Health Insurance

The BBQ Pit
81

How ridiculous is your take on universal healthcare when it can be summed up as “Well golly gee, it benefits me.” As if any critic of socialized medicine would claim that nobody benefits from the policy.

That’s the whole point, if it is such a value proposition for you, maybe somebody else is getting fucked in that distorted economy. Does that enter the blinkered minds of the social democrat? No, they’re content to leisurely lap up the skimmings from the hapless taxpayer, who’s resultant poverty is assuaged by increasing global output thanks to capital accumulation and the ever-expanding global division of labor.

82

OK, Will, how do you explain all the other countries that manage universal health coverage without going bankrupt? I’m not seeing any groups of people getting fucked by universal coverage, unlike in our system where the poor and chronically ill ARE getting fucked.

83

Anyone who pays more, in taxes, for healthcare than they consume is getting abused.

I don’t like the US system with its labyrinthine regulations and big pharma plays, so it’s very clear a lot of people are being abused in this current system. Our system is a result of our politics (and to a certain extent an unhealthy culture), which is messed up big time. I do not want to surrender healthcare to that political system.

84

What complete nonsense. Is anyone who pays more for private insurance (health or any other kind) than they consume in insurance payouts also getting “abused”? And do you seriously believe that people with greater healthcare needs generally deserve to be sick, and should be left to die if they can’t afford to pay?

The point is that the private insurance model doesn’t work for healthcare, because people have widely differing healthcare needs. Every country except the U.S. has realized that a principal public insurance pool providing UHC should be funded out of general taxation. The social principle is that under a Rawlsian veil of ignorance we don’t know if our healthcare needs will be high or low; so part of the social contract of living in a civilized country should be that we all make a mandatory contribution to an insurance pool for UHC. The simplest way to implement mandatory insurance is to fund it through general taxation. Of course some participants will consume more of the insurance pool than others. That’s the underlying risk-sharing principle of all insurance.

85

How so? We will be paying the government instead of an insurance company.

86

I knew when I saw the poster name that the post would consist of noxious emanations from your asshole. I was curious to see the details since abject ignorance is always amusing, and there it is.

The “value proposition”, you blathering shitstain, is that it’s not a zero-sum game and everyone benefits from UHC because the costs are on average about half of what you poor fuckers have to pay, and it covers everyone unconditionally for everything that’s medically necessary. It’s your fucked-up system that’s unsustainable, collapsing under its own paperwork and profiteering mercenaries. I feel terrible for the poor unfortunates that are stuck with it but I can at least have the satisfaction of knowing that you, personally, deserve it.

87

Oh, it is sustainable, as we pay a lot of money, and Doctors, hospitals and drug companies get it. We don’t want to die, after all.
It may be difficult to convince someone of your argument by calling them a “shit stain”.

88

“Not sustainable” means it eats up a rapidly growing larger and larger part of the entire nation’s GDP. The operative picture here is: boat (b), water coming in (x), water being pumped out (y), where x >> y.

Very difficult, I’m sure. Fortunately, my objective with certain posters like that one is not to change their minds, assuming they even have one. My objective is to ridicule them.

89

Even assuming your premise is correct, it requires you to take a ridiculously short-term view. I am currently being “abused” by dint of the fact that I pay into Medicare yet don’t consume it. I currently pay for health insurance that “abuses” me because I don’t need it right now. The whole point of health insurance is that consumption of health services is unpredictable.

I am also getting abused by local taxes because I have never needed the fire department. Somehow, that doesn’t bother me (nor apparently my other non-fire-prone fellow citizens).

90

Well, truth IS generally considered to be an absolute defense…

91

Wait, WillFarnaby thinks that it’s the Baby Boomers who are pushing for UHC? They’re happy with the status quo, because they’ve already got their socialized medicine, and screw all the rest of us.

92

Did you do any research to back that up, or just guess?

93

Per capita, looks like we’re #2 behind Japan. So in absolute numbers we’ve got more than anybody.

I’d say that per capita is the meaningful stat for this discussion.

94

OK

95

Not sure why the 3rd and 20th letters in our funny alphabet come to mind.

96

Thanks for the explanation.

97

For those cretins who rail that the UHC tax-burdens are onerous and will send the poor taxpayer into a miserable poverty, have you bothered to actually investigate the costs to the individual?

In Australia, our UHC is called MEDICARE (not to be confused with the US one). It covers everyone from cradle to grave, and apart from some specific treatments like some cosmetic surgeries, every illness and every accident is covered under the scheme. MOSTLY there are no out-of-pocket expenses (deductibles) if you are treated as a ‘public patient’.*

Only people working are charged a MEDICARE LEVY, and it is sourced via the Taxation Office. It is set as a percentage of your annual gross income, and as a point of interest:

A single person earning $80,000 per year will pay $1,600 as their total contribution towards our UHC.

That is ONE THOUSAND, SIX HUNDRED DOLLARS folks.

Now that person might not need a great deal of medical treatment in any given year, but hey, who knows what’s around the corner, right? Let’s say last year he visited his GP 3 times, and maybe needed a check by a specialist dermatologist at a public hospital to rule out some suspicious spots on his shoulder. Without Medicare, he probably would have paid around $600 (eg) so his contribution is considerably more than what he would have paid out.

But THIS year he was involved in a nasty accident, spent 3 weeks in hospital (3 separate surgeries while an inpatient) then another 3 weeks in a rehab unit. Then daily visits by a home-care nurse and weekly followup through an outpatient clinic at the hospital.

It cost our patient NOTHING. NOT A SINGLE CENT. But you can bet it cost Medicare many tens of thousands of dollars…that is paid for by EVERYONE putting in to the system.

This is how it works.

Now show me a private medical insurance policy in the US that costs $1600 per year that doesn’t leave you with huge expenses anyway!

98

No. I referred to the EKG I had several years ago at the government hospital, but by chance I visited a private hospital exactly one month ago, and am looking at my cash receipt right now. I’ll show this exact bill verbatim, the only change being to divide by 33.44 to convert Thai ฿ to U.S. $. This private hospital is the best hospital within a 2-hour drive from my house, is very competent and even luxurious-looking. It receives no government subsidy and caters only to upscale patients — the “UHC” here supports only government hospitals.

I do not have any health insurance, so these prices are complete, not just co-pays. I hadn’t visited my cardiologist for several years; he gave me a blood panel test and a treadmill test, and spent a while talking to me.
$1.46 – Medical supplies
$38.28 – Chemistry lab (Blood test)
$74.76 – EST (Cardiac treadmill test)
$8.97 – Electrocardiogram
$1.50 – Packaged Medical (Outpatient service) charge
$11.96 – Physician evaluation and management

$136.93 – Total

As you can see, the EKG was only $9 even at this expensive hospital. This is NOT the EKG automatically included in the treadmill test; for some reason he also had them do a preliminary EKG in another room before the treadmill.

ETA: He said I did very well on the treadmill test :slight_smile: … though I was panting very heavily by the end.
.

99

:confused: Is this what they teach you on the YouTube channel that also teaches you an incorrect definition of “money”?

In any system, whether based on taxes or insurance premiums, those who do not suffer illness or injury will subsidize those who do. This is called “abuse” only by those whose brains have atrophied due to over-exposure to despicable and/or stupid right-wing memes.

In another breaking news development, two plus two is still four.

100

But the doctors in America are better because they are driven by the profit motive to excel, whereas your kangaroo doctors are just happy to hop around and don’t really understand the concept of fiat currencies or lamborghinis.