Universal Healthcare is Wonderful and Will Ensure Better Health care for everyone

[sppunk]

Originally Posted by Trotskilicious

people are freaking the fuck out pretty quickly, it's kind of amusing (but more annoying). we still got 3 1/2 years of your psychotic shit to suffer through.

I'm an Obama supporter. But he's really fucked up this debate.

He's put his tail between his legs and backed away. Healthcare co-ops at a regional level, if that's what they eventually push, will be more expensive than current healthcare rates. Go figure.

[Caine Walker]

Originally Posted by sppunk

Healthcare co-ops at a regional level, if that's what they eventually push, will be more expensive than current healthcare rates. Go figure.

how do you figure?

[sppunk]

Healthcare gets cheaper (I'm speaking of insurance, actually, I guess) when you have more people enrolled in a plan.

One massive plan provides cheaper rates than small, private, individual plans. It plays big into the risk/reward component of the underwriters who govern the insurance agency. If you do this at a regional level, you have small groups which inevitably leads to high premiums.

I'm not opposed at all to co-op systems, and if it's a national system that could work great. I'm fearful though this whole charade won't lead to any changes other than governing rules for health insurers.

[Future Boy]

Last I heard co-ops were dead too, no? Anyhow this sorts of tpouches on what Sppunk said Daily Kos: State of the Nation

But how I understand it, there arent any big enough to really make a difference.

[Gish08]

Originally Posted by sppunk

Sorry, I didn't know we were still hung up on a presidential campaign. I thought by now we'd all moved on to Chapter 2, or How I Lose My Popularity And Clout With The American People.

You'll recall that Bill Clinton, the only Democratic President to win more than one term since FDR, had something like a 30 or 40% approval rating at this time in his first four years. He got elected twice and remains a highly popular President.

Originally Posted by Corganist

Wait a second, you're saying that Bush was viewed as a cult figure by his party...and Obama is not? Huh? Obama's rise to power all but epitomizes "cult following!"

We are through the looking glass here.

Many voters and folks in the media are in love with this man, but do you really think important people within the party that a. have a lot of pride and b. disagree with him on health care are going to give in to his initiatives?

[Nimrod's Son]

Originally Posted by Gish08

You'll recall that Bill Clinton, the only Democratic President to win more than one term since FDR, had something like a 30 or 40% approval rating at this time in his first four years. He got elected twice and remains a highly popular President.

In fairness he ran against Bob Dole, who basically got the nomination for time served. It would be like giving the next Dem nod to Ted Kennedy. Well except the difference being one was a war hero and the other a murderer.

Originally Posted by Gish08

Many voters and folks in the media are in love with this man, but do you really think important people within the party that a. have a lot of pride and b. disagree with him on health care are going to give in to his initiatives?

If Obama can't even lead his own party, then what good is he? At least Clinton could do that.

[jczeroman]

Originally Posted by sppunk

Healthcare gets cheaper (I'm speaking of insurance, actually, I guess) when you have more people enrolled in a plan.

I see what you are saying here, but this is not entirely true. Healthcare gets cheaper when more (average or healthy) people enrol in a plan. If government mandates and regulations force unhealthy or high risk people into a plan, the said plan will be more expensive then it otherwise would be.

[Nimrod's Son]

Originally Posted by jczeroman

I see what you are saying here, but this is not entirely true. Healthcare gets cheaper when more (average or healthy) people enrol in a plan. If government mandates and regulations force unhealthy or high risk people into a plan, the said plan will be more expensive then it otherwise would be.

wait a second here.. .you mean the healthy people will have to pay for the sick? that's not what obama promised! i thought the rich would pay for all of us!

[sppunk]

Originally Posted by jczeroman

I see what you are saying here, but this is not entirely true. Healthcare gets cheaper when more (average or healthy) people enrol in a plan. If government mandates and regulations force unhealthy or high risk people into a plan, the said plan will be more expensive then it otherwise would be.

