Why do people vote against their own interests? (American Healthcare reform)

[shockerfan]

I don’t believe anyone has ever quantified medical breakthroughs so it’s a matter of opinion but I’d say that Asia and Europe are leading in medical innovation.

The situation is exactly as I said and I have the bill to prove it. It’s also the same with a wide variety of medicines; they’re called generics. The active ingredients are the same as their name-brand counterparts. The only differences are the fillers and the cost.

Why would the taxpayer be gouged if the pharmaceutical industry is forced to charge less?

1. Well, I don’t have the time to research this one…so I guess it is just opinion at this point.
2. I’m sure you have the bill to prove what you were charged. I would contend that there are more costs involved than the product cost itself. Malpractice costs? Unpaid medical bill costs? etc. Like I said, if it were EXACTLY as you said, and the ONLY variables were $2-3 saline cost and $500 sell price, then I promise you there would be savvy business people all over that one, after all, business people are a greedy bunch aren’t they? But, experience has shown me that a deal too good to be true (I go into saline business, and undercut the competition by $10 and make $487 profit per unit), then it probably is too good to be true. Just a long way of saying I don’t think you know all the variables to this issue.
3. Example: After Katrina, a guy from KY went to LA with a truck load of generators. Tried to sell them for multiples of what he paid for them. He was charged with price gouging. This might make you feel good. Unfortunately, there were customers willing to pay his price. Unfortuntely, those customers could no longer buy them since this guy was not allowed to sell them at the price he wanted. I was not worth it to him to buy the generators, put them on a truck, drive to LA and deliver them to the customer’s doorstep, so he went home with generators in hand, and some legal issues. The customer had to do without a generator. Feel better? Price controls = shortages.

 

[rlg94086]

The public option struck fear in the hearts of the insurance companies and their greedy ways. Imagine it, they would’ve had to COMPETE! Maybe even lower costs, frivolity, streamline, lower premiums, and stop letting their CEO’s go party it up in Vegas! The Far Right went out of their way to make sure health care for the masses died. Greed, pure and simple, clothed in a “constitutional” patriotic cellophane.

I’m up for a public option at the state level, but not the national level. I can never understand why a state the economic size of California hasn’t offered a public option to its citizens. The economy is bigger than many countries!

 

[shockerfan]

The public option struck fear in the hearts of the insurance companies and their greedy ways. Imagine it, they would’ve had to COMPETE! Maybe even lower costs, frivolity, streamline, lower premiums, and stop letting their CEO’s go party it up in Vegas! The Far Right went out of their way to make sure health care for the masses died. Greed, pure and simple, clothed in a “constitutional” patriotic cellophane.

Compete? One competitor has to make a profit to stay in business. The other “competitor” can run a loss seemingly forever, since it finances its endeavor by taking other people’s money by force. Fair competition?

Then, the government would be the only competitor, and given its proven track record of being hugely inefficient, the taxpayer, would be paying higher prices or higher taxes to finance the money losing endeavor.

 

[Ridgerunner]

It really is too bad that this administration and congress spent so much time, energy and money simply to come up with a bill that tells insurance companies they have to insure people they would not otherwise insure; have unrealistic coverages and deductibles, and provide for middle class subsidies that will probably be overwhelmed by the cost increases occasioned by the government forcing insurance companies to have unrealistic coverages and deductibles and insure people they would not otherwise insure.

They might have spent that time and energy to better effect by actually addressing the increasing costs of healthcare itself. Possibly a starter would be to decouple Medicare rate (upon which all other rates are based) from provider costs; a practice which mightily encourages gold-plating and medical palace building. Possibly the government might have looked at sky-high reimbursement rates for super-specialties and the rather low rates for primary care. Imaginably it would have looked at the cost of “defensive medicine” and what malpractice litigation is adding to the cost of healthcare. (Med Mal coverage for an ob-gyn around here is well in excess of $100,000/year. Family practitioners’ insurance often equals their salaries. Does anybody really not realize that doubles their cost of care?) Possibly they could have looked at more modest contributions to states’ forced placement plans. Possibly they could have reconsidered the significant duplication of high-tech machinery and services, which is largely paid for by the government. And, of course, the government could have considered and quantified the costs of ER care of illegal aliens which to them is free, but which adds to the bills of everyone else. Possibly some consideration could have even been given to contracting with clinics south of the border, where costs are 2/3 less, to which illegals could be sent instead of to those in our border states.

But in reality this administration wants a fully socialized system, and wants insurance companies to fold and go away. Ultimately, unless something is done to stop it, that’s exactly what will happen.

