What is your life worth ...

TragicMonkey said:
Of course, I pay four or five times what I'd be paying if I got the same exact coverage, from the same exact insurer, via an employer. They get discounts. Individuals don't.
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Not quite. If you're paying 4 or 5 times what you once were it's because your employer was paying the rest. There is a discount for large groups, but it is definitely not 80%!

What is flawed, IMHO, is that the employer can deduct the portion of the insurance they pay from their gross income for tax purposes, while the individual policy holder cannot.
 
WildCat said:
Not quite. If you're paying 4 or 5 times what you once were it's because your employer was paying the rest. There is a discount for large groups, but it is definitely not 80%!
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Not entirely. When you're part of a group plan, the risk is parcelled out between you all. When you get an individual plan, they charge you based on your own actual personal medical history, not via statistics. I once had a single small kidney stone. It didn't require surgery, or medicine. Basically, the treatment was "drink lots of water until it goes away". But since that's what I had, insurers fear I'll get another one, and need surgery for it, so they charge me quite a lot for a policy. Were I insured through a group, they would be basing their prices off statistics for the group, mostly age and gender stuff. So be warned, people who think individual policies are a good idea: if you have ever had anything, or are deemed to be "at risk" for something, you will pay more.
 
TragicMonkey said:
Not entirely. When you're part of a group plan, the risk is parcelled out between you all. When you get an individual plan, they charge you based on your own actual personal medical history, not via statistics. I once had a single small kidney stone. It didn't require surgery, or medicine. Basically, the treatment was "drink lots of water until it goes away". But since that's what I had, insurers fear I'll get another one, and need surgery for it, so they charge me quite a lot for a policy. Were I insured through a group, they would be basing their prices off statistics for the group, mostly age and gender stuff. So be warned, people who think individual policies are a good idea: if you have ever had anything, or are deemed to be "at risk" for something, you will pay more.
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That'll learn ya to go to the doctor. ;)
 
TragicMonkey said:
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When you're part of a group plan, the risk is parcelled out between you all. When you get an individual plan, they charge you based on your own actual personal medical history, not via statistics. I once had a single small kidney stone. It didn't require surgery, or medicine. Basically, the treatment was "drink lots of water until it goes away". But since that's what I had, insurers fear I'll get another one, and need surgery for it, so they charge me quite a lot for a policy.
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Your story is another good argument for the single-payer system. Can't get better than having the whole country be the insurance pool.

Be glad that you don't have diabetes. I am, in most states diabetics can't purchase individual health insurance policies at all:
http://www.diabetes.org/advocacy-and-legalresources/healthcare/healthinsurance/individual.jsp

The current USA health insurance system has a lot of negative repercussions. I know people who have told me that their doctors have volunteered to write down their medical history incorrectly in their files so that they would not have problems purchasing health insurance in the future. This is nice, except when memory fails, one may need to have ones history written down accurately.

Another repercussion is that people hesitate to volunteer in medical studies. As a hard of hearing person I often seen requests for hard of hearing people to participate in gene studies get an extremely low response rate, or even no responses. The reason? People were very wary of doing anything that could have a negative effect on their being able to get health insurance in the future. In one forum a research scientist bitterly complained that we (hard-of-hearing people) wanted to have better hearing, but were not willing to do anything to help. We explained our position and suggested he look for volunteers in countries that had a single-payer system.

The current USA health insurance system is a real tribute to the powerful lobbying abilities of the health insurance companies. They are really the only ones benefiting from the current system.
 
Shera said:
The current USA health insurance system is a real tribute to the powerful lobbying abilities of the health insurance companies. They are really the only ones benefiting from the current system.
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They are in business to provide a service and make a profit. Is there some reason why they shouldn't "benefit" from the current system?
 
The Central Scrutinizer said:
What's wrong with that? It's a business expense.
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I think the objection is that the individual can't deduct their own medical insurance from their taxes. It's my biggest expense after rent, and a decidedly large chunk of my annual income. If I didn't have it, and got badly sick, I would have to go on Medicaid and cost the taxpayers. It really is in the government's interest if I keep my insurance, therefore letting me deduct even a portion of the expense would be beneficial to all.
 
