@Wariowoods and Zenman Thank you for the kind words! It's nice to see a few more people that share my opinions. And Wariowoods, long post or not I read over your post, and you made some great points regarding the situation in a well thought out and intelligent way.
And regarding the avatar, the low cut shirt does make it look weird in such a small picture, doesn't it?
I do also want to let those I've argued with (Gameking and I especially have been bouncing it back and forth) know I have enjoyed this. I don't think less of you in any way just because we don't agree and I hope I don't chase you away from an important discussion.
Why do people think the government will help healthcare by controlling it? If the government controls healthcare, it will make everyones' lives misreable.
Oh? Enlighten me.
You want the government controlling healthcare!? If the government controls healthcare, people who are not able to be under the universal healthcare program are screwed. People who have good indenpent healthcare programs will be forced to switch over, causing grief. Universal healthcare is not going to solve the enconomy, it will just make things worse. Besides, this universal healthcare plan was being talked about long before the enconomy went sour. It was suggested by Hillary Clinton back during the 1990s.
@ supersonic as i have stated to others on this thread, it is a choice, no one is forcing you to have the plan. it is merely there for people to have if they lack insurance or cannot pay for it.
Why do people think the government will help healthcare by controlling it? If the government controls healthcare, it will make everyones' lives misreable.
Oh? Enlighten me.
You want the government controlling healthcare!? If the government controls healthcare, people who are not able to be under the universal healthcare program are screwed. People who have good indenpent healthcare programs will be forced to switch over, causing grief. Universal healthcare is not going to solve the enconomy, it will just make things worse. Besides, this universal healthcare plan was being talked about long before the enconomy went sour. It was suggested by Hillary Clinton back during the 1990s.
"People will be forced to switch over causing grief" Untrue, and this is the point you lead with? 1 in 4 live without any health insurance and you want to claim that they shouldn't be able get any because it would require tweaking the private sector. Nice. As for the Clinton thing, what exactly does that have to do with anything? Universal health care has been put forth at various times for at least 50 years.
"The government of the United States is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion."
Man, I step out for dinner and drinks and miss all this heat here? I've read every page and have yet to hear anyone factually dismiss any of the points or suggestions I've made.
I'm too tired and foggy to repost them all. If you're really interested, just breeze through the pages and look for my avatar.
Not wanting to overpay for healthcare, mine or others', is not "cold" or "heartless." it's SMART. And NOTHING in the proposal reduces the cost of healthcare. To the contrary, the proposal significantly increases the per-capita cost.
Better healthcare, cheaper healthcare, and more readily available healthcare will ONLY be provided by private industry. The market offers exactly ZERO examples where healthy competition increased pricing and reduced quality.
The only thing the US government should do is get out of the way of interstate insurance sales, and crack down on an overly litigious malpractice system being used as a lottery ticket by scumbags trying to get over.
No worries, V-man, I dug up one of your posts to look at.
You claim that only the private industry will be able to provide better and cheaper health care. But they won't. By being a for profit company in this business their goal is never to truly provide the best care. The bare minimum and not a dime more, if you will. The poor and sick are a business risk that they won't touch. Gotta add in that co-pay as well. The return comes back in the negative, so how would that help them? Malpractice lawsuits are out of hand (even if they are still incredibly important), but getting rid of the worst isn't a magic tonic. The industry was sick long before that was a factor.
@MERG: "Private industry is the cause of more expensive and worse healthcare." Why, because you say so? Please provide one example of private industry increasing costs and decreasing quality in ANY market. Let me save you the trouble: you can't.
The system needs improving, I agree. Please see my earlier posts for my suggestions on where to begin.
Regarding the number of uninsured, let's do the math, shall we? Everybody now... ~300M in the US ~250M with health insurance coverage ~50M uninsured
Of those ~50M... ~20M illegal aliens ~30M uninsured
Of those ~30M, let's assume 0.00% elective non-coverage, so that every one of those 30M want health care but can't afford it. That's 1 in 10. So........what, are we to overhaul the entire system at the cost of hundreds of billions if not trillions of dollars for 10% of the population? Please. Wake the hell up.
I'm all for exception handling. Raise a bit more tax (if that's even necessary) to cover the outliers and special cases. Solve the actual probem. Don't make a crisis where there isn't one, then try and recreate the whole system using that crisis as an excuse.
And one more so you don't think I wanted to just look at one. With your claim of 250,000,000 being insured, how many do you think have serviceable coverage? How many get their coverage through the job and are scewed if they get downsized? How many are stuck in dead end jobs because their insurance is tied to the job?