It’s possible, of course, that we could end up with a two-tier system like that of France, where people who have insurance or money get the care they want, while the rest of the population gets the care the government wants to give them. The left, of course, won’t want to see that (at least not for anyone other than for themselves). And, of course, if we end up with a socialized system, “medical tourism” will actually serve the well-to-do, just as it does for Canadians now.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Compete? One competitor has to make a profit to stay in business. The other “competitor” can run a loss seemingly forever, since it finances its endeavor by taking other people’s money by force. Fair competition?

Then, the government would be the only competitor, and given its proven track record of being hugely inefficient, the taxpayer, would be paying higher prices or higher taxes to finance the money losing endeavor.

Compete? Again, Medicare, Medicaid and federal employees’ insurance are all administered by private insurance companies, because the government can’t do it with the efficiency the insurance companies can. There wouldn’t be any real competition in administration. The government would simply hire insurance companies to do more for it than they now do. There would be competition in the premiums because the government could simply tax everybody more in order to subsidize the premiums. But that’s not true competition.

 

[EmperorNapoleon]

Just a long way of saying I don’t think you know all the variables to this issue.

I know that the pharmaceutical industry has an outrageously high profit margin and net income and that Americans are charged many times the amount of money for the exact same product than citizens of any other country and there’s no valid reason for it.

Feel better? Price controls = shortages.

The first fault with your scenario is that there are other companies willing to pick up the slack. The second is your assumption that the pharmaceutical industry would rather collectively pack up and put themselves out of business than simply reduce their prices. Europe has price controls and there are no shortages.

 

[shockerfan]

The public option struck fear in the hearts of the insurance companies and their greedy ways. Imagine it, they would’ve had to COMPETE! Maybe even lower costs, frivolity, streamline, lower premiums, and stop letting their CEO’s go party it up in Vegas! The Far Right went out of their way to make sure health care for the masses died. Greed, pure and simple, clothed in a “constitutional” patriotic cellophane.

Also, what I find amazing is that liberals have no sense of history. None. All you have to do is look at the government’s track record (or Massachusettes track record) in running healthcare programs. Higher costs and insolvency is what you see.

Perhaps people with your mindset would be more persuasive if you would have said, lets pick a state, a small state, and test run a program there. If it doesn’t work, we’ll keep tinkering with it until we get it right. Then, and only, then, we will try to implement at a few other states. Then if you get repeatable results, take it national.

But no, liberals insisted on forcing this stupid law on the whole country at one time. A law THEY ARE ALREADY ISSUING EXEMPTIONS TO, A law the author, the House Speaker, the Senate majority leader didn’t read before voting on it. Its as if they tried to fail. So I guess you can say they succeeded at failing. And for that, God willing, tonight they will be fired. Unfortunately, we have their bill to pay for (as do our children and grandchildren.)

 

[LemonAndLime]

What is un-Christian is to steal money away from others, against their will who have earned that income by the sweat of their brow, and then give it to somebody who didn’t earn it, in the name of charity.

That very much sounds to me like donating to charity, which we as Christians are very much encouraged to do. The way you put it, its evil to give to charity.

 

[Ridgerunner]

The public option struck fear in the hearts of the insurance companies and their greedy ways. Imagine it, they would’ve had to COMPETE! Maybe even lower costs, frivolity, streamline, lower premiums, and stop letting their CEO’s go party it up in Vegas! The Far Right went out of their way to make sure health care for the masses died. Greed, pure and simple, clothed in a “constitutional” patriotic cellophane.

Except, of course, that the great majority of people in the U.S. already have health coverage and that Obamacare won’t cover most of the ones who didn’t. But again, Obamacare was intended to fail, and will fail. The public option will be their next move. The left will say “See, insurance company greed made everybody’s premiums skyrocket and made Obamacare fail. We need to get the insurers out of this and adopt full socialization.” Everybody knows that.

Then, the wealthy will buy their insurance abroad and get treatment abroad; likely in new (American) clinics in Mexico. Pity the wealthy Canadians who will have to travel all the way to Monterrey to escape their system, instead of to Hartford or New York the way they do now.

 

[rlg94086]

That very much sounds to me like donating to charity, which we as Christians are very much encouraged to do. The way you put it, its evil to give to charity.

Which charities take money from people “against their will?”

 

[shockerfan]

I know that the pharmaceutical industry has an outrageously high profit margin and net income and that Americans are charged many times the amount of money for the exact same product than citizens of any other country and there’s no valid reason for it.

The first fault with your scenario is that there are other companies willing to pick up the slack. The second is your assumption that the pharmaceutical industry would rather collectively pack up and put themselves out of business than simply reduce their prices. Europe has price controls and there are no shortages.

1. So why is the solution to implement a national healthcare program, as opposed to (for example) letting Americans purchase drugs from Canada? Why buy a whole new car, when you just need to change the tire?
2. False, shortages abound until manufacturing caught up. Until then, people were in the dark without electricity, in many cases due to price controls preventing people who had generators on hand from going the extra mile to get them to LA.

