"We are out of money" says Obama "So we must subsidize health care"
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Fisticuffs wrote:
So how would you prevent the consolidation of those types of smaller services into larger ones? If you're going to argue that the free market would prevent it - well, the free market allowed this to happen already! What would be different this time around?
Firstly, other industries don't seem to have a problem chasing down people who don't pay. My electric company seems to be able to do it without relying on an 'electricty insurance industry' that its customers are required to have before they get electrical service. Secondly, everything you just mentioned would be efficiently handled by easily avialable computer systems if there was any real incentive for the health care industry to invest in it. I continue to be appalled at how backwards the health care industry is in terms of using modern technology. I can't even find a doctors office that will send an appointment to me by email so that it is automatically registered in my calender. You could cut out the lions share of clinic staff simply by allowing people to schedule their own appointments online. Lastly, the issue is reducing the number of people invovled with providing health care to those who are actually health care providers. That is the only way you will ever actually reduce the cost without reducing actual quality of service provided to people.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
Stan Shannon wrote:
Firstly, other industries don't seem to have a problem chasing down people who don't pay
Sure they do. How many times have you been told that the high interest rates on credit cards is caused by the folks who don't pay and who can't be forced to pay? How many times have you been told that the banks are in trouble because of the mortgages that aren't being paid and the mortgagees who can't be forced to pay? When are you going to wake up?
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Both democrats and republicans are playing for the same team and it's not us. - Chris Austin
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Stan Shannon wrote:
And what is wrong with that?
Nothing's wrong with wanting to pay your own way...Oh you meant? Well, begging is the second oldest profession, so who am I to look down on it?
Stan Shannon wrote:
my parents did pay their own way
Your father "worked" for the Works Progress Administration, a creation of Roosevelt, that makes the stimulus package pale in comparison. You would have starved to death if it wasn't for the money he sucked away from the productive members of society.
Stan Shannon wrote:
I spent half my teen age years working with my dad doing some kind of work on some old ladies home in town.
How much exactly did that lower the cost of health care in the local hospital?
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Both democrats and republicans are playing for the same team and it's not us. - Chris Austin
Oakman wrote:
Well, begging is the second oldest profession, so who am I to look down on it?
Jon, Jake Shannon was no begger. The man worked his ass of for his family. Leave that one alone.
Oakman wrote:
Your father "worked" for the Works Progress Administration, a creation of Roosevelt, that makes the stimulus package pale in comparison. You would have starved to death if it wasn't for the money he sucked away from the productive members of society.
No, it was the CCC. And, yes, he was a big supporter of FDR as most of his generation were. He would have kicked my ass for bad mouthing Roosevelt. But I wasn't acutally around at the time.
Oakman wrote:
How much exactly did that lower the cost of health care in the local hospital?
Who said it did? The point is that the health care system was sufficiently well organized that it could be provided by charitable institutions for those few who needed it.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
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Stan Shannon wrote:
Firstly, other industries don't seem to have a problem chasing down people who don't pay
Sure they do. How many times have you been told that the high interest rates on credit cards is caused by the folks who don't pay and who can't be forced to pay? How many times have you been told that the banks are in trouble because of the mortgages that aren't being paid and the mortgagees who can't be forced to pay? When are you going to wake up?
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Both democrats and republicans are playing for the same team and it's not us. - Chris Austin
Oakman wrote:
How many times have you been told that the high interest rates on credit cards is caused by the folks who don't pay and who can't be forced to pay?
I would'nt know.
Oakman wrote:
How many times have you been told that the banks are in trouble because of the mortgages that aren't being paid and the mortgagees who can't be forced to pay?
That was all working fine before the government got involved.
Oakman wrote:
When are you going to wake up?
I'm actually pretty damn sure I'm not the one who needs to wake up.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
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Oakman wrote:
Well, begging is the second oldest profession, so who am I to look down on it?
Jon, Jake Shannon was no begger. The man worked his ass of for his family. Leave that one alone.
Oakman wrote:
Your father "worked" for the Works Progress Administration, a creation of Roosevelt, that makes the stimulus package pale in comparison. You would have starved to death if it wasn't for the money he sucked away from the productive members of society.
No, it was the CCC. And, yes, he was a big supporter of FDR as most of his generation were. He would have kicked my ass for bad mouthing Roosevelt. But I wasn't acutally around at the time.
