Cash4Clunkers - see a Corvette die

[HeyBub]

Not so. Both the UK and Canada have (small) private health care. Even if your assertion was accurate, so what? And 60% of "private" insurance in the U.S. IS non-profit (think Blue Cross).

No it's not. Lack of health insurance is not the same as lack of health care.

The administration quotes ~45 million uninsured. The next day they say that

15 million illegal aliens will NOT be covered by the "public" plan. Now we're down to 30 million. Of these, about 15 million are between the ages of 18 and 27 who choose to not spend their beginning wages for health insurance. Of the remainder, about 2.5 million are incarcerated, 4 million are between jobs where they will be covered, a significant number are eligible for Medicaid or S-CHIP which they'll automatically get as soon as they apply, and lesser groups.

After all the arithmetic is done, there are exactly EIGHT people in the entire United States that need health insurance and can't get it! For these eight, the administration would f*ck up the system that serves 265 million quite well.

What do you think needs fixing?

I strongly agree with that last. Lets nibble at the margins (tort reform, portability, nationwide availability, etc.), before we throw out the baby, the bath water, AND granny.

[Master Betty]

The millions of uninsured and our declining standard of care compared to the rest of the world. Do some research on the life expectancy of Americans as opposed to other industrialized countries. We are losing the race in hc and it's a damn shame our congress can't stand up to the insurance, drug companies and lawyers.

Not sure where you got your figures but I'm not going to get into that numbers debate. I think the US standing in the world with regards to quality of hc is enough of a wake up call.

The granny debate is an issue I refuse to debate. It's just ridicules. Healthcare IS already rationed. Always will be. Nobody has talked about euthanasia except the wackos.

[Stormin Mormon]

How Freudian. You liberals tend to suffer from Pension Envy. Next thing, you'll want to marry your mother. Conservatives see success and want to imitate it. Liberals see success and want the government to punish it.

[Kurt Ullman]

Many of the Blues have been switched to for-profit. All 14 of Wellpoint's Blues are for-profit, for instance.

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[Kurt Ullman]

I'd have to agree. That is one of the main things econ systems of all stripes do... ration outputs and inputs.

[Jim Yanik]

Douglas Johnson wrote in news: [e-mail]:

[Jim Yanik]

Douglas Johnson wrote in news: [e-mail]:

[Jim Yanik]

Kurt Ullman wrote in news:kurtullman- [e-mail]:

the company is not in business for "society",it's in business for itself. but companies are profitable while paying for their employee's healthcare.

It's also considered part of the employee's compensation for work performed.

No,mostly from gov't regulation. Stifles competition and adds overhead in compliance.

agreed.

[Jim Yanik]

Kurt Ullman wrote in news:kurtullman- [e-mail]:

Yeah,and ADDING **30 million more people** covered and not adding more healthcare people will result in MORE and stricter rationing. It has everywhere else.

And Government is proven to be exceedingly POOR at running such things;

USPS,AMTRAK,Senate/House lunchrooms,Medicare and Medicaid.

Examine the Oregon Healthcare system;that's a good indicator of how things would be under gov't operation.

[Kurt Ullman]

Gee, you 'd better tell that to GM, Chrysler, Ford, etc. They missed that. Only Ford managed to dump off the healthcare to the UAW in time.

So what? Pay me directly and let me buy my own.

Mostly the fact that I only pay about 20% of my healthcare expenses out of my own pocket. And that includes the o-o-p part of the premium. Something that heavily subsidized, you get all sorts of pervese incentives to overspend going on. The current plans only exacerbate that concern.

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[HeyBub]

Yep. Someday, some are going to conclude that if they are going to be accused of something, they might as well be the something.

[Master Betty]

Worth it?

[Jim Yanik]

Kurt Ullman wrote in news: [e-mail]:

Many companies -are- profitable while paying part or all of their employees healthcare.

But the "Big Three" have been MISMANAGED.Unions are complicit in that.

the original argument was that companies could get better deals thru group discounts.However,that may not hold true anymore.

No,because excessive gov't regulation STILL increases your costs even if you're paying for them yourself.

employers are NOT "subsidizing" healthcare. It's part of the employee's compensation,that they EARNED. It's no freebie.

And WRT the "Big Three",their union employees apparently have NOT earned their excessive benefits.They were not productive enough to pay for them,and that's reflected in the companies unprofitability.

[Kurt Ullman]

Many are but most likely would be more so if they could get rid of the HC. Or how many small businesses might grow, except for the HC mess. Make it defined payment instead of defined benefit like with pensions. You get X amount of money and you buy insurance with it.

But a big part of what they mismanaged was the HC side. I have always thought it was sorta hypocritical for the unions to suggest the management was at fault, especially when a part of their mismanagement was how badly they managed the unions.

Hasn't for quite awhile, and I am not sure it ever really did. For awhile it was less expensive for the big boys to increase HC benefits (especially the non-existant co-pays and low premiums. Another reason I thought the Big Three were a little hypocritical when their earlier decisions came back to bite them on the nether regions.

Of course they are. Someone else pays 80% of something that you use, then it is subidised. Or at least paid for by someone else, my definition of subsidy.

[HeyBub]

Sigh!

Progessives (i.e., Paul Krugman) like to front this report from the World Health Organization. The methodology used to create the report is so flawed, however, that the report has been debunked countless times. These criticisms, from health organizations such as the American Public Health Association, have been so severe, that even WHO gave up on creating this report in 2000.

The WHO report relies on DALE [Disability-Adjusted Life Expectancy] and this skews into the sunset all manner of statistics. For example, consider South Africa which has the finest health system on the continent and was the site of the world's first heart transplant! The WHO study ranks South Africa

175th out of 191 countries!

How did South Africa get such a low ranking in the WHO study?

AIDS.

And the prevelance of AIDS and its effect on mortality has almost NOTHING to do with the health care delivery system or its cost - or at least it didn't in the decade leading up to 2000.

No, the WHO study is a decade out of date and, even when it was current, was bunk.

[Oren]

"This is a must see for everyone. Daniel Hannan makes a stunning speech ridiculing Nationalised Health Care AKA Obamacare."

3 part video

[Master Betty]

Neat but what does it have to do with the 2 payer system? The title says "Nationalized" HC.

[Douglas Johnson]

Thanks for posting that link, but it didn't seem to contain any references to specific pending bills and relevant sections in them. You don't expect any article titled "5 Liberal Lies About Obamacare" to contain well referenced research and this one doesn't disappoint.

It talks about 100 people a week in Britain losing their eye sight due to a shortage of eye doctors. You dig into the reference they provide and you discover it is all based on a single unsupported statement from a Liberal Democrat MP. Would you believe it if Barney Frank said it? Scare tactics.

-- Doug

[Oren]

I'll just presume you have not watched all three parts. You did reply before having time to listen.

[Master Betty]

Yeah....just a couple min past the Churchill joke....funny guy...

Which part talks about the 2 payer?