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healthcare *yawn*
Topic Started: Aug 13 2009, 05:51 AM (228 Views)
Gruenberg
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aka Kleinschnauzer
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Not sure if this is the right thread, but:

The "all Americans are stupid fat gun-totin' Christians" lobby is having a field day at the moment, but I'm finding it really hard to tell how this debate "about" the NHS is shaping up. Is it just a few blowhards getting the microphone during silly season? Or do the, occasional quite prominent, individuals arguing the NHS is in fact the third arm of a resurgent Commie-Nazi government really believe this?

In the UK people are organizing "Twitter rallies" to defend the NHS, but I wondered if they're getting worked up over something that's largely tongue in cheek? Presumably no one actually believes we mercilessly slaughter our old people for glue/soylent green?
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Kenny
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Yet another fishy forum post reported to the White House! :auss:

The concern is over health-care rationing, which is a legitimate fear, although with all the talk of "death panels" and such the rhetoric's gone over the top. As to the town halls, the media as usual is only showing you the most sensational footage. But if you ask me, Arlen Specter's a freakin' tool and deserves everything he gets.

In other news: Rasmussen: 52% now disapprove of Obama's job performance
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Gruenberg
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aka Kleinschnauzer
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Rationing? I'm afraid I still don't understand. In private systems, you don't just automatically get coverage for everything, right: you have only certain procedures approved? So why does it matter if the bureaucrat making that decision is paid by the government or an insurance company?

But yeah, the death panels was one thing stood out, along with the ridiculous comments about Stephen Hawking. My question is (and I realize you don't have a personal psychic link with her, but still): why did Palin say that? Because she actually thinks it (and does so as a representative of a - perhaps small - group of US citizens who genuinely believe European government to be synonymous with Nazism) or as some kind of political tactic?
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Kenny
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No offense, but I really don't care what Sarah Palin thinks about government rationing; frankly, her comments sound like something Glenn Beck said/would say, and I wouldn't be surprised if she got the idea from him. The two are good friends, after all (because they both have disabled children, not because of ideology). I'm more interested in why the Democratic leadership has decided to be elitist dickheads about this whole thing by labeling their critics a "mob" and implying they are unpatriotic -- when the Dems spent the last eight years accusing the Bush administration of doing the exact same thing to them. Palin can say what she pleases, because, unlike the Democrats, she doesn't have to face the voters in 2010.
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The Evil Smurfs
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Blue Nazi Devil
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Gruenberg,Aug 13 2009
03:59 PM
Rationing? I'm afraid I still don't understand.

Rationing usually refers to forced waits to get treatment. From Snopes:

Quote:
 
Using Ontario (Canada's most populous province) as an example, we find that provincial wait times measured in mid-2007 ranged from 13 days for angioplasty to 297 days for knee replacements.

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Cobdenia
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1953 is the new 1932 for 2008
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So far, that's pretty much the only concern - healthcare wise - that is true, though it is worth noting that waiting lists only concern non-life threatening conditions, such as hip replacements, therapy, dentristry and sex changes (yes, you can get a pair of titties stuck on on the NHS) - and even then, we still have private healthcare in the UK, where waiting lists are minimal or non-existant (to the extent that one almost needs waiting lists in a socialised system to encourage as many people to go private as can); what confuses me is that I can't see how those in the US with private healthcare would be affected, and those without...well, surely having to wait for treatment is better then having none?

There are good reason's not to go down the NHS route - it isn't the best system, and the only reason we have it is because it was the only way anyone had thought of to do it in the late 1940's and now it would be too complicated to change, but the problems with it aren't on the healthcare side, just on the cost side. The NHS is a behemoth, inefficient, and overly beaurocratic (it's also the largest employer in Europe, which in all honesty it doesn't need to be, and shouldn't be), and it costs far more then it should and suffer's massive problems of diminishing returns for investment (the more money that's put in, the less the improvements become)...but the actual healthcare is good.
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eco
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Perhaps I'm only getting edited 'highlights' but rarely have I read so much utter garbage. The NHS is far from perfect but some of the commentary is pure fantasy, and pretty damn offensive at times.
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The Evil Smurfs
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Well, the Snopes article dealt with the Canadian system, which is even more screwed up than other national systems, partially because non-governmental coverage is illegal, which leads to the 'joke': "If America adopts a Canadian-style system, where will Canadians go for healthcare?"

