# Conservative opinion on US health care **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 26, 2009, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356 "2009-07-26T21:42:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![athelas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5e9695/32.png) [@athelas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/athelas)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2009, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/41 "2009-07-27T17:35:51Z")
Hmm, I just stumbled across a blog post relevant to the talk about eeeevil insurance companies: > [@](#): > > “The problem with free-market health insurance is that if a customer develops a truly serious health problem, his insurance company will try very hard to weasel out of the contract… At worst, they’ll claim that you broke the contract somehow, and hope you die before your lawsuit gets to a jury.” > > It seems plausible, no? If your condition is truly catastrophic, won’t profit-maximizing health insurers struggle to “contain their costs” at your expense? > > The problem with this argument is that it proves far too much. The same argument applies to life insurance and home insurance. You dutifully pay your premiums for years. Then you suddenly die, or your house burns down. What’s a profit-maximizing insurer to do? Say you died or the house burned down because you were smoking in bed, of course! Can you prove otherwise? > > Yet in practice, people almost never complain about disingenuous disputes with life or home insurers. Why not? The obvious explanation is that life or home insurance companies that shirk their responsibilities hurt their reputation. It might seem profitable to reject expensive claims, but in the long-run, an insurance company that mistreats its expensive customers is going to have trouble attracting any customers at all. After all, what’s the point of buying insurance from a company that won’t pay when you need it most? > > I agree that there is a popular perception that health insurance is an unusually crooked industry. My main explanation is that customers of health insurance companies have more latitude for unreasonable demands. If your dad dies, the life insurance company owes you $X. If customers ask for $X+1, the firm refuses, and no one sees this as proof that the free market can’t be trusted with life insurance. If you get sick, in contrast, it’s hard for an insurance company to decisively prove that they’ve lived up to their agreement. You can always insist on another expensive test, even if the insurer knows it’s useless… > > Am I saying that health insurance companies never play dirty tricks on their customers? Of course not. It’s a big world, lots of bad stuff happens. What I’m saying, rather, is that reputation works well even in industries where firms have big, lumpy liabilities. There are plenty of examples. What reason is there to think that health insurance isn’t one of them? I would argue that to make the insurance market more accountable, we need to delink employment from insurance, to improve competition for customers. Nevertheless this model does suggest that even a moderate level of consumer choice will lead to accountability for insurers - certainly more than a government insurance monopoly would have. ---
**Author:** ![IdahoMauleMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/71c47a/32.png) [@IdahoMauleMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IdahoMauleMan)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2009, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/42 "2009-07-27T17:44:23Z")
> [@Lightnin](#): > > Because you found a loophole which allowed you to get out of covering me. See _Recission_, above. > > Or I’ve already got an expensive-to-treat disease. Why would you be willing to allow me to buy coverage, knowing that you’re never going to make money off of me? Presumably, you could just charge me an exorbitant premium- but what if I can’t afford that premium? That would assume that there is no competition, and that a monopoly provider to high-risk populations can earn rents from such high premiums. Which isn’t so far off what we have today. The state-by-state over-regulation of the insurance industry practically guarantees a tiny number of providers, thereby reducing choice amongst consumers and driving up premiums. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2009, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/43 "2009-07-27T20:48:56Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > 1. End the employer subsidy of health care. Agreed. > [@](#): > > 1. The government will provide universal catastrophic care, with a deductible indexed to income. I would call it a health care tax, but sure. > [@](#): > > 1. A serious effort will be made to expand the supply of doctors and nurses - not with education subsidies, but by forcing the AMA to accept lower standards for admission, a tiered residency standard, and by encouraging foreign doctors and nurses to emigrate to the United States. point of information: Physician training is subsidized (at the residency level) now. This actually is an indirect source of one of the problems, in that it makes the federal government a monopoly supplier, but not one that sees benefit to itself in maintaining supply, & we’ve had caps on how many residents can be trained. I wish I could see a better way to do it. But do you really plan to take public funding of medical education away, & what should replace it? > [@](#): > > 1. Tort Reform. Defensive medicine is expensive. It’s got to be brought under control. The end of joint and several liability and reforms that require people who bring lawsuits to pay the defendent’s court costs if the judge rules the case to be frivolous would be a good start. I’m out of my depth here, I admit. > [@](#): > > 1. Cass Sunnstein, one of Obama’s advisors, has a very intriguing idea - you can ‘nudge’ people into looking after their own health care by requiring employers to deposit X% of their income in a health savings account. The employee can opt out, but it takes a positive act on their part to do so. Studies have shown that when the default is for money to go into a savings program, the savings rate goes up dramatically. So this is a good way to get people to look after their own health care costs. The amount deposited could be equal to the deductible of the catastrophic coverage at that person’s income level, and the HSAs would be tax deductible. HSA’s again. No. > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > What you have to do is keep the price system working. Under single payer and other universal health care schemes, demand rapidly outstrips supply because there are no price constraints on consumers. In Canada, people take their kids to the doctor when they have the sniffles, and some people are in the emergency ward every time they get a back twinge or a hard bruise (get an X-ray, just in case!). The only thing that limits this now is the fact that you’ll be waiting all night to get a doctor to look at you. If Canada made it easier to get treatment, they’d get even more people flooding the system. Yeah, that happens with private health insurance too. Try again. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2009, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/44 "2009-07-28T03:07:10Z")