"The government of the United States is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion."
Man, I step out for dinner and drinks and miss all this heat here? I've read every page and have yet to hear anyone factually dismiss any of the points or suggestions I've made.
I'm too tired and foggy to repost them all. If you're really interested, just breeze through the pages and look for my avatar.
Respect... mostly. -V
It's funny. I'm on a reasonable, but low wage in a country that has public health care - demographics would put me in the middle class, in terms of personal wealth. Not only is my health good - and I have used the healthcare system before, but I'm not dying of starvation, and indeed I have luxuries in my life. My standard of living is much higher than an equivilently-waged American thanks to the welfare system.
But then, Americans don't realise the rest of the world laughs at its joke of a welfare system.
Ciao Fox. The private industry competes on quality and price. They only ever increase the quality and/or lower the price to beat out other vendors. Airlines, PCs, electronics, automobiles, you name it. Healthcare insurance is no different. Being a profit-driven company is what keeps costs DOWN in a competitive market. If the US Government steps in the game, competition goes out the window. Private sector will compete with the government the way a cow competes with a butcher. Anyone who believes otherwise is deluded. Lower the costs to helathcare providers by taking them out of the crosshairs of ambulance-chasing shysters, and the costs they pass on to the insurance companies to cover the patients will be reduced also.
I am all for exception handling, whether by allocated taxes or medical industry windfall taxes or other means, the roughly 1 in 10 people (very agressive estimate) who don't have health care insurance and can't legitimately afford it - keeping in mind this number will be even less when costs are reduced.
@ vendetta obama made this argument and i think it fits... what about UPS and Fed-Ex Vs the Postal Service? by that logic there would be no UPS or Fed-Ex because the Postal Service is government run
Ciao Fox. The private industry competes on quality and price. They only ever increase the quality and/or lower the price to beat out other vendors. Airlines, PCs, electronics, automobiles, you name it. Healthcare insurance is no different. Being a profit-driven company is what keeps costs DOWN in a competitive market. If the US Government steps in the game, competition goes out the window. Private sector will compete with the government the way a cow competes with a butcher. Anyone who believes otherwise is deluded. Lower the costs to helathcare providers by taking them out of the crosshairs of ambulance-chasing shysters, and the costs they pass on to the insurance companies to cover the patients will be reduced also.
I am all for exception handling, whether by allocated taxes or medical industry windfall taxes or other means, the roughly 1 in 10 people (very agressive estimate) who don't have health care insurance and can't legitimately afford it - keeping in mind this number will be even less when costs are reduced.
Ok, I'll admit that I haven't read the document - but people here keep suggesting that public and private health care are mutually exclusive - is that the plan of the Obama Government? To abolish and outlaw private health care? Really?
It's a beautiful system when you have a base line, public access, government funded health care for the majority. And then private health care which gets to compete on costs and all that for those with a bit more money to spare.
@ vendetta obama made this argument and i think it fits... what about UPS and Fed-Ex Vs the Postal Service? by that logic there would be no UPS or Fed-Ex because the Postal Service is government run
He also said that it's the post office that's always having problems. That doesn't give me much confidence that the government could effectively run health care.
@MERG: "Private industry is the cause of more expensive and worse healthcare." Why, because you say so? Please provide one example of private industry increasing costs and decreasing quality in ANY market. Let me save you the trouble: you can't.
The system needs improving, I agree. Please see my earlier posts for my suggestions on where to begin.
Regarding the number of uninsured, let's do the math, shall we? Everybody now... ~300M in the US ~250M with health insurance coverage ~50M uninsured
Of those ~50M... ~20M illegal aliens ~30M uninsured
Of those ~30M, let's assume 0.00% elective non-coverage, so that every one of those 30M want health care but can't afford it. That's 1 in 10. So........what, are we to overhaul the entire system at the cost of hundreds of billions if not trillions of dollars for 10% of the population? Please. Wake the hell up.
I'm all for exception handling. Raise a bit more tax (if that's even necessary) to cover the outliers and special cases. Solve the actual probem. Don't make a crisis where there isn't one, then try and recreate the whole system using that crisis as an excuse.
And one more so you don't think I wanted to just look at one. With your claim of 250,000,000 being insured, how many do you think have serviceable coverage? How many get their coverage through the job and are scewed if they get downsized? How many are stuck in dead end jobs because their insurance is tied to the job?
