you can't have your cake and eat it too. either the government option is awesome, and the private industry won't be able to compete. or it sucks, and the private industry will be able to compete. you can't have the government option suck balls and then put the private industry out of business.

secondly, the government option will have NO UNUSUAL GOVERNMENT SUBSIDIES AFTER INITIAL START-UP! IT WILL OPERATE ALMOST EXACTLY LIKE A PRIVATE INSURANCE FIRM. read the f*cking thread, educate yourself.

are you f*cking telling me that people who are born with ailments don't "deserve" healthcare? death panels much?

to be as perfectly clear as i can be: MANY SYSTEMS OUT-PERFORM AMERICA'S and WE PAY MORE THAN ANYONE ELSE FOR HEALTH CARE.

I'm aware of this and I agree.
Of course it doesn't bother me that people do things for money. I understand that concept, but when it comes to my health and well being, I think I have every right to be concerned about who I'm putting my trust in. When you're putting someone's life on the line, if you're going into the medical field you shouldn't just be in it for the money. Do you honestly think the best doctors are the ones who got in it for the money or the ones who actually have the passion for it? Sometimes the doctors don't know anymore than the person they're supposed to help. Point and case ( This happened to a relative of mine):

*Doctor prescribes pills
*Paitent doesn't feel good taking the pills but the doctor insists that it's just a side effect, no harm will be done*
*Patient refuses, goes to another doctor
*A year later, major recall on the pills, because they cause heart attack, blood clots, stroke, and even death

So tell me who knew more in this situation? The patient or the intelligent doctor who has a degree? But you don't think I should be concerned when this happens all too often?

You're concerned with something that cannot be changed by private or public health care.

that's where you're wrong:
government regulation can give incentives towards preventative medicine, progressive medicine, and positive health. in a public system, we can pay a doctor more the less he sees his patients, not the other way around. we can pay a doctor for encouraging his patients to quit smoking, or to get a breast exam, etc. etc.

lastly, not everyone thinks that everyone is an evil corrupt bastard. i believe that society can help to make nicer more compassionate people; i think capitalism has done the exact opposite.

No one is entitled to health care.

then that sucks. what if youre too poor?

Preventative care is absolutely essential, and something that is severely lacking in the current overall health care system.

Do you think that encouraging preventative care is feasible with our current system? Right now, the health care industry in general makes money when people are sick, not when they're healthy. I think there is some merit in the idea that a government-run system could push for preventative care and thus save money in the long run. While industry is interested in making money, people are interested in saving money; and insofar as the government acts on behalf of the people (theoretically), it, too, is interested in saving, rather than spending, money.

And to be honest, the "uninsurable" is probably the group that worries me the most. I don't think anyone should be denied insurance or health care because they have a chronic disease.

Insurance companies encourage patients to have preventative procedures done by lowering their insurance rates. I like that system because it places the responsibility upon the individual who is seeking better health and lower insurance rates. Taking care of yourself is the best answer to preventative medicine.

You're living a lie Nate. There will always be evil spirited/mean people who take advantage of others.

I disagree with this. Again, this comes back to the point Holly was trying to make by saying that doctors are people too. In the same way that there are corrupt police, there are corrupt doctors too. You can't avoid human nature. You're concerned with something that cannot be changed by private or public health care. You need to shop around. Take it upon yourself to weed out the good doctors from the bad ones.

there are more aggressive, wider campaigns that a government run system could institute.
when the f*ck did i ever say that there will never be a mean or evil person again? i just said that i don't think everyone is like that, and, further, that i think our capitalist society MAKES people like that. what do you think happens when you promote competition as like... THE BEST THING EVER LOLZ! capitalism doesn't necessarily promote compassion and humanity...

It's true that you can't avoid human nature, and there will always be good and bad doctors; however, why would I need to shop around for a good doctor if I wasn't concerned? If I need to shop around, that obviously means I am concerned about who I put my trust in.

Also, about the insurance, lets just say they do lower rates. You go for a daily checkup, and the doctor discovers that you have some disease that's curable. You go back to your insurance, and they tell you they don't cover this particular disease or the treatment required. Or what about a person who can't get accepted by insurance companies because they already have a preexisting condition. Do you honestly think that insurance in the answer?

In a public health care system our gov't will become a single point of failure. Nate, I do not trust our gov't. They've failed us numerous times in the past.

In a public health care system our gov't will become a single point of failure. Nate, I do not trust our gov't. They've failed us numerous times in the past. I just don't understand how you hold onto the idea that big brother is going to make everything better. I believer our government just wants to take away more of our freedom. Control will always be pushed upon us through a facade of compassion and humanity. Why do you place trust in our gov't?

^ but what i don't get it is what good does higher customer rating do if things like medicare are going broke and aren't sustainable.

Couldn't the same be said about corporations? Why should we trust a corporation to provide fair, adequate health care? You agree that the health care system needs to be overhauled, but how can we trust the corporations to make those necessary changes when the current system makes them obscenely profitable?

