ObamaCare
- Thread starter shankity
- Start date
B_underguy1
Experimental Member
B_underguy1
Experimental Member
Underguy, what exactly is your solution? You say the rich control everything, and everyone in politics is bought and paid for. If the rich actually hold all the cards and no one not working for them will ever make it near power, then what's the right move, or for that matter, the point?
B_underguy1
Experimental Member
The best would be a peaceful democratic revolution. And that can only come when a critical mass understand how the system actually works and how it can be changed.
Getting rid of private banking would make an enormous difference to the world just for a start.
slurper_la
Superior Member
slurper_la
Superior Member
So true!!! But one small problem: the US electorate is so ignorant they won't understand who they're fighting or for what reason because they can't decide what they want the outcome to be.
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J, you seem like a reasonable person and I appreciate that but here's the problem. "Qualify under the many exemptions" translates to your insurance will cost more but the government will subsidize it. Which translates to increasing tax revenue. Which translates to a higher cost of living because companies will increase the cost of goods. People can say what they want but that's how it works.
I'm a simple guy which I guess is the problem.
One simple guy to another. Would you like to add lawyers to that list of "making a hell of a lot of profit or waste"?
My parenthesis about health companies was not intended to be exhaustive. no doubt the entire US economy would suffer if existing health care prices were halved and the industry forced to adjust. To prevent another recession it would almost be necessary to provide care to those previously not getting it, so as to keep up the flow of money.
This illustrates an important point. Same cost but twice as much health care? no brainer?
This illustrates an important point. Same cost but twice as much health care? no brainer?
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Yes that's not going to work. Most of the populace has been anesthetized by consumerism, television and the latest Hollywood blockbuster. There will be no revolution.
I'd be very interested to see the numbers on how much legal expenses are a factor in national health care expenses.
Go read up on how much doctors have to spend on malpractice insurance.
Good job dancing around the subject and coming back to where you were. How about dealing with the root cause but that would be messy wouldn't it?
No, I mean entirely exempt if you chose to go without insurance. https://www.healthcare.gov/exemptions/
I get what you're saying about the cost of living being expanded under costs being passed along the chain, but there's a lot more to factor into cost of living expenses than that. Companies manage to survive under much higher tax rates in other countries, and the government has already passed some restrictions on profitability within the health insurance industry. They could do so again, but I don't think it'll be necessary. The insurance marketplaces have finally made the insurance portability mentioned by politicians in the past a real thing, we'll see how that affects pricing in the future.
Hey, everybody talking about the costs of healthcare. I've got a riddle for you that explains why the costs of procedures are so high, based on my bill from a doctor's visit a few months back. All costs will be rounded for sake of ease.
I thought I had strep throat, so I went to get tested. It was my first time at the clinic, so there was no charge that day while they hammered out the costs with my insurance company. I got tested and went home. After about four months I finally got a bill. It was for $15, which was about what I expected for a copay, so I was fine with that. However, I saw they had a breakdown for the bill, including total cost and what the insurance paid. I saw that before the insurance company got the bill, it was $145.
So the question is this: If the bill was $145 total, and I paid $15, how much did the insurance company pay?
The answer? Not a dime. Every cent was covered under their discount. Having insurance was just a VIP pass to partake of their massive 88% (with exact numbers in calculation) discount. But what would an uninsured person off the street have to pay? The full $145. The reason why the individual mandate is necessary is because the artificial discount forces hospitals to raise their prices to ridiculous levels just so they can get $15 for the damn test.
So here's what I propose: Have the government investigate to find the real costs of healthcare and procedures compared to the price charged and insurance company discounts for them. Then move in and simultaneously place a price cap on the amount the hospitals are allowed to charge for a procedure and a legislative cap on the level of discount insurance companies can bargain for.
Done correctly it'll look like this. Hospital needs to collect about $400 for a procedure to cover costs and make desired profit levels. However, insurance companies have bargained for an 80% discount on the procedure, so the hospital sets the price at $2000 in order to collect their $400. The government moves in and tells the hospital to lower their price to $500 and tells the insurance company they can't get more than a 20% discount. Afterward, the same $400 is exchanging hands, but someone with a shitty job and without insurance isn't getting crippled by the cost.
Follow this up by repealing the individual mandate. A lowering of costs in the health marketplace coupled with a lack of legislative need to buy insurance will cause the demand for insurance to fall, which when coupled with the competitive nature of the new marketplace, will cause prices in general in the health insurance industry to fall. The price cap on the procedures would be either temporary or adjusted periodically to adjust for inflation and changing costs, but the discount caps on the insurance companies would be permanent.
Anyone else have any thoughts on this idea?
