Democrats want universal health care

[Whereisup]

Every developed nation except the United States has universal health care. They do vary from one another, so there are various ways one can be set up. It would not be disruptive if the United States simply made everyone at any age eligible for Medicare. That would also make it easy to keep costs down.

Everyone who qualifies is already eligible for medicare. That's never been the problem. It's getting them to change the stall until the claimant dies policy.

The proposal is that everyone automatically would qualify for Medicare, including all young people. In addition, if everyone were on Medicare, that would put pressure on health care providers to be more honest.

There is something of a stall, but it is the health care businesses which do this, not the government.

I've seen this personally with the HMOs. They receive a flat fee of a number of thousands of dollars per year, and as long as there is nothing serious,they are very friendly and helpful. I have seen that change when someone develops an illness which will cost them a lot of money treat

One case involved a person my mother knew who was on Secure Horizons. She developed a hoarse voice that wouldn't go away and went to her Secure Horizons doctor, and he told her not to worry, that it was nothing. However, it didn't go away so she went back a couple of times more and he sent her away again. Finally, she developed a lump in her throat that was obvious. When she went to the doctor again, he told her that it was cancer and had now spread so far that treatment was impossible. Nevertheless, she went to the hospital for chemotherapy, and died after the first dose. That has happened to enough people I personally or indirectly have known that I wonder if people are sometimes given a fatal dose so the HMO won't have to pay the money to keep on treating them..

Then, it happened to my mother, and I saw it closely because I took care of my mother. There were difficulties time after time, but I will just describe the beginning; My mother developed severe itching so went to her Kaiser doctor. Kaiser is a cooperative, but it is a cooperative of doctors, not a cooperative of patients. Her doctor told her it was nothing and without doing any tests, just sent her away with some itch medicine. That didn't work so she went back again, and he sent her to psychiatry.

At that point, I decided to do some reading in medical books, and discovered that itching was a symptom in several serious diseases. I was seeing my own psychiatrist due to depression, and asked him. He told me that itching isn't a psychiatric symptom. The doctors at Kaiser had all gone to medical school, so at least some of them should have known that.

So she got worse and began to develop some jaundice. At that point, she was too embarrassed to go in again but I said I would go with her and got her to agree.

So we went into the urgent care clinic. I was a bit embarrassed to go into the examining room with her, but decided I had better.

So we went into the examining room, and a young Chinese resident said it looked like it might be a serious problem, and sent us to radiology. At radiology, we were told that they were too busy for her, but if we came back the next day, we could make an appointment then. I don't know why, but I asked if we could have the barium drink now so she could take it right away when we got an appointment. The nurse had probably never been asked that, and gave us the drink.

That evening, the young Chinese resident called us at home to ask about the appointment. We told him what had happened, and he said to come to urgent care first thing in the morning and he would arrange for the scan. When he heard that we had the barium drink in hand, he said my mother should drink it now.

So we went in, and the young Chinese resident tried to get an appointment for my mother, but radiology refused. He then said that he could admit her to the hospital, and then she could have the scan right away. However, the supervising doctor told him no and that she should go home. The young Chinese doctor was then taken off the case. Evidently, he didn't know that not to be caring about patients was Kaiser policy.

So I was really scared and forced myself to speak calmly, because I knew that if I raised my voice, they might call security. As calmly as I could, I explained that her first Kaiser doctor had sent her home without doing tests, and that in some medical books, I had read that itching can be a symptom of something serious, so we would just wait.

They then sent a nurse in to tell us that we would be more comfortable waiting in the waiting room, but I knew we wouldn't get back in if we left, so I said it was OK because we were comfortable here. Still trying to speak calmly.

They then sent a higher level doctor in to tell us to leave, and I went through my calm spiel about her not having been given tests before, and my having read the medical books, and that the young Chinese resident had said something was seriously wrong.

So we waited another hour or so in the examining room, and two doctors came in. I repeated my spiel. They said that radiology was too busy. I said that we would be willing to wait for a midnight appointment if necessary. I also added that she had already drunk the barium drink, and it would cause a waste of money if the scan wasn't done.

At that point, she was admitted to the hospital, given the scan, and the next day, she had emergency surgery to open a blocked bile duct. It turned out that she had cancer. Getting her treated afterwards involved some similat difficulties.

So I know about your stall, and it wasn't the government which did it. Also notice that it was a Chinese doctor who was honest and wanted to help. Although there are problems between the United States and China which need to be resolved, I think that shows that there is something good in Chinese culture that we could connect to.

