With all this talk about universal "free" health care vs. our current system no one is talking the time to step back and think of the consequences of free health care. I agree that universal health care is socialism and that if implemented will raise our already high taxes but I also agree that our current system with insurance companies looking out for their bottom line and Medicaid and Medicare is broken and backward. That is why I am advocating the formation of a system that still keeps our insurance companies around but also looks out for the LEGAL minimum wage worker who is at the present at the mercy of the insurance companies. With my system the insurance companies will be subject to government intervention and regulation on what they can charge in premiums much like the car insurance companies and what they can deny as far as pre-existing conditions and timetables for which you have to file a claim. Who will foot the bill you ask? Well since my plan is government paid for all children (17 and under) OF ALL IMMIGRATION STATUS and to those who are LEGALLY allowed to live here 18 and older who have a job or who are on a parents insurance who have a job, the job would foot the premium for all employees. But this will cause a financial collapse of the company you might say well the cost of the premiums would be tax deductible for the companies at the end of the year (assuming our current tax system is in place and not the Fair Tax). The only people that would be eligible for "free" health care would be all children under 18 and and persons deemed unable to work due to illness or handicap. I am a firm believer that if you are over 18 and are able to work but sit on you lazy rump all day you DOT NOT DESERVE HEALTH CARE AT ALL. But whose going to pay for the care for the children and disabled? They would be put under the care of the state much like Medicare and Medicaid. The advantage to my system is it compiles both of these bureaucratic systems into a better one.
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We need to get government and regulation out of health care. Regulating health care will lead to long lines and poor care. Look at procedures that are not covered by insurance and run simply by free enterprise. Lasix eye surgery, liposuction, breast augmentation... They are all reducing in price and at the same time improving in technique. Illegal immigrants will cost our countries tax payers about 87 billion per year in entitlements. Combine that with a raise in taxes and I am moving to the Ruby Ridge.
I agree with the idea that the government should provide health care to seniors and children under 19. All seniors and children should be required by law to register for Medicare, and the government should negotiate reasonable prices from the medical comunity. The rest of the population should be insured through employer plans, with employees copaying a portion. It should be mandated by law (with stiff penalties for failure to comply) that all employers provide health insurance and that all employees sign up for it. If a spouse does not work, the employee must co-pay for husband/wife coverage. (I handle the insurance at my (small) firm and it is the family plans that are over-priced; single coverage and husband & wife are affordable). For students between 19 and 24, the university would be considered the employer. This universal coverage would then eliminate the outrageous prices for care justified by hospitals claiming that they have to "cost shift" due to the number of uninsured treated on an emergency basis. Since there is universal payment, insurance company premiums can be regulated and no denials of coverage need to be permitted. Also, the medical portion of worker's compensation premiums that businesses are required by law to pay can be eliminated. This will offset some of the cost of health insurance premiums for businesses. How many of you are aware that businesses that provide health care insurance are paying insurance companies twice for their employees? You are covered at home for sickness and injury by the health insurance premium, and you are covered at work for injury by the worker's compensation premium. With the relatively low unemployment rate usually enjoyed in the United States, the government could provide temporary health benefits to the unemployed, with the unemployed paying a fee to the government out of their unemployment compensation. When they are re-employed, they would go onto the employer's plan. As for the perpetually unemployed, they are probably already on Medicaid; if not, they would need to register for a government plan if they show up at a hospital for treatment. Since, by law, health care insurance is mandated and universal (either by government or employer plans), when an illegal immigrant seeks health care, they would be flagged by the system as not having coverage. Hospitals and doctors would, by law, have to inform the immigration department. If an investigation finds that the immigrant is employed under the table, the government can impose HUGE fines on the company employing the immigrant for failure to remit the employer/employee portions of social security, failure to withhold federal and state income taxes and failure to provide a health insurance plan. If the government were diligent and draconian in their fines of businesses who flout tax and health care regulations, they could drastically deter the underground cash economy and significantly increase tax revenue to offset the cost of insuring seniors and children. The illegal immigrant who is illegally employed can remain in the country 1.) if he cooperates in the investigation of the corporate scofflaw who employs him/her and 2.) registers for a social security card and files tax returns. Illegal immigrants who are not employed or who refuse to cooperate in an investigation of their employers must be deported. Next, the pharmaceutical companies, who add so much cost to our health care system, must be regulated. First, our tax dollars fund a great deal of medical research that the pharmaceutical companies use to develop drugs. Therefore, a percentage of the profits from any drugs produced from government research should be paid back to the government to offset the cost of Medicare. Second, pharmacetical companies, like tobacco companies, should have restrictions on the amount of money they can spend on advertising. All the hundreds of millions spent on TV commercials and magazine ads unnecessarily increase the costs of the drugs. Finally, we come to the doctors and the lawyers. Doctors should be prohibited by law from owning any portion of a firm that provides medical imaging or testing. This restriction would eliminate the health insurance carriers claims that doctors request unnecessary tests to make extra money. Health insurance carriers also claim that doctors order unnecessary tests to avoid being sued. Therefore, medical malpractice liability damages and malpractice insurance rates must be regulated. Obstetricians can't be held responsible for a baby's health until the age of 21! Lawsuits should have to pass some sort of gross negligence standard. The AMA in return must do a better job of policing their own, and doctors and nurses must have access to anonymous hotlines to report negligent doctors and nurses to government and/or insurance agencies. The ridiculous number of hours worked by residents and interns (and some nurses) should be reduced and regulated like commercial drivers are: no more than 10 hours on followed by 12 hours off. The final suggestion deals with reducing the cost of administration. Doctors pay for additional staff to process all the referals and paperwork required by the insurance companies; insurance companies reject claims in order to delay payments to doctors and hospitals, thereby increasing costs, etc. To solve this hidden cost in the system, there must be universal claims forms, universal procedure codes and prompt payment laws.
