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joetheogre ●
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CockAtLaw said...
I respectfully disagree with almost all of your post. Other countries, particularly France and Germany, who have government run insurance (not government run hospitals, there is a difference) spend about half as much as we do per person on health care and have longer life expectancies. Additionally, the wait times for elective procedures, such as hip replacements, are not significantly different than the average time in the US.
With regards to your comments about tort reform, Obama is actually on the record as agreeing to make tort reform a part of the package if someone was willing to meet him halfway. Obviously that didn't happen. Obama already backed off a single payor system to adopt the individual mandate which was a republican idea in the first place, but I guess that along with tort reform wasn't enough negotiating. The reality of the situation is that republicans will do everything they can to make sure that Obama doesn't get the credit for healthcare reform. It's not about principle, it's about party allegiance. Also, most independent papers (i.e., written by academics who are experts in the relevant field as opposed to affiliates of the Heritage Foundation and other think tanks) state that tort reform would cut costs by approximately 1%-2%. Once we have tackled tort reform so that doctors are shielded from liability even when they kill people, I say we tackle auto accident reform so that all damages from drivers (even those who drive intoxicated) are capped at 200K. This way, car insurance coverage limits can go down and premiums will be reduced. See how much cheaper that is? I'm sure there are no negative benefits to society, except for those people who are injured. After that, I am personally going to take on damage caps for legal malpractice claims. My insurance would be a lot lower if I didn't have to worry about getting sued all the time, and with lower insurance, I can charge lower rates. Everyone wins. If only there wasn't some pesky concept of personal responsibility I should be worrying about.
The political fact of the matter surrounding the mandate is that if it is struck down, what do you think the next attempt at health reform will look like? Obama was a centrist and catered to the mandate, the market based solution. The next democratic president who takes on the issue will see what's happened and not be so accomodating. Without a mandate, the only solution left is single payor. Well, either that or allow hospitals to deny treatment based on ability to pay. I suppose we could go there next.
This post was edited by theyear2001 on 4/9/2012 at 10:06 PM
theyear2001 ●
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CockAtLaw said...
While I certainly understand the point you are making and don't disagree that simplicity would be ideal, we do not live in a perfect world. Obviously, I haven't read the entire law, and I doubt very few people have. The fact of the matter, as you point out, is that the people who voted for the law probably have never read the thing just like the people criticizing it likely haven't either.
With regards to the cost, I sincerely doubt that anyone knows what it will be. I do know that many people have created many models and answers are all over the place. Some say cost is billions, some say trillions. Some say deficit goes up, some say deficit goes down. What I do know is that the Bush tax cuts from 2001-2003 reduced government revenues by trillions and the economy seemed to be doing fine in the late 90s before they took effect. Those tax cuts are still in effect, but don't seem to have had any impact on the economy at all; almost as if there is no or very little correlation. It is simplistic, but unfortunately I am not educated enough in the economics to know for sure.
I have no answers either, only the belief that our present course is unsustainable. The question then is who do we trust to fix it? The two options are the private sector or the public sector. The private sector's main mission/goal/purpose is to make a profit, and for those profits to grow. The public sector's mission would be to provide healthcare. Smarter people than I can try to balance these two systems.
I'm sure there are many, many problems with this analogy but I seem to think of NASA when I think of healthcare. Without the federal government really taking the lead and investing in the mission, would we have even reached the moon yet? What would be the market based incentive to do so? While we waited for this to happen, how many everyday inventions developed in connection with NASA research would we currently not have? How long would it have taken the private sector to establish the interstate highway system? When someone did it, it surely wouldn't be free so I'm assuming toll roads would be everywhere. I am in no way shape or form arguing for a socialist state, but it does appear that for a few very large complicated problems, the government can be a psuedo-early adopter to help establish initial value so the private sector can take over and really take it to the next level.
theyear2001 ●
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joetheogre said...
The individual mandate was actually an idea of republicans to maintain the free market in health care. The thing with the health care bill is that you already pay for others to get it - in the form of higher costs. If everyone had the same access, people would get check ups instead of waiting until they need emergency surgery. So instead of paying half a million dollars for someone on welfare to have a costly surgery and rounds of intense chemotherapy, you can pay less for him to have periodic check ups and less intense treatment when a problem is detected. That is an extreme example, but whether you realize it or not you are essentially already paying for a universal health care system, except the one we have now costs more.
theyear2001 ●
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joetheogre said...
My car insurance comparisson is based off the thinking that requiring everyone to have car insurance prevents the state from having to pay any damages and it keeps costs down because everyone is insured.
I'm not sure where we will go honestly. If Obama gets re-elected I'm not sure he would try and pass a revamped version, but maybe he would.
Remember, Obamacare is actually going to reduce the deficit (i.e. it is cheaper than what the government currently spends). If your concern is with the principle of the individual mandate and the slippery slope it suggests, that is certianly justifiable.
I'm not saying your opinion here isn't legitimate. It certainly is. I disagree with it, but I am not a diehard supporter of Obamacare either. I think it is a step in the right direction, but I'm not sure it is as effective as it could be.
theyear2001 ●
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CockAtLaw ●
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