Jim

 

[asterism]

Medicare costs about $10,000 per person per year. Where is the $3.5 Trillion going to come from if everyone is on it?

 

[Whereisup]

I've forgotten nothing.

Show us a single Republican vote in favor of the PPACA.

The Republicans could have blocked the bill in the Senate, but they didn't.

Anyone who doesn't like history has the right not to know. But not knowing about history does cause people to make mistakes.

So the problem we have is that of keeping the people who don't want to know about history safe. How can we do that?

Jim

Please show me how the bill could have been blocked by the Republicans in the Senate.

This ought to be good.

That has been talked about in the news media perhaps twice a week for several years. I haven't kept a tally so I don't know exactly how many times the news media has talked about this. I suppose you might be from a foreign nation so you haven't seen the news reports. Or perhaps there is a news source you rely on that I don't watch nor read, and for some reason, that news source is dishonest and doesn't report what is really happening.

You might be just saying that for political reasons, but I try to give everyone the benefit of the doubt. Even if you are, your political reasons might be sincere and come from your best estimate of what you think is good for America and Americans. If so, I might disagree with you, but what you are doing is good.

It requires a 60% vote in the Senate to block a filibuster and vote on the bill. If 60% of the Senators don't vote to proceed to a vote of the bill, the bill is blocked and can't be voted upon. Since there are fewer than 60 Democratic Senators, some Republicans must vote with them to block a filibuster and proceed to a vote on the bill.

Jim

 

[Whereisup]

Medicare costs about $10,000 per person per year. Where is the $3.5 Trillion going to come from if everyone is on it?

Your numbers seem to be off. The United States is spending about 17 percent of Gross Domestic Product on health care and the GDP is about 15 trillion dollars per year. If I didn't make a mistake in multiplying, that means we are spending only 2.55 trillion dollars per year. We are already spending that but from a variety of government and private sources.

There is one immediate savings that would occur right away. Medicare spends about 5% of the money on administrative costs, while the health insurance companies spend about 20%. So government is much more efficient than the health insurance companies. What the health care insurance companies have done has caused the unnecessary deaths of probably a few million people. So health care insurance companies don't deserve to survive. There would be a good case for putting their executives in prison.

Then, the money being spent on VA medical care and Medicaid would be folded into the Medicare budget.

Then, government can't keep costs down now because it has no leverage. If the government doesn't pay what doctors and other health care businesses want, they will simply refuse to treat Medicare patients. However, if everyone were on Medicare, doctors, hospitals, etc. would have to accept whatever Medicare would pay. That by the way is one reason health care businesses are so strongly against universal health care.

So let us assume that we might decide to reduce health care costs to 12% of Gross Domestic Product, which would still be well above the cost in any foreign developed nation universal health care program. That would be 1.8 trillion dollars per year. Some of that money would come from the current Medicare tax. The rest would have to be made up from some new taxes.

But notice that people would save money they now spend from their own pockets. Everyone would be better off financially.

Together, in various ways, Americans are spending about 2.55 trillion dollars per year now. With a 12% Medicare universal health care, or some other 12% universal health care system, Americans would only be spending 1.8 trillion dollars per year. So Americans would be spending 750 billion dollars per year less than we all spend now.

Divided equally, with a 12% universal health care program, Americans would save $2,500 per year over lifetime average cost with our current system, including the system before Obamacare. That would be a savings of $10,000 per year for a family of four.

Much of the savings would come to people as lower prices for products and higher salaries, so it would be invisible yet real. Universal health care would be much cheaper than we pay now.

Health care is an area that needs to be a government program because as we have seen, private enterprise and medical care don't mix in any way well.

What private enterprise is so good at is manufacturing things like cars, appliances, packaged food, carpets, and on and on. Private enterprise is also good at providing many services, such as cell phone services.

My feeling in general is that private enterprise should do the many things it does well. Then, government should do the things that private enterprise has proven that it does a terrible job at.

Jim

 

[asterism]

The Republicans could have blocked the bill in the Senate, but they didn't.

Anyone who doesn't like history has the right not to know. But not knowing about history does cause people to make mistakes.

So the problem we have is that of keeping the people who don't want to know about history safe. How can we do that?

Jim

Please show me how the bill could have been blocked by the Republicans in the Senate.

This ought to be good.

