Article on Socialized Medicine

[chillzatl]

no, I do not think that health care is a right. The government should have no say in it. Though I feel they should work with insurance providers to come up with a system that gives everyone a cost effective, non tax funded option. Things can be done without passing laws and typically they are done better when the government doesn't involve itself.

[Diesel]

Here's where we actually see differently.

I think that there should be an automatic system of healthcare insurance. I think that initially everybody should be made to pay into it. I would even go so far as to say if you don't use it, you get a rebate. However, if you do, you don't.

Why should everybody be made to pay in?

Well, if we are a great nation, then there are certain things that great nations have. Great schools, great streets, great areas for entertainment... and along with that, great health care opportunities. When Atlanta prepared for the Olympics and used tax dollars to pay for some of the venues, very few people objected. However, I think it is one of the saddest things that we can come together of trivial things and not be able to come together over health care for everyone. A rebate would also keep down those abusive visits for those who are money conscious.

Don't get me wrong, I know that a lot of things that have been "socialized" turn out bad. However, I don't think it's the idea that makes it bad, I think it's when everybody tries to pin something onto that plan. For instance Social Security. That fund would be doing fine if Congress hadn't spent it up over the years. The school system would work if stupid plans hadn't been brought up over the years.

I think if you put the plan for healthcare into the hands of Doctors and Administrators and away from congress, it too will work well.

[Diesel]

The other thing is that insurance companies to me are the real bad guys.

Insurance is such a rip off.

It takes having money to cover yourself to realize how stupid insurance really is.

For instance Car Insurance...

I'm going to pay you $4000.00 per year to cover my car which is worth $16,000.

OK.. So what happens after 4 years? I'm still paying for coverage?

When you get older and you realize, you've never had a wreck.. you've never had to use your insurance... You wonder..well what in the hell do I have it for.

Health insurance is the same way sorta. Well, there are some procedures that make health insurance worth the money. However, overall, Insurance companies make money hand over fist just for saying that they will do...

If there's a way to cut the cost of the Health Insurers and to cut the cost of the Doctor's bill and especially the drug companies, I think things will be much better.

[chillzatl]

that'll just be our disagreement point on the subject then. To me what you're describing sounds more like what welfare is today and welfare is a broken, wasteful mess of a program. Welfare was supposed to be a system that was used so people could get back on their feet but instead has become a career for many. I can see any mandatory tax funded healthcare being abused much the same way.

Keep in mind that I'm not talking about those who are legitimately unable to work due to age or health. Those aren't the people that abuse the systems. It's the ones who are unwilling to work that abuse it and those people have proven already that they can stretch a system to its limits.

Again, there are just too many creative, well thought out options out there to fall back on asking the government to raise taxes to pay for it. I would like to see them all debated at length before anything was done.

[Eddielives]

Hold on. A person doesn't get a car insurance policy with the expectation that he/she is going to have a wreck. You get insurance for the purpose of using it only if you have to, which I would hope most people hope to never actually have to use it. You can't say it was pointless to have it or that the insurance companies just ripped you off. I don't follow your logic there at all.

[Diesel]

Well, let's start here:

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You get insurance for the purpose of using it only if you have to, which I would hope most people hope to never actually have to use it.

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I agree with this...

However, for the insurance company, there is no cut off... They just continually collect money.

Now follow me Eddie... IF you NEVER EVER have an auto accident in the time that you are driving, does the insurance company call you up one day and say... Mr. Lives, we have been collecting this money for you all this time in case you had an accident. Welp, now that you're no longer driving, we will be sending you this check worth 3 Million dollars for Money collected (with interest) over the time period that you were paying us.

You will never get that call.

And I'm appalled that you don't realize that an insurance company can take your money, invest it, make money with your money and never have to pay any of your money back.. and if you ever do have an accident, they can pay you off and then immediately will drop you. That's if they decide to pay off your claim...

Finally, the kicker is that the government basically has forced everyone to use insurance! It's the law!!!

You don't see the rip off in that?

[Diesel]

Once again, you bring up Welfare (another failing system).. I agree with you that Welfare did fail. However, it wasn't the plan behind welfare that failed, it was the implementation. If you say that there's an insurance that's available in case you lose your job, however, it's only available for 3 months, I say that's a great plan. Especially if you have the employers paying a percentage. However, the implementation of Welfare failed when you started rewarding people for being lazy.

Reforms for Welfare are definitely necessary. It's only meant to be a short term help. I think that's where it failed. YOu see women having babies (in the most extreme cases) in order to get more welfare benefits. People waiting by mailboxes for welfare checks. I think that instead of all of that, you should have a continuous system of training... Maybe community college vouchers for a period that a person is on Welfare and their welfare is dependent on their attendance and performance in the college. The point is train people to work. Roosevelt had the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC). I think this idea was a good one... along with the chain gang for prisoners. In light of this Minnesota tragedy, I think that there's a lot that can be done with the employed to strengthen the nation. Just As Roosevelt used them. Put them to work, teach them a trade and that the same time, make the cities and the rural areas new again.

At least that's how I see it. Reform is needed, but it doesn't mean that the idea was bad.