Right to the your end part, which kills small groups. If it's a massive group the sickly can't hurt the premium as much because of mass.

We should mandate weight.

[Trotskilicious]

we should tax fast food

[duovamp]

[duovamp]

Achilles Last Stand should only be listened to at full volume.

[Trotskilicious]

i like the concept that we shouldn't have national health care because some sick people should just die instead of having health care because that would be too expensive

i mean that's wonderful libertarian logic right there. fuck everyone else but me.

[Debaser]

Originally Posted by Trotskilicious

i like the concept that we shouldn't have national health care because some sick people should just die instead of having health care because that would be too expensive

i mean that's wonderful libertarian logic right there. fuck everyone else but me.

its called the free market baby

[ravenguy2000]

Originally Posted by duovamp

[Trotskilicious]

i thought he was a fascist

[publius clodius]

[Trotskilicious]

hahaha commie fascist

[Starla]

one side of her tummy has collapsed into her pants

[Nimrod's Son]

Originally Posted by Trotskilicious

i like the concept that we shouldn't have national health care because some sick people should just die instead of having health care because that would be too expensive

you either:
a.) have no concept to the legitimate objections to this plan
or
b.) are just fucking trolling because that's all you do

[Nimrod's Son]

The Whole Foods Alternative to ObamaCare

Eight things we can do to improve health care without adding to the deficit.


By JOHN MACKEY

"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out
of other people's money."
—Margaret Thatcher

With a projected $1.8 trillion deficit for 2009, several trillions more in deficits projected over the next decade, and with both Medicare and Social Security entitlement spending about to ratchet up several notches over the next 15 years as Baby Boomers become eligible for both, we are rapidly running out of other people's money. These deficits are simply not sustainable. They are either going to result in unprecedented new taxes and inflation, or they will bankrupt us.
While we clearly need health-care reform, the last thing our country needs is a massive new health-care entitlement that will create hundreds of billions of dollars of new unfunded deficits and move us much closer to a government takeover of our health-care system. Instead, we should be trying to achieve reforms by moving in the opposite direction—toward less government control and more individual empowerment. Here are eight reforms that would greatly lower the cost of health care for everyone:

Chad Crow
• Remove the legal obstacles that slow the creation of high-deductible health insurance plans and health savings accounts (HSAs). The combination of high-deductible health insurance and HSAs is one solution that could solve many of our health-care problems. For example, Whole Foods Market pays 100% of the premiums for all our team members who work 30 hours or more per week (about 89% of all team members) for our high-deductible health-insurance plan. We also provide up to $1,800 per year in additional health-care dollars through deposits into employees' Personal Wellness Accounts to spend as they choose on their own health and wellness.