That has been talked about in the news media perhaps twice a week for several years. I haven't kept a tally so I don't know exactly how many times the news media has talked about this. I suppose you might be from a foreign nation so you haven't seen the news reports. Or perhaps there is a news source you rely on that I don't watch nor read, and for some reason, that news source is dishonest and doesn't report what is really happening.

You might be just saying that for political reasons, but I try to give everyone the benefit of the doubt. Even if you are, your political reasons might be sincere and come from your best estimate of what you think is good for America and Americans. If so, I might disagree with you, but what you are doing is good.

It requires a 60% vote in the Senate to block a filibuster and vote on the bill. If 60% of the Senators don't vote to proceed to a vote of the bill, the bill is blocked and can't be voted upon. Since there are fewer than 60 Democratic Senators, some Republicans must vote with them to block a filibuster and proceed to a vote on the bill.

Jim

I think you need to research the process used to pass the bill in the Senate and the original name of the bill that got passed.

Start here:

Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

No Republicans voted for any part of the PPACA and Republicans did whatever they could to stop it.

 

[asterism]

Here is the actual Senate vote for the PPACA, no Republican voted in favor of it.

U.S. Senate: Legislation & Records Home > Votes > Roll Call Vote

 

[asterism]

Medicare costs about $10,000 per person per year. Where is the $3.5 Trillion going to come from if everyone is on it?

Your numbers seem to be off. The United States is spending about 17 percent of Gross Domestic Product on health care and the GDP is about 15 trillion dollars per year. If I didn't make a mistake in multiplying, that means we are spending only 2.55 trillion dollars per year. We are already spending that but from a variety of government and private sources.

Why do you assume consumption of health services won't go up when it's no cost to most people? I was incorrect about the population though, it's 317 Million. The latest figure available shows Medicare costing $9,702 per beneficiary in 2012.

There is one immediate savings that would occur right away. Medicare spends about 5% of the money on administrative costs, while the health insurance companies spend about 20%. So government is much more efficient than the health insurance companies. What the health care insurance companies have done has caused the unnecessary deaths of probably a few million people. So health care insurance companies don't deserve to survive. There would be a good case for putting their executives in prison.

Your 20% number is bogus. Your 5% estimate for administrative cost for Medicare is due to the high costs of individual Medicare claims. There's no incentive to reduce costs or be efficient, so it's simply 5% of a much larger number compared to comparable service in the private sector.

Then, the money being spent on VA medical care and Medicaid would be folded into the Medicare budget.

Then, government can't keep costs down now because it has no leverage. If the government doesn't pay what doctors and other health care businesses want, they will simply refuse to treat Medicare patients. However, if everyone were on Medicare, doctors, hospitals, etc. would have to accept whatever Medicare would pay. That by the way is one reason health care businesses are so strongly against universal health care.

So let us assume that we might decide to reduce health care costs to 12% of Gross Domestic Product, which would still be well above the cost in any foreign developed nation universal health care program. That would be 1.8 trillion dollars per year. Some of that money would come from the current Medicare tax. The rest would have to be made up from some new taxes.

But notice that people would save money they now spend from their own pockets. Everyone would be better off financially.

Together, in various ways, Americans are spending about 2.55 trillion dollars per year now. With a 12% Medicare universal health care, or some other 12% universal health care system, Americans would only be spending 1.8 trillion dollars per year. So Americans would be spending 750 billion dollars per year less than we all spend now.

Divided equally, with a 12% universal health care program, Americans would save $2,500 per year over lifetime average cost with our current system, including the system before Obamacare. That would be a savings of $10,000 per year for a family of four.

Much of the savings would come to people as lower prices for products and higher salaries, so it would be invisible yet real. Universal health care would be much cheaper than we pay now.

Health care is an area that needs to be a government program because as we have seen, private enterprise and medical care don't mix in any way well.

What private enterprise is so good at is manufacturing things like cars, appliances, packaged food, carpets, and on and on. Private enterprise is also good at providing many services, such as cell phone services.

My feeling in general is that private enterprise should do the many things it does well. Then, government should do the things that private enterprise has proven that it does a terrible job at.

Jim

Now show me any government program that has ever experienced reduced costs once it was nationalized. The grand plans are alway similar to yours until the law is passed and then the cost savings plans are forgotten. But few care by that point, the majority of those benefiting aren't paying the increased costs.

 

[Politico]

Of that entire essay this sentence nullifies any point you were trying to make.

There is something of a stall, but it is the health care businesses which do this, not the government.

