Slate exposes the "Medicare for All" lie being pushed by Democrats

[SavannahMann]

Hi. Pleased to meet you.

My wife has double insurance. Both mine from work, and Medicare. When we schedule a procedure she needs, the insurance is a headache, they’ll only approve it for a single day. The Medicare hoops are far more difficult to navigate. When she needed a Wheelchair to get around, the Insurance Company sent one out within a week of the Doctor writing the order. Medicare contacted us a year later to see if we were ready to receive the item. A year. A fucking year later.

I could go into details of the headaches of dealing with Medicare, basically they are secondary, and anything not covered by the Primary, my work insurance, what would be our part, should be picked up by Medicare. Yet, they fight over every single thing. If it was just Medicare, then the prescriptions the Doctor’s are writing, would be denied, and the treatments that she is getting, would be denied, or approved about two years after her death.

So I am very pleased to meet you.

Bullshit.

So what proof do you have that I am lying? Perhaps this news article is lying too.

Signing up for Medicare? Read this cautionary tale first

Meh. What do we care about Chronic Pain Patients? Screw them, Medicare is.

Medicare Rule Will Create New Challenges for Chronic Pain Patients

Long term care, well, Medicare won’t really cover it, but hey, I’m sure that CNBC is full of shit too. Here's what is not covered by Medicare and here’s how you can prepare

Funny isn’t it, how you seem to know all the answers, except that you don’t provide any proof for your assertions. Just this idea that if you had Medicare, all would be swell and there would never be any problems. Of course, the truth is very different.

Take some time, go visit the Nursing Homes that are publicly funded, after a walk through you might be wondering if the Inquisition is taking place in the back. Privately funded, that is to say paid for by the occupants, or their families, are sometimes very nice. Guess which of them is paid for by Medicare? You guessed neither, you got it right.

Yeah. You were lying.

I posted links. What do you have? Tell us your experience with Medicare.

Links? You lied about your personal experience and then tried to shove opinion pieces down our throats. You're a disgrace.

A news report from PBS is an opinion piece? Do you know what opinion means?

 

[LoneLaugher]

Bullshit.

So what proof do you have that I am lying? Perhaps this news article is lying too.

Signing up for Medicare? Read this cautionary tale first

Meh. What do we care about Chronic Pain Patients? Screw them, Medicare is.

Medicare Rule Will Create New Challenges for Chronic Pain Patients

Long term care, well, Medicare won’t really cover it, but hey, I’m sure that CNBC is full of shit too. Here's what is not covered by Medicare and here’s how you can prepare

Funny isn’t it, how you seem to know all the answers, except that you don’t provide any proof for your assertions. Just this idea that if you had Medicare, all would be swell and there would never be any problems. Of course, the truth is very different.

Take some time, go visit the Nursing Homes that are publicly funded, after a walk through you might be wondering if the Inquisition is taking place in the back. Privately funded, that is to say paid for by the occupants, or their families, are sometimes very nice. Guess which of them is paid for by Medicare? You guessed neither, you got it right.

Yeah. You were lying.

I posted links. What do you have? Tell us your experience with Medicare.

Links? You lied about your personal experience and then tried to shove opinion pieces down our throats. You're a disgrace.

A news report from PBS is an opinion piece? Do you know what opinion means?

Why did you lie?

 

[SavannahMann]

So what proof do you have that I am lying? Perhaps this news article is lying too.

Signing up for Medicare? Read this cautionary tale first

Meh. What do we care about Chronic Pain Patients? Screw them, Medicare is.

Medicare Rule Will Create New Challenges for Chronic Pain Patients

Long term care, well, Medicare won’t really cover it, but hey, I’m sure that CNBC is full of shit too. Here's what is not covered by Medicare and here’s how you can prepare

Funny isn’t it, how you seem to know all the answers, except that you don’t provide any proof for your assertions. Just this idea that if you had Medicare, all would be swell and there would never be any problems. Of course, the truth is very different.

Take some time, go visit the Nursing Homes that are publicly funded, after a walk through you might be wondering if the Inquisition is taking place in the back. Privately funded, that is to say paid for by the occupants, or their families, are sometimes very nice. Guess which of them is paid for by Medicare? You guessed neither, you got it right.

Yeah. You were lying.

I posted links. What do you have? Tell us your experience with Medicare.

Links? You lied about your personal experience and then tried to shove opinion pieces down our throats. You're a disgrace.

A news report from PBS is an opinion piece? Do you know what opinion means?

Why did you lie?

I didn’t. I told you the truth. I am waiting to hear your experiences with Medicare. Obviously you imagine that Medicare is a free medical card. Just whip it out and get treated for free. That is far from the truth. The links I provided would give you some insight into that. But you prefer to live by your perceptions instead of the truth. Or perhaps I should say your imagination.

Head down to your local pharmacy. Watch for a while. See how much the elderly, those lucky Medicare folks, have to pay for their prescriptions.

You can not blame the truth for hiding where you won’t look.

 

[DigitalDrifter]

Medicare for All Doesn’t Mean What Americans Think It Means

“Medicare for all” is a popular and politically effective slogan. Polls have shown that 70 percent of adults, and maybe more, say they’d support opening the federal health care program for the elderly to every American. This is all much to the delight Sen. Bernie Sanders, who managed to mainstream the idea during his 2016 presidential run, and has trumpeted those survey results in recent appearances.


One problem for Sanders is that when most Americans hear the words “Medicare for all,” they aren’t necessarily imagining the sort of single-payer system the Vermont senator has proposed. Worse yet, support for national health insurance seems to vacillate a great deal based on how pollsters couch the question. On Wednesday, for instance, the Kaiser Family Foundation published its latest tracking poll on public attitudes towards health care policy. Similar to its previous results, it found that 56 percent of Americans would support “a national health plan, sometimes called Medicare for all, in which American would get their insurance from a single government plan.” That’s not a bad outcome on its face. But many survey takers seemed to be confused about what Medicare for all, as it’s been formally proposed, would actually do. Among those under the age of 65 who had employer-sponsored coverage, 55 percent said they thought they would be able to keep their current health plan if Medicare for all were put in place.


That is not how Sanders’ single-payer bill would work. The legislation that Sanders has written, and that many of his colleagues and potential Democratic primary opponents endorsed, would expressly ban private insurance plans that compete with the government.


That turns out to be a fairly unpopular idea. According to Kaiser, support for Medicare for all drops to 37 percent if survey takers are told that the bill would eliminate private insurance companies, with 58 percent opposed.


In other words, Americans want access to government insurance, but they don’t want to be forced to use it—people prefer optionality. Kaiser finds that 73 percent of adults support “creating a national government administered health plan similar to Medicare open to anyone, but would allow people to keep the coverage they have.” This is an idea that, in health policy world, generally gets referred to as “Medicare for anyone.” The closest thing to it is probably a proposal produced by the Center for American Progress that would ban private insurers from competing on the individual market and would create strong incentives for employers to move their employees onto the federal plan.

==================================

Expand the current Medicare / Medicare Advantage / Medicare Supplement system to all, with graduated coverage as we age. Maintain the current and popular free market component, and take a massive cost monkey off the backs of American employers.

You are being lied to, if you care.
.

And even if we had Medicare for all, it wouldn't work like Bernie and the left-wing mindless Democraps claim.

Medicare, and Medicaid both, pay out LESS than the cost of care. Now image any business in human history, that can survive while paying out less money, than how much it costs to provide service, and please tell me which one is still in business?

The answer is none.

So how are hospitals and doctors able to stay open, while providing care to Medicare/Caid patients which pays out less than the cost of providing that service?

They charge non-government patients MORE money.

Two people go into a hospital, and both get $1,000 worth of care, but one is a private patient, and the other is a government patient.

The gov-patient only pays out $800 for that $1,000 in care. How does the hospital not go bankrupt? By charging the private patient $1,200 for $1,000 in care.

This is why expanding Medicare/caid has drastically increased health care costs after Obama-care was passed.