I’m **a** conservative. I speak for no other but myself on this issue. One of the big problems, I think, is that people believe health care is a right. I think it would be nice if it it was, but it’s not. It’s just not possible for it to be one. To explain, a person may live a long and healthy life, and then come down with a terrible, and ultimately fatal illness. In ye olden days, the family would usually take such a person home, make him as comfortable as possible, and allow nature to take it’s course. Nowadays we will engage in heroic measures to try to sustain that life, and we will often succeed, at great financial cost for a number of years. There is an argument here about the **quality** of life being sustained, but that would be on a case by case basis, and is not for me to evaluate. I will say that to sustain life for just a little longer we put people through tortures that are unjustifiable in any other context. We would not be this cruel to our dogs. A final, catastrophic illness, at advanced age often comes with a huge financial burden. The current thinking seems to be that the resources we must commit to sustaining that life are to be spent without question, as a matter of right. As people live to be older, and the technology to sustain life improves, these costs can only go up. We spend a lot of money prolonging inevitable outcomes. Not only do I not think this is right, I also think that it’s not a right. We are not obligated to do so as a society. If a person in such circumstances has the means to pay for it, so be it. If not, then no. I know that’s callous, but I don’t think it’s me being callous. The simple fact is that what is becoming technologically possible in postponing the inevitable given unlimited funds surpasses our possibility of funding it. There is no societal triage. There should be if the society is paying for it. That’s one problem. * * * My main objection is more basic. I believe that the government cannot give us anything. We give to the government. I think allowing the government into our lives over such basic choices as health care is selling out our freedom for an intangible and negligable benefit. It is not the government’s job our responsibility to take care of us in this way. The government should not feed us, clothe us, provide us healthcare. It is not our mommy. We are responsible for ourselves. We take care of ourselves, and we take care of the government. All the government can do is take from us. While I realize the police and the court system are necessary, my interractions with the police and the court system have not been all that positive. They have a lot of power and all too often and arbitrary and uncaring in the application of that power. Same for the DMV. Same for public schools, the IRS. My interractions with the government have universally been dealing with vast, complacent, wasteful, and uncaring bureaucracies. I wish to minimize my involvement with them simply because they are rarely positive. I think the idea of giving such greater power over our lives is simply crazy. We’re voting ourselves into slavery. The scariest words in the English language are “I’m from the government, and I’m here to help you.” The government can’t help us, and we shouldn’t believe it can, or expect it to. The simple belief that it can creates a moral hazard. I think we need to be responsible for ourselves. Then too, I think that many of the problems we face in the healthcare system stem from government interference. More government interference is not the answer. To steal a quote from my liberal brethren “we can’t drill our way out of this problem.” Our expectations are simply unrealistic. So, to answer the OP, my stance is that healthcare in the US is flawed. Having the government take it over is like trying to save a drowning man by throwing water at him. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2009, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/45 "2009-07-28T03:22:12Z")
Another thought: We seem to be able to provide a pretty reasonable level of healthcare to our dogs at pretty reasonable costs without excessive bureaucracy, or governmental interference. It seems to me that the healthcare system for our pets is better than it us for us, not just from a cost standpoint, either. Our pets get good service from competent caring individuals in a timely manner with a minimum of regulatory interference at a reasonable price. The four main differences are: 1. We pay for our pets out our own pockets rather than getting a third party to pay, so we are cognizant and aware of costs and interested in keeping them down while making sure we receive maximum benefit for our dollar. 2. Vets don’t customarily get sued for gazillions of dollars. 3. Less bureaucracy. 4. Reasonable expectations. We don’t seek unlimited heroic interference at great cost for our pets especially in the face of an inevitable outcome. I do think we treat our pets better than ourselves in this regard. ---