Oakman wrote:
How much exactly did that lower the cost of health care in the local hospital?
Who said it did? The point is that the health care system was sufficiently well organized that it could be provided by charitable institutions for those few who needed it.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
Stan Shannon wrote:
Jon, Jake Shannon was no begger
Call it what you will, I prefer to pay my own way.
Stan Shannon wrote:
No, it was the CCC
Same difference. The money he was paid was taxed away from people who had real jobs.
Stan Shannon wrote:
Who said it did?
Sorry, I was under the impression you were talking about what worked to lower health costs. If I'd realised you were totally off topic I would have ignored your message.
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Both democrats and republicans are playing for the same team and it's not us. - Chris Austin
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Oakman wrote:
How many times have you been told that the high interest rates on credit cards is caused by the folks who don't pay and who can't be forced to pay?
I would'nt know.
Oakman wrote:
How many times have you been told that the banks are in trouble because of the mortgages that aren't being paid and the mortgagees who can't be forced to pay?
That was all working fine before the government got involved.
Oakman wrote:
When are you going to wake up?
I'm actually pretty damn sure I'm not the one who needs to wake up.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
Stan Shannon wrote:
That was all working fine before the government got involved.
So what? The question you raised was whether or industries had trouble tracking down deadbeats. I hope you see how wrong you were when you said there were none.
Stan Shannon wrote:
I'm actually pretty damn sure I'm not the one who needs to wake up.
Kinda the reverse of one of those dreams where you realise you are dreaming, huh? You think everyone else is. :laugh:
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Both democrats and republicans are playing for the same team and it's not us. - Chris Austin
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Stan Shannon wrote:
Well, I disagree. I think insurance is a drag on capitalistic processes. It takes money out of productive use, and returns very little to the economy for the amount that it takes out. Insurance is second only to the legal profession as a drain on the overall economy - that is, people getting paid enormous amounts of money for producing no product that actually serves to grow the economy.
So, you don't really care about a free market, but rather an "efficient" one? How does this differ, substantively, from general leftism?
Ilíon wrote:
So, you don't really care about a free market, but rather an "efficient" one? How does this differ, substantively, from general leftism?
Well, sorry, but yes, I believe there would be much more freedom in the free market if insurance were not weighing the entire system down.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
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Stan Shannon wrote:
Jon, Jake Shannon was no begger
Call it what you will, I prefer to pay my own way.
Stan Shannon wrote:
No, it was the CCC
Same difference. The money he was paid was taxed away from people who had real jobs.
Stan Shannon wrote:
Who said it did?
Sorry, I was under the impression you were talking about what worked to lower health costs. If I'd realised you were totally off topic I would have ignored your message.
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Both democrats and republicans are playing for the same team and it's not us. - Chris Austin
Oakman wrote:
Call it what you will, I prefer to pay my own way.
That is an easy thing to say when you've lived half your life off money given to you by your own father. My dad did not have the means to pay for the entire hospitalization of a 14 month old daughter who had been burned over half her body or for the still experimental eye surgery my mother required to save her sight. That hardly made the man a piker, but it does prove how efficiently the health care system at the time operated.
Oakman wrote:
Same difference. The money he was paid was taxed away from people who had real jobs.
Absolutely. I never claimed otherwise. And it was completely wasted.
Oakman wrote:
Sorry, I was under the impression you were talking about what worked to lower health costs. If I'd realised you were totally off topic I would have ignored your message.
As I cleraly stated, I was addressing your insult to my family.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
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Stan Shannon wrote:
Yes they did
Nice backtrack
Stan Shannon wrote:
The more insurance agents, the more government bureaucrats involved the more expensive it will be.
HMOs don't have agents, they have salesmen.
Stan Shannon wrote:
the more government bureaucrats involved the more expensive it will be
As I've already reported, Medicare has a 3% rate for administration; most private health insurance has a 20% rate.
Stan Shannon wrote:
When you strip the health care system down to providers and patients,
As has been pointed out to you already, insurance companies of any sort are created by entrepreneurs seeking to make a buck by betting that their clients will put up more in bets than they will have to pay out. Just like any other form of gambling. Unless you are going to pass laws making selling insurance illegal, it will happen.
