This is the Government that You Want to Run Health-care?

[Francesca R]

I disagree with anything being nationalized. Government interfering in the free market is never a good idea.

What is your position on public goods? Do they exist to you?

 

[jimbob]

Oh noes, Acuity is invoking Adam Smith.

 

[JEROME DA GNOME]

Take any way of measuring it you want. You are paying more and getting less.

Someone was tossing out there that NHS cost about 3000 pounds per year per person.

Well guess what! I pay less than that for my family and I have never waited in line for any service! I have access to world class doctors!

Ohh, by the way. There is no one in America that does not have access to medical care. I know that facts are difficult to deal with when emotion rules the thought process.

 

[JEROME DA GNOME]

I was marvelling about how much of the US population's labour is being taken by the government to fund Medicare/Medicaid, which the very people who are paying the taxes to support it, cannot access.

First you call the opposing arguments selfish and now you invoke selfishness to argue your point.

 

[zooterkin]

Someone was tossing out there that NHS cost about 3000 pounds per year per person.

Well guess what! I pay less than that for my family and I have never waited in line for any service!

Including what you pay for Medicare/Medicaid?

Ohh, by the way. There is no one in America that does not have access to medical care. I know that facts are difficult to deal with when emotion rules the thought process.

So, nobody dies or suffers due to lack of medical attention in the US because they can't afford it?

 

[JEROME DA GNOME]

Including what you pay for Medicare/Medicaid?

Yep.

So, nobody dies or suffers due to lack of medical attention in the US because they can't afford it?

Correct.

 

[jimbob]

Someone was tossing out there that NHS cost about 3000 pounds per year per person.

Well guess what! I pay less than that for my family and I have never waited in line for any service! I have access to world class doctors!

Ohh, by the way. There is no one in America that does not have access to medical care. I know that facts are difficult to deal with when emotion rules the thought process.

On each of these indicators, more than two-fifths of lower-income adults in the U.S. said they went without needed care because of costs in the past year.

Are you going to answer my question about how much someone on $7/hour could afford to spend on healthcare?

ETA: Here for example:

Jerome, I saw your answer to this post:



However you are missing the point of the question.

With universal healthcare, the costs don't need to be reduced implausibly, to provide coverage for the poor, as the state subsidises healthcare.

You are claiming that a truly free-market system would be so cheap that everyone could afford healthcare (without subsidy).

I am asking how cheap this would need to be.

How much could someone USD7/hr be expected to afford to pay for healthcare?

1) as a one-off cost?
2) as an annual expendature?

Once we have some figures, we can then discuss how the free-market could reduce the cost of healthcare sufficiently to provide cover.

Of course it is valid to say that if the poor can't afford healthcare, and can't get charity, then they should be allowed to die. However, that is repugnant to me. You are not claiming that, but that the free market pixies* will make everything alright. This does seem to be Balrog's view however.



*thanks quixotecoyote

 

[volatile]

Someone was tossing out there that NHS cost about 3000 pounds per year per person.

$3000 DOLLARS. £1,400 POUNDS. Per year.

Your numbers do not add up, because on top of whatever you pay in premiums, you also pay "an average of $5,440 for each person in the United States" for Medicaid.

There is no possible way that you pay less than us. Your state bill is between twice and three times as large per capita for starters, and you then have to pay for individual care on top.

 

[volatile]

Correct.

You have already been shown that this is not the case.

" More than 18,000 adults in the USA die each year because they are uninsured and can't get proper health care, researchers report in a landmark study released Tuesday."

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/healthcare/2002-05-22-insurance-deaths.htm

Further: Kev, quoted in this thread but posting in another, said that premiums in his area were $1,500 per MONTH, and this is for a level of care less comprehensive than the NHS provides, and includes a "deductible". Do you dispute these figures?

How much do you pay, per month, and what level of care can you expect to receive?

 

[JEROME DA GNOME]

You have already been shown that this is not the case.

" More than 18,000 adults in the USA die each year because they are uninsured and can't get proper health care, researchers report in a landmark study released Tuesday."

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/healthcare/2002-05-22-insurance-deaths.htm

Further: Kev, quoted in this thread but posting in another, said that premiums in his area were $1,500 per MONTH, and this is for a level of care less comprehensive than the NHS provides, and includes a "deductible". Do you dispute these figures?

How much do you pay, per month, and what level of care can you expect to receive?

Well if USA Today printed it it must be true!!!

