore. When I went shopping for medical services -- the money folks in the Doctor's office thought I was off my rocker asking how much for a procedure.. We need to RESTORE a market in Medical Care. There IS NO MARKET in medical care for you to bitch about because govt interference has killed it. Stashing $thousands a year in Medical savings (away from the insurance companies) would allow you to acheive the same "payed up" effect at retirement. Where you could comfortably achieve a $20K or $40K deductible that YOU controlled with a $100K+ nest egg to back it all up.

NOTHING gets fixed in retirement medical care that doesn't start with a WORKER at a YOUNG age. That's how life really is... It's NOT risk-free living. Just ask those public servants that are gonna see their pensions whittled down in the near future.. Just when they're all ready to retire..

We never argue anymore in this country about ideology, we end up arguing about FACTS.

Here are some facts to digest and contemplate:

The reason Medicare is an expensive venture is not because it is run by the government. It is expensive because the PRIVATE industry that delivers health care is the most expensive on the planet...by FAR, like DOUBLE. It is that same private health care industry that has driven up costs.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What do all these countries with much lower costs have that America doesn't?

Answer: Universal vs. Private Health Insurance

There is one factor common to the top 15 countries with lower heath care costs. They all have strong state funding of single-payer universal health care, instead of insurance based health care tied to employment. The bottom four countries – Germany, USA, Portugal and Switzerland – all depend more heavily on profit-based, private health insurance provided primarily through the employer/employee relationship.

“Other countries negotiate very aggressively with the providers and set rates that are much lower than we do.” They do this in one of two ways. In countries such as Canada and Britain, prices are set by the government. In others, such as Germany and Japan, they’re set by providers and insurers sitting in a room and coming to an agreement, with the government stepping in to set prices if they fail.

In America, Medicare and Medicaid negotiate prices on behalf of their tens of millions of members and, not coincidentally, purchase care at a substantial markdown from the commercial average. But outside that, it’s a free-for-all. Providers largely charge what they can get away with, often offering different prices to different insurers, and an even higher price to the uninsured.

As I said before, there is no 'invisible hand' that can fix Medicare. AND... there is no 'invisible hand' that can fix our health care cost problems.

The facts: health care does not and never will fit into a classic market transaction. There is an intrinsic problem inherent in health care, the patients has no leverage in the transaction, except to not deal with the insurer or provider...IN THEIR NEXT LIFE.

Health care is an unusual product in that it is difficult, and sometimes impossible, for the customer to say “no.” In certain cases, the customer is passed out, or otherwise incapable of making decisions about her care, and the decisions are made by providers whose mandate is, correctly, to save lives rather than money.

In other cases, there is more time for loved ones to consider costs, but little emotional space to do so — no one wants to think there was something more they could have done to save their parent or child. It is not like buying a television, where you can easily comparison shop and walk out of the store, and even forgo the purchase if it’s too expensive. And imagine what you would pay for a television if the salesmen at Best Buy knew that you couldn’t leave without making a purchase.

The problem with health care's skyrocketing costs in America is not too much government intervention, it is not enough government intervention.

 

[LogikAndReazon]

All we need to do to "fix" social insecurity is prolong the eligibility age and of course, increase the social security payroll tax !!!

For the common good......................LOL

 

[JWBooth]

If I could actually mislead myself into believing that, I might reconsider my vote in November.
Alas, the notion that the R's will actually attempt to do something about government is all just fantasy.

 

[Oddball]

Ryan is a diciple of Ayn Rand and should not be allowed within a heartbeat of the Presidency.

Yes, Ayn Rand - the person who had to live under the very communism your spoiled and free ass thinks is "cute" and "cuddly".

Ayn Rand knew what the fuck she was talking about, and that has never been more obvious than the nightmare maxist in the White House named Obama and his Obamacare....

The same Ayn Rand who had to get Social Security and Medicare at the end of her life, because she wasn't nearly as good at Capitalist thing as she thought she was.

She was forced to pay into those scams, therefore she was entitled to recoup her losses.

How is it you looters come to believe that being against the socialistic welfare state means that you also have to put up with robbed with no recompense?

 

[flacaltenn]

What is your prescription for the future? You folks on the right will never tell anyone. Because your prescription for the future is social Darwinism. Survival of the fittest and the richest...let 'em die.

