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No, you're missing my point.
The point is that, one day, he MIGHT have to go to the emergency room. Just as he might one day have need of police or firefighting service.
If something like that happens (and yes, I would rather be left on the road than taken to the ER, which reminds me, need to make sure I have a DNR on file), then I should be held responsible. I should be billed, my tax refunds confiscated, my wages liened, and estate confiscated when I died, etc. The only way society is getting stuck with an ER bill related to me is if I die and my brother refuses to pay it, otherwise I'll find a way.
And like I said, if you want to increases taxes to pay for emergency healthcare, I have no problem with that (hence, I have no problem with the current system). The problem I have is being fined for not supporting a private company. It's complete non-sense.
That was more of an anecdotal story than any sort of argument, hence "on a side note." Still think we shouldn't have been charged the 911 dispatch fee with it taking them so long to get there, though.
No, you're missing my point.
The point is that, one day, he MIGHT have to go to the emergency room. Just as he might one day have need of police or firefighting service.
Fair enough. And I think there's some merit to what you said that I bolded above. Giving hospitals some legal mechanisms to recoup payments from those who don't pay for the care they received would probably do a lot of good in terms of controlling costs.
Fair enough. That's a valid objection.
It's quite a bit syntactical, but it's a principle issue.
I actually have no problems with the so called public options. A lot of people don't realize it, but we already have several such things happening in Texas. Any flood policy is required to go through the National Flood Insurance Program. All windstorm policies in Texas go through TWIA (an exchange, much like what's talked about in HB3200). And Texas also has Texas Mutual Insurance Company, a government sponsored en y available for all covering Workers Comp insurance.
Honestly, creating an exchange and requiring individual policyholders to go through it makes a lot of sense, until you start adding in the facist control HB3200 grants.
Of course, I'd much prefer wider and better use of HSAs, since probably (my own estimate) 95% of people would be better off taking the money they and their employers pay into an "insurance" plan and putting it into savings, and the savings from lack of agency commissions and insurance company overhead would probably pay the difference on the other 5%.
Quite true. It makes no sense to me that they don't have such abilities. Of course, it also makes no sense that PLUS loans are non-transferable. I tried my hardest to get them to transfer the PLUS loan to my name when mom died, but they wouldn't do it and wrote it off instead.
this . This plan is ing horrible and any mandate without a public option is a crock of meant to do nothing more than line the pockets of private insurance companies. I swear to ing god Obama needs to step the up and not let this pass or he will never meet any expectations I have for his presidency.
This is probably worse than no "reform"
The Left has to face the sad truth...
ObamaCare is going the way of HillaryCare. Good riddance.
Now, can we talk about some common sense reforms?
To date, everything proposed by Democrats has been worse than no reform. That's what we've been telling you.
"common sense reforms"
of course! who can be against common sense?
Now, give us your details, or maybe just the Big Picture.
The three main reforms would involve:
Tort reform to reduce the incidence of "defensive" medicine and to reduce the cost of malpractice insurance.
Relax regulations prohibiting insurance companies to sell across state lines.
Provide tax breaks for privately purchased insurance plans just like those afforded employer-based group plans or, better yet, offer no tax break for either.
If they pass this trash I will stay home in the 2010 elections, and if Obama signs it, he'll never get my vote in 2012 (even if Palin gets the republican nomination). If this is the kind of garbage the democrats are going to come up with as some half-assed lip-service reform bill, then I hope they get slaughtered in 2010.
Baucaus' plan is fully bi-partisan, both parties hate it.
Calm down guys. You think Obama has gone this far, already ing his chances in 2010, to give up and still have his 2010 arms race ed up but now with no reward? He went hard when he did not have to go hard. He is the most powerful man in the world. You don't think he can get Snow and others to sell their soul? C'mon.
They will do something. Last resort, your coward President will backdoor it some how.
Besides, he's still got 7 more years to try.
I would agree with you but the primary ground shifting this bill does is create numerous npo's. NPO's operate a lot better than the govt and private for profit health insurance companies. Look no further than Minnesota. they spend 91% of insurance dollars on care, mostly through NPO's. Everyone else gets 78%
This is the best alternative we have. It works. It really will.
They are against it because it makes no one rich, that's a lot of the money driving this in the first place. The for profit insurance companies aren't on board with this at all.
