Which political party wants you dead?

[Shalamar]

I forgot to add that I couldn't afford the co-pays even if I bought insurance because I only pay myself enough to cover the essentials, and a few beers, as everything else stays in the business. However that little that I do pay myself is too much to qualify for state access... even if enrollment wasn't frozen. If it wasn't so maddening it would be comical.

I don't think conservatives realize that small businesses are the back bones of the economy and there would be a lot more if people could get access to healthcare.

I agree. With some form of universal health insurance, small businesses would be better off, and would be able to hire better people who would otherwise not take the job due to a lack of health care benefits.

 

[TragicMonkey]

I agree. With some form of universal health insurance, small businesses would be better off, and would be able to hire better people who would otherwise not take the job due to a lack of health care benefits.

I think the economy would benefit from the greater mobility between jobs all around. I know people who are stuck in jobs they hate, doing bad work as a result, because they are too terrified of getting sick to leave their job and insurance. Most companies make you wait 90 days before your benefits kick in, so if you switch jobs and get sick, you're out of luck. If insurance were realistically available (I don't consider paying $100 a month for a plan with a ten thousand dollar deductible realistic) without being tied to employers, people could enjoy a great deal more mobility between jobs.

 

[Biscuit]

I agree. With some form of universal health insurance, small businesses would be better off, and would be able to hire better people who would otherwise not take the job due to a lack of health care benefits.

I think the economy would benefit from the greater mobility between jobs all around. I know people who are stuck in jobs they hate, doing bad work as a result, because they are too terrified of getting sick to leave their job and insurance. Most companies make you wait 90 days before your benefits kick in, so if you switch jobs and get sick, you're out of luck. If insurance were realistically available (I don't consider paying $100 a month for a plan with a ten thousand dollar deductible realistic) without being tied to employers, people could enjoy a great deal more mobility between jobs.

I know at least 3 people that would start their own business or switch jobs if they could retain their health insurance. When ever someone says, "wow you are so lucky to own your own business, I have always wanted to open a ____________." (fill in the blank) I ask why they haven't and the answer is almost always health care related.

Most conservatives I meet are blown away that a liberal like me owns a business. I think they assume only conservatives are capable of that. They never get how beneficial universal healthcare would be. I have to laugh at how absurd the arguments against it are because otherwise it would make me cry.

 

[eeyore1954]

Evil socialized medicine would remove the middleman that is insurance, eliminating an entire incredibly rich industry that makes all its profit from not spending the money they are paid on provision of healthcare. How keeping them around is helping the parties they are highly motivated to not pay is beyond me.

I think we should get rid of the evil middlemen in all industries. Think of how much less expensive every thing would be.

 

[TragicMonkey]

I think we should get rid of the evil middlemen in all industries. Think of how much less expensive every thing would be.

Yeah, right. Middlemen can be necessary when it comes to distribution, marketing, getting the products to the consumers. But what exactly does the insurance middleman add to healthcare? It receives money from one source, and pays a smaller amount to another. What value has been added? What benefit does the patient and the provider receive from having this intermediary?

 

[Travis]

Travis - Any luck on PCIP? The Federal high risk insurance pool? Here are the eligibility requirements:




Premiums are $164 a month if you're in your twenties.

I've looked into it. Apparently I will need to be re-rejected.

 

[Tatyana]

If the US were more like beloved Canada and Europe, we'd have an even worse business climate, and our rates of developing new medical tech, some half of everything the world invents, would fall off to match the per-capita of Europe. While this would still be better than North Korea or Somalia, it would be worse than it is now.

Then the rates of life saving due to new tech would slow, and people would die, as the years marched on, who wouldn't otherwise die.


In such a world, you'd be more likely to die with full health insurance from government than a technologically more advanced world with US-style health insurance.


"Giving out free insurance" at the cost of development rates kills far more than it saves. Of course, other business-unfriendly policies unrelated to medical care also affect this greatly, to be sure.

How does this work exactly?

I don't see any major medical breakthroughs coming from insurance companies.

 

[boooeee]

I've looked into it. Apparently I will need to be re-rejected.

If you're looking to get rejected quickly, you could try to apply through ehealthinsurance.com. Seems like a win/win. If they reject you, you're covered. If they don't reject you.......you're covered.

 

[Neally]

Evil socialized medicine would remove the middleman that is insurance, eliminating an entire incredibly rich industry that makes all its profit from not spending the money they are paid on provision of healthcare. How keeping them around is helping the parties they are highly motivated to not pay is beyond me.

LOL. Bought into the evil insurance industry meme? The profit margin for health insurance companies is about 3%, and there are plenty of non-profit insurance companies yet their premiums are not much different than the for profit companies, since margins are so low. Sorry to burst that bubble.

 

[Neally]

Yeah, right. Middlemen can be necessary when it comes to distribution, marketing, getting the products to the consumers. But what exactly does the insurance middleman add to healthcare? It receives money from one source, and pays a smaller amount to another. What value has been added? What benefit does the patient and the provider receive from having this intermediary?