Is there any reason we can't start building a surplus to defer future costs to the program as it was proposed? Your graft and incompetence argument is standard issue right wing bullshit. The private sector is LESS efficient and just as rife with graft and incompetence. I will give you some reason: Republicans, Grover Norquist and their refusal to address our REVENUE problem.

Morally bankruptcy, raised by wolves right wing conservatives without conscience.

You're damn straight there's a reason we can't build a surplus for Soc Sec right now.. We can't even WRITE CHECKS for soc sec anymore without Borrowing money and paying interest TWICE on EVERY SS dollar benefit.. This is a problem we've KNOWN ABOUT for 30 years and you're not gonna tax us out of the problem.

You've got the Postal Workers running $MILL ad campaigns to convince us NOT TO FUND their pension accounts NOW -- so they can slip the bill to FUTURE taxpayers when they don't realize how out of control that "Trust Fund" is.

EVERYONE is angling to get "theirs"..

I told you what my proposal WAS.. And that was to use the Surplus in ways that WOULD HAVE added real dollar value to the Trust Fund. And you assholes persisted in villifying that as dismantling the system.

NOW --- my proposal HAS TO BE to turn SS into just another Welfare transfer. Grandfather in the grandfathers and mothers and means test the benefits for future reciepients while LOWERING the whole FICA tax structure. You BLEW IT.. There is no do-over here. The theft and incompetence is astronomically too huge.

No way I want to finance J.Z's retirement anymore. I'll contribute SOME for folks that need it in retirement. But you are gonna let me and my prodigeny OUT of the UNIVERSAL trap.

As for Medicare -- deep shame. I told you it killed my Dad.. Once in an accounting error. Once for real. One concept is to develop "payed up" policies, where coverage is taken at an early age and accrues value so that you can take a "payed up" option at age 66 or so.

You are in the process of killing one of the most brilliant plans for lifetime medical care which is the Health Savings concept. NO PROVIDERS have the foggiest idea of what stuff costs anymore. When I went shopping for medical services -- the money folks in the Doctor's office thought I was off my rocker asking how much for a procedure.. We need to RESTORE a market in Medical Care. There IS NO MARKET in medical care for you to bitch about because govt interference has killed it. Stashing $thousands a year in Medical savings (away from the insurance companies) would allow you to acheive the same "payed up" effect at retirement. Where you could comfortably achieve a $20K or $40K deductible that YOU controlled with a $100K+ nest egg to back it all up.

NOTHING gets fixed in retirement medical care that doesn't start with a WORKER at a YOUNG age. That's how life really is... It's NOT risk-free living. Just ask those public servants that are gonna see their pensions whittled down in the near future.. Just when they're all ready to retire..

We never argue anymore in this country about ideology, we end up arguing about FACTS.

Here are some facts to digest and contemplate:

The reason Medicare is an expensive venture is not because it is run by the government. It is expensive because the PRIVATE industry that delivers health care is the most expensive on the planet...by FAR, like DOUBLE. It is that same private health care industry that has driven up costs.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What do all these countries with much lower costs have that America doesn't?

Answer: Universal vs. Private Health Insurance

The problem with health care's skyrocketing costs in America is not too much government intervention, it is not enough government intervention.

Not really interested in polished manufactured numbers. Doctors are being STARVED out of their Medicare practices and the REST OF US are paying for that. And these juvenile analyses never take into the cost of COLLECTING PREMIUMS or Accounting Services provided by OTHER GOVT agencies or a myriad of OTHER COSTS that are swept under the rug.. It's not the cost of doing business. It's bureacratic magic and mirrors.

BTW --- I've told this story before but it REFUTES your last sentence completely.. I was sitting in engineering meetings to design a new nebulizer for CF drug delivery that would make treatment at HOME a substitute for out-patient care.. I realized towards the end of the meeting that the marketing dudes/dudettes hadn't said a word about what this should cost -- so I asked.. They all giggled and laughed... I said I needed an answer.. THis is what they told me...

""Doesn't matter really --- the procedure is reimbursed as govt defined code and that's what the providers will get.. So unless you're planning on using a lot of gold or platinum in the thing -- don't sweat it""""

There's your "" not enough govt intervention" -- you FOOL. And there's the reason that COSTS OF CARE are not ever coming down with a CENTRALLY DICTATED reimbursement schedule. They GIGGLED AT ME -- because YOU ALLOW them to pocket the diff with your AMPLE existing Govt intervention...