**Author:** ![flickster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/7bcc69/32.png) [@flickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flickster)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2009, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/46 "2009-07-28T03:43:06Z")
In reference to [an article by Robert Pear](http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/nation/6548543.html) of the _New York Times_, which appeared in the _Houston Chronicle_ today. > [@](#): > > Under the House bill and a similar measure approved by the Senate health committee, premium subsidies would be available to families with incomes up to four times the poverty level, or $88,200 for a family of four. With income at that level, a family could be required to pay as much as 12.5 percent of its income in premiums under the Senate bill and 11 percent under the House measure. WTF That’s about $212 per week, which is about $100 more per week than I am currently paying through my employer’s group health plan. > [@](#): > > But Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., acknowledged that “there are some questions’” about whether insurance would be affordable. “People who are making $50,000 or $60,000 a year and are spending $13,000 on health insurance may not get much of a subsidy,” said Wyden, a member of the Finance Committee. again, WTF > [@](#): > > “Under the bill approved by the Senate health committee,” Finan said, “a family with annual income of $40,000 could obtain subsidies, but would still have to pay premiums of $1,760 and as much as $2,320 in co-payments and deductibles, for a total of $4,080, or 10 percent of family income. And they might have to pay more if they use specialists outside the network of doctors in their health plan.” WTF, WTF, WTF Is anyone paying attention to any of this? What is the advantage? Middle class America get’s bent over the barrel yet again.. Sorry, but this has disaster written all over it… ---
**Author:** ![athelas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5e9695/32.png) [@athelas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/athelas)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2009, 3:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/47 "2009-07-28T03:46:43Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > It seems to me that the healthcare system for our pets is better than it us for us, not just from a cost standpoint, either. Our pets get good service from competent caring individuals in a timely manner with a minimum of regulatory interference at a reasonable price. > > The four main differences are: > > 1. We pay for our pets out our own pockets rather than getting a third party to pay, so we are cognizant and aware of costs and interested in keeping them down while making sure we receive maximum benefit for our dollar. > > 2. Vets don’t customarily get sued for gazillions of dollars. > > 3. Less bureaucracy. > > 4. Reasonable expectations. We don’t seek unlimited heroic interference at great cost for our pets especially in the face of an inevitable outcome. I agree with 1-3. 4 I think is a natural human urge, and the only reason that it is a problem now is because nobody pays when they make the decision to have heroic treatments. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2009, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/48 "2009-07-28T03:48:46Z")
> [@flickster](#): > > That’s about $212 per week, which is about $100 more per week than I am currently paying through my employer’s group health plan. Or about $46 dollars less per week than what I pay for COBRA. It all depends on your point of view. ---
**Author:** ![geezermom67](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/c4cdca/32.png) [@geezermom67](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/geezermom67)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2009, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/49 "2009-07-28T03:57:13Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > Another thought: > > We seem to be able to provide a pretty reasonable level of healthcare to our dogs at pretty reasonable costs without excessive bureaucracy, or governmental interference. > > It seems to me that the healthcare system for our pets is better than it us for us, not just from a cost standpoint, either. Our pets get good service from competent caring individuals in a timely manner with a minimum of regulatory interference at a reasonable price. > > The four main differences are: > > 1. We pay for our pets out our own pockets rather than getting a third party to pay, so we are cognizant and aware of costs and interested in keeping them down while making sure we receive maximum benefit for our dollar. > > 2. Vets don’t customarily get sued for gazillions of dollars. > > 3. Less bureaucracy. > > 4. Reasonable expectations. We don’t seek unlimited heroic interference at great cost for our pets especially in the face of an inevitable outcome. > I do think we treat our pets better than ourselves in this regard. and 5 1. If we can’t afford the treatment, it’s legal to put the pets to sleep ---
**Author:** ![flickster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/7bcc69/32.png) [@flickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flickster)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2009, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/50 "2009-07-28T04:07:49Z")
> [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > Or about $46 dollars less per week than what I pay for COBRA. It all depends on your point of view. Been there, done that as well. I feel for you cause it does suck. However, I knew when I was doing COBRA, it was only temporary, not for the rest of my days… ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2009, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/51 "2009-07-28T04:25:59Z")
> [@flickster](#): > > Been there, done that as well. I feel for you cause it does suck. > > However, I knew when I was doing COBRA, it was only temporary, not for the rest of my days… It’s quite possible it will be the last health insurance I will ever have. My wife is on SSDI and will become eligible for Medicare in about a year. I am 55, self-employed, a cancer survivor, and have had a perforated ulcer, so I expect any insurance I can find will be 1) prohibitively expensive, or 2) so bereft of benefits as to be worthless. I am planning on being a burden to society. ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2009, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/52 "2009-07-28T15:29:50Z")
> [@flickster](#): > > Sorry, but this has disaster written all over it… Why does this shock anybody? Every government program costs thirty-eleven bajillion dollars, is beneficial to four people, and makes life worse for thousands of other people. The only thing I can think that this will do is make people beg for a single-payer national health care system. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2009, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/53 "2009-07-28T15:32:56Z")
> [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > …I am planning on being a burden to society. Stealing an embarassingly corny pop-culture line, because it works: You’re not heavy. You’re our brother. ---