Jmcg, you hit a lot of what is wrong with the system but not everything. Hats off to you. Many do not even see a problem with the system.
Betty
Betty327@ptd.net
We can have universal health care, but I also dont want the Feds too involved. So lets have 10-12 big insurance pools....
State of Hawaii, California teachers, UAW, NRA, University of Minnesota...whoever...
...and every citizen has 12 months to buy into one of the big plans.
I'll bet within a year eveyone has good care at low rates.
Theres plenty of money in the system now, but its divided between hospitals, doctors, and insurance companies in a bad way to keep costs high.
I don't want government in the middle to drive up costs through inefficiency. I also don't want insurance companies in the middle to drive up health care costs through their profit motive.
Phil
Been to the Unity08 Delegate wiki lately? Join today!http://unity-usa.org
Lets uncorrupt our government!
our taxes should be able to give every born American health care. And if someone wants to come to America and bide by our rules and learn our language just like our grandfathers and grandmothers did before us then fine let them work and swear oath to our flag and become Americans then i don't have a problem with them coming here but for me a born American to have to press 1 for English then i have a big problem. If we stop spending billions on a war we cant and wont win like viet Nam then we could easily support a good health care system that would only rise our taxes by between 8 and 11 % I would be pleased to pay for the cost. We spend billion on other countries to help them out, train there armies just to have to fight them later when they rise against us. Wake up America we are being sold out by our own government.
The problem with:
"With my system the insurance companies will be subject to government intervention and regulation "
is you get an administration like the current one that ignores it's regulation responsibilities. There are regulations about mine saftey, for example, that just never get enforced. Fire regulators, reduce fines - with the insurance lobby making donations to campaigns, government oversight won't work.
We have the best government money can buy.
My suggestion - establish a co-pay schedule based on income - never free, and not ridiculous at the top end, either, but give a reason not to go to a doctor for a hangnail.
Pay your co-pay, submit bill to government, and government pays doctor.
US Marine vet Vietnam 4/68 - 8/69 5th District, NJ
We have already had disease out breaks from unimmunized illegals. We need a national network of storefront clinics that can handle whatever comes in the door, victims of violence, traffic accidents, and illness that can treat immediately to determine if anyone is a carrier, and stabilize their condition.
Further, and much more expensive treatment will depend on the health insurance. But the poor masses which are coming will be even more malnourished with the rise in grain prices, and their immune systems will be even more likely to carry new hybrid pathogens. If there is to be any hope of preventing outbreaks in major urban areas, then treatment and isolation must begin with initial symptomology.
More over, Alan Greenspan noted that it will not matter how much money you throw at healthcare if there are not enuf nurses to deliver it. Unfortunately, ever since the birth control pill came out, nurses, teachers, social workers, etc have used it thinking they could teach the craft to the client classes. Unfortunately, they were wrong about that, and Head Start & Equal opportunity have not delivered the hoped for number of competent young social safety net workers.
And many of those who first began using the pill 40 years ago, are starting to retire. One of my friends is a psychiatric social worker, still hard at it at age 69. They can not find anyone to replace her. Its not like you can train anyone; this kind of work requires an innate intuitive skill at reading body language you cant get from a book or teach to enterprising young people interested only in monetary rewards.
As I saw one nurse say:"If we want competent nurses to take over after us, we need to give birth to the girls ourselves." There is, however, one other option; smart young women in graduate school are donating eggs to be frozen that they can access later after their careers are online and they feel they can afford to raise kids. But a donantion cycle produces 300 eggs. If Nurses, Teachers, Social Workers, & Psychotherapists also donated eggs, then the taxpayers would be well served by funding fertility clinic services for poor women who lack other job skills. Their innate mothering instincts are still going to be perfectly adequate, especially with smart girls who are so much easier to raise than those that suffer from mental pathology.
Of course, the nation could import more doctors and nurses from cultures which are already in short supply. But there are problems our nurses have in understanding Doctor's orders given in Pakistani or Hindi English, and the medical transcription services are falling behind because they cant understand the foreigners either. This is leading to errors in medical records in therefore in ongoing treatment. Again, throwing money at it is not going to work. We need medical personnel who were raised in American English speaking households.
