Obamacare failing as expected....as predicted

[davew]

Originally Posted by Sinner369

Obviously, being from Canada I don't know the details of the Affordable Care act..............but universal health care works all over the world (including Canada).........the US with ten times the population should work too...........what are the problems and why?

Some very big industries - pharmaceuticals, insurance (malpractice and individual/group health, related lawyers), medical professionals (doctors, nurses, related workers), medical equipment suppliers / developers, hospital/ health care facility owners .....


all working together to increase how much they can make.... from each other and everyone they do business with.

17.2% of GDP in USA - the DIMocrats did not look at the entire picture and looked at one aspect, the health insurance area because the broke people without insurance kept going to emergency rooms for stuff like fevers...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health..._United_States

the theory of free universal health care is nice, but involves all areas with costs controls and subsidy's not seen in USA, as well as limits to what will be done and how long treatment will continue. Some argue about 'death panels' needed to decide what will be allowed.

[Sinner369]

Have your ever seen the price of a generic drug compare with the retail price? Unbelievable.

I do know that we Canadians are told not to get sick in the US.........or if they are injured........please fly back to Canada as soon as possible........the cost in the US is prohibitive.

[Capper Al]

Originally Posted by Clocker

Because single payer health care greatly limits choice. Americans have long had choices and don't want to give them up. There are ways to provide health care to people who don't have it without taking away choices for people who don't want the one size fits all version.

A lot of us still feel capable of making our own decisions about what we want and need without the government telling us that we don't know what is good for us.

The insurance companies set the limits now. It took Obamacare to step in and mandate insurance companies not to reject people with previous health issues. Wasn't this segment of the population being limited by insurance companies? It isn't an axiom that "single payer health care greatly limits choice".

[chadk66]

Originally Posted by HalvOnHorseracing

I actually figured out what my lifetime contribution was to Medicare, but I'll use a couple of examples. There was a time when FICA and Medicare were combined as one deduction, but this year the Medicare amount of 1.45% is shown separately. Say you had a 40 year working career and you made a total of $2.8million - and that would put you in the top decile of all earners. If you paid the Medicare amount for the entire 40 years, you'd have paid about $40,000 total. Say you retire at 65 and live to age 80 you would essentially have paid $2,700 a year for the Part A insurance. One major surgery would cost you more than that without insurance. And the people I know paying for individual insurance are paying $2,700 for about two months of premiums. From that perspective, not so bad.

Let's say instead of a big earner, you were an average wage earner. Over the same 40 years, you would have earned maybe $1.2million. That means you would have paid a little under $17,000 in Medicare taxes, meaning your 15 years of being on Medicare would cost a little over $1,130 a YEAR.

I'm not sure how you came up with the insane amount, but most of us are not going to be in the 1% - most people are between the two examples I gave. As to the strings attached, given I am quite close to someone who is intimately familiar with Medicare, and while Docs and hospitals would be glad if it paid them more, I'm hearing the patients are covered for the procedures. As for the unnecessary testing, most of that is for two reasons - so hospitals and docs can bill for more than a patient visit and so the hospital can cover it's butt. But again, straight from the horse's mouth, most treatments do not require expensive confirmatory testing. Sure, if you think you've broken a bone you get an X-Ray. If you have a lump you get a biopsy. But as I said, a lot of what seem to be superfluous tests allow for greater billing, or because there are not electronic medical records systems that show repetitive tests. That is not on Medicare.

I also checked on the paper shuffle. Straight from the horse's mouth, all you send to Medicare is a claim form, exactly like you do for every other insurance company.

While you are correct that more docs are becoming non-participating providers, many of them will still accept Medicare patients because guess what - they get a higher reimbursement from Medicare than a participating provider.

I'm not telling you that Medicare is the greatest program in the history of programs. Just that most of the people who use it think it is a pretty good deal. And most of fraud has been weaned out of the program. There I are still improvements that could be made, and yes, long term funding is undoubtedly an issue, especially considering how little that insane lifetime amount really is if you live to the average age of your cohort. Frankly, if I had paid twice as much it would have been a good deal. And clearly the medical reimbursement part can only stretch so thin. But compared to what the people I know having to pay for private insurance are paying - $1,200 a month - Medicare is a great deal.

some great info. it's not nearly as bad as it seems when your paying. I'm not saying it's not a great deal. I'm saying it's not the end all thus the need for supplements. In regards to the claims, of course you just send in one claim form. However, to arrive at that point is where it takes so much manpower. My sister and my uncle are both doctors. They have had to hire multiple people just to do the additional medicare requirements in the past ten to fifteen years. I personally believe the medicare system should be handled by the private sector. The money should have all have been and currently should be kept in an untouchable account that is used only to pay for medicare claims. Not be available to politicians to raid. Hire the private sector to handle claims and premium payments.

[chadk66]

Originally Posted by Capper Al

The insurance companies set the limits now. It took Obamacare to step in and mandate insurance companies not to reject people with previous health issues. Wasn't this segment of the population being limited by insurance companies? It isn't an axiom that "single payer health care greatly limits choice".

excluding existing conditions limitations was the only good thing to come out of obumblescare. But that could have simply been done with a simple law. That being said, to do that would/did cost tax payers a ton of money. Very expensive to cover those people. Some states have had that for numerous years. But their medical coverage was much more in those states. That's where just opening up the insurance industry across states lines would have made so much sense. But that could have consequences too. Just look at what interstate banking has done to the banking/financial industry.

