Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

Ted Cruz

7 (6.5%)

Rick Santorum

16 (14.8%)

Michelle Bachmann

13 (12%)

Chris Christie

23 (21.3%)

Rand Paul

49 (45.4%)

Total Members Voted: 107

[Helgoland]

And frankly, Italy has the second best national healthcare (second only to France). We are better than you, Americans.
Where does that leave you, uh, if even Italy is better?

Germany's pretty good, too - does anyone have a breakdown/comparison of European health care systems?

[Darvi]

I'm pretty sure if North Korea had any health-care to speak of, they'd be better than America. :I

Their healthcare consists of killing anybody who complains that their healthcare is bad.

[Helgoland]

Their healthcare consists of killing anybody who complains.

FTFY

[Loud Whispers]

I'm pretty sure if North Korea had any health-care to speak of, they'd be better than America. :I

Their healthcare consists of killing anybody who complains that their healthcare is bad.

100% satisfaction guaranteed!

[Helgoland]

I'm pretty sure if North Korea had any health-care to speak of, they'd be better than America. :I

Their healthcare consists of killing anybody who complains that their healthcare is bad.

100% satisfaction guaranteed!

Don't give the US corporations any ideas...

[misko27]

I'm pretty sure if North Korea had any health-care to speak of, they'd be better than America. :I

Now that isn't fair. North Korea can't even build a snowlift. And we have many snow lifts, of many shapes and sizes.

[GreatJustice]

In related news, GOP may be in agreement with some of the ACA

The interesting thing is that, in the US, costs have tended to increase drastically whenever it moves closer towards a socialized or semi-socialized system

Please substantiate your extremely dubious proposition or retract it.

Your argument is invalid the instant it starts comparing "private insurance" costs to Medicare and Medicaid, when, in fact, private insurance is so incredibly controlled through coverage mandates (even ignoring the ACA) and statewide restrictions that it has exactly the same problems. Compare the graph provided earlier with this:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Not saying your point is invalid, but perhaps you shouldn't raise hay about someone comparing private insurance to Medicare/Medicaid and then immediately present a graph that does so.

And on the subject of pharmaceuticals, I would absolutely love (love) a law that bans the advertisement of prescription medication. You could, say, advocate awareness of a disease, but since people can't buy prescriptions of their own accord, there is no purpose advertising it! I do know the real reason is to hopefully get unfortunate saps to berate their doctor until the one with the actual knowledge has to give up and just prescribe the damn thing. That's another, practical reason to ban them.

The two primary issues with drug costs in America are that doctors are basically forced to recommend expensive treatment, even when uneconomical, because of tort law (an American doctor that recommends a treatment that costs thousands of dollars less but is 1% less effective is held responsible if it doesn't work because the other treatment might have worked) and that generic drugs are held back by patent laws (leading to drugs costing thousands of dollars up until being released to the general public).

Your argument is invalid the instant it starts comparing "private insurance" costs to Medicare and Medicaid, when, in fact, private insurance is so incredibly controlled through coverage mandates (even ignoring the ACA) and statewide restrictions that it has exactly the same problems. Compare the graph provided earlier with this:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

and it's pretty clear that the bulk of American healthcare expense increases occurred after out of pocket payment began to fall, in short, when healthcare started to become more "socialized". I can go into more detail about what specific issues the system has, but I've had this argument so many times that I'd rather not explain every little problem with the American system.

This doesn't even remotely resemble an actual comparison of healthcare payment systems.  You just picked statistics that are relating to the same general topic and showed that the trendline in that which you deem virtuous leads in the right direction.  This is the most disingenous graph you have yet to post.  Or are you actually so ignorant you don't realize that out of pocket expenses (copays) are part of the same system as insurance?  I have trouble believing this is the case unless you are a child with wealthy parents who has never paid for any healthcare in your life.

Congrats GreatJustice, you have outdone yourself.

Oh wait, you are a Canadian.  Well maybe this should be a wakeup call that you are talking about something that you are transparently ignorant about.

Copays are utterly irrelevant when they are a tiny fraction of what a person pays for in comparison to actual out of pocket expenses for a person without insurance. Are you seriously arguing that having to pay for ~15% of your actual treatment constitutes "out of pocket expenses" in the way that actually, you know, paying the doctor/hospital yourself is (as was the case most of the time before the HMO Act and almost all of the time before WW2)?

This is besides the point that, again, up until the 70s, American healthcare was as cheap as in any other country (nearly all of which already had socialized systems, by the way) and of similar quality. Prices only shot past CPI after healthcare began to be dominated by insurance companies and people were divorced from their costs. I could continue, but for once, I'm going to ask you; what do you think caused this sudden, inexplicable increase in costs?

[Owlbread]

I'm pretty sure if North Korea had any health-care to speak of, they'd be better than America. :I

Now that isn't fair. North Korea can't even build a snowlift. And we have many snow lifts, of many shapes and sizes.

Well North Korea used to have free health care that was pretty decent (better than what a lot of Americans get now) before the wall came down and they resorted to using beer bottles for IVs.