Lastly, we'd be well served by banning corporate healthcare plans. The kickbacks given to the transnationals drives up the cost of premiums for everyone else, and reduces the pressure of competition to lower prices.
The last time a Great Nation wore its faith on its sleeve, it was a swastika.
okay first of all we need to understand that unverisal healthcare would be better then basic healthcare so doctors will accutally diganose you with problems that having to wait before its too late. Why is it that you people are so caught up on yourself our current system is not good and it lacks then other countries we came in 38th which is terrible since we bring outselves as a wealthy country.
lets change and let everyone have healthcare this is immoral cause we are dealing with peoples health and thats what keeps us going so think about that one or when we you see the next citzen put six feet into the ground. thanks for your time :) Tym
We came in 38th in part because no population has such a high rate of consumption of sugar cereals, junkfood, & soda. We also have alarmingly high rates of substance abuse, and we have minorities whose genetic endowments exacerbate these problems. Having universal healthcare is not going to do much about the murder rate.
Whatever we do has to be within the framework of what the foreign holders of dollar denominated investments will accept. If we tried to fund universal healthcare for such an intrinsically unhealthy lifestyle the cost could lead to a run on the dollar and a complete collapse of the economy.
Huckabee, of all people, is right on this. We need to tax high fructose corn syrup and aspertame. We need to quit funding bypass surgery for people who failed to have healthy lifestyles. We need to show the global financial community, which holds nearly 9 trillion in US debt, that we are willing to force abortions on women who cannot provide the safe drug free environment needed for the unborn. We'd jail them if they gave drugs to a baby.
With foreclosure and bankruptcy rates already at worrisome levels, we simply dont have the global credit to provide medical services for self inflicted maladies. If we taxed sugar cereals, candy, junkfood, soda & beer, we could eliminate food stamps and use the money to give away healthy food to parents for their kids. That would do more than free healthcare for the problems the 'free market' creates.
But I'd also ban corporate healthcare so that the kickbacks would not have to be paid for out of the pockets of those who need to buy their own health insurance. It'd also lower the payroll costs which would encourage investment and reduce outsourcing job losses. We could then force each insurer to cover some portion of the 'charity' cases.
We also need a national network of walk in neighborhood nurse practitioner clinics with the equipment to deal with both the risk of pandemic outbreaks and emergency or WMD problems.
The Chinese have tested over 1000 herbs in scientific double blind studies. The German Commission E monograph on herbs resports on hundreds of such studies, finding scores of herbs with proven therapeutic value that would dramatically reduce the social cost of pharmaceuticals. Just making more rich doctors is not going to do the job.
(edited for language-moderator)
I'm getting a headache reading about all of the problems in our health care system. It seems to me that the issues we face in health care are related to, and exacerbated by, many other problems in our current political and social environment. You really can't have satisfactory improvement in an area as large and complicated as health care without addressing things like unemployment, the homeless, immigration, corporate greed, the drug companies, political ignorance and corruption, and the weird desire of many people to eat, drink and/or smoke themselves into a state of chonic disease.
My head really hurts now.
The point is that we have a lot to do. And the beat place to start is with the maniac in the White House and his den of liars and thieves. Isn't that why we are all here?
I think I will go to the ER for an aspirin!
I agree that the healthcare problem is just a reflection of a society going down the tubes! Instead of offering high value to the consumer, it's often about rewarding errors, waste and abuse through greater profits, while punishing cost-effectiveness. And you know what, there are many people who don't want it to change very much. Get me an aspirin, too, while you're at it.
Steve Beller, PhD
Wellness Wiki
Curing Healthcare Blog
we need to grow up. Moderators can edit whatever they like, but I would point out that what is regarded as profane or foul language is a *Christian* principle. The Stoics were adamant about the use of vulgar language and hated euphamism. Since I am a Stoic, I try to keep to that moral value which I regard as higher than that of Christian dogma.
But it is indicative of a fundamental, pun intended, problem, this notion that there are "magic words". Now its one thing to engage in ad hominum, and we see all to much of it in lieu of addressing difficult and emotional issues like healthcare. But part of healthdcare is mental health, which includes the ability to dispassionately examine a position even if the language it is expressed in is regarded as blasphemous by Christians. I doubt frankly that the Dali Lama would edit a single word of any my postings, but instead address the thrust of my argument in as plain language as he likes.
This fixation over profanity and vulgarity is itself a symptom of the mental pathology which blinds us to finding real solutions in health care and many other issues. I find its use an effective twit filter, that those who get upset over my language do so because they cant handle thinking about the issue at hand. Anyone who has read the studies on Group Think by Janis and others can understand how some misperceive anything which would offend the sensibilities of those they live and work with. But we do that kind of thing for the senile, children, and mental patients. We also expect our politicians to avoid the use of offensive language. But I am not running for office.
If Unity 08 is going to get anywhere, it'll have to break out of group think, and one of the ways to do that, is to be blunt, vulgar, even offensive- since all the partisan groups that have fixed positions on this cant handle it. Like I say, its time to grow up.