Okay, I had a long post before but it wouldn't let me post it so I'll just keep this short and sweet.
You can argue semantics if you like, but it actually has. Problem is regardless of the number of times we have actually doubled the deficit reducing it by $130 billion is still leaving us in a huge gaping whole of a deficit created by Obama himself. I can decrease the deficit by $300 billion if I increase it by $2 trillion first.
Here's the whole quote, not cherry picked, I'm still interpreting it the same way. Am I just reading this wrong????
On the Anne Doig topic, okay so the Canadian health care system isn't as perfect as I thought it was, I'll give you that. However, she's looking to the France and UK systems to come up with solutions (anything but the U.S. really) on effective spending measures. She's also thinking about mixing private and public coverage, isn't that what the U.S. is getting at. Again, these bills aren't single-payer bills. Her father was also one of the more prominent people against Canadian health care reform back in '62, so not doubting her, but she may be a teeeeeensie bit biased.
Originally Posted by
chessknt87 
I'll bite, can you please demonstrate what/how much these private costs are and how the government will be able to run more efficiently?
Last time I checked, medicaid/medical fraud was ~20% whereas in private insurance it was close to 0. I also remember being taught that private companies compete against each other--> most efficient model wins, so why would the government and a haggle of ill-informed senators know more about running a health insurance company than the CEO of Healthnet?.
Even if you give the government the befit of the doubt on every count and hypothetically make every private insurance company nonprofit, youd still only get a few billion (much less that a tort overhaul) saved.
Where are you getting this "few billion saved" rationale from? Everything I've been reading has been showing that adding tort reform would barely put a dent on health care savings compared to comprehensive reform:
http://washingtonindependent.com/55535/tort-reform-unlikely-to-cut-health-care-costs
Also, using the same rationale for competition, wouldn't adding a government plan to compete against the private insurers also lead to more efficient models?
1. Like I said before: lower doctor compensation + more taxes where doctors bear the burden --> lower incentive for doctors to join medicine --> lower demand for going to medical school --> lower quality doctors. Did I say "crappy, uneducated doctors and 3rd world country, rusty health equipment?" No, that's called an
appeal to ridicule.
2. Did I say money comes out of nowhere, or that it doesn't cost money to have reform? No, in fact, I said quite the opposite. And $1 trillion - $600 billion is still very much in the red, just to let you know. And no, $1 trillion is not like $800 billion, it's more like $10 trillion if the same pattern of going over the budget occurs for this government program.
3. You disagreed and stated some non sequitur argument that I don't even want to address. Something along the lines of "giving people money is bad because then they'll buy health insurance, which is bad because health insurance companies are bad." Err, alright. I was trying to say that some people would rather have money than health insurance, and they'd have more
utility than if they all had health insurance.
4. I said nothing about subsidies. Explain how this has any relevance to the laws of supply and demand if that's what you were trying to refute with this non sequitur. You're saying that making health care cheaper makes it more accessible. The point of the article I quoted was that making health care cheaper makes it less accessible by leading to shortages: there is not an infinite supply of healthcare.
1. Silly me, I thought doctors were supposed to be in this profession because they loved what they did and liked helping people. Either way, who says they'll be payed less? These are just your guesses and conspiracy theories, not really any facts or statistics. You can say all you want how this new bill will start the apocalypse, and lead to people eating babies, and create a super AIDS all you want, doesn't make it true until I see some facts or studies on this.
2. Uh yeah, compared to the Republican alternative that would only add to our deficit, and not even reduce it in years to come, I'll still take the Democrat plan, thank you very much.
3. I thought I had a very valid point, I know you're not necessarily for it, you should have read it all the way through even though I had the token liberal "supporting corporate America is bad." I was saying it doesn't do anything to control costs, so we'll ultimately have to pay more for it. Makes perfect sense to me....
4. Did you read the article you posted? It was talking about the proposed Medicare cuts, which are based on subsidies, and I was saying that cutting subsidies really did nothing to quality or affordability for healthcare when added to reform. I thought the whole point of the article was to show how Medicare cuts were bad (which is not, why else would the AARP be for health care reform), not to prove your point about supply and demand, may have read in wrong. Spending boatloads of money doesn't necessarily equate to quality for the record, medical studies have shown that time and time again. And so yeah, prices are allowed to rise on your theory that we have more of a supply, who gets access to it? Only the rich yet again. Damned if you do, damned if you don't according to your theory.
Okay, stopping here. I'm not going to be convinced, you guys aren't going to be convinced. We can all at least agree our system is not great right now, so I'm willing to at least TRY something. I'm not going to wait for another 80 years for something to happen. We're not going to please everyone, and I'm absolutely fine with that. No system is perfect, but I'll give any change a shot because ours is far from it. Good day everyone.
I was hoping to get this reaction out of you. Sorry - didn't mean to offend your kind.