It is not Blue Cross that refuses to process a SS or MC claim. It is the government. People die every day waiting for help. It's a game to those assclowns in Washington. And you think it would be better if they were in charge of everything? Go back to sleep sheeple.

 

[Norman]

The Myth of Medicare's 'Low Administrative Costs' - Forbes

Good read on Medicare. Not sure if completely true, but the concept is correct.

Besides that, I can personally attest that it's a VERY bad idea to eliminate choice in health care or insurance. Individuals need different things!

Although, with obamacare there may not be that much choice anymore anyway. At least there still is a private sector where can you pay with cash and get what you actually need.

 

[Whereisup]

The Myth of Medicare's 'Low Administrative Costs' - Forbes

Good read on Medicare. Not sure if completely true, but the concept is correct.

Besides that, I can personally attest that it's a VERY bad idea to eliminate choice in health care or insurance. Individuals need different things!

Although, with obamacare there may not be that much choice anymore anyway. At least there still is a private sector where can you pay with cash and get what you actually need.

It's not really a bad idea to reduce choice in medical care in terms of the data. The developed nations with universal health care provide better medical care than the United States, including that average lifespans are longer in those nations. One reason is that medical care is petty cut and dried. For most illnesses, there is only one best treatment. The differences are in whether or not doctors and hospitals are careful to give the best treatment. Then, research creates new treatments which will be better, in which case everyone switches to those new treatments. If doctors are sincere, where we get problems is with rare diseases. Then, it is often necessary to go to a major medical school to find someone who knows what the disease is.

Now in many other areas, I agree with you that choice and diversity are important. It was a restriction of choice and diversity which brought the former USSR down.

Government doesn't automatically do a bad job, and corporations don't always do a good job. It depends on who is in power at the time. And it's not just a matter of paying the top person more in order to attract talent. I was on a message board for shareholders of various companies, and I don't know whether or not their view was based on ADEQUATE data, but it was their opinion that the more a corporation pays its CEO, the worse the corporation does. The idea that the government always does a bad job is propaganda by corporations who want to have government contracts.

Actually, the health care business community could at any time just decide that 17% of GDP is enough for them, and they would just wiggle around their own services and their coordination with others to give everyone in the nation good medical care for that 17%. I seem to remember some basic oath from ancient Greece they take that would obligate them to provide good medical care for everyone. I hope you guys know the name of the oath, but if some of you don't, that means there is something very wrong with the educational system. In any case, they don't give good medical care to everyone. If I remember correctly, there was a report from the Rand Corporation, in 2001 or 2002, which does research for the military and others, that of people with good health insurance, about 40% were not receiving the best medical care for their health problems. Instead of giving people good medical care, the health care community seems to want to increase their share of the GDP so that they will earn more and more than 17% in the future.

From what I know, a number of doctors give good medical care. In addition, there are some hospitals which give good medical care. Some of those hospitals are one's that the wealthy go to, and they do cost more. I have seen or heard about some top medical school hospitals who do excellent and sometimes amazing work. Think in terms of Stanford medical school hospital, Harvard, and other top medical schools if you have a rare or difficult to treat illness. No doubt there are some other hospitals who also are sincere about giving patients good medical care.

Sometimes, if one is ill, one can look for one of those. However, often, one doesn't have time to do a lot of research, so one must simply take what is immediately available.

Jim

 

[Whereisup]

People want to be taken care of. Shocker.

True, sort of, but if you want to see the baseline personality, a good source seems to be the way hunter-gatherer tribes function. There has been little evolution since then.

In hunter-gatherer tribes, people do want to be taken care of when necessary, but they also want to do their share. Hunter-gatherer tribes are small and composed of close relatives, so they operate much like a family. Primitive farming tribes also are often similar.

There was an interesting research project that I learned about in an anthropology class in Berkeley. Anthropologists are always studying primitive tribes, so one of them decided to turn the tables and bring a couple of primitive tribesmen to America to study us.

The thing that most shocked them were the homeless people on the streets. The Papua New Guinea men kept saying things like "But why aren't they being helped? Where are their family and friends?"

So that is our natural personality. In terms of our basic human personality, we like to be helped when necessary, and we are happy to contribute. Up to a point, OUR culture twists people out of that basic personality, however.

Jim

 

[Vox]

Democrats want universal health care

Of course. It actually costs less than "let him die".

of course it costs less. because it is let them die - a leftard dream to contain the costs

 

[Vox]

The Myth of Medicare's 'Low Administrative Costs' - Forbes

Good read on Medicare. Not sure if completely true, but the concept is correct.