Now here's the issue... every time these mindless left-wingers claim they want Medicare for all, and tell you how much it is going to cost, their claims on how much it will cost, is based on Medicare paying less than the cost of care.

But if you eliminate private patients, how is the hospital going to stay in business without being able to shift the costs onto private patients?

They can't. So all the hospitals will close.

Well the government isn't going to let that happen. So Medicare/caid is going to have to drastically increase payouts to hospitals. That will in turn drastically push up taxes on the lower and middle class.

All this crap about how it will be paid for by the rich? Crazy. Not happening. All this garbage about only a 6% tax? Insane, won't cover it. Taxes will have to go up dramatically on the lower and middle class, to cover Medicare for all.

The democraps are all lying. Totally lying. Or the democraps themselves are all as ignorant as AOC. Maybe they are just so dumb, they really don't know how stupid their claims are.

Yes, the Democrats are lying. They're using "Medicare for All" instead of "Single Payer" because it polls better, even though they know it's a lie. Their obedient zombies will deny it, of course, but that's what obedient zombies do. Meh.

Now, to the other issue you raise, provider reimbursement. Yes, that's THE issue as I see it.

So that's a problem. What can we do about that? How do we keep reimbursement high enough?

Well, we could start with tort reform to eliminate defensive medicine, which is ridiculously expensive. Since corporations will save a shitload on health care benefits, let's increase the tax rate a couple of points. That would be a nice start.

We find a problem, we address it, we fix it. One at a time. That's how we used to do things.
.

Right now of course we have Medicare and we have private insurance plans, doled out by employers, or paid for by the individual.
If people believe opening up "Medicare for all" means simply a new choice and everything else staying intact, it sounds much better that way, and you know Dimocrats are not going to go out of their way to explain it in detail.

 

[Mac1958]

As I said in the original post, a base Medicare foundation would allow people access to diagnostic and preventive care, allowing us to catch problems earlier and when they're cheaper. The younger you are, the less of a drag you are on the system. Let free market competition and innovation provide the rest.
.

1. Young, healthy people are not going to pay for HCI no matter how cheap it is, especially if you're going to offer them Medicare for all.


2. You did say this, right?

"Expand the current Medicare / Medicare Advantage / Medicare Supplement system to all".

Are you backing off of that? Are you going to cover the currently uninsured in your Medicare For All plan? Including illegals?


3. You also said "take a massive cost monkey off the backs of American employers". Ok, onto whose back are you going to lay that cost? Taxpayers, right? How many people and how much money are we talking about here?


4. Still sounds like you'll be adding a lot more people into our HC system that is already overburdened.

5. This has the distinct feel of another back door approach that eventually ends up with Single Payer. Young healthy people only signed up for the ACA cuz of the tax penalty if they didn't, and a lot of them paid the penalty if they had to. Now that the penalty is gone, millions are dropping out. Why is your system any different?

Third try.

Expand the current Medicare / Medicare Advantage / Medicare Supplement system to all. Include a sliding coverage scale that begins at maybe 30% when we're young so that preventive, diagnostic and maybe basic care are covered. Allow people to purchase Medicare Advantage Plans or Medicare Supplements as needed. Allow the free market to expand those plans so they are even more cost competitive and worth it. Let the free market innovate.

A basic, low-end, preventive/diagnostic/base care coverage would create a huge cottage health care industry nationally, where neighborhood strip mall mini-clinics, one step below Urgent Cares, could address the simple stuff without jamming primary care physicians' offices. Hell, they could be staffed with CNAs and LPNs who just do the basics. Continue the ongoing upgrade of electronic medical records so that primary care docs have access to this information.

That last part just hit me. The sliding scale thing is my idea. I was the financial guy in the room for a Fortune 100 insurer when they put these plans together, piece by piece, co-pay by co-pay, cost by cost, contract by contract, county by county in my state. IDEAS can happen if we LET them.

All we have to do is THINK out of the BOX a little and LISTEN a little. Stop worrying about what could be, look at the big picture, fuck the politics.
.

Ideas can happen if we let them, but programs and policies should NOT happen without a well-thought-out plan for how to achieve it and a clear and honest estimate of the costs involved. Failures to do both is how we find ourselves with a $22 Trillion debt and heading north in one quick hurry. That is why we simply CANNOT stop worrying about what could be, we damn well better be looking at the best case, worst case, and most-likely case of what could happen so that we do not drive ourselves and future generations into bankruptcy any sooner than necessary. And I don't give a fuck about the politics either, but my objections and questions must be answered before I and many others get on-board. Such as:

* Young healthy people just aren't going to sign up in big enough numbers and associated revenue to support the payouts for older sicker people. It's just not going to happen. It didn't work with Obamacare, and I see no reason why your system would be any different.

* The ACA also counted on savings from more preventative and diagnostic care, which didn't seem to help keep the costs down. The costs of premiums, co-pays, and deductibles continued to go way up, just like they did prior to the ACA.

* You didn't answer this question: you also said "take a massive cost monkey off the backs of American employers". Ok, onto whose back are you going to lay that cost? Taxpayers, right? How many people and how much money are we talking about here? That means you will be adding some (most?) employees who currently have coverage to the number of uninsured, which may be as high as 50 million, and that's not counting the illegals in this country plus those who are on the way in the future or will be at some point. I can see companies offering their employees extra money if they move off of their current employer-provided HCI to Medicare For All.

* I simply cannot see how private HCI can compete with a Medicare For All program, except for the supplement/advantage type policies. And if Medicare For All has to cover pre-existing conditions, then nobody is going to sign up for private insurance at all, unless they or a family member needs coverage right now. Except the rich guys who can afford it. So what I see is a pathway to Single Payer, whether you intended it or not.

* Dude - Medicare for all means a substantial increase in the demand with no increase in the supply of providers and facilities. That IS a problem with your idea, same as it is for any other idea for gov't sponsored healthcare. I don't need another explanation of how good your program is, I need answers to my questions and issues. I get that the details and numbers have to be worked out, but for now it's too sketchy.

* Young healthy people just aren't going to sign up in big enough numbers and associated revenue to support the payouts for older sicker people. It's just not going to happen. It didn't work with Obamacare, and I see no reason why your system would be any different.
Older, sicker people are already covered, the system is already absorbing them and the insurance companies are making a profit. All we're doing here is adding younger, healthier people at a lower coverage rate. Cover them for the basics and let them buy their way up in the free market. Seniors like their plans. So will the rest of us.

* The ACA also counted on savings from more preventative and diagnostic care, which didn't seem to help keep the costs down. The costs of premiums, co-pays, and deductibles continued to go way up, just like they did prior to the ACA.
It's my understanding there has been significant savings due to preventive and diagnostic care. The last year I worked with that company they were pretty pleased with the results. And remember, that's with SENIORS, who have significantly more issues than a 30-year old.

* You didn't answer this question: you also said "take a massive cost monkey off the backs of American employers". Ok, onto whose back are you going to lay that cost? Taxpayers, right? How many people and how much money are we talking about here? That means you will be adding some (most?) employees who currently have coverage to the number of uninsured, which may be as high as 50 million, and that's not counting the illegals in this country plus those who are on the way in the future or will be at some point. I can see companies offering their employees extra money if they move off of their current employer-provided HCI to Medicare For All.
Yes, I address that above. As we try to figure out how to keep reimbursement rates higher, one part of the fix might well be a few points in corporate tax rates. My small and mid-sized business owner clients would love to see that, because it would put them on a more even keel with the multi-national monsters who can afford health coverage far more than they can. Smaller businesses are suffering trying to pay health insurance costs, but they have no choice, because the big guys are. Seriously, does that seem right to you? Let's take that pressure off them.

