Socialized Healthcare

See, leaving something like healthcare up to the free market system makes no sense. It's like leaving police services, or firemen up to the free market. Only those who can afford to have their house protected to pay for it have it protected. The insurance companies will only cover you if your house is robbed if you live in a certain neighbourhood, police will show up at your door only if you qualify for a pre-screening and you have no pre-existing conditions.

Not to mention that insurance companies are double-dipping in their profits and making more money than the actual cost of healthcare delivery.

I mean, as the system exists right now, even if you are covered for something - a health insurance's main goal is to deny you coverage somehow to make profit.

 

That's pretty ass-backwards. And as it stands right now USA universal healthcare coverage is something that can be affordable. It can cost tremendously less in spending to deliver services without cutting corners in efficiency.

The fact that universal healthcare costs more than the USA's private system is a myth.

As it stands, if you get pregnant without health insurance in the USA it's impossible to obtain health insurance because you are considered to have a pre-existing condition.

Well, woop-de-fucking-doo. Who knew that people would unexpectedly get pregnant and require medical attention.

The kind of system that neglects to take care of women, children, the poor, the disabled, the needy is a terrible, ass-backwards system.

It's all fine and dandy to theorize that in an ideal state the free-market thrives and functions like a well-oiled machine but the reality of that idealistic notion does not match the patterns of human behaviour or human nature. It's like applying calculus to explain an orgasm.

 

You can't rely on the markets to solve real human rights problems or expect the market to fix something like millions of people have no access to healthcare.

 

(Just to put a figure on this...)

EDIT: I rechecked these figures and they're not what I thought. The US currently spends about the same amount per capita on healthcare as the UK. God knows what you're spending it on though.

 

One theory:

Sounds pretty sensible. Stitch in time and all that.

 

Amen!!

I have worked as a substitute teacher when I was between jobs. I remember I was in a 6th grade class and we were reading a story about this lady flying an airplane. I think she was the first black female pilot. And the point of the story was to try and motivate kids to do whatever your dream is, break the status quo, do what you want in life. And the kids just didn't get it. I was trying to explain to them why this kind of thing is so important, and I made the mistake of saying something like "Everybody knows who Jessica Simpson is with now, but nobody cares about stuff that matters." All the little girls started happily jabbering away about Jessica Simpson and all that mess.

 

oops, canceled a double post

 

Right, Ari. So you address those problems and leave the rest of us alone.

Human Rights problems; How has Obama addressed them?

Everyone in America has access to healthcare. If you have no insurance, your healthcare is going to suck, but the hospitals are not going to let you die. They will fix you and the bill goes to the taxpayer. Maybe what you meant to say is millions of people have no insurance. OK, fine, true. Help them. But here are a couple of problems with the House Bill

Employers that don't offer health insurance will be fined 8% (Of what I don't know, I've not heard.) But that 8% might be less than what they would pay to provide health insurance. So they just pay the fine and shift all their employees over to govt care. I don't wanna be on govt care. Sure you may not have had problems with it, but many people have.

If you change ANYTHING about your plan, OH sorry, off you go to government plan.

So when Obama says if you like your plan you can keep it, I say he's full of shit.

Your posts about bring up some very good points. And I say cool, lets fix healthcare, but there are so many better ways to get it done. Obama is such a hypocrite it makes me sick. He says the republicans aren't suggesting a plan, but I have heard plenty; HSAs, tort reform, bring down the cost of a doctor visit (Take a look at a doctor's bill. No matter what he does, it's >$100), let a nurse handle some of the visits instead of an expensive doctor, let doctors have tax deductions when they work at free clinics, more and better free clinics by the way, and address the situation with those without health insurance and only them.

Or the best way to address the health insurance mess is to fix the economy. When people have a job they have the money to pay the doctor. When the boss is making money, he is more likely to offer health insurance as part of the benefits package. But then Obama doesn't care about that, he just wants to grab as much power as possible.

That, my dear, is a fooking BRILLIANT analogy!

Reminds me of the Monty Python skit where the logics professor's wife had been screwing the milk man on the kitchen floor and therefore she hadn't made dinner. Logics and Calculus can't explain sex.