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Both democrats and republicans are playing for the same team and it's not us. - Chris Austin
Oakman wrote:
As I've already reported, Medicare has a 3% rate for administration; most private health insurance has a 20% rate.
Percent of what?
Oakman wrote:
Unless you are going to pass laws making selling insurance illegal, it will happen.
I would support that.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
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Stan Shannon wrote:
That was all working fine before the government got involved.
So what? The question you raised was whether or industries had trouble tracking down deadbeats. I hope you see how wrong you were when you said there were none.
Stan Shannon wrote:
I'm actually pretty damn sure I'm not the one who needs to wake up.
Kinda the reverse of one of those dreams where you realise you are dreaming, huh? You think everyone else is. :laugh:
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Both democrats and republicans are playing for the same team and it's not us. - Chris Austin
Oakman wrote:
So what? The question you raised was whether or industries had trouble tracking down deadbeats. I hope you see how wrong you were when you said there were none.
I never said there were none - I merely said 'other industries'. And in any case even credit card companies don't require insurance. I'm sure the electric company calculates such loses into their costs as would a medical office running a similar business operation. So what? Thats not the same thing at all as saying - I don't need to worry about my credit card bill because my insurance will cover the cost. I'm beginning to think you are the one drinking tonight. Although I do hear that whisky bottle calling my name...
Oakman wrote:
Kinda the reverse of one of those dreams where you realise you are dreaming, huh? You think everyone else is.
Whatever...
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
modified on Saturday, May 23, 2009 10:26 PM
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Oakman wrote:
Call it what you will, I prefer to pay my own way.
That is an easy thing to say when you've lived half your life off money given to you by your own father. My dad did not have the means to pay for the entire hospitalization of a 14 month old daughter who had been burned over half her body or for the still experimental eye surgery my mother required to save her sight. That hardly made the man a piker, but it does prove how efficiently the health care system at the time operated.
Oakman wrote:
Same difference. The money he was paid was taxed away from people who had real jobs.
Absolutely. I never claimed otherwise. And it was completely wasted.
Oakman wrote:
Sorry, I was under the impression you were talking about what worked to lower health costs. If I'd realised you were totally off topic I would have ignored your message.
As I cleraly stated, I was addressing your insult to my family.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
Stan Shannon wrote:
My dad did not have the means to pay for the entire hospitalization of a 14 month old daughter who had been burned over half her body or for the still experimental eye surgery my mother required to save her sight. That hardly made the man a piker,
So he went out and begged the neighbors to cover it for him instead of paying his own way like you say he should have? And what the neighbors didn't cover, the hospital and doctors had to up the rate to paying customers to cover for him. How very not collectivist.
"Republicans are the party that says government doesn't work and then they get elected and prove it." -- P.J. O'Rourke
I'm a proud denizen of the Real Soapbox[^]
ACCEPT NO SUBSTITUTES!!! -
Oakman wrote:
As I've already reported, Medicare has a 3% rate for administration; most private health insurance has a 20% rate.
Percent of what?
Oakman wrote:
Unless you are going to pass laws making selling insurance illegal, it will happen.
I would support that.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
Stan Shannon wrote:
I would support that.
"Everything can be solved by a free market - as long as that free market prohibits doctors from saving themselves hassle, time, and money by billing insurance companies at a set fee schedule, they need to either do it all themselves or hire staff to do it for them. But, it's okay for doctors to form a coalition and allow people to purchase insurance - sorry, pay a flat fee for medical service for those group of doctors. But the staff that manage the people purchasing guaranteed access to care, organize the access to care, and handle the money from the fees aren't really allowed to pool their resources or call themselves an insurance company even though that's basically what they are. Then everything would be way better."
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Stan Shannon wrote:
My dad did not have the means to pay for the entire hospitalization of a 14 month old daughter who had been burned over half her body or for the still experimental eye surgery my mother required to save her sight. That hardly made the man a piker,
So he went out and begged the neighbors to cover it for him instead of paying his own way like you say he should have? And what the neighbors didn't cover, the hospital and doctors had to up the rate to paying customers to cover for him. How very not collectivist.
"Republicans are the party that says government doesn't work and then they get elected and prove it." -- P.J. O'Rourke
I'm a proud denizen of the Real Soapbox[^]
ACCEPT NO SUBSTITUTES!!!Tim Craig wrote:
So he went out and begged the neighbors to cover it for him instead of paying his own way like you say he should have?