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what confuses me is that I can't see how those in the US with private healthcare would be affected
You are Big Corporation CEO. You spend $100,000 per year providing health care to your employees. The government penalty for not providing healthcare is $50,000. It doesn't take an economic whiz to note you can cut that expense in half by no longer offering healthcare to your employees. Joe Lunchbox loses his private healthcare and is stuck with the government system.

My numbers are randomly made up, but if the no-coverage penalty is less than the cost of providing healthcare, any publicly traded company will almost be required to discontinue providing healthcare (as their fiduciary (and legal) duty to their shareholders is to maximize profit).

And this is without getting into how having a government entity which cannot go bankrupt will not compete on even footing with companies with can go bankrupt. It's not a level playing field, and the government will insure (HA!) that it stays uneven, as in a truly free market, the governmental entity would die a horrible screaming death. The only reason the US Postal Service still exists is because the government enforces its monopoly and doesn't let UPS, DHL, and FedEx do standard mail delivery.

Or, as someone else pointed out, there are three forms of health coverage in America: Medicare, Medicaid, and private insurance. Two of them are charging headlong into insolvency. Why is it assumed that the government diving into the third will have any different results?

Everyone constantly bitches about how the government just fucks up everything it touches (when was the last time someone said something positive about the DMV?), but they all jump on the bandwagon for having the government control health care? Seriously? This isn't what America needs. This isn't what Americans want, either.
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Cobdenia
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1953 is the new 1932 for 2008
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Fair enough - whilst I think the fine vs cost problem could easily be sorted, the financial aspect is I think a perfectly reasonable objection, along with government screwing upperance. As I said, the NHS is over expensive, and ideally does need to be reformed, but I don't think reform would be possible (partly due to the cost of reform, partly because the solution which would come about would likely be some public-private partnership thingy which the British have a tendency to be utterly incompetent at running smoothly - public private partner ships are to us what law enforcement is to the Italians, incorruptability to the sub-saharan Africans, or humility to French: we just can't seem to do it)
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Snefaldia
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Quote:
 
You are Big Corporation CEO. You spend $100,000 per year providing health care to your employees. The government penalty for not providing healthcare is $50,000. It doesn't take an economic whiz to note you can cut that expense in half by no longer offering healthcare to your employees. Joe Lunchbox loses his private healthcare and is stuck with the government system.

My numbers are randomly made up, but if the no-coverage penalty is less than the cost of providing healthcare, any publicly traded company will almost be required to discontinue providing healthcare (as their fiduciary (and legal) duty to their shareholders is to maximize profit).


This is a valid concern, and frankly a problem I don't understand- isn't one of the biggest drains on business healthcare expense; companies like GM flush cash down the toilet paying out benefits and insurance costs- the public option would theoretically reduce the burden on companies, which would improve efficiency- right? Or am I missing something?

Quote:
 
And this is without getting into how having a government entity which cannot go bankrupt will not compete on even footing with companies with can go bankrupt. It's not a level playing field, and the government will insure (HA!) that it stays uneven, as in a truly free market, the governmental entity would die a horrible screaming death. The only reason the US Postal Service still exists is because the government enforces its monopoly and doesn't let UPS, DHL, and FedEx do standard mail delivery.


The truly free market it a complete and utter lie because there is always some form of control or restriction, whether it's legal, governmental, or social- but that's another discussion, and I don't know that the "Postal Question" is really that applicable to the healthcare debates, mostly because the insurance/health market isn't limited to four major players.

Quote:
 
Or, as someone else pointed out, there are three forms of health coverage in America: Medicare, Medicaid, and private insurance. Two of them are charging headlong into insolvency. Why is it assumed that the government diving into the third will have any different results?


