Universal Healthcare? Can it work? I'm doubtful...

[zasterguava]

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I just don't see how anyone could look at what our government is doing now and has done throughout history and think it would be a good idea to give them a few trillion more bucks for any reason.

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To transfer power and control to a more democratizing force than unnacountable profit driven tyrannies?

[jogsxyz]

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The issue is simply that prices keep spiraling out of control, less and less people can afford it, and even if you HAVE insurance, you can't afford to get SICK. So what's the point in having it in the first place? The whole system needs to be redesigned to keep costs down. If you can show that the private market can do that, then I'm all for it. I have my doubts about that, though.

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Hasn't insurance increased the cost of healthcare? They're just another middle man.
Wasn't it easier to see a doctor 100 years ago, before health insurance?

[Dane S]

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To transfer power and control to a more democratizing force than unnacountable profit driven tyrannies?

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Better than a monopolistic theft-driven tyranny imo. Almost everything I use to support my life, from food to the internet, is provided by "profit-driven tyrannies", so I'm not convinced that they are fundamentally evil. Sure there are bad eggs, but using this as justification for an entity that is a million times worse seems somehow counterproductive.

[Taso]

Ugh, we already had this debate in that thread. I'll break it down for everyone:

Almost everyone favors private health care
Two or three posters favor "free healthcare for everyone" as well as bullets made of chocolate and bunnies and sunshine. And higher taxes.

[Inso0]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I just don't see how anyone could look at what our government is doing now and has done throughout history and think it would be a good idea to give them a few trillion more bucks for any reason.

[/ QUOTE ]

To transfer power and control to a more democratizing force than unnacountable profit driven tyrannies?

[/ QUOTE ]


Out of curiosity... where do you think those profits go?


This is something that has always amazed me about "CORPORATIONS ARE THE DEVIL!" people.... where do you honestly think those profits go? Do you think some insurance guy has a few billion dollars stuffed under his mattress somewhere?

The private sector redistributes wealth FAR better than the government does.

[bobman0330]

hehe, someone actually cited public schools as an example of the government being competent?

[DblBarrelJ]

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Does it work perfectly? No Is it better than your current system? Yes

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Please expand on your knowledge of the flaws of "our system".

[Dane S]

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The private sector redistributes wealth FAR better than the government does.


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This is the key to everything imo.

[Case Closed]

[ QUOTE ]
Ugh, we already had this debate in that thread. I'll break it down for everyone:

Almost everyone favors private health care
Two or three posters favor "free healthcare for everyone" as well as bullets made of chocolate and bunnies and sunshine. And higher taxes.

[/ QUOTE ]
That seems like an appropriate reasonable characterization of both sides of the argument.

[Borodog]

The problems with the US healthcare system are caused by too much socialism, not too little. We've *had* socialized medicine for more than 40 years, ever since medicaid and medicare socialized healthcare for the poor and elderly, who conse the bulk of healthcare services. The most powerful union in the nation is the AMA, whch greatly restricts the supply of doctors, damatically increasing costs. Health insurance has literally thousands of mandates that prevent competition from operating, skyrocketting the costs there. Goveremt mandates treatment be given at capped prices which offsets costs onto those paying out of pocket or with private insurance, again increasing both medical and insurance costs. As insurance premiums skyrocket due to governent interventions, more and more people choose not to buy private insurance, increasing the premiums for the remaining suckers and increasing the pressure to socialize the insurance industry. Mandated treatments with taxpayers picking up the bill cause a tremendous increase in demand, restrction in supply, shortages to patients who most need care because it is misallocated to those that don't and cause further skyrocketting costs to taxpayers. The price caps cause medical providers to avoid shifting resources to the capped services, distoring the structure of the industry further.

In every industry that is not heavily regulated or outright nationalized or socialized, like consumer electronics, prices fall over time as increasing productivity reduces the costs of production. This is masked by monetary inflation, but is still obvious for say computers. But all industries that are heavily regulated, intervened in or outright socialized or nationalized see costs skyrocket, such as health insurance, health care, public education, roads, police, courts, you name it. Quality and service suck, costs are sky high.

The US spends more on healthcare because wears fatter than the rest of the world. We also are more wealthy, can meet basic needs like food shelter energy and transport with a smaller fraction of our income leaving more to spend on healthcare. The "worse health outcomes" is similarly a crock; we're fatter and that has a lot of negative health impacts, thus the higher spending.

And before someone brings it up if they haven't already, the claim that government run health systems are more efficient than the private sector is also a crock. Medicaid and Medicare simply foist off the cost of administration and compliance onto the provders, shifting those costs off the goverment books and onto the backs of consumers. Furthermore the cost of pure regulatory compliance is gigantic, further distorting the cost of private health care provision.

There is one area of human medicine where the amount of government intervention is at a minimum: plastic surgery. Fake [censored] and new noses are not covered by Medicaid and Medicare yet, and hence the price of plastic surgery is plunging.

Also, I think it I'd terrible that I can get faster and cheaper health care for my dog than for my wife, but it is unsurprising, since destroying the veterinary care industry has not been a high priority for politicians for four decades.