GannonFan wrote:kalm wrote:
Sure there is.
1). This is corporatism/crony capitalism at its best...you know, the kind that most conks and way too many donks defend.
2). Single payer. Make for profit insurance only for Cadillac plans.
Single payer doesn't really do anything unless we are willing to stipulate how much health care someone can get and put a cap on how much we're willing to pay for it. The issue that we have today is that everyone wants their healthcare right away and they don't want to pay for it. Talking about insurance companies and crony capitalism are great icebreakers at Occupy meetings, but it's just a red herring. We want everything when it comes to healthcare (we want every test, every specialist, every procedure, and every drug) right away and we don't want to pay for those things. That's where the issue lies and that's what's not fixed with Obamacare and what isn't fixed just by uttering "single payer". If we don't want these things to cost as much, we need to say to people that they cannot get whatever they want whenever they want, and in some cases they won't be getting it at all. And if they still want to have the immediate access to everything that they do today, then we need to be honest and say that it costs a lot and people need to be prepared to pay for it. All the other stuff about corporatism and such are just smoke and mirrors to shift the debate to politics and not about the actual issues involved.
Except that pretty much the rest of the advanced world uses single payer spending less for better outcomes. Of course you already know this.
There are multiple reasons for higher costs but you're only partially right about everyone expecting something for nothing. Some people simply have gone without or waited until a relatively curable problem turns into something big and expensive which ends up costing everyone more anyways.
Then there's the whole pricing structure. I had a buddy go in for a five hour out patient surgery recently that cost $12,000 with insurance. I guarantee you the cash price would have been no more than 1/2 of that.
Or how about Medicare Part D? Every other government is able to leverage their buying power and negotiate down prices.
Would single payer fix everything? No. Would it save us money? Yes. I agree with you in that we may have to restrict how it's used and certain non essential procedures, products, and services might not get covered but hey, weren't you just the one pining on about people expecting something for nothing?
We have socialized medicine Ganny...it's socialism for Pfizer and United Healthcare and capitalism for the rest of us. We once again worship at the alter of faux private enterprise so a few thousand people can get really wealthy. Sorry my man, not everything needs to be for profit (fire departments, health insurance). The system is broken. Quit being a regressive stick in the mud and start considering alternative solutions.