MEDICARE & MEDICADE have higher customer ratings than private insurance; their costs have have increased @ slower rates, their coverage is greater, & their record on providing care is better. they are the best performing health services in america, & they are SOCIALIZED & RUN BY THE GOVERNMENT.

the bush administration lowered taxes like bat nuts crazy, & spent money like bat nuts crazy. for example, if we hadn't gone to war with iraq we wouldn't have to worry about a bankrupt medicare. this is what needs to be done: refinancing through taxation. tax the rich & pay for medicine. otherwise, we lose more money in the high costs of private insurance & the current healthcare system.

The are RUN BY THE GOVERNMENT and they are going BANKRUPT.

Based on the actuarial projections of the Medicare Trust Fund, which is tasked with annually reporting to Congress on how the bottom line looks, the point where Medicare will pay out more than it takes in -- even by a penny -- won’t occur until somewhere between 2014 to 2028. But that presumes no changes in how Medicare income or spending. Either could be adjusted well before that point. Both have been adjusted at various times in the past well before the point of insolvency. Put another way, the Department of Defense budget is raised every year, usually in lieu of asking it to cut its budget substantially, but when’s the last time someone said the DOD was bankrupt?

[...]

But why is Medicare’s current financing structure insufficient in perpetuity? [...] The reasons why are pretty obvious. None of them have to do with the bugbear of government incompetency.

The major reason is that health care costs have gone up for all payers, public and private, and dramatically so. Since 1970, health care costs have gone up for Medicare by 8.5% annually – but for private insurance, it’s 9.7%. Unlike private insurance, Medicare doesn’t have the option of pricing its product out of reach of new beneficiaries, dropping coverage on existing beneficiaries, or finding reasons not to accept new beneficiaries who look like they might have future health problems. Medicare has a lot of trouble controlling health care costs, and that’s largely driven by geographic variance in payments to doctors and physicians and the perverse incentives of fee-for-service payment, which incentivizes more care instead of better care. Guess what? Private insurance has the exact same problems. (Hey pot, it’s the kettle – you’re black!)

Medicare is also growing pretty quickly thanks to the baby boomers -- about 587,000 per year. The number of people with employer-based insurance has been on a slow but steady decline.

Luckily, we’ve known about this future problem for a while, and we were, er, lucky enough to have champions of the free market and conservative principles in Congress and the White House when we set about tackling the problem over the past decade. One solution was the institution of Medicare Advantage plans, where beneficiaries could opt-out of traditional Medicare and enroll in an HMO. As mentioned on this blog many times, the problem is the Medicare Advantage plans cost 14% more per beneficiary than traditional Medicare for no demonstrably better outcomes – and now we have about 11 million Americans enrolled in them. That waste adds up. As stated in the Kaiser report, “strictly from the perspective of program financing it is undisputed that Medicare Advantage payments have added to the cost of Medicare borne by the government.”

Much, much worse has been the prescription drug programs. It was supposed to use private drug plans in competition to drive down costs, until all kinds of pharma-friendly provisions were added in by the likes of Rep. Billy Tauzin – the same Billy Tauzin who went on to become president of PhRMA. Again, from the Kaiser report, “Two-thirds of the $72 billion increase in Medicare expenditures from 2005 to 2006 resulted from the implementation of Part D.”

And yet, Medicare’s financing is solvable. If the annual rate of growth was a mere 1% above the growth in GDP instead of our current pace of +2.5%, we’d cut our spending in half by 2038. You can imagine how good our Medicare Trust report would look then. As it just so happens, we have a plan on the table to accomplish exactly that – and benefit those in the private insurance system as well. It’s called health care reform, and we need it to pass this year.

Universal Healthcare = death, slow and steady, with axes.
I say Hakuna Matata... thats how we should handle it. Hakuna Matata.

Universal Healthcare = death, slow and steady, with axes.
I say Hakuna Matata... thats how we should handle it. Hakuna Matata.

hahahahaha that's so ridiculous. are you a naturalist (or whatever they are) who believe that when they get sick, nature has its way to cure you. or kill you, cuz that's survival of the fittest? and so you don't take your medicine?

You completely ignored my point about the government granted monopoly that allows USPS's shitty service to continue.

So why is the government option necessary in the first place if it's just going to be like a private insurance firm?

Either you're not telling the whole story, or you're lying.

No one is entitled to health care.

And to be perfectly clear, I have stated several times that I am not opposed to healthcare reform. Just not the kind of healthcare reform you want.

i have no idea what you want from me.

you say the quality will be poor, i show you that other countries have high performing, high quality socialized medicine.

i show you, even further, that america's highest performing medicine is actually socialized medicine (i.e. medicare and medicaid).

you say that government can't do anything right, i show you that sometimes it can.

you say that we shouldn't trust government, i ask why we should trust corporations.

you say that you want reform, but don't describe what sort of reform that may be.

you just suck ass @ debating. it's sickening trying to discuss an issue with you; you're so obviously uninterested in what the opposition has to say.