Because the first two are programs concieved, organized, and established to address specific problems that are no longer as applicable, I would think. The goal isn't just a feel-good social equity thing (though that's definitely a worthy component) but also a means of ameliorating the problems in an industry that will deny coverage because a cough is a preexisting condition.

Quote:
 
Everyone constantly bitches about how the government just fucks up everything it touches (when was the last time someone said something positive about the DMV?), but they all jump on the bandwagon for having the government control health care? Seriously? This isn't what America needs. This isn't what Americans want, either.


The government is only as good as the people that work for it, and when you've got a surly, undereducated, unimaginative bureaucrat that's running things, of course there are going to be problems. But the DMV doesn't deny you a renewal on your driver's license because you had a fender-bender in a parking lot, and they sure as hell don't charge you extravagant amounts of money for it... that's auto insurance's domain.
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The Evil Smurfs
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Snefaldia,Aug 16 2009
03:52 PM
This is a valid concern, and frankly a problem I don't understand- isn't one of the biggest drains on business healthcare expense; companies like GM flush cash down the toilet paying out benefits and insurance costs- the public option would theoretically reduce the burden on companies, which would improve efficiency- right? Or am I missing something?

Which rather puts lie to the claim that you'll be able to "keep your plan". If your plan is via your employer, and your employer dumps coverage, you aren't being allowed to keep your plan, you're being funneled into the government plan.

Which, incidentally, will raise costs for people still in your old plan, as all those people contributing no longer are. This makes dumping coverage more enticing for the corporations that haven't done so yet. I had slippery slope arguments as much as the next guy, but there's a pretty clear potential for a domino effect here. And imagine the repercussions if a major employer like GE or Walmart decide to dump coverage.
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Snefaldia
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No one's hotter than Bea.
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I wonder how many people in the US, by percent, get their insurance from their companies. My family doesn't; I don't just mean my immediate family- most of my aunts and uncles don't, I think. My grandmother doesn't.

We've clearly got a case here where that might happen, but I'd be interested to see how it works out. I don't think the country can continue along the same route- it's already becoming harder for the uninsured to find affordable coverage, so something definitely has to be done... the question is, what?
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Greenspoint
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Let me get this straight.

Obama's health care plan was written by a committee whose head says he
doesn't understand it, will be passed by a Congress that hasn't read it,
will be signed by a president who smokes, funded by a treasury chief who
did not pay his taxes, overseen by a surgeon general who is obese, and
financed by a country that is nearly broke.

What could possibly go wrong?
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The Palentine
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The thinking man's pervert
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real Torte reform could cut a lot of the cost of insurance. Allowing a person to buy health insurence from agents outside of your state could help, and actually allowing the Inspector General's office to investigate and prosecute those companies, doctors, and patients guilty of fraud, would also cut costs. My biggest concern is the government has already proven that they cannot run insurance effectively(Social Security, medicare, and medicaid are for all practical purposes out of money). Now just because The Annointed One is in office, they'll be much better at it?
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Snefaldia
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No one's hotter than Bea.
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I don't have the figures on Medicare/Medicaid etc, but I wonder at the accusation of " the government can't run healthcare," and then pointing to those programs today as proof. We can't forget that the Baby Boomers are now getting to the point where they're really starting to drain the funds- of course the money's going to disappear when you've got millions of old people clamoring for care and then complaining when it can't be afforded!

Personally, I blame the demographers who didn't see this coming. "Oh sure, GI Joe, just go ahead and have two kids and a dog and a house and we'll figure the rest out later!"

An NPR broadcast yesterday focused on demography as a severe problem with healthcare and social security, simply because of the sheer numbers of the boomer generation that are intent on collecting or getting coverage. My instinct tells me that when most of them die some of the problems will disappear. ;)

Sidenote: This isn't a jab at you, Pal, but I have to say I find the term "anointed one" rather demeaning and silly. It's was of attacking Obama that doesn't provide any logical or factual reasons for opposing him- it's the same thing as calling Bush "Shrub" or "Chimpy;" or Clinton "Slick Willy" (which I have never done in any case)- it's intellectually devoid of meaning.
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