* I simply cannot see how private HCI can compete with a Medicare For All program, except for the supplement/advantage type policies. And if Medicare For All has to cover pre-existing conditions, then nobody is going to sign up for private insurance at all, unless they or a family member needs coverage right now. Except the rich guys who can afford it. So what I see is a pathway to Single Payer, whether you intended it or not.
That's what I'm talking about: The health insurance industry would change and simplify so that it's not covering people from the first dollar (at least with Medicare Supplements). Medicare would be the foundation, and then the insurers would compete for the rest, based on the existing Medicare Advantage and Medicare Supplement systems. They're not competing with Medicare, they're adding to them. The MA and Supplement insurers are doing great, this would expand the competition pool.

* Dude - Medicare for all means a substantial increase in the demand with no increase in the supply of providers and facilities. That IS a problem with your idea, same as it is for any other idea for gov't sponsored healthcare. I don't need another explanation of how good your program is, I need answers to my questions and issues. I get that the details and numbers have to be worked out, but for now it's too sketchy.
As I said, the lower-end stuff that jams primary care doctors offices could go to small clinics. There's a shitload of services that can be provided there, and it could be coordinated with, or owned by, insurers and hospitals.

Right now, we have SEVEN fucking health care delivery/payment systems:

1. Private Pay
2. Medicaid
3. Medicare
4. VA
5. Group Health
6. Individual Health/ACA
7. Workers Comp

That is MADNESS. If my plan has holes, great, let's work on that. Let's take the best ideas from both ends so that it's not being changed every few years by political winds.

We used to collaborate and innovate. The answers are all out there, if we stop screaming and start thinking.
.

Sure. Let's eliminate all government run health care, reduce regulations, and allow competition to drive down health care prices.

As for private pay or insurance... that's free market. Leave it alone.

Since that's clearly not going to happen, you may want to think about what might.

Playing an all-or-nothing game could pretty easily leave you with nothing.
.

 

[Mac1958]

As I said in the original post, a base Medicare foundation would allow people access to diagnostic and preventive care, allowing us to catch problems earlier and when they're cheaper. The younger you are, the less of a drag you are on the system. Let free market competition and innovation provide the rest.
.

1. Young, healthy people are not going to pay for HCI no matter how cheap it is, especially if you're going to offer them Medicare for all.


2. You did say this, right?

"Expand the current Medicare / Medicare Advantage / Medicare Supplement system to all".

Are you backing off of that? Are you going to cover the currently uninsured in your Medicare For All plan? Including illegals?


3. You also said "take a massive cost monkey off the backs of American employers". Ok, onto whose back are you going to lay that cost? Taxpayers, right? How many people and how much money are we talking about here?


4. Still sounds like you'll be adding a lot more people into our HC system that is already overburdened.

5. This has the distinct feel of another back door approach that eventually ends up with Single Payer. Young healthy people only signed up for the ACA cuz of the tax penalty if they didn't, and a lot of them paid the penalty if they had to. Now that the penalty is gone, millions are dropping out. Why is your system any different?

Third try.

Expand the current Medicare / Medicare Advantage / Medicare Supplement system to all. Include a sliding coverage scale that begins at maybe 30% when we're young so that preventive, diagnostic and maybe basic care are covered. Allow people to purchase Medicare Advantage Plans or Medicare Supplements as needed. Allow the free market to expand those plans so they are even more cost competitive and worth it. Let the free market innovate.

A basic, low-end, preventive/diagnostic/base care coverage would create a huge cottage health care industry nationally, where neighborhood strip mall mini-clinics, one step below Urgent Cares, could address the simple stuff without jamming primary care physicians' offices. Hell, they could be staffed with CNAs and LPNs who just do the basics. Continue the ongoing upgrade of electronic medical records so that primary care docs have access to this information.

That last part just hit me. The sliding scale thing is my idea. I was the financial guy in the room for a Fortune 100 insurer when they put these plans together, piece by piece, co-pay by co-pay, cost by cost, contract by contract, county by county in my state. IDEAS can happen if we LET them.

All we have to do is THINK out of the BOX a little and LISTEN a little. Stop worrying about what could be, look at the big picture, fuck the politics.
.

Ideas can happen if we let them, but programs and policies should NOT happen without a well-thought-out plan for how to achieve it and a clear and honest estimate of the costs involved. Failures to do both is how we find ourselves with a $22 Trillion debt and heading north in one quick hurry. That is why we simply CANNOT stop worrying about what could be, we damn well better be looking at the best case, worst case, and most-likely case of what could happen so that we do not drive ourselves and future generations into bankruptcy any sooner than necessary. And I don't give a fuck about the politics either, but my objections and questions must be answered before I and many others get on-board. Such as:

* Young healthy people just aren't going to sign up in big enough numbers and associated revenue to support the payouts for older sicker people. It's just not going to happen. It didn't work with Obamacare, and I see no reason why your system would be any different.

* The ACA also counted on savings from more preventative and diagnostic care, which didn't seem to help keep the costs down. The costs of premiums, co-pays, and deductibles continued to go way up, just like they did prior to the ACA.

* You didn't answer this question: you also said "take a massive cost monkey off the backs of American employers". Ok, onto whose back are you going to lay that cost? Taxpayers, right? How many people and how much money are we talking about here? That means you will be adding some (most?) employees who currently have coverage to the number of uninsured, which may be as high as 50 million, and that's not counting the illegals in this country plus those who are on the way in the future or will be at some point. I can see companies offering their employees extra money if they move off of their current employer-provided HCI to Medicare For All.

* I simply cannot see how private HCI can compete with a Medicare For All program, except for the supplement/advantage type policies. And if Medicare For All has to cover pre-existing conditions, then nobody is going to sign up for private insurance at all, unless they or a family member needs coverage right now. Except the rich guys who can afford it. So what I see is a pathway to Single Payer, whether you intended it or not.

* Dude - Medicare for all means a substantial increase in the demand with no increase in the supply of providers and facilities. That IS a problem with your idea, same as it is for any other idea for gov't sponsored healthcare. I don't need another explanation of how good your program is, I need answers to my questions and issues. I get that the details and numbers have to be worked out, but for now it's too sketchy.

* Young healthy people just aren't going to sign up in big enough numbers and associated revenue to support the payouts for older sicker people. It's just not going to happen. It didn't work with Obamacare, and I see no reason why your system would be any different.
Older, sicker people are already covered, the system is already absorbing them and the insurance companies are making a profit. All we're doing here is adding younger, healthier people at a lower coverage rate. Cover them for the basics and let them buy their way up in the free market. Seniors like their plans. So will the rest of us.

* The ACA also counted on savings from more preventative and diagnostic care, which didn't seem to help keep the costs down. The costs of premiums, co-pays, and deductibles continued to go way up, just like they did prior to the ACA.
It's my understanding there has been significant savings due to preventive and diagnostic care. The last year I worked with that company they were pretty pleased with the results. And remember, that's with SENIORS, who have significantly more issues than a 30-year old.

* You didn't answer this question: you also said "take a massive cost monkey off the backs of American employers". Ok, onto whose back are you going to lay that cost? Taxpayers, right? How many people and how much money are we talking about here? That means you will be adding some (most?) employees who currently have coverage to the number of uninsured, which may be as high as 50 million, and that's not counting the illegals in this country plus those who are on the way in the future or will be at some point. I can see companies offering their employees extra money if they move off of their current employer-provided HCI to Medicare For All.
Yes, I address that above. As we try to figure out how to keep reimbursement rates higher, one part of the fix might well be a few points in corporate tax rates. My small and mid-sized business owner clients would love to see that, because it would put them on a more even keel with the multi-national monsters who can afford health coverage far more than they can. Smaller businesses are suffering trying to pay health insurance costs, but they have no choice, because the big guys are. Seriously, does that seem right to you? Let's take that pressure off them.

* I simply cannot see how private HCI can compete with a Medicare For All program, except for the supplement/advantage type policies. And if Medicare For All has to cover pre-existing conditions, then nobody is going to sign up for private insurance at all, unless they or a family member needs coverage right now. Except the rich guys who can afford it. So what I see is a pathway to Single Payer, whether you intended it or not.
That's what I'm talking about: The health insurance industry would change and simplify so that it's not covering people from the first dollar (at least with Medicare Supplements). Medicare would be the foundation, and then the insurers would compete for the rest, based on the existing Medicare Advantage and Medicare Supplement systems. They're not competing with Medicare, they're adding to them. The MA and Supplement insurers are doing great, this would expand the competition pool.