Besides that, I can personally attest that it's a VERY bad idea to eliminate choice in health care or insurance. Individuals need different things!

Although, with obamacare there may not be that much choice anymore anyway. At least there still is a private sector where can you pay with cash and get what you actually need.

It's not really a bad idea to reduce choice in medical care in terms of the data. The developed nations with universal health care provide better medical care than the United States, including that average lifespans are longer in those nations. One reason is that medical care is petty cut and dried. For most illnesses, there is only one best treatment. The differences are in whether or not doctors and hospitals are careful to give the best treatment. Then, research creates new treatments which will be better, in which case everyone switches to those new treatments. If doctors are sincere, where we get problems is with rare diseases. Then, it is often necessary to go to a major medical school to find someone who knows what the disease is.

Now in many other areas, I agree with you that choice and diversity are important. It was a restriction of choice and diversity which brought the former USSR down.

Government doesn't automatically do a bad job, and corporations don't always do a good job. It depends on who is in power at the time. And it's not just a matter of paying the top person more in order to attract talent. I was on a message board for shareholders of various companies, and I don't know whether or not their view was based on ADEQUATE data, but it was their opinion that the more a corporation pays its CEO, the worse the corporation does. The idea that the government always does a bad job is propaganda by corporations who want to have government contracts.



Jim

Not true.Actually an absolute fallacy.

and yes, government automatically does a VERY bad job as it has been proven by the fall of all government utopias, including USSR.

 

[asterism]

The Myth of Medicare's 'Low Administrative Costs' - Forbes

Good read on Medicare. Not sure if completely true, but the concept is correct.

Besides that, I can personally attest that it's a VERY bad idea to eliminate choice in health care or insurance. Individuals need different things!

Although, with obamacare there may not be that much choice anymore anyway. At least there still is a private sector where can you pay with cash and get what you actually need.

It's not really a bad idea to reduce choice in medical care in terms of the data. The developed nations with universal health care provide better medical care than the United States, including that average lifespans are longer in those nations. One reason is that medical care is petty cut and dried. For most illnesses, there is only one best treatment. The differences are in whether or not doctors and hospitals are careful to give the best treatment. Then, research creates new treatments which will be better, in which case everyone switches to those new treatments. If doctors are sincere, where we get problems is with rare diseases. Then, it is often necessary to go to a major medical school to find someone who knows what the disease is.

Now in many other areas, I agree with you that choice and diversity are important. It was a restriction of choice and diversity which brought the former USSR down.

Government doesn't automatically do a bad job, and corporations don't always do a good job. It depends on who is in power at the time. And it's not just a matter of paying the top person more in order to attract talent. I was on a message board for shareholders of various companies, and I don't know whether or not their view was based on ADEQUATE data, but it was their opinion that the more a corporation pays its CEO, the worse the corporation does. The idea that the government always does a bad job is propaganda by corporations who want to have government contracts.

Actually, the health care business community could at any time just decide that 17% of GDP is enough for them, and they would just wiggle around their own services and their coordination with others to give everyone in the nation good medical care for that 17%. I seem to remember some basic oath from ancient Greece they take that would obligate them to provide good medical care for everyone. I hope you guys know the name of the oath, but if some of you don't, that means there is something very wrong with the educational system. In any case, they don't give good medical care to everyone. If I remember correctly, there was a report from the Rand Corporation, in 2001 or 2002, which does research for the military and others, that of people with good health insurance, about 40% were not receiving the best medical care for their health problems. Instead of giving people good medical care, the health care community seems to want to increase their share of the GDP so that they will earn more and more than 17% in the future.

From what I know, a number of doctors give good medical care. In addition, there are some hospitals which give good medical care. Some of those hospitals are one's that the wealthy go to, and they do cost more. I have seen or heard about some top medical school hospitals who do excellent and sometimes amazing work. Think in terms of Stanford medical school hospital, Harvard, and other top medical schools if you have a rare or difficult to treat illness. No doubt there are some other hospitals who also are sincere about giving patients good medical care.

Sometimes, if one is ill, one can look for one of those. However, often, one doesn't have time to do a lot of research, so one must simply take what is immediately available.

Jim

Government doesn't do a bad job by default, but this administration and the last one certainly have given us enough evidence to show that THEY aren't good at managing anything.