Money not spent in one year rolls over to the next and grows over time. Our team members therefore spend their own health-care dollars until the annual deductible is covered (about $2,500) and the insurance plan kicks in. This creates incentives to spend the first $2,500 more carefully. Our plan's costs are much lower than typical health insurance, while providing a very high degree of worker satisfaction.
• Equalize the tax laws so that employer-provided health insurance and individually owned health insurance have the same tax benefits. Now employer health insurance benefits are fully tax deductible, but individual health insurance is not. This is unfair.
• Repeal all state laws which prevent insurance companies from competing across state lines. We should all have the legal right to purchase health insurance from any insurance company in any state and we should be able use that insurance wherever we live. Health insurance should be portable.
• Repeal government mandates regarding what insurance companies must cover. These mandates have increased the cost of health insurance by billions of dollars. What is insured and what is not insured should be determined by individual customer preferences and not through special-interest lobbying.
• Enact tort reform to end the ruinous lawsuits that force doctors to pay insurance costs of hundreds of thousands of dollars per year. These costs are passed back to us through much higher prices for health care.
• Make costs transparent so that consumers understand what health-care treatments cost. How many people know the total cost of their last doctor's visit and how that total breaks down? What other goods or services do we buy without knowing how much they will cost us?
• Enact Medicare reform. We need to face up to the actuarial fact that Medicare is heading towards bankruptcy and enact reforms that create greater patient empowerment, choice and responsibility.
• Finally, revise tax forms to make it easier for individuals to make a voluntary, tax-deductible donation to help the millions of people who have no insurance and aren't covered by Medicare, Medicaid or the State Children's Health Insurance Program.
Many promoters of health-care reform believe that people have an intrinsic ethical right to health care—to equal access to doctors, medicines and hospitals. While all of us empathize with those who are sick, how can we say that all people have more of an intrinsic right to health care than they have to food or shelter?
Health care is a service that we all need, but just like food and shelter it is best provided through voluntary and mutually beneficial market exchanges. A careful reading of both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution will not reveal any intrinsic right to health care, food or shelter. That's because there isn't any. This "right" has never existed in America
Even in countries like Canada and the U.K., there is no intrinsic right to health care. Rather, citizens in these countries are told by government bureaucrats what health-care treatments they are eligible to receive and when they can receive them. All countries with socialized medicine ration health care by forcing their citizens to wait in lines to receive scarce treatments.
Although Canada has a population smaller than California, 830,000 Canadians are currently waiting to be admitted to a hospital or to get treatment, according to a report last month in Investor's Business Daily. In England, the waiting list is 1.8 million.
At Whole Foods we allow our team members to vote on what benefits they most want the company to fund. Our Canadian and British employees express their benefit preferences very clearly—they want supplemental health-care dollars that they can control and spend themselves without permission from their governments. Why would they want such additional health-care benefit dollars if they already have an "intrinsic right to health care"? The answer is clear—no such right truly exists in either Canada or the U.K.—or in any other country.
Rather than increase government spending and control, we need to address the root causes of poor health. This begins with the realization that every American adult is responsible for his or her own health.
Unfortunately many of our health-care problems are self-inflicted: two-thirds of Americans are now overweight and one-third are obese. Most of the diseases that kill us and account for about 70% of all health-care spending—heart disease, cancer, stroke, diabetes and obesity—are mostly preventable through proper diet, exercise, not smoking, minimal alcohol consumption and other healthy lifestyle choices.
Recent scientific and medical evidence shows that a diet consisting of foods that are plant-based, nutrient dense and low-fat will help prevent and often reverse most degenerative diseases that kill us and are expensive to treat. We should be able to live largely disease-free lives until we are well into our 90s and even past 100 years of age.
Health-care reform is very important. Whatever reforms are enacted it is essential that they be financially responsible, and that we have the freedom to choose doctors and the health-care services that best suit our own unique set of lifestyle choices. We are all responsible for our own lives and our own health. We should take that responsibility very seriously and use our freedom to make wise lifestyle choices that will protect our health. Doing so will enrich our lives and will help create a vibrant and sustainable American society.

[Trotskilicious]

Originally Posted by Nimrod's Son

you either:
a.) have no concept to the legitimate objections to this plan
or
b.) are just fucking trolling because that's all you do

why do you cry so much about it

[Nimrod's Son]

So it's b. then.

[Trotskilicious]

:the helicopter:

[Ever]

Originally Posted by Trotskilicious

i like the concept that we shouldn't have national health care because some sick people should just die instead of having health care because that would be too expensive

i mean that's wonderful libertarian logic right there. fuck everyone else but me.

I don't understand. Are you saying that the scarcity principle wouldn't apply when there is public healthcare

There are only so many machines and capable doctors, staff. Obviously not everyone who desires a high level of healthcare is going receive this.

If its not money that should decide who gets treatment what is? Political connections? Skill in kissing ass? Personal connections?

So its a question of who and to whom?

Who should be organizing healthcare? on what basis will the organizers know they are doing a good job? What happens to the bad organizers what happens to the good ones?

