freedomdwarf1
Posts: 6845
Joined: 10/23/2012 Status: offline
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ORIGINAL: DesideriScuri quote:
ORIGINAL: freedomdwarf1 I have tried to explain it to you many times Desi. quote:
ORIGINAL: DesideriScuri 1. It's cheaper in other countries. No one here is disputing that. But you are constantly disputing where those cost savings come from. I dispute that the US will see spending drop simply by changing systems. And I have given you dozens of examples in multiple threads of where massive savings are made when insurance companies are not involved and when the spending power of a whole country produce economies of scale. Economies of scale are indisputable facts regardless of where it is applied, including healthcare. You refuse to believe this yet it is proven everywhere there is any single-payer system in operation. quote:
ORIGINAL: DesideriScuri quote:
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ORIGINAL: DesideriScuri 2. No one can show that a country that switched to socialized medicine had costs drop. The only thing anyone can show, is that costs rose slower. So, thinking that costs are going to drop if only the US would switch to a socialized plan, is unproven. UK 1948 - The government unleased the NHS system. Medical costs plummeted and everyone was covered no matter who you were. No more profiteering by private doctors that only the rich could afford. Cite please. I have also given you plenty of cites to prove my point as well as personal examples. Before the NHS was created in 1948, only the affluent could afford to see a doctor or pay for effective medicine. Here's 2 more picked at random - From Star Medical: The National Health Service has grown to become the world’s largest publicly funded health service since its launch in 1948. You could argue it’s the most cost-effective healthcare system in the world in terms of the extent of care it provides, and while its difficulties are widely documented, it’s also internationally renowned as a system for quality healthcare delivery. From Ecenomics Online: Wanless recommended that the current system, based on general taxation, should continue because it achieved the right balance between equity and efficiency. The report was particularly critical of private insurance, regarding a system based on private insurance as: 1) Inequitable - unfair on the less well-off. 2) Having high administration costs 3) No incentive for cost control - note the problem of third-party payment. The Wanless report basically identified that private insurance was not as cost-effective as publicly-funded systems. quote:
ORIGINAL: DesideriScuri quote:
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ORIGINAL: DesideriScuri 3. Continuing to point out (what the Left does; this comment is not directed specifically towards you) that the socialized systems pay, roughly, 50% of what the US pays (overall) is disingenuous, at best. My best guess is that it's considerably LESS than 50% of what a typical US citizen would pay. There are many examples of where a socialised healthcare system caps costs that the US rip-off people. It's typically 50% lower %GDP aggregate spending, isn't it? The UK spends less than most EU countries on healthcare as %GDP. The WHO puts costs per day bed (excluding drugs & diagnostics) at over $1,000/day. A typical day bed in NHS hospitals are just £400/day (about $500). quote:
ORIGINAL: DesideriScuri quote:
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ORIGINAL: DesideriScuri 4. Where are the profits in the US health care system? With the insurance companies. Insurance companies are required, by current law, to spend 80% - at a minimum - of premium revenues directly towards care. If an insurance company had no other costs, outside of covered care - no utilities, no staff, no physical assets, etc. - the most profit they could see is 20%. That doesn't get us to 50% savings. We've had this argument before. The cost of care in the US is a lot higher than elsewhere so that 80% minimum requirement actually buys you less care than elsewhere. When that cost, in itself, is a lot lower, that's where you'll gain your savings. And of course, no profits to account for either. quote:
ORIGINAL: DesideriScuri quote:
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ORIGINAL: DesideriScuri 5. I hope you realize that my only real beef with single payer, is the lack of Constitutional Authority for the Federal Government to do it, and that I've already state many, many times, that I would support a Constitutional Amendment granting the authority to the Federal Government to provide a single payer health system for US citizens. Why would they need authority to do it Desi?? Just introduce it and for those that quailfy or pay into it - let them receive the benefits of the system. People will soon realise just how much better it is than insurance-based systems. That's not how the political system is supposed to work in the US. Any Constitutionality question would be moot if all that had to be done was introduce it. The US system sees all authorities existing within the individual, unless authorities were granted to government. The US Constitution was a compact between the People and the States granting authorities to a Federal Government. It didn't grant all authority to the Federal Government, no matter how an Administration acts. Unless provision of care was an authority granted through the Constitution, it isn't supposed to be allowed to do it. So you are telling me that the US government isn't allowed to offer anything to the people?? That's crap. quote:
ORIGINAL: DesideriScuri quote:
As for the californian system... sounds to me like a parallel insurance-based system; it has all the hallmarks of one. In single-payer systems, you don't "claim" anything and it doesn't exclude people from using other systems if they so choose. It's not exactly parallel. The way I read the legislation, any benefits or services "Healthy California" (that's what the legislation calls it) covers won't be allowed to be covered by other insurance. quote:
This bill would prohibit health care service plans and health insurers from offering health benefits or covering any service for which coverage is offered to individuals under the program, except as provided. So, the choice would be cash or Healthy California for anything HC covers. For everything else, it's cash or private insurance. And as I said earlier, social healthcare doesn't stop anyone claiming on their own insurance policy. Of course, that also means they couldn't use HC for their treatment as they'd be using their own provider. But a true single-payer system doesn't prohibit private plans like HC seems to be doing. So it seems that HC is indeed, nothing more than a fudged insurance-based system as I suspected.
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“If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.” George Orwell, 1903-1950
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