TragicMonkey said:
I think the objection is that the individual can't deduct their own medical insurance from their taxes. It's my biggest expense after rent, and a decidedly large chunk of my annual income. If I didn't have it, and got badly sick, I would have to go on Medicaid and cost the taxpayers. It really is in the government's interest if I keep my insurance, therefore letting me deduct even a portion of the expense would be beneficial to all.
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But what else should we be allowed to deduct? Car payments? The grocery bill? Phone bill? Health club membership? TiVo and NetFlix payments? Where do you stop? At some point no one will pay any taxes!
 
The Central Scrutinizer said:
But what else should we be allowed to deduct? Car payments? The grocery bill? Phone bill? Health club membership? TiVo and NetFlix payments? Where do you stop? At some point no one will pay any taxes!
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Slippery slope. There are already dozens of deductions. Fricking health insurance seems amply qualified to be one of them.
 
TragicMonkey said:
Slippery slope. There are already dozens of deductions. Fricking health insurance seems amply qualified to be one of them.
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Based upon what? How about car payments? Really, where do you stop? Would you allow for health insurance deductions and then never add another dedduction?
 
The Central Scrutinizer said:
Based upon what? How about car payments? Really, where do you stop? Would you allow for health insurance deductions and then never add another dedduction?
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Oh, for heaven's sake. In that case, I suggest we get rid of all deductions for everything, because you don't think medical insurance is worth a deduction.
 
TragicMonkey said:
Oh, for heaven's sake. In that case, I suggest we get rid of all deductions for everything, because you don't think medical insurance is worth a deduction.
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Off topic...

I myself am in favor of a flat tax, with no deductions for anything. So I am okay with that. :)
 
TragicMonkey said:
You can do this. This is how I have medical insurance, since my last couple of employers didn't offer any benefits.

Of course, I pay four or five times what I'd be paying if I got the same exact coverage, from the same exact insurer, via an employer. They get discounts. Individuals don't.
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I'll take issue with "you can do this." I was hospitalized for an illness 24 years ago and have not had any expenses related to that illness since then, but the insurers see me as a high risk and won't insure me at any cost. Not everyone can buy individual policies.
 
Ladewig said:
I'll take issue with "you can do this." I was hospitalized for an illness 24 years ago and have not had any expenses related to that illness since then, but the insurers see me as a high risk and won't insure me at any cost. Not everyone can buy individual policies.
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I didn't say it was "cheap". It's just possible. My premiums are quite high. After rent, it's my biggest expense.

eta: Oh, misread. You really can't get one from anybody? In auto insurance, the ultra-high risk people go into a state-controlled insurance pool and they are portioned out amongst the insurers doing business in that state. It costs much more than other people would pay, but insurers can't refuse them. I just assumed there was something like that for medical insurance, too.
 
The Central Scrutinizer said:
And yes, there should be no deduction for health insurance.
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Or anything else? Do you agree with any deductions at all?

I'm trying to figure if you oppose a health insurance deduction because you don't think health insurance deserves one and other things do, or because you have your own tax theories and no deductions at all is the way you want to go.
 
aerosolben said:
... (and the use of diarrhea alone implies that a simple condition we all experience is killing Africans, which is inaccurate).
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Diarrhea is an induced symptom of many parasitic diseases, since, after all, a successful parasite moves on. Some specialists can concentrate on sexual transmission, but excretion is more dependable. Getting out is one thing, getting in somewhere else appropriate is another. Often the process is convoluted and requires a series of hosts and environments. That requires a long process of evolution. The human parasites of Africa have been evolving along with us for millions of years, and nowhere else is that true. As a result, Africa is both beset with multitudinous parasites and is poor and remote in the modern world. The African population has been, and is, debilitated by parasites, but survives, albeit at low densities (compared to China or India, for instance). Debilitation not only because of infection but by the body's investment in resisting infection. Central Africa was the last part of the world to be grabbed by European imperialists because the region kills Europeans. Plentiful quinine was the first requirement, but even after that Europeans died at a horrendous rate.

Death by diarrhea is a disease of poverty, and is most prevalent in Africa. The disease, poverty and remoteness are interwoven.
 
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