Insurance reform, necessary, but is it sufficient?

Can you please read for comprehension?

Medicare costs nearly tenfold what it was projected to cost when it was set forth, back in '65....And that's taking inflation into account between then and today.

Amazing what happens when something's "free", isn't it?
 
S...Eagle,
I disagree. Single payer, non-profit. No need to advertise. No need for small print, no need for lawyers to work day and night to limit payouts, no need for salespeople, district managers, executive managers or CFO's, CEO's.

Why do we need insurance companies?
Why?
Consider, the conservative chic was willing to let General Motors fail and all of its employees put out of work. I willing to let the insurance companies reinvent, and maybe sell something useful like time shares or snake oil to cure hypocrisy. We sure need that.

I agree....a person doesn't really NEED insurance....if he's healthy and/or rich....but insurance companies exist because of the CHANCE that a person may experience a medical emergency that costs more than they can handle....insurance companies make money by betting the odds...

An emergency is the only reason to buy health insurance.....and if that was the only reason why people bought health insurance the costs of that catastrophic insurance would go WAY DOWN...

However most Americans think insurance companies must provide every medical service from a heart attack down to a hangnail....and that's what causes problems and high prices....you should pay for those hangnail problems yourself...

If people started saving in their HSAs from the time they started working they would have plenty of money to cover most health costs for most of their lives....perhaps even a heart attack or two...

When people start buying health services on the free market costs will go way down due to competitiveness because nobody can charge more than the market will bear...it's the only REAL way we are going to cut health care costs...by cutting out the middlemen - the government, employers, all-inclusive insurance companies - who gum up everything and push up prices...
 
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The public option may eliminate health care and medical insurance companies eventually, but it won’t be any cheaper.

It'll be a little cheaper.. but not much as long as the total marketplace is still being completely screwed up my the massive number of poorly regulated private insurers.

Show me a government program that is more efficient than a private program.

Ummm... Medicare. It only has less than half the administrative overhead of private insurers.

Damn! At this rate we could all end up as government employees.

I wonder what that means?
 
Can you please read for comprehension?

Medicare costs nearly tenfold what it was projected to cost when it was set forth, back in '65....And that's taking inflation into account between then and today.

Amazing what happens when something's "free", isn't it?

Mark Twain said it best, "There are lies, damn lies and statistics". Now, Dude, I'm not coping out, but I really am not inclined to go into an in depth debate. Suffice it to say, what we have doesn't work. It makes the few wealthy at the expense of the many.
 
Can you please read for comprehension?

Medicare costs nearly tenfold what it was projected to cost when it was set forth, back in '65....And that's taking inflation into account between then and today.

Amazing what happens when something's "free", isn't it?

I wonder what the increase in health care costs has been for the 'private' system since the mid-60's? Did anyone project that by 2009 we'd be spending over 17% of our GDP on healthcare?
 
The public option may eliminate health care and medical insurance companies eventually, but it won’t be any cheaper.

It'll be a little cheaper.. but not much as long as the total marketplace is still being completely screwed up my the massive number of poorly regulated private insurers.
Your ass it'll be cheaper.

The surest way to make anything more expensive and be a sure-fire money loser is for gubmint to take it over.

See: Amtrak

No... see: Medicare.

You know, that government run health insurance program? We ARE talking about government run health insurance programs here right? How about we use an actual real world one as the example instead of looking at trains?

Or how about this? See: EVERY OTHER INDUSTRIALIZED NATION ON PLANET EARTH who use higher levels of public sector involvement in their health care systems. Because every single last one of them is containing costs significantly better than the US is. Without exception.

Ummm... Medicare. It only has less than half the administrative overhead of private insurers.
I'm sooooo tired of that BS statistic being spewed as gospel.

Administrative costs aren't the only things on the expense side of a ledger[/quote]

Quite right!

Well, there's profits to shareholders... oh, wait, knock that one off too. Medicare spending less again.

Hmm, and then of course there's the really biggie. The actual payment for the care itself. It seems to me I remember hearing the occasional tales of doctors being resistant to taking on medicare patients because of the low fees they have to charge to medicare. Now... what does that mean for our little cost comparison do you think? Hmm?

Want to keep going?

....Medicare costs nearly 10 times (and that's counting inflation) what it was projected to costs when it was passed....admin costs and all.

Try again.

Try again... because? Is that some really poorly thought out joke? Your response to the fact that medicare is currently, right now, here in the 21st century... outperforming the private sector on cost control is to say "well, well... medicare costs more than they THOUGHT it would 40 years ago!"

And I should care exactly why? "Oh no, it costs more than they expected it was going to in the 60s! Quick! Switch to the even MORE expensive private sector providers! That'll fix that!"

Is that the conclusion we're all supposed to jump to here? Or did you have some other brilliant reason for puling that statement out?
 
The reform package will pass, and those representatives, including the GOP swine from GA and AL, who oppose it, are going down next year.
 

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