Can you really get free medical care??

[LS2JSTS]

My health insurance plan in two or three sentences.....Reid, are you listening...lol


Eliminate all health insurance, mandate that providers post open and equitable tables of charges for services. All care to be provided on a cash basis. Add tax incentives to the IRS code that gives $1 for $1 reduction in taxes for every dollar that is saved in a "health account" in your name at your bank...end of plan.

It will promote cheaper health care costs and stimulate savings in this country which we desperately need.

 

[CivicFan]

Yes.

 

[FADEC]

Originally Posted By: CivicFan
Originally Posted By: daddi
So then more less all the bills will get "shoved under the rug" at some point, and my friend doesn't have to pay a thing?


Yes, depending on his financial circumstances. he sounds like an alcoholic without a job so he can't pay his bills so they will be written off at some point.


Ya...I'm afraid that's what he's becoming...I haven't seen him in about four years.

 

[CivicFan]

Originally Posted By: Drew99GT
Originally Posted By: CivicFan
Originally Posted By: Drew99GT
Originally Posted By: Rand
I just wish the hospitals wouldnt overcharge 400%

I get a bill for a MRI its 4000$ without insurance..

WITH insurance its 1150..

its no wonder people dont pay when they dont have insurance.


At a minimum, if we do anything with our health care system, they should mandate that objective stated pricing be in affect.

The current system is akin to buying a car with bad credit when they won't list a sales price.


You would need a single payer system for that like Medicare.


Oh please. Our current private system with all it's collusion is as hush hush with finances and pricing as it can get, and you think it'll get better with the government in complete control of it?


Yes.

 

[Drew99GT]

Originally Posted By: CivicFan
Originally Posted By: daddi
So then more less all the bills will get "shoved under the rug" at some point, and my friend doesn't have to pay a thing?


Yes, depending on his financial circumstances. he sounds like an alcoholic without a job so he can't pay his bills so they will be written off at some point.


Under the current system, he at least has some consequences to this. His credit is probably screwed etc.

In some European systems, they essentially take care of addicts and let them continue killing themselves on everyone else dime.

When I go to the hospital vomiting with alcohol poisoning, my fellow BITOGers won't have to pay for it!

 

[CivicFan]

Originally Posted By: LS2JSTS
My health insurance plan in two or three sentences.....Reid, are you listening...lol


Eliminate all health insurance, mandate that providers post open and equitable tables of charges for services. All care to be provided on a cash basis. Add tax incentives to the IRS code that gives $1 for $1 reduction in taxes for every dollar that is saved in a "health account" in your name at your bank...end of plan.

It will promote cheaper health care costs and stimulate savings in this country which we desperately need.


That would have horrendous consequences. If you really think like that, you probably are unable to think beyond your own circumstances or haven't seen much in this life.

 

[LS2JSTS]

Only for those looking for free health care.

And please, feel free to post these dire consequences. I'll shoot them down as you think of them as I have thought this through. The only dire consequences would be for a bunch of bureaucrats living off inflated health costs and a bunch of free loaders looking to get into my pocket book.

People willing to save and plan for their future would be fine. Those willing to live off others hard work, well they can move to Canada. Good health is not a right, any more than good genes are.

 

[CivicFan]

So, according to your "plan", if you don't have enough income, you die in a gutter somewhere?

 

[Drew99GT]

Originally Posted By: CivicFan
Originally Posted By: Drew99GT


Oh please. Our current private system with all it's collusion is as hush hush with finances and pricing as it can get, and you think it'll get better with the government in complete control of it?


Yes.


Medicare's present value unfunded liability today, as I type this, is over $73 billion dollars. That is $10 billion more then world GDP.

In a perfect world, with politicians that aren't corrupt, I think a single payer system could work. It more our less works in countries like Canada, but they don't have deficits that are BIGGER THEN WORLD GDP!!!!!!!!

 

[CivicFan]

You asked about transparent pricing, not the financial situation with medicare. The present value of their future projected liability has nothing to do with the transparent pricing of the H.C. providers.

 

[Drew99GT]

Originally Posted By: CivicFan
Originally Posted By: LS2JSTS
My health insurance plan in two or three sentences.....Reid, are you listening...lol


Eliminate all health insurance, mandate that providers post open and equitable tables of charges for services. All care to be provided on a cash basis. Add tax incentives to the IRS code that gives $1 for $1 reduction in taxes for every dollar that is saved in a "health account" in your name at your bank...end of plan.

It will promote cheaper health care costs and stimulate savings in this country which we desperately need.


That would have horrendous consequences.


I agree on that! Insurance for health coverage is a given - you going to pay cash when your house burns down?

There should be fair competition amongst the insurance and medical industry though, with fair and open pricing.

 

[Drew99GT]

Originally Posted By: CivicFan
You asked about transparent pricing, not the financial situation with medicare. The present value of their future projected liability has nothing to do with the transparent pricing of the H.C. providers.


You said the only way to fair pricing is Medicare. I simply pointed out the fallacy in that logic, as we can't afford what we've already got.

 

[LS2JSTS]

Originally Posted By: CivicFan
So, according to your "plan", if you don't have enough income, you die in a gutter somewhere?