Says the guy who's been ignoring me this entire time.

what you continuously refuse is the fact that socialized medicine outperforms private medicine all over the world & even in america.

CONSUMER SERVICE SATISFACTION IS SIGNIFICANTLY HIGHER FOR MEDICARE & MEDICAID THAN IN COMPARISON TO PRIVATE HEALTH INSURANCE.

p.s. what does the size of population have to do with anything?

p.p.s. we need to put more money into systems that are not adequately funded; it's no different than paying the highest prices in the world for mediocre healthcare.

p.p.p.s. what inefficiencies & higher costs do government regulations contribute? how are these related to the inefficiencies and high costs of our private industries?

p.p.p.p.s. how many people have the tobacco industry killed? how long have they been trying to hide the fact that their product kills? how have they designed it to addict people? and it's all legal! & cost efficient! wow, capitalism is so cool! because efficiency & profit are more important THAN f*ckING ANYTHING?!?!?! right.

p.p.p.p.p.s. explain EXACTLY how deregulation would fix healthcare in america.

And what you continuously ignore is the fact that they're unsustainable. If I had the ability to borrow basically unlimited amounts of money/print money out of thin air/forcibly take money from the most productive members of society, I bet I could beat medicare/medicaid in customer satisfaction.

The country would implode, but at least we'd have universal healthcare before that happen s, and that's all the matters, right?

Try the same scheme in China. How's their healthcare system compared to the US?

Barriers to competition artificially lower the supply of things like doctors and drugs. Lower supply leads to higher prices.

IT STILL OUTPERFORMS PRIVATE INDUSTRY! so, if we want good healthcare, tax people as much as we need in order to have it. i haven't ignored the fact that it costs money, i have continuously addressed that: tax people! you, on the other hand, completely ignore the fact that it works better than private insurance; people like it more than private insurance. what we need is healthcare that works, &, ultimately, the cost of socialized medicine is LOWER than that of PRIVATE medicine. so, your entire problem is with taxation? notice how i'm arguing for the best healthcare for everyone, & you're arguing against taxation?

notice how this isn't a thread about the moral quality of taxation?

like france and germany imploded? talk about alarmist bullshit. you sound like f*cking glen beck. go read a book you moron.

i have no f*cking clue, i'm not an expert on chinese healthcare. are you? how about you stop ignoring my question and answer it: what EXACTLY does population have to do with it? why does universal healthcare work so well in germany and france? why would a similar system not work here in the states? give me some details, please.

exactly what barriers to competition exist that are contributing to such high costs? explain exactly what would happen if we removed said barriers & exactly how that would work.

Which is true because you have to get that accepted by the government. I mean if i had to get a transplant i wouldn't want to wait months, i shouldn't have to and there have been people who have had to wait that long.

The government can't control the availability of donated organs/tissue (I'm assuming that's what you mean by transplant). Besides, a lot of that is done on a case by case basis.

The government can't control the availability of donated organs/tissue (I'm assuming that's what you mean by transplant). Besides, a lot of that is done on a case by case basis.

You must forgive me, Steven, I'm from the north.
What other transplants are there besides organ and tissue transplants? State laws regulate organ donation, but it isn't up to the government to decide who does and who doesn't get transplants, so I don't know what the waiting time for getting a transplant has to do with universal healthcare. If it were an issue of paying for the transplants, then of course. There are both medical and non-medical financial issues that need to be dealt with. I'm just not sure what you're trying to get at when you bring up the waiting time.

so, why the f*ck don't we have universal healthcare?

im going to put my own 2 cents in here.

My mother was talking to her friends cousin who is from Toronto. Canada has universal health care. The one thing he said was
"Americans don't really realize that if they get universal health care then they're going to have to wait longer for the most simplest medical needs. Like if you break something, surguries, dentist, therapies , transplants you're going to have to wait possibly weeks or months even though it should take maybe minutes or days. They're more concerned on how much they don't have to spend."

Which is true because you have to get that accepted by the government. I mean if i had to get a transplant i wouldn't want to wait months, i shouldn't have to and there have been people who have had to wait that long.

The government protects, not provides. That is the communities, and churches responsibility.

so guyz... about that healthcare being passed.

^what has that got to do with anything?

the delay of the passing of this bill is probably why the USA's HDI is still behind many european countries.

health care is a merit good, high demand and low supply. it's stupid that most of the USA's health care is in the private sector, since it doesn't help to protect the people with lower incomes.

healthcare should be in the public sector because everybody deserves to be treated. in the private sector it gets manipulated and people in the health industry will care more for what they earn that much many people they save.

________ should be in the public sector because everybody deserves to be ________. in the private sector it gets manipulated and people in the ________ industry will care more for what they earn that much many people they save.

cmon, she lives in China