Regarding the pharmaceutical industry. I am saying that the cost to develop drugs is very very high. Price controls will be a disincentive to developing many new drugs. Sure, they can drop price on some drugs…the ones with the lowest risk. But if you think that they will develop new experimental drugs that might be risky, they you are mistaken. For a high risk, you need a high reward, otherwise it won’t happen.

 

[j1akey]

Compete? Again, Medicare, Medicaid and federal employees’ insurance are all administered by private insurance companies, because the government can’t do it with the efficiency the insurance companies can. There wouldn’t be any real competition in administration. The government would simply hire insurance companies to do more for it than they now do. There would be competition in the premiums because the government could simply tax everybody more in order to subsidize the premiums. But that’s not true competition.

I’m not sure about Medicaid and the federal empoyees insurance but for Medicare only Medicare Part D is administered by private companies though it is regulated through the medicare program. Parts A, B and C are administered through the government.

 

[LemonAndLime]

Which charities take money from people “against their will?”

Because of course, there would be not benefit in having a similar system that we have in the NHS. The amount of taxes I pay in my life just on the NHS will never exceed the amount I’ll save. No one is denying that a tax in place of fees will save money, its kinda like saying “but they’ve giving me christmas presents against my free will!”

 

[EmperorNapoleon]

1. So why is the solution to implement a national healthcare program, as opposed to (for example) letting Americans purchase drugs from Canada? Why buy a whole new car, when you just need to change the tire?

Because there is still the issue of providing healthcare coverage to those who can’t afford it.

Regarding the pharmaceutical industry. I am saying that the cost to develop drugs is very very high. Price controls will be a disincentive to developing many new drugs. Sure, they can drop price on some drugs…the ones with the lowest risk. But if you think that they will develop new experimental drugs that might be risky, they you are mistaken. For a high risk, you need a high reward, otherwise it won’t happen.

The problems that you’ve mentioned simply don’t exist in countries which already have socialized healthcare. The pharmaceutical industry also spends many times the amount of money on marketing and lobbying than it does on acctual research and development.

 

[Ridgerunner]

I know that the pharmaceutical industry has an outrageously high profit margin and net income and that Americans are charged many times the amount of money for the exact same product than citizens of any other country and there’s no valid reason for it.

The first fault with your scenario is that there are other companies willing to pick up the slack. The second is your assumption that the pharmaceutical industry would rather collectively pack up and put themselves out of business than simply reduce their prices. Europe has price controls and there are no shortages.

It’s not all roses for the drug companies. nytimes.com/2010/11/03/business/03pfizer.html?partner=yahoofinance.

European governments also bury the cost of their drugs in their general budgets, since many of them are the actual buyers of the drugs. You can subsidize anything and make it cheaper for the consumer.

 

[Ridgerunner]

I’m not sure about Medicaid and the federal empoyees insurance but for Medicare only Medicare Part D is administered by private companies though it is regulated through the medicare program. Parts A, B and C are administered through the government.

No they aren’t. The actual administration is done by private insurance companies. I have had occasion to be involved in disputes with Medicare concerning coverages and approved procedures. Around here, anyway, you work it out with Blue Cross/Blue Shield. In other places it might be another insurer. I’ll agree that the government has some different coding processes, different approved combinations etc. But that’s a matter of using one computer program instead of another.

 

[rlg94086]

What is un-Christian is to steal money away from others, against their will who have earned that income by the sweat of their brow, and then give it to somebody who didn’t earn it, in the name of charity.

That very much sounds to me like donating to charity, which we as Christians are very much encouraged to do. The way you put it, its evil to give to charity.

Which charities take money from people “against their will?”

Because of course, there would be not benefit in having a similar system that we have in the NHS. The amount of taxes I pay in my life just on the NHS will never exceed the amount I’ll save. No one is denying that a tax in place of fees will save money, its kinda like saying “but they’ve giving me christmas presents against my free will!”

Your response makes no sense. First of all, you didn’t answer my question. Secondly, taxes are not charity and government-run healthcare is not a gift.

 

[doanli]

My premiums went up substantially this past summer.

My company renews our benefits every July. I dread what the news is going to be in July 2011. Wondering if they’ll even offer it because it may be too expensive for them to carry anymore.

 

[gurneyhalleck1]

I have mixed feelings about this. First of all, what is wrong with the insurance system is that since we’re a free society and a republic with choices in the hands of consumers, consumers make lousy choices. Take Sam. He eats doughnuts for dinner each night, smokes cigarettes, eats at McDonald’s and downs Big Macs for dinner. He doesn’t walk, jog, exercise, or give a dang about his health. He sits around watching the boob-toob after work. He has diabetes, hypertension, high cholesterol.