There was no begging and no need for it. In the case of my sister the christian community saw the need and responded to it voluntarily. They didn't have to be asked.
Tim Craig wrote:
And what the neighbors didn't cover, the hospital and doctors had to up the rate to paying customers to cover for him.
Probably so. Although, since this happened before I was even born, I'm not sure how much of the bill my dad ended up paying. I never heard that part of the story, just the part about the Nazarene church organizing to help my sister.
Tim Craig wrote:
How very not collectivist.
It is absolutely a form of collectivism. It is the grass roots, bottom up collectivism that American society was specifically and intentionally designed to promote. The point remains that there should be instituiton in our society which care for the needs of the poor. But those institutions do not have to conform to a centralized collectivist model. Thre is another model which works far better - the decentralized collectivism of true Jeffersonian democracy.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
modified on Sunday, May 24, 2009 7:33 AM
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Stan Shannon wrote:
I would support that.
"Everything can be solved by a free market - as long as that free market prohibits doctors from saving themselves hassle, time, and money by billing insurance companies at a set fee schedule, they need to either do it all themselves or hire staff to do it for them. But, it's okay for doctors to form a coalition and allow people to purchase insurance - sorry, pay a flat fee for medical service for those group of doctors. But the staff that manage the people purchasing guaranteed access to care, organize the access to care, and handle the money from the fees aren't really allowed to pool their resources or call themselves an insurance company even though that's basically what they are. Then everything would be way better."
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Fisticuffs wrote:
Then everything would be way better."
No, everything would be better if there were fewer people involved in the process. Health insurance is an entirely separate industry which takes your health care money, yet provides no health care, while getting rich for pretty much doing nothing. Our health care dollars are essentially supporting three entirely separate industries - the health care industry itself, the health insurance industry, and the industry represented by a huge government bureaucracy. That is untenable. I simply refuse to believe that the problem of managing health care expenses necessarily requires that much more overhead than does that of virtually any other industry. We are being duped into believing that is the case because all three legs of that stool are in cahoots with one another to take our money away from us.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
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Fisticuffs wrote:
Then everything would be way better."
No, everything would be better if there were fewer people involved in the process. Health insurance is an entirely separate industry which takes your health care money, yet provides no health care, while getting rich for pretty much doing nothing. Our health care dollars are essentially supporting three entirely separate industries - the health care industry itself, the health insurance industry, and the industry represented by a huge government bureaucracy. That is untenable. I simply refuse to believe that the problem of managing health care expenses necessarily requires that much more overhead than does that of virtually any other industry. We are being duped into believing that is the case because all three legs of that stool are in cahoots with one another to take our money away from us.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
Stan Shannon wrote:
No, everything would be better if there were fewer people involved in the process.
Well, pretty much every system everywhere has demonstrated that doesn't make things better, it means that a smaller number of people have to handle a larger diversity of problems, which means everything gets handled both less efficiently and less competently.
Stan Shannon wrote:
I simply refuse to believe that the problem of managing health care expenses necessarily requires that much more overhead than does that of virtually any other industry.
You guys spend more per capita on your health care than any other country, mostly because of the profit margin for your huge private insurers*, which seems to suggest that switching to a public government accountable non-profit insurer model would save you considerable amounts of money. Beyond that, I don't really know what the best solution is for you guys (capping personal income for insurance owners? capping the amount of funds an insurer is permitted to acquire? financed non-profit insurers?) but at least we can agree on the fact that some form of government intervention is necessary to keep the health care system fair. * - removed the part in which I talk out of my ass
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Stan Shannon wrote:
No, everything would be better if there were fewer people involved in the process.
Well, pretty much every system everywhere has demonstrated that doesn't make things better, it means that a smaller number of people have to handle a larger diversity of problems, which means everything gets handled both less efficiently and less competently.
Stan Shannon wrote:
I simply refuse to believe that the problem of managing health care expenses necessarily requires that much more overhead than does that of virtually any other industry.