Tort reform does little for costs, we've seen that Especially in TX. Study after study shows that costs associated with malpractice lawsuits make up 1% to 2% of the nation's $2.5 trillion annual health-care bill and that tort reform would barely make a dent in the total.
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine...8030880703.htm
Tell anyone who had severe life limiting malpractice performed on them that they are only worth $250,000. One can only hope you're never in that situation.
Fixing medical malpractice fixes tort issues. Anything else is having lowered expectations.
"Tort reform to reduce the incidence of "defensive" medicine and to reduce the cost of malpractice insurance."
that didn't work in TX, why would it work nationally. Tort reform, like Acorn, is just another right-wing red herring.
"Relax regulations prohibiting insurance companies to sell across state lines."
How much would this save? how would it save anything? The big insurance companies are already NATIONAL companies with consolidated overheads.
"Provide tax breaks for privately purchased insurance plans just like those afforded employer-based group plans or, better yet, offer no tax break for either."
yes, extremely unfair that self-provided health insurance isn't subsidized like employer-provided, but "no tax break" is simply impossible.
And of course, Yoni wants to maintain the status quo of the US being ripped off by the health profit industry. Yoni's simple logic is "it's the most expensive in the world therefore it's the best in the world"
aka, motivated reasoning, the objective is "The USA is the best in the world in everything, therefore the US health care system must be the best and any supporting Yoni-rat- reasong proves it"
Last edited by boutons_deux; 09-17-2009 at 05:41 AM.
Damn the insurance companies...they just want our money and make profits.
It's obvious the govt doesn't want our money.
BS. You must not know much about the insurance company. Each state has their own laws and offices regarding insurance. To operate in a state, you have to comply to those laws, and pay to have a license saying you can sell in each state. In fact, many have a child company to operate in each of the states they have a lot of buisiness in specifically because of that.
Having a bunch of different forms (at least one for each state you are in), plus the cost of keeping your registrations and licenses up to date is pretty hefty.
In fact, insurance companies have repeatedly asked for regulation to be taken over by the government specifically because it is a big cost with them. Granted, they just want to take the savings as extra profit, but it is a very big deal and could make a huge difference in rate increases.
"could make a huge difference in rate increases."
ok, anybody got any calculations?
With 5% - 7% health insurance rises/year for the last decade, and projected to be the same for next decade (2010 is supposed to cost $30K/year for family of 4), does ANYBODY seriously believe making insurance companies subject only to federal regulations rather than state regulations will see any reduction in insurance rates?
Did tort reform cause doctors to reduce their charge to patients?
reduce defensive testing?
reduce insurance rate to doctors?
reduce the payout of insurance companies to malpractice victims?
Then you're getting into the issue of state's rights vs government....which is a whole new battle to fight.
Love how you slid from federal vs state regulation to tort reform, but since you asked.
Read:
http://docisinblog.com/index.php/200...s-tort-reform/
reduced number of lawsuits, reduced medical liability rates, increase number of practicing physicians, Texas is no longer a state with a liability crisis (becoming the first state to be removed from the AMA's list), doctors more willing to perform procedures...
And again:
http://blogs.wsj.com/health/2008/05/...r-tort-reform/
7000 new doctors in 3 years. Malpractice lawsuits dropped off some 90% (from nearly 1200 the year before tort reform, to 184 in 2007). Mentions the increase in complaints to TMB, but associates that with increased regulatory oversight granted in the legislation.
Here's more:
http://www.atra.org/wrap/files.cgi/7964_howworks.html
There's some claims it's uncons utional though:
http://www.texarkanagazette.com/news...in-texas-2.php
"Did tort reform cause doctors to reduce their charge to patients?"
No (it wasn't meant to and Doctors have used the savings to buy new equipment and hire more staff)
"reduce defensive testing?"
Unclear (but doctors are more willing to use riskier procedures that have been commonly used in other states)
"reduce insurance rate to doctors?"
Yes, by a significant amount.
"reduce the payout of insurance companies to malpractice victims?"
Don't know, but considering the sharp drop in malpractice lawsuits, it's very probable.
Quite true. It's a matter of whether or not you want it to fall under interstate commerce or not.
I'd say it does (company in one state selling products in another), in which case the federal government should have the right to set standards. Of course, the federal government could probably only set minimum standards, much like minimum wage laws (which should be considered uncons utional).
In most cases, as long as the state law is at least as strict as the federal, then the state law trumps the federal.
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