**Author:** ![IdahoMauleMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/71c47a/32.png) [@IdahoMauleMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IdahoMauleMan)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2009, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/54 "2009-07-28T15:52:13Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > I believe that the government cannot give us anything. We give to the government. I think allowing the government into our lives over such basic choices as health care is selling out our freedom for an intangible and negligable benefit. It is not the government’s job our responsibility to take care of us in this way. The government should not feed us, clothe us, provide us healthcare. It is not our mommy. We are responsible for ourselves. We take care of ourselves, and we take care of the government. All the government can do is take from us. > We’re voting ourselves into slavery. The scariest words in the English language are “I’m from the government, and I’m here to help you.” Good God. A voice of reason, seemingly from the Heavens. You just made my day, Mr (or Mrs?) Scylla. I have renewed faith in the readers and posters on the SDMB. Huzzah! Huzzah, I say! ---
**Author:** ![tumbleddown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e9bcb4/32.png) [@tumbleddown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tumbleddown)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2009, 6:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/55 "2009-07-29T06:44:17Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > I believe that the government cannot give us anything. We give to the government. I think allowing the government into our lives over such basic choices as health care is selling out our freedom for an intangible and negligable benefit. Do you deny that government run healthcare works and provides exceptional service (since there are no recission issues, if nothing else) for our senior citizens, our completely indigent, our government employees and our military members and their families? ---
**Author:** ![Ruminator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b9bd4f/32.png) [@Ruminator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruminator)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2009, 12:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/56 "2009-07-29T12:42:26Z")
> [@tumbleddown](#): > > Do you deny that government run healthcare works and provides exceptional service (since there are no recission issues, if nothing else) People who look at the total picture would deny that it “works” because that word also must include a sustainable way to pay for it across generations. It has to “work” even with upside down demographics. People only say it “works” because they only look at the benefits payout instead looking deeper into the program’s total cashflow in to the fund and out of it. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2009, 1:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/57 "2009-07-29T13:02:31Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > I believe that the government cannot give us anything. We give to the government. I think allowing the government into our lives over such basic choices as health care is selling out our freedom for an intangible and negligable benefit. It is not the government’s job our responsibility to take care of us in this way. The government should not feed us, clothe us, provide us healthcare. It is not our mommy. We are responsible for ourselves. We take care of ourselves, and we take care of the government. All the government can do is take from us. > … > > So, to answer the OP, my stance is that healthcare in the US is flawed. Having the government take it over is like trying to save a drowning man by throwing water at him. We’re so lucky that the Apollo project, Interstate Highway System, and TVA just magically appeared with no government involvement. And just think where we’d be if those wonderful wonderful corporations hadn’t set up Social Security and Medicare out of the goodness of their hearts. And isn’t it nice that we can eat food and take medications that have been inspected and tested without any government involvement? Gosh, this libertarian paradise is just so wonderful! ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2009, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/58 "2009-07-29T14:28:36Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > And just think where we’d be if those wonderful wonderful corporations hadn’t set up Social Security and Medicare out of the goodness of their hearts. I suspect that if a private corporation tried to set up Social Security in its present form, they would be arrested for creating a Ponzi scheme. Of course, if a corporation had set up Medicare, maybe they would not have structured it so that it will eventually cost more than all current government programs [put together](http://www.parapundit.com/archives/004162.html). Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2009, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/59 "2009-07-29T15:01:08Z")
Still, where would we be without it? SS has given independence to a great many seniors who otherwise would have had to move in with their kids. Without Medicare, what would the mortality rate of the elderly be? ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2009, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356/60 "2009-07-29T15:14:56Z")
Hey, I think Shodan is really making some progress with the cite thing, supplying us with intelligent, responsible expertise on the issues! Such as: > [@](#): > > …This is partially a result of the rise of Hispanics as a percentage of the US population. Hispanics are medically uninsured at two and half time the rate of whites. You see, we do not have enough of a financial problem already from an aging population. We need to add to the ranks of the welfare state recipients by importing lots of low skilled workers who, in turn, have lots of children who grow up to be low skilled workers. I’m thinking our elites are sort of like the Manchurian Candidate but on a massive scale. They are doing more damage by supporting mass immigration than all the convicted traitors in US history. > > We need to stop the immigration of all lower IQ people… How refreshing! Clear-eyed, hard-headed realism, not like wishy-washy liberal sites, sobbing endlessly over the plight of the undeserving, many of whom cannot even speak passable English, and are diluting and debasing our cultural heritage in places like San Diego, Las Cruces, San Jacinto… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conservative-opinion-on-us-health-care/504356.md?page=4)