If there is going to be only one payer (and all people can go to hospital whenever they want thus rendering money revenues effectively meaningless and unable to provide the price mechanism which is responsible for allocating factors of production to their most efficient uses in the market) how on earth can market forces be the answer to these questions?

They're not.

Eventually there'll have to be more and more direct control regulating how and how not to run medical services in order to try and eliminate the inevitable queues that would result. This is because the current amount of capital in the health industry isn't able to treat everyone at once for all illnesses.

I feel that under a more socialized healthcare system it is going to be precisely the elderly and the ill who lose out as they will be said to take up too much space and attention while people who still have a chance might need it more urgently.

I think looking at examples where healthcare is completely public can show you the dangers of such a system. The example of former socialist republics should serve as a warning, as should North Korea and Cuba. The current state in England is completely atrocious, so its not just a result of whether the country is poor as a whole or not. I think in England it's something like 1 million people out of a population of 55 million are waiting for surgery? Canada is not doing much better and here in Australia I wouldn't know cause after waiting in line for 14 hours at the emergency room for something that wasn't actually even an emergency I stopped going to public hospitals and pay the $50 I need to get my x-rays at chatswood medical centre instead.

I think what the current administration is proposing in the U.S will only lead to tough times for you guys.

Oh well good luck

[Debaser]

del

i don't have the time.

[bardy]

hey, I have a high deductible insurance plan and an HSA that my company contributes to, we must be on the forefront!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Debaser]

Originally Posted by Ever

I don't understand. Are you saying that the scarcity principle wouldn't apply when there is public healthcare

There are only so many machines and capable doctors, staff. Obviously not everyone who desires a high level of healthcare is going receive this.

If its not money that should decide who gets treatment what is? Political connections? Skill in kissing ass? Personal connections?

So its a question of who and to whom?

Who should be organizing healthcare? on what basis will the organizers know they are doing a good job? What happens to the bad organizers what happens to the good ones?

If there is going to be only one payer (and all people can go to hospital whenever they want thus rendering money revenues effectively meaningless and unable to provide the price mechanism which is responsible for allocating factors of production to their most efficient uses in the market) how on earth can market forces be the answer to these questions?

They're not.

Eventually there'll have to be more and more direct control regulating how and how not to run medical services in order to try and eliminate the inevitable queues that would result. This is because the current amount of capital in the health industry isn't able to treat everyone at once for all illnesses.

I feel that under a more socialized healthcare system it is going to be precisely the elderly and the ill who lose out as they will be said to take up too much space and attention while people who still have a chance might need it more urgently.

I think looking at examples where healthcare is completely public can show you the dangers of such a system. The example of former socialist republics should serve as a warning, as should North Korea and Cuba. The current state in England is completely atrocious, so its not just a result of whether the country is poor as a whole or not. I think in England it's something like 1 million people out of a population of 55 million are waiting for surgery? Canada is not doing much better and here in Australia I wouldn't know cause after waiting in line for 14 hours at the emergency room for something that wasn't actually even an emergency I stopped going to public hospitals and pay the $50 I need to get my x-rays at chatswood medical centre instead.

I think what the current administration is proposing in the U.S will only lead to tough times for you guys.

Oh well good luck

The rationing argument is such a dodge. Rationing occurs in both free market and socialized systems. I can understand that under socialized healthcare, there may be people left with too little healthcare*. But I would have to say that is quite a bit better than leaving over 40 million people with nothing at all.

For all the gripes you toss at other wealthy countries' socialized healthcare systems, would you prefer to give up your own country's healthcare system in exchange for the United States?

Instead of building a nice big strawman of a fictional proposal of an american single payer system, maybe you should research the actual proposals flying around washington. If you get into the nuts and bolts of them, you would realize that these proposed reforms pretty much do everything they can to protect and preserve the private healthcare market, to the probable detriment of substantial cost savings.


*under the proposed hybrid system, you are still perfectly free to purchase additional coverage with your own money if the govt system is not enough for you.

[ravenguy2000]

heh

[Debaser]

i wish i just posted this instead