* Dude - Medicare for all means a substantial increase in the demand with no increase in the supply of providers and facilities. That IS a problem with your idea, same as it is for any other idea for gov't sponsored healthcare. I don't need another explanation of how good your program is, I need answers to my questions and issues. I get that the details and numbers have to be worked out, but for now it's too sketchy.
As I said, the lower-end stuff that jams primary care doctors offices could go to small clinics. There's a shitload of services that can be provided there, and it could be coordinated with, or owned by, insurers and hospitals.

Right now, we have SEVEN fucking health care delivery/payment systems:

1. Private Pay
2. Medicaid
3. Medicare
4. VA
5. Group Health
6. Individual Health/ACA
7. Workers Comp

That is MADNESS. If my plan has holes, great, let's work on that. Let's take the best ideas from both ends so that it's not being changed every few years by political winds.

We used to collaborate and innovate. The answers are all out there, if we stop screaming and start thinking.
.

Thank you for your patience. Can't say as I agree that all this is a good idea, but we do need to improve HC in this country and I think it's clear that the ACA is not the answer. I think we're going to have to revamp the whole system from top to bottom, with tiers of providers and facilities and changes in medical schools and training.

Most countries that have some form of UHC pay for it with taxes that everybody pays, like a VAT or consumption tax. With an income tax that everybody pays too, not just the top 50%. In my view, this needs to be done at the state level where they design their own system and the voters pass the new system via a referendum. Maybe with a block grant of some kind from the federal gov't. It does not bode well that UHC failed in Vermont, and was rejected in Maryland, Colorado, and California.

This is one of those many situations where there simply is not going to be a "good" answer, because the whole damn thing is based on people getting sick and old. This is a matter of mitigating bad stuff.

What I'm really trying to get to is a plan than (1) has a track record of relative success, (2) has elements already in place that can simply be scaled up, (3) take undo pressure off of certain parts of our economy, and (4) includes positives from both ends of our political system so that we can stop this constant political back-and-forth.

I'd rather be debating over the best way to make beer. This is not a fun subject, but it can touch people's lives profoundly.

Thanks for the challenging, interesting conversation. Rare to find around here.
.

 

[Darkwind]

From the article-

There are lots of reasons Democrats are increasingly supporting legislation that would eliminate employer-sponsored coverage entirely. Both Harris and Booker, for example, are co-sponsors on Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) single-payer bill, which would move all Americans to government-run coverage.

Why is that a bad thing? Frankly, that we let our employers hold our family's health coverage over our heads is obscene.

Correct.

And employers would love nothing more than to free themselves from the burden of dealing with providing their employees with healthcare insurance.

Employers don't have to provide it now.

 

[Mac1958]

Medicare for All Doesn’t Mean What Americans Think It Means

“Medicare for all” is a popular and politically effective slogan. Polls have shown that 70 percent of adults, and maybe more, say they’d support opening the federal health care program for the elderly to every American. This is all much to the delight Sen. Bernie Sanders, who managed to mainstream the idea during his 2016 presidential run, and has trumpeted those survey results in recent appearances.


One problem for Sanders is that when most Americans hear the words “Medicare for all,” they aren’t necessarily imagining the sort of single-payer system the Vermont senator has proposed. Worse yet, support for national health insurance seems to vacillate a great deal based on how pollsters couch the question. On Wednesday, for instance, the Kaiser Family Foundation published its latest tracking poll on public attitudes towards health care policy. Similar to its previous results, it found that 56 percent of Americans would support “a national health plan, sometimes called Medicare for all, in which American would get their insurance from a single government plan.” That’s not a bad outcome on its face. But many survey takers seemed to be confused about what Medicare for all, as it’s been formally proposed, would actually do. Among those under the age of 65 who had employer-sponsored coverage, 55 percent said they thought they would be able to keep their current health plan if Medicare for all were put in place.


That is not how Sanders’ single-payer bill would work. The legislation that Sanders has written, and that many of his colleagues and potential Democratic primary opponents endorsed, would expressly ban private insurance plans that compete with the government.


That turns out to be a fairly unpopular idea. According to Kaiser, support for Medicare for all drops to 37 percent if survey takers are told that the bill would eliminate private insurance companies, with 58 percent opposed.


In other words, Americans want access to government insurance, but they don’t want to be forced to use it—people prefer optionality. Kaiser finds that 73 percent of adults support “creating a national government administered health plan similar to Medicare open to anyone, but would allow people to keep the coverage they have.” This is an idea that, in health policy world, generally gets referred to as “Medicare for anyone.” The closest thing to it is probably a proposal produced by the Center for American Progress that would ban private insurers from competing on the individual market and would create strong incentives for employers to move their employees onto the federal plan.

==================================

Expand the current Medicare / Medicare Advantage / Medicare Supplement system to all, with graduated coverage as we age. Maintain the current and popular free market component, and take a massive cost monkey off the backs of American employers.

You are being lied to, if you care.
.

And even if we had Medicare for all, it wouldn't work like Bernie and the left-wing mindless Democraps claim.

Medicare, and Medicaid both, pay out LESS than the cost of care. Now image any business in human history, that can survive while paying out less money, than how much it costs to provide service, and please tell me which one is still in business?

The answer is none.

So how are hospitals and doctors able to stay open, while providing care to Medicare/Caid patients which pays out less than the cost of providing that service?

They charge non-government patients MORE money.

Two people go into a hospital, and both get $1,000 worth of care, but one is a private patient, and the other is a government patient.

The gov-patient only pays out $800 for that $1,000 in care. How does the hospital not go bankrupt? By charging the private patient $1,200 for $1,000 in care.

This is why expanding Medicare/caid has drastically increased health care costs after Obama-care was passed.

Now here's the issue... every time these mindless left-wingers claim they want Medicare for all, and tell you how much it is going to cost, their claims on how much it will cost, is based on Medicare paying less than the cost of care.

But if you eliminate private patients, how is the hospital going to stay in business without being able to shift the costs onto private patients?

They can't. So all the hospitals will close.

Well the government isn't going to let that happen. So Medicare/caid is going to have to drastically increase payouts to hospitals. That will in turn drastically push up taxes on the lower and middle class.

All this crap about how it will be paid for by the rich? Crazy. Not happening. All this garbage about only a 6% tax? Insane, won't cover it. Taxes will have to go up dramatically on the lower and middle class, to cover Medicare for all.

The democraps are all lying. Totally lying. Or the democraps themselves are all as ignorant as AOC. Maybe they are just so dumb, they really don't know how stupid their claims are.

Yes, the Democrats are lying. They're using "Medicare for All" instead of "Single Payer" because it polls better, even though they know it's a lie. Their obedient zombies will deny it, of course, but that's what obedient zombies do. Meh.

Now, to the other issue you raise, provider reimbursement. Yes, that's THE issue as I see it.

So that's a problem. What can we do about that? How do we keep reimbursement high enough?

Well, we could start with tort reform to eliminate defensive medicine, which is ridiculously expensive. Since corporations will save a shitload on health care benefits, let's increase the tax rate a couple of points. That would be a nice start.

We find a problem, we address it, we fix it. One at a time. That's how we used to do things.
.

Right now of course we have Medicare and we have private insurance plans, doled out by employers, or paid for by the individual.
If people believe opening up "Medicare for all" means simply a new choice and everything else staying intact, it sounds much better that way, and you know Dimocrats are not going to go out of their way to explain it in detail.

As I've pointed out, and is backed up by the Slate piece, the Dems are lying to you on health care.

They are calling this "Medicare for All" when it's really true Single Payer.

The dishonest "Medicare for All" title polls better, and that's why they're using it.