[lue]

This is besides the point that, again, up until the 70s, American healthcare was as cheap as in any other country (nearly all of which already had socialized systems, by the way) and of similar quality. Prices only shot past CPI after healthcare began to be dominated by insurance companies and people were divorced from their costs. I could continue, but for once, I'm going to ask you; what do you think caused this sudden, inexplicable increase in costs?

I personally think it's the lack of socialized health care that's shot up the prices, though admittedly I only hold this as a factless opinion at the moment.

Having read your original post, I fear I may have misunderstood your initial point. I was under the impression you said that all social systems increase costs, when you actually said it was just the US. (Apologies for that.) Do you have any support for the idea the Only In America, would socialized healthcare be more expensive? Is it just the fact that it's partially implemented? Or what? I would find it incredulous that only the US couldn't succeed at this goal.

And once more on Big Pharma: I didn't say ads would be the only step, but it certainly would help a bunch. I can imagine those "disease advocacy" ads could point to an informational website, which just so happens to mention Foozatril way more often than Prescriptix. There are most likely many other things you'd have to watch out for once there's an ad-ban.

Also, that particular facet of tort law sounds hideous. The motivation for its existence is understandable, however one should remind the lawmakers that medicine is more than just "pick the one that wins most often".

[mainiac]

Are you seriously arguing that having to pay for ~15% of your actual treatment constitutes "out of pocket expenses" in the way that actually, you know, paying the doctor/hospital yourself is (as was the case most of the time before the HMO Act and almost all of the time before WW2)?

No, I am arguing that you are profoundly ignorant as to the actual composition of the market structure in the US.  People paying out of pocket do so because they are too poor to afford insurance and live in a state with bad medicaid.  They aren't economizing, they're getting sick for lack of treatment.  Out of pocket expenses are dominated by co-pays and deductibles.  They are not trending downward because of cost controls, but because the rate at which they rise is less than the rate at which insurance costs as a whole arise.  You are pointing to a change in the composition of insurance.

You seriously should learn some of the very basics about the way this actually works before you lecture us about it.  The fact that you thought out of pocket and private insurance rates indicated different payment plans shows you have no business pretending for a second you know how the hell this works.

[Chaoswizkid]

Do you have any support for the idea the Only In America, would socialized healthcare be more expensive? Is it just the fact that it's partially implemented? Or what? I would find it incredulous that only the US couldn't succeed at this goal.

US can succeed. Problem is that the current method likely won't cut it for that. Our version of socialized healthcare is mandatory insurance which isn't doing anything to cut costs. The price of healthcare isn't dropping. In fact, since there are some new taxes on aspects of healthcare being implemented to help cover the government's cost of paying for portions of healthcare for the unemployed or impoverished, healthcare costs might actually rise. There's nothing that's actually cutting the cost of the problem, which is our healthcare being ridiculously expensive. It either stays the same or increases due to increasing costs thanks to additional taxes.

[mainiac]

US can succeed. Problem is that the current method likely won't cut it for that. Our version of socialized healthcare is mandatory insurance which isn't doing anything to cut costs.

Except for fixing the problem of adverse selection in the individual market...

You know, the single most important problem.

[NobodyPro]

Suppose you were an idiot, and suppose you were a member of Congress; but I repeat myself.

[Chaoswizkid]

US can succeed. Problem is that the current method likely won't cut it for that. Our version of socialized healthcare is mandatory insurance which isn't doing anything to cut costs.

Except for fixing the problem of adverse selection in the individual market...

You know, the single most important problem.

Oh, see, I thought the most important problem was our healthcare costs from the hospitals and the drug stores. I was ignoring insurance, because insurance payouts are set based on the healthcare costs themselves and the monthly rates are adjusted for that (no sense in charging $300 a month if the risk is that you're likely to only pay $300 for a hospital visit, you know?). I fail to see how adverse selection is the most important problem considering that.

Unless you are applying adverse selection to actual healthcare costs and not insurance, in which case I don't understand and I'd appreciate it if you elaborated.

[mainiac]

US can succeed. Problem is that the current method likely won't cut it for that. Our version of socialized healthcare is mandatory insurance which isn't doing anything to cut costs.

Except for fixing the problem of adverse selection in the individual market...

You know, the single most important problem.

Oh, see, I thought the most important problem was our healthcare costs from the hospitals and the drug stores. I was ignoring insurance, because insurance payouts are set based on the healthcare costs themselves and the monthly rates are adjusted for that (no sense in charging $300 a month if the risk is that you're likely to only pay $300 for a hospital visit, you know?). I fail to see how adverse selection is the most important problem considering that.

Unless you are applying adverse selection to actual healthcare costs and not insurance, in which case I don't understand and I'd appreciate it if you elaborated.

You were asking what the individual mandate does to address costs.  The individual mandate solves the problem of adverse selection.

If you don't have the mandate then only those who expect to have high costs would buy insurance, leading to escalating prices and people not having insurance.  But solving the problem of adverse selection, you create a system where it is now possible for insurance companies to make a profit by holding down costs long term rather than competing to cherry pick customers.  As it is they have no incentive to keep costs down.