He has Blue Cross and so do I. I am a vegetarian (I actually am). I am about 20 lbs overweight but I watch my blood pressure, walk a lot, try to stay active, eat whole grains, low fat soymilk, some occasional sweets, low carbs, plenty of vegetables and fruits, organic lifestyle, etc. We both have the same insurance. Gurney is paying higher premiums for Sam. Sam is a deadbeat. Gurney’s health is good except for the occasional cold or allergy flare-up. My premiums are high because of Mr. Slob.

I resent that. I don’t like paying for this guy! Yet when the government tries to tell McDonald’s to knock off the trans fats or harrasses cigarette companies or tries to get restaurants to offer more healthy choices, tea partiers jump off the couch crying socialism! socialism! They talk out of both sides of their mouths? They hate the fact that the government wants to try to make things healthier thus sticking up for the right to eat junk food and garbage AND YET they sympathize with the insurance companies who are raising their rates precisely because of slobs and junk food-inhalers?

If we want to stick with private insurance only, then we need to do SOMETHING to get people to get healthier. This country is obese. I have travelled overseas many, many times. Trust me, people are not all blimps in other countries, especially Asia and Europe. This country is full of wide-load porkers, convenience foods, slop, preservatives, pestacides, and junk. We are a fat country.

Some people, usually conservatives, cry, “education! education! just education people and we won’t have to be socialists telling us all how to live!” and yet trust me, teachers will get yelled at by tea party parents when we try to teach nutrition at school. “I don’t want to raise my boy an organic, tree-huggin’ hippie boy!” that’s the expected outcome. And it does no good to teach nutrition if mom and dad take the kid to the Micky-Dee’s drive-thru after work and pump 'em full of sodium, fat, and blub.

So what do we do?

One option is to raise the premiums on people who are overweight. Set goals and healthy weight cut-offs. If a person exceeds it by more than a few pounds, their premiums go up 40% a year. They could also give discounts to people who go to gyms and get positive physicals, etc. If they are diabetic, they should drop weight and help deal with it. High blood pressure? Drop weight! Exercise. Give incentives, punish obesity, educate, and the government should try to get restaurants to publish nutrition information, ban certain ingredients, drop higher taxes on chains that shovel out slop like the fast food dives, etc.

If we could be pro-active, punish the obesity-makers, get this country healthier, we wouldn’t have to look at things like the public option.

Now, having said all that, what about people with GENUINE health problems? Some folks have cancer, diabetes from birth, lukemia, parkinsons (like my mom), injuries, you name it. Is it fair to refuse those folks with pre-existing conditions and throw them out in the cold? The Far Right would say “yes” without batting an eye. It’s all $$$, business baby, not a moral issue at all.

We need a balance. and the governments, states, should play a role. As long as we have to be in this as a team with insurance, then as Hillary said, it takes a village. The day that we have insurance companies that only insure one person, then we can have the luxury of keeping government and common sense out. But the world we live in has massive pools of people grouped under one insurance provider and the healthy have to pay for the slobs. Republicans stick up for the right to be a bum, are ok with the sky-rocketing obesity and crisis, and sit on their thumbs with corny plans like tort reform that are somehow going to change the whole scope of things. Nonsense.

Except, of course, that the great majority of people in the U.S. already have health coverage and that Obamacare won’t cover most of the ones who didn’t. But again, Obamacare was intended to fail, and will fail. The public option will be their next move. The left will say “See, insurance company greed made everybody’s premiums skyrocket and made Obamacare fail. We need to get the insurers out of this and adopt full socialization.” Everybody knows that.

Then, the wealthy will buy their insurance abroad and get treatment abroad; likely in new (American) clinics in Mexico. Pity the wealthy Canadians who will have to travel all the way to Monterrey to escape their system, instead of to Hartford or New York the way they do now.

 

[Cider]

Why is that Americans are voting against steps to provide free healthcare when its in your own personal and financial interests?

Before anyone argues about my use of the word “free” - the healthcare is free. You pay tax yes, but it doesn’t increase when you go into hospital therefore you’re not being charged for the care you’re recieving, therefore it is free TO YOU. It’s like paying the postage on what you order but not actually paying for the order itself.

The article might be from earlier this year but it discusses the reasons why people have been against it, from an outsider’s perspective (British). This is where I’m coming from as a British person - I just can’t understand why people are against attempts to make it “free.” The issue of “Obamacare” is very much topical at the moment in the USA, and it’s got us Brits talking again too.

You obviously know little about the US bill that was passed. Nothing is free. It’s a mandate forcing people to purchase health insurance coverage or pay a fine. I think you must be confusing your Brit system with the American bill. Because we don’t have free healthcare, if we go to the hospital it isn’t free, we are still required to pay whatever the deductables and copays ect that are in the terms of our specific insurance policy.