I'm not thrilled to say that, I hate to see them do that, but it's true.
.

 

[Mac1958]

From the article-There are lots of reasons Democrats are increasingly supporting legislation that would eliminate employer-sponsored coverage entirely. Both Harris and Booker, for example, are co-sponsors on Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) single-payer bill, which would move all Americans to government-run coverage.

Why is that a bad thing? Frankly, that we let our employers hold our family's health coverage over our heads is obscene.

Correct.And employers would love nothing more than to free themselves from the burden of dealing with providing their employees with healthcare insurance.

Employers don't have to provide it now.

They don't have to legally, but in order to attract and retain good employees, they have to find a way. The big guys can do it, so the small guys have no choice but to try.

I watch as my small and mid-sized business clients struggle to pay for health insurance because they have no damn choice. The Regressive Left doesn't care about that, because they think all business owners, regardless of the size of the company, are rich and evil. What an ignorant, child-like view.

It's stupid that businesses should have to pay for health insurance.
.

 

[LoneLaugher]

Medicare for All Doesn’t Mean What Americans Think It Means

“Medicare for all” is a popular and politically effective slogan. Polls have shown that 70 percent of adults, and maybe more, say they’d support opening the federal health care program for the elderly to every American. This is all much to the delight Sen. Bernie Sanders, who managed to mainstream the idea during his 2016 presidential run, and has trumpeted those survey results in recent appearances.


One problem for Sanders is that when most Americans hear the words “Medicare for all,” they aren’t necessarily imagining the sort of single-payer system the Vermont senator has proposed. Worse yet, support for national health insurance seems to vacillate a great deal based on how pollsters couch the question. On Wednesday, for instance, the Kaiser Family Foundation published its latest tracking poll on public attitudes towards health care policy. Similar to its previous results, it found that 56 percent of Americans would support “a national health plan, sometimes called Medicare for all, in which American would get their insurance from a single government plan.” That’s not a bad outcome on its face. But many survey takers seemed to be confused about what Medicare for all, as it’s been formally proposed, would actually do. Among those under the age of 65 who had employer-sponsored coverage, 55 percent said they thought they would be able to keep their current health plan if Medicare for all were put in place.


That is not how Sanders’ single-payer bill would work. The legislation that Sanders has written, and that many of his colleagues and potential Democratic primary opponents endorsed, would expressly ban private insurance plans that compete with the government.


That turns out to be a fairly unpopular idea. According to Kaiser, support for Medicare for all drops to 37 percent if survey takers are told that the bill would eliminate private insurance companies, with 58 percent opposed.


In other words, Americans want access to government insurance, but they don’t want to be forced to use it—people prefer optionality. Kaiser finds that 73 percent of adults support “creating a national government administered health plan similar to Medicare open to anyone, but would allow people to keep the coverage they have.” This is an idea that, in health policy world, generally gets referred to as “Medicare for anyone.” The closest thing to it is probably a proposal produced by the Center for American Progress that would ban private insurers from competing on the individual market and would create strong incentives for employers to move their employees onto the federal plan.

==================================

Expand the current Medicare / Medicare Advantage / Medicare Supplement system to all, with graduated coverage as we age. Maintain the current and popular free market component, and take a massive cost monkey off the backs of American employers.

You are being lied to, if you care.
.

And even if we had Medicare for all, it wouldn't work like Bernie and the left-wing mindless Democraps claim.

Medicare, and Medicaid both, pay out LESS than the cost of care. Now image any business in human history, that can survive while paying out less money, than how much it costs to provide service, and please tell me which one is still in business?

The answer is none.

So how are hospitals and doctors able to stay open, while providing care to Medicare/Caid patients which pays out less than the cost of providing that service?

They charge non-government patients MORE money.

Two people go into a hospital, and both get $1,000 worth of care, but one is a private patient, and the other is a government patient.

The gov-patient only pays out $800 for that $1,000 in care. How does the hospital not go bankrupt? By charging the private patient $1,200 for $1,000 in care.

This is why expanding Medicare/caid has drastically increased health care costs after Obama-care was passed.

Now here's the issue... every time these mindless left-wingers claim they want Medicare for all, and tell you how much it is going to cost, their claims on how much it will cost, is based on Medicare paying less than the cost of care.

But if you eliminate private patients, how is the hospital going to stay in business without being able to shift the costs onto private patients?

They can't. So all the hospitals will close.

Well the government isn't going to let that happen. So Medicare/caid is going to have to drastically increase payouts to hospitals. That will in turn drastically push up taxes on the lower and middle class.

All this crap about how it will be paid for by the rich? Crazy. Not happening. All this garbage about only a 6% tax? Insane, won't cover it. Taxes will have to go up dramatically on the lower and middle class, to cover Medicare for all.

The democraps are all lying. Totally lying. Or the democraps themselves are all as ignorant as AOC. Maybe they are just so dumb, they really don't know how stupid their claims are.

Yes, the Democrats are lying. They're using "Medicare for All" instead of "Single Payer" because it polls better, even though they know it's a lie. Their obedient zombies will deny it, of course, but that's what obedient zombies do. Meh.

Now, to the other issue you raise, provider reimbursement. Yes, that's THE issue as I see it.

So that's a problem. What can we do about that? How do we keep reimbursement high enough?

Well, we could start with tort reform to eliminate defensive medicine, which is ridiculously expensive. Since corporations will save a shitload on health care benefits, let's increase the tax rate a couple of points. That would be a nice start.

We find a problem, we address it, we fix it. One at a time. That's how we used to do things.
.

Right now of course we have Medicare and we have private insurance plans, doled out by employers, or paid for by the individual.
If people believe opening up "Medicare for all" means simply a new choice and everything else staying intact, it sounds much better that way, and you know Dimocrats are not going to go out of their way to explain it in detail.

As I've pointed out, and is backed up by the Slate piece, the Dems are lying to you on health care.

They are calling this "Medicare for All" when it's really true Single Payer.

The dishonest "Medicare for All" title polls better, and that's why they're using it.

I'm not thrilled to say that, I hate to see them do that, but it's true.
.

If they were doing that, you would have a point. But they aren't. They use the terms interchangeably.

 

[LoneLaugher]

Yeah. You were lying.

I posted links. What do you have? Tell us your experience with Medicare.

Links? You lied about your personal experience and then tried to shove opinion pieces down our throats. You're a disgrace.

A news report from PBS is an opinion piece? Do you know what opinion means?

Why did you lie?

I didn’t. I told you the truth. I am waiting to hear your experiences with Medicare. Obviously you imagine that Medicare is a free medical card. Just whip it out and get treated for free. That is far from the truth. The links I provided would give you some insight into that. But you prefer to live by your perceptions instead of the truth. Or perhaps I should say your imagination.

Head down to your local pharmacy. Watch for a while. See how much the elderly, those lucky Medicare folks, have to pay for their prescriptions.

You can not blame the truth for hiding where you won’t look.

You absolutely lied. Admit that and we can try discussing the efficacy of Medicare.

 

[Mac1958]

Medicare for All Doesn’t Mean What Americans Think It Means

“Medicare for all” is a popular and politically effective slogan. Polls have shown that 70 percent of adults, and maybe more, say they’d support opening the federal health care program for the elderly to every American. This is all much to the delight Sen. Bernie Sanders, who managed to mainstream the idea during his 2016 presidential run, and has trumpeted those survey results in recent appearances.


One problem for Sanders is that when most Americans hear the words “Medicare for all,” they aren’t necessarily imagining the sort of single-payer system the Vermont senator has proposed. Worse yet, support for national health insurance seems to vacillate a great deal based on how pollsters couch the question. On Wednesday, for instance, the Kaiser Family Foundation published its latest tracking poll on public attitudes towards health care policy. Similar to its previous results, it found that 56 percent of Americans would support “a national health plan, sometimes called Medicare for all, in which American would get their insurance from a single government plan.” That’s not a bad outcome on its face. But many survey takers seemed to be confused about what Medicare for all, as it’s been formally proposed, would actually do. Among those under the age of 65 who had employer-sponsored coverage, 55 percent said they thought they would be able to keep their current health plan if Medicare for all were put in place.


