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MmeGigs -> RE: "How to fix the entitlement crisis" (5/22/2008 8:27:43 PM)
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ORIGINAL: cyberdude611
And we CANNOT do universal healthcare. If we do that right now this country will surely go into bankruptcy.
Baloney. Between private insurance and government programs we're already spending enough (or nearly enough) money on health care in the US to cover the cost of universal health care. We're spending a huge amount of our health care dollar on administration. If we could just come up with a single claim form that would work for all insurance companies and the govt, we'd save enough to provide universal prenatal and well-child care. We could cover a lot more with a standard formulary and list of covered procedures.
If the govt were to provide or administer health care, the increased cost that businesses and individuals would pay in taxes would be offset by the savings in health care premiums they're no longer paying. It's roughly the same amount of money we're talking about, it's just a matter of whose pockets it comes out. If we want government to pay for it, we have to pay more taxes. If we want businesses to pay for it, we have to pay higher prices. If we want individuals to pay for it, we have pay wages that will enable them to do that, and so pay higher prices.
What do you think is the best solution? I'm willing to go with any of them - it's pretty much the same $ out of my pocket any way you cut it. The solution I am not willing to go with is abandoning our low-income folks and telling them to fend for themselves, and I'm not willing to protect insurance company profits at these folks' expense.
It all comes out of the consumer/citizen's pocket one way or another. Having seen from the inside the way that business operates and the way that government operates, as I have worked for both, I am much more inclined to trust government to take care of this. Business is more interested in profit, govt (at least on the local level where most of the money is disbursed) is more interested in bang for the buck. When it comes to health care, I want bang for the buck.
quote:
ORIGINAL: cyberdude611
We dont have the money to send 300 million Americans to the doctor and pay for every test, every procedure, and every surgery. We just dont have the money. We also dont have enough doctors. I right now cant get an appoitment (non-emergency) with my doctor for 2 months. He's that booked. If we have universal healthacre....how long will I have to wait then? A year?
So in order for you to get the kind of health care you feel that you're entitled to, you're willing to keep the system the way it is and let 48 million people in the US go without any health care coverage? According to the Insitutes of Medicine, 20,000 people die in the US every year because they don't have health insurance. Maybe we need to get them all to come to one place and die together to get people to understand that this is a serious problem.
There is rationing in every health care system - that is the nature of the beast. There will never be enough money to provide everyone with the best care that is available. What we have to decide is how we are going to ration that care. In the US, we do that on the basis of ability to pay. If you have money or good insurance you have no problem. If you don't have money or insurance and aren't poor enough to be on Medicaid, you're pretty much screwed. You'd better hope that there is some foundation for your illness or disease. Even if you have good insurance and plenty of money, you can be still be wiped out by a heart attack or a stroke or cancer or what-have-you.
Since we have to ration care, I'd rather do it on the basis of bang for the buck for the particular patient and treatment than on the financial situation of the patient.
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ORIGINAL: cyberdude611
And when you start forcing doctors to take paycuts in order to lower healthcare costs....more doctors will leave the practice. This is exactly what has happened to education. We are losing teachers because we are opening more schools and to pay for rising education costs we have to reduce teacher salaries. When you make more money as an Assistant Manager at McDonalds than teaching a High School class....you have to be nuts to go to school, pay $20,000 for a Masters degree and be a teacher. So we now have a teacher shortage and class sizes are going up and test scores are going down.
Again, this is baloney. There hasn't been much talk of doctors talking pay cuts, indeed, much of the discussion has been about cutting doctor/provider overhead and preserving the profitability of the practice of medicine.
Teacher salaries and doctor salaries really have nothing at all in common. Teacher salaries have decreased because they are funded by our tax dollars and have been taking a hit as the "No New Taxes" crapola has gained momentum. Still, there are plenty of people who want to be teachers. Where I live class sizes are going up not because of lack of teachers but because of lack of funds to pay teachers. There are trained teachers working at McDonald's while class sizes are reaching 30+. And I'm in a relatively affluent community.
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ORIGINAL: cyberdude611
Government is NOT the answer to our problems.
Nor is the market. The market has a profit motive but no social conscience. A long-term functional and sustainable society needs both - a true cooperation and partnership between profit motive and social conscience.
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