You guys spend more per capita on your health care than any other country, mostly because of the profit margin for your huge private insurers*, which seems to suggest that switching to a public government accountable non-profit insurer model would save you considerable amounts of money. Beyond that, I don't really know what the best solution is for you guys (capping personal income for insurance owners? capping the amount of funds an insurer is permitted to acquire? financed non-profit insurers?) but at least we can agree on the fact that some form of government intervention is necessary to keep the health care system fair. * - removed the part in which I talk out of my ass
- F
<blockquote class="FQ"><div class="FQA">Fisticuffs wrote:</div>Well, pretty much every system everywhere has demonstrated that doesn't make things better, it means that a smaller number of people have to handle a larger diversity of problems, which means everything gets handled both less efficiently and less competently.</blockquote> Actually, doing more with less is the very definition of productivity. And productivity is the only thing capable of growing an economy.
Fisticuffs wrote:
You guys spend more per capita on your health care than any other country,
Yes, and, as I said, that is because we are supporting three industries while most other nations are only supporing one - the government. Yet the actual healt care we receive is, arguably, better than elsewehre precisely because it is more market driven. Your government managed health care systems are going to fail, as will ours if we go that route, and it will bring your entire economy down with it. That isn't a possbility, that is a certainty.
Fisticuffs wrote:
fact that some form of government intervention is necessary to keep the health care system fair.
Fairness should never be the goal of the US government. The goal of the US government should be equal opportunity, not fairness. Fairness is an inherently Marxist concept and has no place in a Jeffersonian political system. Equal opportunity is best achieved by making the overall economy as productive as possible, which would include a productive, free market, health care system.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
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Stan Shannon wrote:
No, everything would be better if there were fewer people involved in the process.
Well, pretty much every system everywhere has demonstrated that doesn't make things better, it means that a smaller number of people have to handle a larger diversity of problems, which means everything gets handled both less efficiently and less competently.
Stan Shannon wrote:
I simply refuse to believe that the problem of managing health care expenses necessarily requires that much more overhead than does that of virtually any other industry.
You guys spend more per capita on your health care than any other country, mostly because of the profit margin for your huge private insurers*, which seems to suggest that switching to a public government accountable non-profit insurer model would save you considerable amounts of money. Beyond that, I don't really know what the best solution is for you guys (capping personal income for insurance owners? capping the amount of funds an insurer is permitted to acquire? financed non-profit insurers?) but at least we can agree on the fact that some form of government intervention is necessary to keep the health care system fair. * - removed the part in which I talk out of my ass
- F
It's the law of supply and demand. As long as the supply of health care remains limited, some mechanism will spring into place to ration what is available. In Canada, is is a bureacracy where waiting times for health care have quadrupled since the 90's; in the U.S. it is costs which have gone up even faster. If we really want to do something about health care delivery costs we have got to figure out how to make more of it available. The costs will come down; the waiting times will come down. But those doctors who are accustomed to owning islands in the Aegean and taking summer vacations in the Alps will not be thrilled. Neither will the Congress critters who like donations from these same docs come re-election time.
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Both democrats and republicans are playing for the same team and it's not us. - Chris Austin
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Mike Gaskey wrote:
unless you're as wealthy as Rush Limbaugh, without insurance you would recieve a death sentence the minute you had: a stroke, a heart attack, cancer or any number of other costly to treat conditions. anyone of the three I chose to list, and I can produce an exhaustive list, can run into millions of dollars to treat.
Yeah? So? The answer to that is to take better care of yourself. No system, not insurance, nor government, not free market can cost effectively deal with the general decline in health related to aging or those who simply refuse to care for their own health by their behavior. Yes, insurance is a method of spreading the costs of the few to a larger group of people, but that simply means that those of us who do watch our health are paying for the health care of those who do not. People get sick and people die, there is nothing that can be done to prevent that and any system which assumes that goal is doomed to failure. And certainly cancer can strike anyone, and accidents can injure anyone. But the numbers in that category are not so enormous that a free markdet health care system could not deal with the few who would simply be incapable of providing for their own care. Again my own family in the 1950's was a perfect example of how effectively a free market system was able to provide care for the poor.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
Stan Shannon wrote:
Yeah? So? The answer to that is to take better care of yourself
Stan Shannon wrote:
And certainly cancer can strike anyone
I hate to belabor the point, but you simply do not understand the problem.