The same is true for health care. IF you close the holes in the border and make everybody here pay taxes... And put people to work, I guarantee you that it will work. Our fortunes would change like overnight. However you can't take on 25 Million none taxpayers and allow several million of them to take advantage of the benefits.. then watch the money go out and think that the nation is going to prosper.

[Eddielives]

I do not see a rip-off in paying for insurance that you thankfully never had to use. I do see a rip-off if a customer of an insurance company has the gall to expect every penny back, or even any of it back simply because they never had to file a claim. If you're so sure that you are never going to have an accident or need insurance, then don't get any. Keep your own money in your own account and you won't have any complaint. Again, insurance is payed for with the hope that you never have to use it, not that you expect to. It sounds as if you are actually suggesting that because they are making money that they are evil or something.

As for an insurance company dropping a customer for one claim, that is ridiculous, but the free market will take care of a company that conducts itself like that.

As for the government making us have insurance, I have no problem with that because I don't want to be left high and dry if some loser hits me and doesn't have the assets to compensate me for my losses. I don't want to have to get Ken Nugent after their asss. "One call, that's all."

[AHF]

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As for the government making us have insurance, I have no problem with that because I don't want to be left high and dry if some loser hits me and doesn't have the assets to compensate me for my losses. I don't want to have to get Ken Nugent after their asss. "One call, that's all."

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If someone doesn't have insurance there is a good chance they will be so broke that they are judgment proof anyway.

Requiring car insurance is an absolute necessity, IMO.

[Diesel]

Believe me, I plan to be self-insured.

Think about it...

If you put enough money into an interest bearing account, then you can easily insure yourself and make money in the process. Instead of allowing some company to take your money and do the same and never give you back anything in return?

[AHF]

From personal experience, I can tell you I would never go without healthy insurance. A bad run with something or a major development can really wipe you out in a hurry.

The same goes for a motorist. All it takes is one kid running out in the road in front of your car for a tragedy to occur that could bankrupt you.

I may lean towards being overinsured but I definitely see a place and need for insurance in most people's lives.

[KB21]

That's not correct at all.

Doctor's cannot charge whatever they want to charge, because insurance companies pay what they want to pay. It doesn't matter. I can charge $150 for a 99214, yet medicare is going going to pay me $90 for that visit. Most insurance companies use the medicare standards as their base for payment.

So, no. Doctor's cannot charge what they want to charge.

[KB21]

It shouldn't be funded with tax dollars, and it should in no way be in the federal government's hands.

All health insurance should be privatized. Medicare and medicaid should be placed into the private sector and out of the government's hands. The money spent by the government on both programs, as well as welfare for that matter, could be used for much better purposes.....like education at the state level and better funding for our military at the federal level.

[KB21]

The thing about welfare is that it did exactly what the democrats intended for it to do. It got people to depend upon the government and allowed for big government to rule. The idea that this was intended as something to help get people back on the feet is nothing but a false premise. That was never the intention, because if it was, then the abuse could have been cut out long ago.

[AHF]

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The idea that this was intended as something to help get people back on the feet is nothing but a false premise. That was never the intention, because if it was, then the abuse could have been cut out long ago.

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I don't follow this.

Does that mean the US was never intended for Democracy because corruption in government hasn't been cut out?

Institutions set up for noble purposes can become institutions that are perverted based on vested interests. That is why, for example, our system is now set up to place barriers in the way of third parties. What was set up as a noble democracy gets perverted because people involved with the system have a vested interest in maintaining and abusing the system.

And it isn't just Democrats with welfare. Remember that the Republicans controlled the House, Senate and White House for most of Bush's presidency. If eliminating welfare abuse was a serious goal they would have done it. The same goes for Democrats, of course.

[Diesel]

Health insurance is different because of the sky high prices of health care. And when you think about it, why does it cost $80 ($15 copay and $65 doctors fee) for the doctor to check your temperature, check your heart rate, check your vital signs and prescribe an antibiotic. It's a rip off because you can't buy antibiotics over the counter...

[Diesel]

You're right in one instance, Insurance companies will pay what they want to pay. However, the rest is up to the patient to pay. That's how it works right now KB... Thought you would know that.

So when you're charging a patient with the flu $80.00 and think that the insurance will cover it all and all you've done is prescribe antibiotic... The insurance company will probably pick up about $50.00 and the patient has the other $30.00 to contend with.

So what's to be said about procedures that cost 10s of thousands and drugs that have been bloated in price to extract as much as possible from the insurance company??

[Diesel]

Afraid not.

I think you need to go back to the Roosevelt years and do your research.

Roosevelt's plans were so good that they ended unemployment. The CCC was so successful that it got people into the work force too well and caused the CCC to be no longer neccessary.

Welfare was never intended to be a crutch. That's some of your rhetoric. mismanagement and forgetting it's purpose is what happened to welfare.

I love the way you talk about Welfare as though it's such a horrible word. You try to villify it. Well, this is the truth, without Welfare, Crime would have gone to an alltime high. Welfare is the result of 90% of the nations wealth being in 1% of the people's hands. So is more prisons.

[KB21]

No, that isn't how it works. The doctor doesn't end up getting what he charges. He gets what the insurance pays.

[Eddielives]

We're not a democracy. You won't find the word democracy in the constitution. In fact, I believe our forefathers warned against a mob-rule society. That word has just become so misunderstood that people just accept it blindly.