Fox, the 250M is not "my" claim, as you seek to represent it. Good tactic, but not accurate. That is the figure being used by the authorities on both sides of the argument. And being "stuck" in a dead-end job that puts food on the table and insures your family against medical costs is not really that dead-end, nor one you should feel stuck in. Surely any upgrade would offer comparable benefits?
Ciao Fox. The private industry competes on quality and price. They only ever increase the quality and/or lower the price to beat out other vendors. Airlines, PCs, electronics, automobiles, you name it. Healthcare insurance is no different. Being a profit-driven company is what keeps costs DOWN in a competitive market. If the US Government steps in the game, competition goes out the window. Private sector will compete with the government the way a cow competes with a butcher. Anyone who believes otherwise is deluded. Lower the costs to helathcare providers by taking them out of the crosshairs of ambulance-chasing shysters, and the costs they pass on to the insurance companies to cover the patients will be reduced also.
I am all for exception handling, whether by allocated taxes or medical industry windfall taxes or other means, the roughly 1 in 10 people (very agressive estimate) who don't have health care insurance and can't legitimately afford it - keeping in mind this number will be even less when costs are reduced.
Ok, I'll admit that I haven't read the document - but people here keep suggesting that public and private health care are mutually exclusive - is that the plan of the Obama Government? To abolish and outlaw private health care? Really?
It's a beautiful system when you have a base line, public access, government funded health care for the majority. And then private health care which gets to compete on costs and all that for those with a bit more money to spare.
It's all a sham. Obama is making it to look like we have a choice and that we can still get private insurance if we choose. But Obama said in HIS OWN WORDS that it will take between 10-20 years to eliminate the private insurance companies and have a single payer system (universal healthcare). By setting up the public option, it will eventually drive away private insurance companies.
@ vendetta obama made this argument and i think it fits... what about UPS and Fed-Ex Vs the Postal Service? by that logic there would be no UPS or Fed-Ex because the Postal Service is government run
He also said that it's the post office that's always having problems. That doesn't give me much confidence that the government could effectively run health care.
@Zenman: Mister Obama should learn a bit of corporate history before denigrating commerical icons of American industry. FEDERAL Express got its name by agreeing to deliver the paychecks to government workers in a timely fashion - something the US Post Office couldn't promise or deliver on. Secondly, the US Post Office runs at an operating defecit of approximately $10 MILLION per DAY. By any calculus, that is an abject failure.
kay, that 's fair, but the Postal Service doesn't have the massive lag today that people think GHC will have, i get my mail at a reasonable rate EDIT: although that has NOTHING to do with this thread
By setting up the public option, it will eventually drive away private insurance companies.
Why would it? It doesn't here.
Secondly, the US Post Office runs at an operating defecit of approximately $10 MILLION per day. By any calculus, that is an abject failure.
Simplistic, and incorrect. Infrastructure is expensive, yes, but the intangible benefits that it provides contributes far more to an economy that cost.
For instance. At the very least Public companies employ workers - unemployment is one of the very worst indications of a poor economy, since it has follow-on impact into major areas such as retail.
Another example - In Australia the Government is building a FTTH network - the NBN. For $50 billion. Now, people have been complaining that this is expensive, but that's a stupidly simplistic look at it. That NBN network will enable better ways of doing business and improve the competitiveness of Australian businesses on the world stage. Does the Government get it's $50 billion investment back? No, but the contribution to the broader economy will be far greater.
Even simpler, look at roads. Those cost Governments around the world billions on billions a year. And with the exception of the odd toll road, don't generate any income directly. But you remove the roads from a city and watch its economy collapse.
This thread is filled with such simplistic thinking that I am embarrased on behalf of you all.
It's all a sham. Obama is making it to look like we have a choice and that we can still get private insurance if we choose. But Obama said in HIS OWN WORDS that it will take between 10-20 years to eliminate the private insurance companies and have a single payer system (universal healthcare). By setting up the public option, it will eventually drive away private insurance companies.
It does though, Zenbro. Universal, US Government-run healthcare provides no incentive for providers to control costs or for patients to be cost-conscious and not abuse the system. This will in turn lead to increased costs. Increased costs lead to a shortfall in allocated funding, which in turn leads to higher taxes. This is the way it has always been with government programs. There is no rational reason to believe this will be any different.
Goodnight for now fellas. I'm gonna go walk the neighborhood on this beautiful New York night.
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Topic: Government run Health care! yes or no?
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