Mike - typical white guy. The USA does have universal healthcare, but you have to pay for it. D'oh. Thomas Mann - "Tolerance becomes a crime when applied to evil." The NYT - my leftist brochure. Calling an illegal alien an “undocumented immigrant” is like calling a drug dealer an “unlicensed pharmacist”. God doesn't believe in atheists, therefore they don't exist.
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It's the law of supply and demand. As long as the supply of health care remains limited, some mechanism will spring into place to ration what is available. In Canada, is is a bureacracy where waiting times for health care have quadrupled since the 90's; in the U.S. it is costs which have gone up even faster. If we really want to do something about health care delivery costs we have got to figure out how to make more of it available. The costs will come down; the waiting times will come down. But those doctors who are accustomed to owning islands in the Aegean and taking summer vacations in the Alps will not be thrilled. Neither will the Congress critters who like donations from these same docs come re-election time.
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface Both democrats and republicans are playing for the same team and it's not us. - Chris Austin
Oakman wrote:
In Canada, is is a bureacracy where waiting times for health care have quadrupled since the 90's
In Ontario, ironically, for that you can thank the NDP (socialist) government that had the astounding foresight to viciously cut the number of places available in medical schools in the 90s. They've only just started adding more spaces recently.
Oakman wrote:
If we really want to do something about health care delivery costs we have got to figure out how to make more of it available.
Tell me about it. One other issue is that both of our systems are very prohibitive against foreign trained doctors practicing. The reasons for that are multifactorial - some are good (are they trained enough to do it?) some are not so good (perhaps some resistance to competition?).
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<blockquote class="FQ"><div class="FQA">Fisticuffs wrote:</div>Well, pretty much every system everywhere has demonstrated that doesn't make things better, it means that a smaller number of people have to handle a larger diversity of problems, which means everything gets handled both less efficiently and less competently.</blockquote> Actually, doing more with less is the very definition of productivity. And productivity is the only thing capable of growing an economy.
Fisticuffs wrote:
You guys spend more per capita on your health care than any other country,
Yes, and, as I said, that is because we are supporting three industries while most other nations are only supporing one - the government. Yet the actual healt care we receive is, arguably, better than elsewehre precisely because it is more market driven. Your government managed health care systems are going to fail, as will ours if we go that route, and it will bring your entire economy down with it. That isn't a possbility, that is a certainty.
Fisticuffs wrote:
fact that some form of government intervention is necessary to keep the health care system fair.
Fairness should never be the goal of the US government. The goal of the US government should be equal opportunity, not fairness. Fairness is an inherently Marxist concept and has no place in a Jeffersonian political system. Equal opportunity is best achieved by making the overall economy as productive as possible, which would include a productive, free market, health care system.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.
Stan Shannon wrote:
Actually, doing more with less is the very definition of productivity.
Now you're playing word games. You seriously expect me to believe that if there are fifty small practices, and each of those practices needs to somehow come up with their own fee schedule, means of billing, billing records, and payment processing that would be a more productive system than consolidating and standardizing those services through a single agency? What are you smoking?
- F
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Stan Shannon wrote:
Actually, doing more with less is the very definition of productivity.
Now you're playing word games. You seriously expect me to believe that if there are fifty small practices, and each of those practices needs to somehow come up with their own fee schedule, means of billing, billing records, and payment processing that would be a more productive system than consolidating and standardizing those services through a single agency? What are you smoking?
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Fisticuffs wrote:
You seriously expect me to believe that if there are fifty small practices, and each of those practices needs to somehow come up with their own fee schedule, means of billing, billing records, and payment processing that would be a more productive system than consolidating and standardizing those services through a single agency?
Yes, I actually do expect that. These organizations are set up to achieve the very results Jon mentioned below - sucking as much money as possible out of a captive customer base forced to deal with a business plan that has intentionally eleminated competition. There is no reason that a medical practice could not operate the same way any other small business does. You don't see other business operations requiring insuarnce of their customers, yet they confront the same basic business requirements any doctor would. Yes, obviously, the costs of non-payment has to be figured into their business plan, but that is no different than any other business. And the issue of catastrophic health problems is not an argument against that. No system can provide top level service for everyone who needs to be cared for when they are not able to provide for their own needs due to illness and injury. It simply cannot be done.
Chaining ourselves to the moral high ground does not make us good guys. Aside from making us easy targets, it merely makes us idiotic prisoners of our own self loathing.