Is the American healthcare system really so broken?

Originally posted by zeeblebot
chunk it all, fund it like highways, maximize automation.

Did you really just advocate for fully government funded healthcare?

yeah, we'd save lots of money not having to do insurance, and having payouts decided by a national system rather than local boards.

if i were an insurance industry worker, i would definitely have been interested in supporting the tea parties. who says they're really astroturf?

Originally posted by no1marauder
I bet you he won't.

I would think there are really significant barriers to entry for the insurance market. I have my doubts that any government proposal could increase private market competitiveness without increasing the risk to consumers of fraud or inadequately capitalized companies.

I also think that since the insurance ...[text shortened]... he costs to the public option for covering consumers that they won't for profit based reasons.

the insurance companies wouldn't like the plan - at least my version of it

Part of my plan includes doing everything to encourage people to set up savings accounts they can use to pay out of pocket for their routine healthcare costs. They would then only be interested in buying coverage for the truly catastrophic situations. Having insurance companies covering routine costs is a major gravy-train for insurance and a bad deal for everyone else.

I would also convene a panel of experts to study the insurance markets and determine if there are regions or situations where a truly competitive market would be impossible. In that case, greater regulation or government intervention would then be necessary.

Originally posted by Melanerpes
the insurance companies wouldn't like the plan - at least my version of it

Part of my plan includes doing everything to encourage people to set up savings accounts they can use to pay out of pocket for their routine healthcare costs. They would then only be interested in buying coverage for the truly catastrophic situations. Having insurance companies ...[text shortened]... mpossible. In that case, greater regulation or government intervention would then be necessary.

Your plan is unrealistic. Did you know that a one day stay in a hospital in NYS costs an average of $3000? Virtually any medical problem is now "catastrophic" in costs to the average American worker who's incomes has been stagnant for three decades. If they had money to save, they'd be saving it.

Originally posted by no1marauder
A plan which gives a bunch of extra business to the insurance industry while stripping away all regulations on it is just more corporate welfare.

You would think the evidence of the last decade as regards the radical de-regulation of the financial industry and the consequences thereof would make the free market cheering section think twice, but apparently some lessons are just too hard to accept.

But if there were a public option, the private insurers would have to be efficient so as to compete with the federally run insurance.

If you're correct that a single payer system is best, then eventually the private insurers will fold for inability to compete with the federal plan and you'll have your single payer system.

So, why do you have a problem with private insurers operating alongside a public option?

Originally posted by sh76
But if there were a public option, the private insurers would have to be efficient so as to compete with the federally run insurance.

If you're correct that a single payer system is best, then eventually the private insurers will fold for inability to compete with the federal plan and you'll have your single payer system.

So, why do you have a problem with private insurers operating alongside a public option?

I never said I did, so you're making a Strawman argument.

Originally posted by no1marauder
I never said I did, so you're making a Strawman argument.

You said you support a single payer system (page 4 of the thread; 3rd post from the bottom).

How is that not saying you don't want a public option along side private insurers?

Originally posted by AThousandYoung
You are a voice of sanity in these forums.

Well, thank you! 🙂

Originally posted by sh76
You said you support a single payer system (page 4 of the thread; 3rd post from the bottom).

How is that not saying you don't want a public option along side private insurers?

A "single payer system" and a "public option" are two very different things.

You asked why I opposed private insurers competing against a "public option", which I obviously don't as per the discussion. I do oppose your idea of a completely deregulated private insurance industry able to dump all its problematic customers onto the public option while the government mandates that consumers have to buy their product. This is providing them a windfall at no cost and is just another example of corporate welfare.

I'm too lazy to check now whether countries with single payer allow people to buy private insurance or not. I don't care if that option is provided or not in the distant future when single payer is finally adopted in the US.

Originally posted by no1marauder
Your plan is unrealistic. Did you know that a one day stay in a hospital in NYS costs an average of $3000? Virtually any medical problem is now "catastrophic" in costs to the average American worker who's incomes has been stagnant for three decades. If they had money to save, they'd be saving it.

The point I'm making is this:

What if we took the money that employers currently spend to provide health insurance to workers and instead gave most of that money directly to the workers to invest in their own savings account for routine healthcare expenses. (The remaining money would pay for catastophic situations.)