[chadk66]

Originally Posted by Sinner369

Obviously, being from Canada I don't know the details of the Affordable Care act..............but universal health care works all over the world (including Canada).........the US with ten times the population should work too...........what are the problems and why?

I lived right on the Canadian border for most of my life. Have relatives in Canada. Most of them I know would rather have our system. Canada's system is very costly and ours is catching theirs in a hurry. Bottom line is healthcare is expensive and someone has to pay for it. My sister is a doctor in oncology and treats many Canadians every year for various reasons.

[Tom]

the US with ten times the population should work too...........what are the problems and why?

Why?
Ten times the population.

And we are not a "normal nation."
We are 50 states united, or 57 if you are a moron democrat.

And 47% of that 10 times doesn't pull its own weight.
We have a mentally challenged government hat celebrates the rising number of people who have to go on food stamps as some kind of a victory.

We have no grasp of math so we shrug off 20 trillion in debt and dance when we stop increasing it so much every year.

We, basically are idiots down here. We have a cancer that ACA doesn't cover. It is called democrats. It is fatal.

And we have much more than ten times the expenses of bailing out the world than most of those other "nations" have. If we were to stop foreign aid, stop reacting to disasters, invasions, oppression, we could spend a lot more on HC.

[Clocker]

Originally Posted by Capper Al

The insurance companies set the limits now. It took Obamacare to step in and mandate insurance companies not to reject people with previous health issues. Wasn't this segment of the population being limited by insurance companies? It isn't an axiom that "single payer health care greatly limits choice".

Insurance is a business, with premiums based on risk. Young male drivers pay more for auto insurance than middle age women because of risk differences. Would you expect to go buy auto insurance and have it cover preexisting damage on your car?

Before ObamaCare, states had publicly funded high risk pools that provided health care coverage to people with preexisting conditions. The feds could have done the same thing nation wide. That's how it should be done. If society deems it to be good, society should pay for it, not hide the subsidies in the premiums paid by healthy people.

I repeat, insurance is a business, coverage of preexisting illness is welfare. Trying to hide the latter in the former is a lie.

[Capper Al]

Originally Posted by Clocker

Insurance is a business, with premiums based on risk. Young male drivers pay more for auto insurance than middle age women because of risk differences. Would you expect to go buy auto insurance and have it cover preexisting damage on your car?

Your right again. Insurance is a business not looking out to cover anything that they can get away with. Health, education, and welfare are unalienable rights. You might have seen this before:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed, by their Creator, with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.

[Clocker]

Originally Posted by Capper Al

Your right again. Insurance is a business not looking out to cover anything that they can get away with. Health, education, and welfare are unalienable rights. You might have seen this before:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed, by their Creator, with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.

Where does it say in there that an insurance company has the constitutional obligation to provide you with health care? If the government, which is society, feels that something is necessary for life, then the government should pay for it.

By your argument, the government should force grocery stores to give food away to anyone that can't afford to buy what they want. And if I need a car to get to work then Ford or Toyota should give me one. And if I am homeless, Hilton Hotels should just give me a room for free. But none of those things happen.

So please explain the difference. Explain why the government pays for food and lodging for people that need it, but according to you should force an insurance company to pay for health care for the needy.

[davew]

Originally Posted by Clocker

Where does it say in there that an insurance company has the constitutional obligation to provide you with health care? If the government, which is society, feels that something is necessary for life, then the government should pay for it.

By your argument, the government should force grocery stores to give food away to anyone that can't afford to buy what they want. And if I need a car to get to work then Ford or Toyota should give me one. And if I am homeless, Hilton Hotels should just give me a room for free. But none of those things happen.

So please explain the difference. Explain why the government pays for food and lodging for people that need it, but according to you should force an insurance company to pay for health care for the needy.

socialism and communism on the way

[incoming]

Originally Posted by Clocker

Where does it say in there that an insurance company has the constitutional obligation to provide you with health care? If the government, which is society, feels that something is necessary for life, then the government should pay for it.

By your argument, the government should force grocery stores to give food away to anyone that can't afford to buy what they want. And if I need a car to get to work then Ford or Toyota should give me one. And if I am homeless, Hilton Hotels should just give me a room for free. But none of those things happen.

So please explain the difference. Explain why the government pays for food and lodging for people that need it, but according to you should force an insurance company to pay for health care for the needy.

LOOK OUT!!!!!!!Here comes a cartoon.

[Capper Al]

Originally Posted by Clocker

Where does it say in there that an insurance company has the constitutional obligation to provide you with health care? If the government, which is society, feels that something is necessary for life, then the government should pay for it.

By your argument, the government should force grocery stores to give food away to anyone that can't afford to buy what they want. And if I need a car to get to work then Ford or Toyota should give me one. And if I am homeless, Hilton Hotels should just give me a room for free. But none of those things happen.

So please explain the difference. Explain why the government pays for food and lodging for people that need it, but according to you should force an insurance company to pay for health care for the needy.

You're amazing. I'm not saying insurance companies have to do anything more than what the government tells them to. It is up to the government to make sure that the people are covered. Your grocery analogy is just your mind going blank.

[incoming]

What can I say!!

[Clocker]

Originally Posted by incoming

What can I say!!

Are you saying that Al is a toon?