 

[Polk]

Nah...the Budget Munster claims that was just a "youthful dalliance" and that he's dedicated, heart & soul to Thomas Aquinas now. Somebody clued him in on the the fact that you can't be a follower of Christ and of Rand.

The "Nuns on the Bus" are driving it in. Sister Simone is really critical and vocal about Ryan and his failure as a Catholic.

Great...a Catholic who does not understand her doctrine.

Just what we need...another moron making policy.

It's like Jesus said: Feed not the poor, but waterboard them instead.

 

[Polk]

I believe in making sure the old get their SSI that they earned. Anyone that wants to cut that is stealing from them as surely as someone robs a man on a street corner. Certainly, we do need reforms, but not all of the new deal was wrong.

We need to reform SSD to make sure that only people that have a REAL disability get it. No more just for not having a job running onto it.

Huge reforms are needed. Let's not throw our old under the BUS.

We can work on putting more of the frame work on the state. The same reason we don't want education under the federal government. A centralize government abuses its people this way.

Do you even know what the qualifications for SSI are? If you did, you'd know it's a fate no one wants.

 

[Polk]

Listening is a truly pathetic creature.

The Agenda Project: Granny Off the Cliff - YouTube

Romney doesn't want to cut Medicare or SSI.

The main reason people "want" to qualify for SSI is because it also makes you eligible for Medicaid in most states. The Republican proposals call for massive Medicaid cuts.

 

[Bfgrn]

You're damn straight there's a reason we can't build a surplus for Soc Sec right now.. We can't even WRITE CHECKS for soc sec anymore without Borrowing money and paying interest TWICE on EVERY SS dollar benefit.. This is a problem we've KNOWN ABOUT for 30 years and you're not gonna tax us out of the problem.

You've got the Postal Workers running $MILL ad campaigns to convince us NOT TO FUND their pension accounts NOW -- so they can slip the bill to FUTURE taxpayers when they don't realize how out of control that "Trust Fund" is.

EVERYONE is angling to get "theirs"..

I told you what my proposal WAS.. And that was to use the Surplus in ways that WOULD HAVE added real dollar value to the Trust Fund. And you assholes persisted in villifying that as dismantling the system.

NOW --- my proposal HAS TO BE to turn SS into just another Welfare transfer. Grandfather in the grandfathers and mothers and means test the benefits for future reciepients while LOWERING the whole FICA tax structure. You BLEW IT.. There is no do-over here. The theft and incompetence is astronomically too huge.

No way I want to finance J.Z's retirement anymore. I'll contribute SOME for folks that need it in retirement. But you are gonna let me and my prodigeny OUT of the UNIVERSAL trap.

As for Medicare -- deep shame. I told you it killed my Dad.. Once in an accounting error. Once for real. One concept is to develop "payed up" policies, where coverage is taken at an early age and accrues value so that you can take a "payed up" option at age 66 or so.

You are in the process of killing one of the most brilliant plans for lifetime medical care which is the Health Savings concept. NO PROVIDERS have the foggiest idea of what stuff costs anymore. When I went shopping for medical services -- the money folks in the Doctor's office thought I was off my rocker asking how much for a procedure.. We need to RESTORE a market in Medical Care. There IS NO MARKET in medical care for you to bitch about because govt interference has killed it. Stashing $thousands a year in Medical savings (away from the insurance companies) would allow you to acheive the same "payed up" effect at retirement. Where you could comfortably achieve a $20K or $40K deductible that YOU controlled with a $100K+ nest egg to back it all up.

NOTHING gets fixed in retirement medical care that doesn't start with a WORKER at a YOUNG age. That's how life really is... It's NOT risk-free living. Just ask those public servants that are gonna see their pensions whittled down in the near future.. Just when they're all ready to retire..

We never argue anymore in this country about ideology, we end up arguing about FACTS.

Here are some facts to digest and contemplate:

The reason Medicare is an expensive venture is not because it is run by the government. It is expensive because the PRIVATE industry that delivers health care is the most expensive on the planet...by FAR, like DOUBLE. It is that same private health care industry that has driven up costs.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What do all these countries with much lower costs have that America doesn't?

Answer: Universal vs. Private Health Insurance

The problem with health care's skyrocketing costs in America is not too much government intervention, it is not enough government intervention.

Not really interested in polished manufactured numbers. Doctors are being STARVED out of their Medicare practices and the REST OF US are paying for that. And these juvenile analyses never take into the cost of COLLECTING PREMIUMS or Accounting Services provided by OTHER GOVT agencies or a myriad of OTHER COSTS that are swept under the rug.. It's not the cost of doing business. It's bureacratic magic and mirrors.