A young, healthy person doesn't go to the hospital very often. Suppose an average healthy person has to spend a week in the hospital one time over a ten year period. Let's say that week costs $20,000. That's $2000 per year. Now an insurance company might charge that healthy person a premium of $4000 per year to cover their "routine costs". At the end of ten years, the healthy person has paid $40,000 when they could have set up their own account and spent $20,000. If your salary is stagnant, you don't really don't need to be paying $40,000 when you could have spent $20,000.

Actually, that healthy person probably would've spent less than $20,000 because when it's coming out of your own pocket, you tend to be more interested in minimizing the amount - so maybe they'd find an accredited hospital that only charged $2000 per day instead of $3000. This would pressure the $3000-day hospital to find ways of cutting waste to prevent that other hospital from taking a lot of their business away - and this sort of thing would reduce everyone's healthcare costs.

Originally posted by no1marauder
I'm too lazy to check now whether countries with single payer allow people to buy private insurance or not. I don't care if that option is provided or not in the distant future when single payer is finally adopted in the US.

Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure that Canada, for example, does not allow any private insurance or private pay for health providers.

Britain does allow private pay; but the NHS is actually government run healthcare, which is different than a public option or single payer system in any case.

To me "single payer system" connotes prohibition on private insurance and, seemingly, even of private out of pocket pay to providers.

Originally posted by sh76
Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure that Canada, for example, does not allow any private insurance or private pay for health providers.

Britain does allow private pay; but the NHS is actually government run healthcare, which is different than a public option or single payer system in any case.

To me "single payer system" connotes prohibition on private insurance and, seemingly, even of private out of pocket pay to providers.

If a country bans private forms of payment, how do they prevent the rise of underground providers who would accept such payment?

You can think of street-corner drug dealers as a kind of "illegal healthcare provider". Consider how difficult it has been to stop them from offering something that almost everyone agrees is harmful. Now consider the prospect of adding legions of additional "illegal healthcare providers" - except that these people would be offering something that everyone agrees is good.

Enforcing this kind of law might end up costing more money than it currently costs to provide healthcare. If any country has been able effectively to do this, maybe we could learn from them in our efforts to solve our current drug dealer problems.

Originally posted by Melanerpes
If a country bans private forms of payment, how do they prevent the rise of underground providers who would accept such payment?

You can think of street-corner drug dealers as a kind of "illegal healthcare provider". Consider how difficult it has been to stop them from offering something that almost everyone agrees is harmful. Now consider the prospect is, maybe we could learn from them in our efforts to solve our current drug dealer problems.

Okay, now that you went and made me research it (😠), my statement was a bit more broad than Canada's actual rule.

As explained in a 2003 report, the Canadian health care system is "unique in the world in that it bans coverage of . . . [physician and hospital] core services by private insurance companies, allowing supplemental insurance only for perquisites such as private hospital rooms. This ban constrains the emergence of a parallel private medical or hospital sector and puts pressure on the provinces to meet the expectations of middle-class Canadians."

http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/354/16/1661

Originally posted by sh76
Okay, now that you went and made me research it (😠), my statement was a bit more broad than Canada's actual rule.

As explained in a 2003 report, the Canadian health care system is "unique in the world in that it bans coverage of . . . [physician and hospital] core services by private insurance companies, allowing supplemental insurance only for perquisi ...[text shortened]... ions of middle-class Canadians."

http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/354/16/1661

But by removing the parallel private medical or hospital sector and the competition it would bring, wouldn't this REDUCE pressure on the provinces?

It's kind of like the US situation in reverse.

In the US, a public option is most likely necessary to keep the private options from becoming bloated and inefficent (especially in markets that lack a competitive market). In Canada, a private option is most likely necessary to keep the public options from becoming bloated and inefficient.

Originally posted by Melanerpes
The point I'm making is this:

What if we took the money that employers currently spend to provide health insurance to workers and instead gave most of that money directly to the workers to invest in their own savings account for routine healthcare expenses. (The remaining money would pay for catastophic situations.)

A young, healthy person doesn't g ...[text shortened]... eir business away - and this sort of thing would reduce everyone's healthcare costs.

I have a rather simple question:

Why don't people do what you are saying NOW? How come they chose to purchase health insurance rather than socking the money that it costs into the bank just in case they need it?

Once you figure that out you'll understand why such a plan is unrealistic.