That is not how Sanders’ single-payer bill would work. The legislation that Sanders has written, and that many of his colleagues and potential Democratic primary opponents endorsed, would expressly ban private insurance plans that compete with the government.


That turns out to be a fairly unpopular idea. According to Kaiser, support for Medicare for all drops to 37 percent if survey takers are told that the bill would eliminate private insurance companies, with 58 percent opposed.


In other words, Americans want access to government insurance, but they don’t want to be forced to use it—people prefer optionality. Kaiser finds that 73 percent of adults support “creating a national government administered health plan similar to Medicare open to anyone, but would allow people to keep the coverage they have.” This is an idea that, in health policy world, generally gets referred to as “Medicare for anyone.” The closest thing to it is probably a proposal produced by the Center for American Progress that would ban private insurers from competing on the individual market and would create strong incentives for employers to move their employees onto the federal plan.

==================================

Expand the current Medicare / Medicare Advantage / Medicare Supplement system to all, with graduated coverage as we age. Maintain the current and popular free market component, and take a massive cost monkey off the backs of American employers.

You are being lied to, if you care.
.

And even if we had Medicare for all, it wouldn't work like Bernie and the left-wing mindless Democraps claim.

Medicare, and Medicaid both, pay out LESS than the cost of care. Now image any business in human history, that can survive while paying out less money, than how much it costs to provide service, and please tell me which one is still in business?

The answer is none.

So how are hospitals and doctors able to stay open, while providing care to Medicare/Caid patients which pays out less than the cost of providing that service?

They charge non-government patients MORE money.

Two people go into a hospital, and both get $1,000 worth of care, but one is a private patient, and the other is a government patient.

The gov-patient only pays out $800 for that $1,000 in care. How does the hospital not go bankrupt? By charging the private patient $1,200 for $1,000 in care.

This is why expanding Medicare/caid has drastically increased health care costs after Obama-care was passed.

Now here's the issue... every time these mindless left-wingers claim they want Medicare for all, and tell you how much it is going to cost, their claims on how much it will cost, is based on Medicare paying less than the cost of care.

But if you eliminate private patients, how is the hospital going to stay in business without being able to shift the costs onto private patients?

They can't. So all the hospitals will close.

Well the government isn't going to let that happen. So Medicare/caid is going to have to drastically increase payouts to hospitals. That will in turn drastically push up taxes on the lower and middle class.

All this crap about how it will be paid for by the rich? Crazy. Not happening. All this garbage about only a 6% tax? Insane, won't cover it. Taxes will have to go up dramatically on the lower and middle class, to cover Medicare for all.

The democraps are all lying. Totally lying. Or the democraps themselves are all as ignorant as AOC. Maybe they are just so dumb, they really don't know how stupid their claims are.

Yes, the Democrats are lying. They're using "Medicare for All" instead of "Single Payer" because it polls better, even though they know it's a lie. Their obedient zombies will deny it, of course, but that's what obedient zombies do. Meh.

Now, to the other issue you raise, provider reimbursement. Yes, that's THE issue as I see it.

So that's a problem. What can we do about that? How do we keep reimbursement high enough?

Well, we could start with tort reform to eliminate defensive medicine, which is ridiculously expensive. Since corporations will save a shitload on health care benefits, let's increase the tax rate a couple of points. That would be a nice start.

We find a problem, we address it, we fix it. One at a time. That's how we used to do things.
.

Right now of course we have Medicare and we have private insurance plans, doled out by employers, or paid for by the individual.
If people believe opening up "Medicare for all" means simply a new choice and everything else staying intact, it sounds much better that way, and you know Dimocrats are not going to go out of their way to explain it in detail.

As I've pointed out, and is backed up by the Slate piece, the Dems are lying to you on health care.

They are calling this "Medicare for All" when it's really true Single Payer.

The dishonest "Medicare for All" title polls better, and that's why they're using it.

I'm not thrilled to say that, I hate to see them do that, but it's true.
.

If they were doing that, you would have a point. But they aren't. They use the terms interchangeably.

When they do, they're lying. Thanks for pointing that out.

When it really counts, they call it S.1804 - 115th Congress (2017-2018): Medicare for All Act of 2017
.

 

[SavannahMann]

I posted links. What do you have? Tell us your experience with Medicare.

Links? You lied about your personal experience and then tried to shove opinion pieces down our throats. You're a disgrace.

A news report from PBS is an opinion piece? Do you know what opinion means?

Why did you lie?

I didn’t. I told you the truth. I am waiting to hear your experiences with Medicare. Obviously you imagine that Medicare is a free medical card. Just whip it out and get treated for free. That is far from the truth. The links I provided would give you some insight into that. But you prefer to live by your perceptions instead of the truth. Or perhaps I should say your imagination.

Head down to your local pharmacy. Watch for a while. See how much the elderly, those lucky Medicare folks, have to pay for their prescriptions.

You can not blame the truth for hiding where you won’t look.

You absolutely lied. Admit that and we can try discussing the efficacy of Medicare.

I told the truth. My wife is handicapped. Disabled. She is bound to a wheelchair for mobility. The insurance company got her a wheelchair in less than two weeks when the Doctor ordered one. Medicare sent a letter a year later saying she could get one from them if the home inspection showed it was feasible in her living arrangement.

My insurance covers about 80% of the Doctors visit. That bill is usually paid within sixty days. Medicare takes six months, if they pay their share at all. Often the bill has to be resubmitted two or three times.

The procedures I mentioned, again true. Medicare has never paid a dime on them in two years. We pay for it. The Insurance requires preauthorization, and approves it for a single day, which means we can’t have anything come up to delay the procedure. A headache, but not a big one. We have been paying the rest not covered by Insurance out of pocket since Medicare hasn’t coughed up a dime.

Medicine? My Insurance covers it, and there are a few headaches there too. For example, my wife needed an asthma inhaler, and the Insurance Company wouldn’t cover it until the Doctor submitted a form showing it was medically necessary. I called the Insurance Company and asked them to show me one person who was not required to breath. We got the inhaler a few days later.

As I said, a few headaches. But compared to what we have to go through for even a little from Medicare, a minor headache I will choose every single time.

You just don’t want to believe it. You obviously have no experience with Medicare. When my Mother in Law had to go into an assisted living place, Medicare paid nothing. Mom had to sell her house to afford it. But hey, Medicare is awesome. Or something. My Grandmother went through her life savings affording the in home assistance that wasn’t covered by Medicare. The nurse that came in every day to help out for a couple hours.

Private Insurance is a pain, and yes, they’re crooks. But they’re predictable and responsive. I wish it was better, and it covered more. But I don’t wish for Medicare as my only option.

Have you seen the elderly at a Pharmacy getting their meds? Often hundreds of dollars later they walk out. Have you ever read what Medicare covers? Medicare is not the European Socialized Medicine you imagine it to be. You don’t just walk in and are instantly covered and in a line.

It is like the VA. Delays and denials are routine. And if you manage to get them to grudgingly agree that the procedure or treatment is necessary, then you still have to find a Doctor who wants to deal with the Medicare headache.

I posted what Medicare is doing to Chronic Pain Patients. There are thousands of threads on Twitter and Facebook telling that story. People suffering because Medicare thinks that they don’t need meds, and the Doctor is prohibited from proscribing them.

I don’t like my Insurance Company which has a local office arguing with my Doctor, what makes you think I want the massive Government office arguing with my Doctor.

You have no first hand experience, if you did, you would be saying that I am telling the truth. Look at this thread, nobody is saying how much they love Medicare. There aren’t Doctors posting how happy they are with the paperwork and annoyances with Medicare. Nobody is screaming you are telling the truth.