BTW --- I've told this story before but it REFUTES your last sentence completely.. I was sitting in engineering meetings to design a new nebulizer for CF drug delivery that would make treatment at HOME a substitute for out-patient care.. I realized towards the end of the meeting that the marketing dudes/dudettes hadn't said a word about what this should cost -- so I asked.. They all giggled and laughed... I said I needed an answer.. THis is what they told me...

""Doesn't matter really --- the procedure is reimbursed as govt defined code and that's what the providers will get.. So unless you're planning on using a lot of gold or platinum in the thing -- don't sweat it""""

There's your "" not enough govt intervention" -- you FOOL. And there's the reason that COSTS OF CARE are not ever coming down with a CENTRALLY DICTATED reimbursement schedule. They GIGGLED AT ME -- because YOU ALLOW them to pocket the diff with your AMPLE existing Govt intervention...

Not really interested in looking at any truth, eh flacaltenn? Gee, maybe you can come back and make me look silly by firing off all the countries that have a market based health care system that has low costs?

Add it to the list of countries that run on Austrian School economics or polluters who emit only CO2...

The answers from the right are always the same...ZERO, ZERO, ZERO...

"Doctors are being STARVED out of their Medicare practices and the REST OF US are paying for that"

Oh, the humanity!

Here is a REAL doctor.

Health Insurance: More Tricks of the Trade

By David Belk M.D.

Another patient of mine had routine blood work done before an appointment. I ordered a lipid panel, a metabolic panel, a blood count and a thyroid test. If you check the reimbursement rates given in the last section, this should have been about $75 worth of tests. A local lab even offers these same tests to cash patients for $95 without a doctor’s order (as you can see).

You can imagine how shocked she was (as was I) when she received the following bill:

As you can see from the top line of numbers, the lab billed her $782.44 or about ten times the expected payment (not unusual for a hospital lab). The discount is only $367.45 leaving her with a $414.69 bill for about $75 worth of labs. She’s currently trying to contest the bill because she thinks that it’s ridiculous (it is). In the meantime, the hospital where she had these blood tests is running out of patience and they want their money.

So what’s going on?

They have insurance. The bills are going through the insurance companies. Why do these tests cost them so much more than an insurance company would usually pay? Insurance companies don’t negotiate—at least not with groups as small as the lab at this hospital. They set a reimbursement rate, which is usually pretty close to what Medicare pays, and we (or the hospital) smiles and says “thank you.” After all, if we’re doing it for Medicare for $75, we’ll probably do it for United Health Care (or any other insurance company) for $80. Why would anyone say “no”?

Maybe United Health Care and Blue Shield are just being generous. But probably not—United Health Care is consistently one of my lowest payers. For example, they pay me $65 and Blue Shield (the insurance provider in the first example) pays me $73 for an office visit. For the same visit, Medicare pays me $79 (that’s right, most private insurers pay me less than Medicare). So why are they being so nice to hospitals?

I can think of at least two reasons an insurance company might price services so outrageously high on certain policies. First, that would punish anyone who buys inexpensive insurance with a high deductible (both of these patients did). Second, they keep you from finding out how much (little) medical service really cost. Patients with high deductibles pay for most of their own medical care. The insurance companies make sure that these patients see a much higher price than the “real” price that they could pay. Just as with generic prescription drugs, insurance companies, not providers determine the price of everything. They can hide their real costs, and punish you for not buying a more expensive plan.

And it doesn’t just change the way patients behave. If an occasional patient has a policy that pays at or near the maximum price charged by the hospital, the hospital is motivated to keep their outrageously high prices. This helps to keep medical care unaffordable to private payers. If these inflated reimbursement rates are only on policies that have very high deductibles, the insurance company will rarely get stuck with the bill. Even at these outrageous prices, most people with private insurance will never need more than $1,500 of medical care in a year. On occasion, someone with one of these policies will have a serious illness and the insurance will have to pay big, but the insurance companies more than make up for these loses with the increase in premiums they get by maintaining their smokescreen.

What this means is that insurance companies have enormous control over the medical industry. They set all rates of reimbursement for all medical services no matter how trivial. These rates vary greatly from policy to policy even for the same service from the same provider. You’ve seen many ways they can use this power to control (and profit from) the entire industry.