I asked you for the study and you refuse to provide it.

 

[JEROME DA GNOME]

$3000 DOLLARS. £1,400 POUNDS. Per year.

Your numbers do not add up, because on top of whatever you pay in premiums, you also pay "an average of $5,440 for each person in the United States" for Medicaid.

There is no possible way that you pay less than us. Your state bill is between twice and three times as large per capita for starters, and you then have to pay for individual care on top.

So, the average 4 person household in America pays $21,760 per year just in taxes for Medicaid.

Your numbers are delusional and false.

 

[JEROME DA GNOME]

Are you going to answer my question about how much someone on $7/hour could afford to spend on healthcare?

I already did. A free market system would reduce the costs of health-care making it affordable.

 

[jimbob]

What would it reduce the price to, and how much can someone on that wage afford?

What would the cost be if they had heart disease that eventually needed a 5-hour coronary bypass? Include the costs of diagnosis, aftercare, and loss of income whilst not working.

 

[volatile]

Well if USA Today printed it it must be true!!!

I asked you for the study and you refuse to provide it.

You've hear of Google, right?

http://www.iom.edu/CMS/3809/4660/4333.aspx

You can buy if if you want. Or you can take the multiple news stories that report on it and the later studies that corroborate it at face value. Or you can bury your head in the sand and carry on pretending you're right.

You choose.

 

[JEROME DA GNOME]

You've hear of Google, right?

http://www.iom.edu/CMS/3809/4660/4333.aspx

You can buy if if you want. Or you can take the multiple news stories that report on it and the later studies that corroborate it at face value. Or you can bury your head in the sand and carry on pretending you're right.

You choose.

Could you explain why people are not getting the care they need because they are poor, yet Medicaid exists.

Why if government is unable to provide health-care to the poor would you want government to provide health-care to all?

Are you standing by your assertion that a 4 person family in America pays $21,760 in taxes for Medicaid?

 

[JEROME DA GNOME]

What would it reduce the price to, and how much can someone on that wage afford?

The cost would be reduced to the point that it was affordable.

What would the cost be if they had heart disease that eventually needed a 5-hour coronary bypass? Include the costs of diagnosis, aftercare, and loss of income whilst not working.

Catastrophic health insurance would cover such things.

 

[volatile]

So, the average 4 person household in America pays $21,760 per year just in taxes for Medicaid.

Your numbers are delusional and false.

That is the total bill for Medicaid and connected programmes divided by the population. That's what "per capita" means. The same sum for the NHS gives us a comparative figure.

http://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/publications_show.htm?doc_id=482678&#doc482678

Health expenditure per capita 2004 - UK $2,546, USA $6,102

The USA spends three times as much as the UK per capita on state healthcare, but you get nothing in return.

Do you dispute these figures? You might not like the numbers because they utterly, utterly demolish any semblance of argument you might have had, but there you go.

The thing is: why does this not enrage you? Aren't you seriously pissed off that you pay three times what I do and get NOTHING in return?

 

[volatile]

Could you explain why people are not getting the care they need because they are poor, yet Medicaid exists.

I don't know. You tell me.

Why if government is unable to provide health-care to the poor would you want government to provide health-care to all?

Eh? This makes no sense. Your system doesn't work. Other countries' governments are quite capable of running, affording and supplying universal healthcare. What makes the US so different?

Are you standing by your assertion that a 4 person family in America pays $21,760 in taxes for Medicaid?

I just linked you the numbers. $6,000 per capita from government spending for "healthcare", according to the independet study done by the Commonwealth Fund. The US Gov. figures are similar, pegging it at $5,440.

I'll also repeat: "The Department of Health and Human Services said that health care spending shot up 9.3 percent in 2002, the largest increase in 11 years, to a total of $1.55 trillion. That represents an average of $5,440 for each person in the United States."

Those are the government's own numbers. How are they "delusional"?

 

[volatile]

Catastrophic health insurance would cover such things.

How much does that cost, and how much is the "deductible"?

 

[JEROME DA GNOME]

I don't know. You tell me.

Because you are arguing against yourself and do not understand your own arguments.

Eh? This makes no sense. Your system doesn't work. Other countries' governments are quite capable of running, affording and supplying universal healthcare. What makes the US so different?

You are not responding what you quoted. Please stay on task.

I just linked you the numbers. $6,000 per capita from government spending for "healthcare".

Now you are presenting yourself as a liar.