Link after Link, example after example, and you stand stubbornly there with your arms crossed and declare me a liar. Tell me your Medicare story. Tell me how they happily approved treatment. Tell me how much it cost you to get the supplemental insurance to cover medication, and the many many things that Medicare doesn’t cover, like nursing homes, and in home assistance, assisted living, and the list goes on, and on, and on.

I’ve told the truth, and you refuse to see.

Here is an article for Seniors to tell them which Medicare Supplimental plans they should consider. They’re going to need something. You know, that pesky Private Insurance you want to see eliminated.

Best Medicare Supplement Insurance Plans | Reviews | Retirement Living

AARP has some information, and they’re for the Seniors right?

What is Medicare Supplement Insurance? | AARP® Medicare Supplement

But you won’t listen, or read. Because you want to believe that Medicare is an awesome pays all system right?

 

[Rustic]

Medicare for All Doesn’t Mean What Americans Think It Means

“Medicare for all” is a popular and politically effective slogan. Polls have shown that 70 percent of adults, and maybe more, say they’d support opening the federal health care program for the elderly to every American. This is all much to the delight Sen. Bernie Sanders, who managed to mainstream the idea during his 2016 presidential run, and has trumpeted those survey results in recent appearances.


One problem for Sanders is that when most Americans hear the words “Medicare for all,” they aren’t necessarily imagining the sort of single-payer system the Vermont senator has proposed. Worse yet, support for national health insurance seems to vacillate a great deal based on how pollsters couch the question. On Wednesday, for instance, the Kaiser Family Foundation published its latest tracking poll on public attitudes towards health care policy. Similar to its previous results, it found that 56 percent of Americans would support “a national health plan, sometimes called Medicare for all, in which American would get their insurance from a single government plan.” That’s not a bad outcome on its face. But many survey takers seemed to be confused about what Medicare for all, as it’s been formally proposed, would actually do. Among those under the age of 65 who had employer-sponsored coverage, 55 percent said they thought they would be able to keep their current health plan if Medicare for all were put in place.


That is not how Sanders’ single-payer bill would work. The legislation that Sanders has written, and that many of his colleagues and potential Democratic primary opponents endorsed, would expressly ban private insurance plans that compete with the government.


That turns out to be a fairly unpopular idea. According to Kaiser, support for Medicare for all drops to 37 percent if survey takers are told that the bill would eliminate private insurance companies, with 58 percent opposed.


In other words, Americans want access to government insurance, but they don’t want to be forced to use it—people prefer optionality. Kaiser finds that 73 percent of adults support “creating a national government administered health plan similar to Medicare open to anyone, but would allow people to keep the coverage they have.” This is an idea that, in health policy world, generally gets referred to as “Medicare for anyone.” The closest thing to it is probably a proposal produced by the Center for American Progress that would ban private insurers from competing on the individual market and would create strong incentives for employers to move their employees onto the federal plan.

==================================

Expand the current Medicare / Medicare Advantage / Medicare Supplement system to all, with graduated coverage as we age. Maintain the current and popular free market component, and take a massive cost monkey off the backs of American employers.

You are being lied to, if you care.
.

And even if we had Medicare for all, it wouldn't work like Bernie and the left-wing mindless Democraps claim.

Medicare, and Medicaid both, pay out LESS than the cost of care. Now image any business in human history, that can survive while paying out less money, than how much it costs to provide service, and please tell me which one is still in business?

The answer is none.

So how are hospitals and doctors able to stay open, while providing care to Medicare/Caid patients which pays out less than the cost of providing that service?

They charge non-government patients MORE money.

Two people go into a hospital, and both get $1,000 worth of care, but one is a private patient, and the other is a government patient.

The gov-patient only pays out $800 for that $1,000 in care. How does the hospital not go bankrupt? By charging the private patient $1,200 for $1,000 in care.

This is why expanding Medicare/caid has drastically increased health care costs after Obama-care was passed.

Now here's the issue... every time these mindless left-wingers claim they want Medicare for all, and tell you how much it is going to cost, their claims on how much it will cost, is based on Medicare paying less than the cost of care.

But if you eliminate private patients, how is the hospital going to stay in business without being able to shift the costs onto private patients?

They can't. So all the hospitals will close.

Well the government isn't going to let that happen. So Medicare/caid is going to have to drastically increase payouts to hospitals. That will in turn drastically push up taxes on the lower and middle class.

All this crap about how it will be paid for by the rich? Crazy. Not happening. All this garbage about only a 6% tax? Insane, won't cover it. Taxes will have to go up dramatically on the lower and middle class, to cover Medicare for all.

The democraps are all lying. Totally lying. Or the democraps themselves are all as ignorant as AOC. Maybe they are just so dumb, they really don't know how stupid their claims are.

Yes, the Democrats are lying. They're using "Medicare for All" instead of "Single Payer" because it polls better, even though they know it's a lie. Their obedient zombies will deny it, of course, but that's what obedient zombies do. Meh.

Now, to the other issue you raise, provider reimbursement. Yes, that's THE issue as I see it.

So that's a problem. What can we do about that? How do we keep reimbursement high enough?

Well, we could start with tort reform to eliminate defensive medicine, which is ridiculously expensive. Since corporations will save a shitload on health care benefits, let's increase the tax rate a couple of points. That would be a nice start.

We find a problem, we address it, we fix it. One at a time. That's how we used to do things.
.

Right now of course we have Medicare and we have private insurance plans, doled out by employers, or paid for by the individual.
If people believe opening up "Medicare for all" means simply a new choice and everything else staying intact, it sounds much better that way, and you know Dimocrats are not going to go out of their way to explain it in detail.

As I've pointed out, and is backed up by the Slate piece, the Dems are lying to you on health care.

They are calling this "Medicare for All" when it's really true Single Payer.

The dishonest "Medicare for All" title polls better, and that's why they're using it.

I'm not thrilled to say that, I hate to see them do that, but it's true.
.

Any type of socialized medicine/healthcare is all kinds of fucked up. Because it always requires the successful to pay for the deadbeats… Never the right thing

 

[LoneLaugher]

And even if we had Medicare for all, it wouldn't work like Bernie and the left-wing mindless Democraps claim.

Medicare, and Medicaid both, pay out LESS than the cost of care. Now image any business in human history, that can survive while paying out less money, than how much it costs to provide service, and please tell me which one is still in business?

The answer is none.

So how are hospitals and doctors able to stay open, while providing care to Medicare/Caid patients which pays out less than the cost of providing that service?

They charge non-government patients MORE money.

Two people go into a hospital, and both get $1,000 worth of care, but one is a private patient, and the other is a government patient.

The gov-patient only pays out $800 for that $1,000 in care. How does the hospital not go bankrupt? By charging the private patient $1,200 for $1,000 in care.

This is why expanding Medicare/caid has drastically increased health care costs after Obama-care was passed.

Now here's the issue... every time these mindless left-wingers claim they want Medicare for all, and tell you how much it is going to cost, their claims on how much it will cost, is based on Medicare paying less than the cost of care.

But if you eliminate private patients, how is the hospital going to stay in business without being able to shift the costs onto private patients?

They can't. So all the hospitals will close.

Well the government isn't going to let that happen. So Medicare/caid is going to have to drastically increase payouts to hospitals. That will in turn drastically push up taxes on the lower and middle class.

All this crap about how it will be paid for by the rich? Crazy. Not happening. All this garbage about only a 6% tax? Insane, won't cover it. Taxes will have to go up dramatically on the lower and middle class, to cover Medicare for all.

The democraps are all lying. Totally lying. Or the democraps themselves are all as ignorant as AOC. Maybe they are just so dumb, they really don't know how stupid their claims are.

Yes, the Democrats are lying. They're using "Medicare for All" instead of "Single Payer" because it polls better, even though they know it's a lie. Their obedient zombies will deny it, of course, but that's what obedient zombies do. Meh.

Now, to the other issue you raise, provider reimbursement. Yes, that's THE issue as I see it.

So that's a problem. What can we do about that? How do we keep reimbursement high enough?