 

Pretty much all of the evidence suggests that when people don't have health insurance, they let medical problems fester for ages until it becomes an emergency. This is turn means a greater cost of treatment. In the UK, poor people generally speaking go to the doctor with these things earlier, before they become an emergency, which reduces the cost of treatment massively, to such an extent that 100% of people can be covered for the same cost per capita as covering 40% of people does in the States. So, financially speaking, it makes no sense to take this attitude.

 

I can see that, I agree. So, I want to get those people insurance and leave the rest alone. How many people are we talking about 20 million? And don't include illegals or people that for some reason don't want insurance.

The US federal government is very inefficient, something as big as this will be a complete fiasco. Barack says he is going to pay for the health care bill through cutting of govt pork. Well, I don't believe him, because there is still waste. Look at the stimulus. So much waste.

Plus, there is the fact that millions of people that currently work for an insurance company are going to lose there jobs.

 

I think a 700+ page law is unnecessary to fix the basic problem with our current health care system. The problem could be solved in less than a paragraph. Simply change the minimum age for Medicare eligibility from 65 to 0, making it available to every US citizen from the moment they are born until the day they die. If the insurance companies want to survive, they will compete.

 

It's closer to 40 million, in a country of 300 million. I don't know if illegals are included in that (in either number, actually), but it's still a pretty huge number of people. I'd imagine there's a fair few who have health insurance but can't really afford it.

These seem like pretty petty niggles to be honest. Do you actually think that state healthcare would wipe out the jobs of "millions of people" in health insurance, bearing in mind that there are plenty of health insurance companies in the UK that have been doing just fine? Many of these companies have been around for centuries and haven't disappeared since the introduction of the NHS.

At the end of the day, and I know you won't believe this, state healthcare is worth spending money on. By the looks of it, budget wise you won't have to tighten your belts much. It's not like you don't have enough money knocking around the place. Maybe hack the odd million out of that huge defense budget that doesn't seem to help you win wars, that kind of thing?

 

So you are saying a government run system would be large inefficient and expensive, but private insurance companies will not be able to compete with it ? I think that says more about private insurance companies than it does about a government run system.

 

I agree that saving people's lives isn't worth the money. :thumbs up:

 

Who exactly is getting socialized health care? Not anyone I know even those on Mediacare or Medicaid. The only socialization I see is the protection of corporations.

 

I totally agree. And I think with the savings of people paying private for protit industry we could pay for it no questions ask. But private industry doesn't want to compete they want a conscripted population to pay them for a product they refuse to guarrantee. Sorry but I refuse to buy their empty promises.

 

If our government wants to mandate something then they need to demonstrate how that fee is productive.

Much like no new taxes...don't force me to purchase something that gives me no return on my investment. I'd rather pay a tax for something I receive, then pay a private contractor for something I don' t!

Now is the time to ask just how well as privatization served all us? I want stats and charts. Show me how deregulating utilities in California was a benefit? How has privatizing prisons worked for any state. Someone has the stats. I want to see them outlined in the public, transparent and with oversight

Let's compare those charter school stats against public schools.

 

The fact is that whether or not you believe that health care for all is a moral issue, it is cheaper to pay for preventative care for everyone than it is to pay for emergency care. That being said, I think that the Democratic bill with the public option is the most that is even remotely politically feasible right now. While it's not perfect, it's definitely a baby step in the right direction.

 

I don't agree with helping some bastard who has no intentions of getting a job, I don't feel like paying for his injuries.

Even Neandertals cared for their sick and injured, often at direct and dire personal risk of life and limb (righties are afraid of spending an extra buck, for gawwwwds sake!). Conservatives aren't satisfied with merely taking us back to 1250, no, they want to wipe out the whole last half million years of human progress. Torture? Yes, they love it. Is anyone surprised?

This is really a struggle not between liberals and the wacko right, but between humankind and those who can't seem to even crawl out from under rocks.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQFX32Ed7ZQ

Watch that video. Real Canadians talkin real healthcare.