You might want to familiarize yourself with the concept of insurance and risk mitigation.

 

[TragicMonkey]

LOL. Bought into the evil insurance industry meme? The profit margin for health insurance companies is about 3%, and there are plenty of non-profit insurance companies yet their premiums are not much different than the for profit companies, since margins are so low. Sorry to burst that bubble.

I work in healthcare, including past jobs for insurance companies. The profit margin is not 3%, unless you are speaking of one of the few companies that sells Managed Medicaid products as its main business. Regular commercial insurers make higher profits than that. Those who wish to obscure the numbers like to include the specialty companies in so the data skews downward. And owing to the complexity of accounting in the industry, it's almost as easy to hide a profit in health insurance as it is to do in Hollywood. A large number of things can be obscured through accrual accounting, or if the situation calls for it, the reverse. But that's not unique to the healthcare industry.

 

[TragicMonkey]

You might want to familiarize yourself with the concept of insurance and risk mitigation.

And you might need to ask yourself what pool could possibly be larger than including everyone? Universal healthcare that includes everyone pools the risk as much as it possibly could be, and changes things from having a subset of the population pay large amounts of money for potential costs to having the whole population pay small amounts of money for actual costs. It would mean the only risk would be the illnesses themselves, not revenue.

 

[DrBaltar]

To be fair, the GoP doesn't really want you dead. They just don't care.

Nope, not quite being fair yet. Try again. The GOP just doesn't want to make other people pay for my health insurance. Now drop the emotional bullcrap. I thought only critical thinking happened here.

 

[Shalamar]

Nope, not quite being fair yet. Try again. The GOP just doesn't want to make other people pay for my health insurance. Now drop the emotional bullcrap. I thought only critical thinking happened here.

Unless you self insure, someone is paying for your health insurance.

A universal system of Health Insurance would cover everyone, regardless of employment, and would likely be less expensive as well.

 

[TragicMonkey]

I would like to interject a moment of sanity by reminding people that healthcare, reform or not, is not a partisan issue. Everyone stands to benefit. Even those who like the current system recognize that it has flaws that need to be corrected. Nobody wants "people to die", not really. They just disagree on what the best solutions are. Because it's complicated. It's life, death, sickness, health, and an enormous amount of money at stake. Naturally this gives rise to passionate feelings on the subject.

 

[DrBaltar]

Unless you self insure, someone is paying for your health insurance.

And this 'someone' is required to pay your health insurance? Is that what you're saying?

 

[Shalamar]

And this 'someone' is required to pay your health insurance? Is that what you're saying?

You can self insure (ie: Buy no health insurance at all) or you pay for someone elses health care as part of the insurance.

It seems that you reject a universal health insurance system, because you don't want to pay for someone else?

 

[Neally]

I work in healthcare, including past jobs for insurance companies. The profit margin is not 3%, unless you are speaking of one of the few companies that sells Managed Medicaid products as its main business. Regular commercial insurers make higher profits than that.

Wrong. The average is 4.5% with margins raging from 5.7% for Aetna to 2.4% for Humana.

And you might need to ask yourself what pool could possibly be larger than including everyone?

I don't need to ask myself that since I already know that the larger the pool the greater the risk is collectively shared. You seemed to have missed this with your previous comment as to simply equating insurance to middlemen. BTW, universal health care still involves a middleman.

 

[DrBaltar]

You can self insure (ie: Buy no health insurance at all) or you pay for someone elses health care as part of the insurance.

Yes, if you pay for health insurance, you are also paying to treat others who are on the same plan. But you are not required to enter the insurance plan.

It seems that you reject a universal health insurance system, because you don't want to pay for someone else?

Hold on, we're still on this topic:

To be fair, the GoP doesn't really want you dead. They just don't care.

Nope, not quite being fair yet. Try again. The GOP just doesn't want to make other people pay for my health insurance. Now drop the emotional bullcrap. I thought only critical thinking happened here.

So back to your original assertion... that the GOP simply doesn't care if you die or not. If you were being honest, you would admit that the real reason is that the GOP does not want to force people to pay for other people's health insurance. For one thing, (and I predict we will soon get confirmation from the Supreme Court), it's unconstitutional. And another, this precedent could be used by the government in the future to require the public to buy other things as well.

 

[Shalamar]

Hold on, we're still on this topic:
So back to your original assertion... that the GOP simply doesn't care if you die or not. If you were being honest, you would admit that the real reason is that the GOP does not want to force people to pay for other people's health insurance. For one thing, (and I predict we will soon get confirmation from the Supreme Court), it's unconstitutional. And another, this precedent could be used by the government in the future to require the public to buy other things as well.

Actually, if your claim was indeed the case, then the GOP would also be trying to eliminate Medicare/Medicade. Right now, people are forced to pay for others health care via taxes, that those people do not have access to, and must pay again for their own insurance.

So I reject your proposition that the GOP is trying to prevent people from paying for others health care/insurance. Because it is happening right now.