Pretty broad assumption there but what put the person in the "gutter"? Was it their bad decisions or mine? Am I and others who do not live in the gutter responsible for others bad decisions?

I concede, bad decisions and bad genes are vastly different circumstances. As always some sort of government safety net for those either unfortunate or stupid enough to be living in the gutter would have to be continued. But for the cast majority of people, they would be better off then lumped in with the dead beats by default within a single payer system.
Under a single payer system, every consumer would be treated like the lowest common denominator. No thanks!

 

[CivicFan]

Originally Posted By: LS2JSTS
Originally Posted By: CivicFan
So, according to your "plan", if you don't have enough income, you die in a gutter somewhere?



Pretty broad assumption there but what put the person in the "gutter"? Was it their bad decisions or mine? Am I and others who do not live in the gutter responsible for others bad decisions?

I concede, bad decisions and bad genes are vastly different circumstances. As always some sort of government safety net for those either unfortunate or stupid enough to be living in the gutter would have to be continued. But for the cast majority of people, they would be better off then lumped in with the dead beats by default within a single payer system.
Under a single payer system, every consumer would be treated like the lowest common denominator. No thanks!


Dude, imagine you lose your job and are under stress. Then you get a heart attack. You will have little choice but to die in a gutter either at that time or some time later.

 

[CivicFan]

Originally Posted By: Drew99GT
Originally Posted By: CivicFan
You asked about transparent pricing, not the financial situation with medicare. The present value of their future projected liability has nothing to do with the transparent pricing of the H.C. providers.


You said the only way to fair pricing is Medicare. I simply pointed out the fallacy in that logic, as we can't afford what we've already got.


The discussion was about pricing and you asked about "objective stated pricing be in affect", i.e. transparent pricing. Medicare prices are transparent.

 

[LS2JSTS]

Originally Posted By: CivicFan
Originally Posted By: LS2JSTS
Originally Posted By: CivicFan
So, according to your "plan", if you don't have enough income, you die in a gutter somewhere?



Pretty broad assumption there but what put the person in the "gutter"? Was it their bad decisions or mine? Am I and others who do not live in the gutter responsible for others bad decisions?

I concede, bad decisions and bad genes are vastly different circumstances. As always some sort of government safety net for those either unfortunate or stupid enough to be living in the gutter would have to be continued. But for the cast majority of people, they would be better off then lumped in with the dead beats by default within a single payer system.
Under a single payer system, every consumer would be treated like the lowest common denominator. No thanks!


Dude, imagine you lose your job and are under stress. Then you get a heart attack. You will have little choice but to die in a gutter either at that time or some time later.


What about the savings accounts that were established? Combined with the lowered cost of care, a person who is responsible would be fine.
Again, I acknowledge that there would have to be a safety net, for the compassionate among us to feel better about themselves and the good health they enjoy. But that safety net would be cheap compared to the cost of a single payer system.

 

[LS2JSTS]

Originally Posted By: Drew99GT
Originally Posted By: CivicFan
Originally Posted By: LS2JSTS
My health insurance plan in two or three sentences.....Reid, are you listening...lol


Eliminate all health insurance, mandate that providers post open and equitable tables of charges for services. All care to be provided on a cash basis. Add tax incentives to the IRS code that gives $1 for $1 reduction in taxes for every dollar that is saved in a "health account" in your name at your bank...end of plan.

It will promote cheaper health care costs and stimulate savings in this country which we desperately need.


That would have horrendous consequences.


I agree on that! Insurance for health coverage is a given - you going to pay cash when your house burns down?

There should be fair competition amongst the insurance and medical industry though, with fair and open pricing.


With one big exception. In housing when someones house burns down it is an easy task to estimate the amount of lost revenue. The prices are open and readily available and comparable across a large segment of a given market.

In health care the costs are far more flexible and often fraudulant and the incentive not to pay doesnt exists. Fraud and price gouging thrive in the health care industry and barely exist within home insurance due to the open availability of pricing models.

Health Insurance as the only way to run health care is a myth. Cash systems would work if the market were allowed to take over.

 

[Drew99GT]

Originally Posted By: CivicFan
Originally Posted By: Drew99GT
Originally Posted By: CivicFan
You asked about transparent pricing, not the financial situation with medicare. The present value of their future projected liability has nothing to do with the transparent pricing of the H.C. providers.


You said the only way to fair pricing is Medicare. I simply pointed out the fallacy in that logic, as we can't afford what we've already got.


The discussion was about pricing and you asked about "objective stated pricing be in affect", i.e. transparent pricing. Medicare prices are transparent.


And the program is in more debt then the entire world can payoff, currently. I'd rather not adopt that system just for the sake of transparent pricing!

 

[Drew99GT]

Originally Posted By: LS2JSTS

Health Insurance as the only way to run health care is a myth. Cash systems would work if the market were allowed to take over.


No way. Even with prices that are too inflated today, costs for many medical procedures are too high. Period, end of story.

If you got cancer, even if the free market were to totally purify the medical industry and prices dropped, it would be too expensive to pay cash for 95% of the population. You'd be talking hundreds of thousands of dollars out of pocket.

 

[FADEC]

Wow...I really stirred up a hornets nest here...good discussion though.