Well, we could start with tort reform to eliminate defensive medicine, which is ridiculously expensive. Since corporations will save a shitload on health care benefits, let's increase the tax rate a couple of points. That would be a nice start.

We find a problem, we address it, we fix it. One at a time. That's how we used to do things.
.

Right now of course we have Medicare and we have private insurance plans, doled out by employers, or paid for by the individual.
If people believe opening up "Medicare for all" means simply a new choice and everything else staying intact, it sounds much better that way, and you know Dimocrats are not going to go out of their way to explain it in detail.

As I've pointed out, and is backed up by the Slate piece, the Dems are lying to you on health care.

They are calling this "Medicare for All" when it's really true Single Payer.

The dishonest "Medicare for All" title polls better, and that's why they're using it.

I'm not thrilled to say that, I hate to see them do that, but it's true.
.

If they were doing that, you would have a point. But they aren't. They use the terms interchangeably.

When they do, they're lying. Thanks for pointing that out.

When it really counts, they call it S.1804 - 115th Congress (2017-2018): Medicare for All Act of 2017
.

Whatever, malcontent. Politicians name things in order to gain support from those who don't pay attention. They
haven't lied about this to you or anyone who pays attention.

 

[Mac1958]

Any type of socialized medicine/healthcare is all kinds of fucked up. Because it always requires the successful to pay for the deadbeats… Never the right thing

The successful are already paying for the "deadbeats" via higher premiums, fees and co-pays. And via longer waiting times in emergency rooms because they're also being used as family doctors offices.

And they're paying more because the "deadbeats" don't have access to preventive and diagnostic care that would otherwise catch their problems earlier, when they would be cheaper to address.

That should be common knowledge by now.
.

 

[LoneLaugher]

Links? You lied about your personal experience and then tried to shove opinion pieces down our throats. You're a disgrace.

A news report from PBS is an opinion piece? Do you know what opinion means?

Why did you lie?

I didn’t. I told you the truth. I am waiting to hear your experiences with Medicare. Obviously you imagine that Medicare is a free medical card. Just whip it out and get treated for free. That is far from the truth. The links I provided would give you some insight into that. But you prefer to live by your perceptions instead of the truth. Or perhaps I should say your imagination.

Head down to your local pharmacy. Watch for a while. See how much the elderly, those lucky Medicare folks, have to pay for their prescriptions.

You can not blame the truth for hiding where you won’t look.

You absolutely lied. Admit that and we can try discussing the efficacy of Medicare.

I told the truth. My wife is handicapped. Disabled. She is bound to a wheelchair for mobility. The insurance company got her a wheelchair in less than two weeks when the Doctor ordered one. Medicare sent a letter a year later saying she could get one from them if the home inspection showed it was feasible in her living arrangement.

My insurance covers about 80% of the Doctors visit. That bill is usually paid within sixty days. Medicare takes six months, if they pay their share at all. Often the bill has to be resubmitted two or three times.

The procedures I mentioned, again true. Medicare has never paid a dime on them in two years. We pay for it. The Insurance requires preauthorization, and approves it for a single day, which means we can’t have anything come up to delay the procedure. A headache, but not a big one. We have been paying the rest not covered by Insurance out of pocket since Medicare hasn’t coughed up a dime.

Medicine? My Insurance covers it, and there are a few headaches there too. For example, my wife needed an asthma inhaler, and the Insurance Company wouldn’t cover it until the Doctor submitted a form showing it was medically necessary. I called the Insurance Company and asked them to show me one person who was not required to breath. We got the inhaler a few days later.

As I said, a few headaches. But compared to what we have to go through for even a little from Medicare, a minor headache I will choose every single time.

You just don’t want to believe it. You obviously have no experience with Medicare. When my Mother in Law had to go into an assisted living place, Medicare paid nothing. Mom had to sell her house to afford it. But hey, Medicare is awesome. Or something. My Grandmother went through her life savings affording the in home assistance that wasn’t covered by Medicare. The nurse that came in every day to help out for a couple hours.

Private Insurance is a pain, and yes, they’re crooks. But they’re predictable and responsive. I wish it was better, and it covered more. But I don’t wish for Medicare as my only option.

Have you seen the elderly at a Pharmacy getting their meds? Often hundreds of dollars later they walk out. Have you ever read what Medicare covers? Medicare is not the European Socialized Medicine you imagine it to be. You don’t just walk in and are instantly covered and in a line.

It is like the VA. Delays and denials are routine. And if you manage to get them to grudgingly agree that the procedure or treatment is necessary, then you still have to find a Doctor who wants to deal with the Medicare headache.

I posted what Medicare is doing to Chronic Pain Patients. There are thousands of threads on Twitter and Facebook telling that story. People suffering because Medicare thinks that they don’t need meds, and the Doctor is prohibited from proscribing them.

I don’t like my Insurance Company which has a local office arguing with my Doctor, what makes you think I want the massive Government office arguing with my Doctor.

You have no first hand experience, if you did, you would be saying that I am telling the truth. Look at this thread, nobody is saying how much they love Medicare. There aren’t Doctors posting how happy they are with the paperwork and annoyances with Medicare. Nobody is screaming you are telling the truth.

Link after Link, example after example, and you stand stubbornly there with your arms crossed and declare me a liar. Tell me your Medicare story. Tell me how they happily approved treatment. Tell me how much it cost you to get the supplemental insurance to cover medication, and the many many things that Medicare doesn’t cover, like nursing homes, and in home assistance, assisted living, and the list goes on, and on, and on.

I’ve told the truth, and you refuse to see.

Here is an article for Seniors to tell them which Medicare Supplimental plans they should consider. They’re going to need something. You know, that pesky Private Insurance you want to see eliminated.

Best Medicare Supplement Insurance Plans | Reviews | Retirement Living

AARP has some information, and they’re for the Seniors right?

What is Medicare Supplement Insurance? | AARP® Medicare Supplement

But you won’t listen, or read. Because you want to believe that Medicare is an awesome pays all system right?

Sad. You won't be honest.

 

[Rustic]

Any type of socialized medicine/healthcare is all kinds of fucked up. Because it always requires the successful to pay for the deadbeats… Never the right thing

The successful are already paying for the "deadbeats" via higher premiums, fees and co-pays. And via longer waiting times in emergency rooms because they're also being used as family doctors offices.

And they're paying more because the "deadbeats" don't have access to preventive and diagnostic care that would otherwise catch their problems earlier, when they would be cheaper to address.

That should be common knowledge by now.
.

Why should the deadbeats be paid for?
Like I’ve always said political correctness is all kinds of fucked up

 

[Mac1958]

Any type of socialized medicine/healthcare is all kinds of fucked up. Because it always requires the successful to pay for the deadbeats… Never the right thing

The successful are already paying for the "deadbeats" via higher premiums, fees and co-pays. And via longer waiting times in emergency rooms because they're also being used as family doctors offices.

And they're paying more because the "deadbeats" don't have access to preventive and diagnostic care that would otherwise catch their problems earlier, when they would be cheaper to address.

That should be common knowledge by now.
.

Why should the deadbeats be paid for?
Like I’ve always said political correctness is all kinds of fucked up

It is what it is.

So it seems logical to take what we can't change and try to make it as bearable as possible.
.

 

[Rustic]

Any type of socialized medicine/healthcare is all kinds of fucked up. Because it always requires the successful to pay for the deadbeats… Never the right thing

The successful are already paying for the "deadbeats" via higher premiums, fees and co-pays. And via longer waiting times in emergency rooms because they're also being used as family doctors offices.

And they're paying more because the "deadbeats" don't have access to preventive and diagnostic care that would otherwise catch their problems earlier, when they would be cheaper to address.

That should be common knowledge by now.
.

Why should the deadbeats be paid for?
Like I’ve always said political correctness is all kinds of fucked up

It is what it is.

So it seems logical to take what we can't change and try to make it as bearable as possible.
.

There is no cure for political correctness, Because political correctness relies on situational morality.
And situational morality always strives for the lowest common denominator