Government Healthcare..........

Psylocide said:
I think you misunderstood me a bit. Yes, I am aware that Health care reform was a huge part of his platform. That being said, he is going about it wrong. Like he said originally, we first need to look out for the Jobs of Americans. We need to address unemployment, 46 million people "need" healthcare, while almost 20 million need jobs. I don't care if you have health insurance or not, if you can't afford shit, you'll either; A. Die or B. Continue to leach off the taxpayers who are going to provide this Healthcare and STILL PAY for welfare, food stamps and all the other shit these deadbeats can't afford.
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The "deadbeats" would still have to buy government run insurance too.

Getting the health care done now could reduce costs to employers and people with jobs which would also help give the economy a boost. Employers with a better/cheaper health care option would potentially have funds freed up to create more jobs etc. This isn't a binary choice where either you do health care, or you create busywork for otherwise unemployed people.

He's first addressing the issues that make him look more benevolent, and that doesn't help anyone.
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It's a more pragmatic issue than that. They have the votes right now. Wait 1-2 years, and proponents like Ted Kennedy are probably dead. If the discussion's tabled, it probably won't be easy to start up again, and will likely never get done.
 
Marginal said:
The "deadbeats" would still have to buy government run insurance too.
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And when they can't afford it... then what?

Marginal said:
Employers with a better/cheaper health care option would potentially have funds freed up to create more jobs etc. This isn't a binary choice where either you do health care, or you create busywork for otherwise unemployed people.
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This also brings up the points of immigration reform, and becoming a more indepenent country. It's not about creating "busywork," it's about making jobs for these people that will improve our economy and self reliance. I'm not saying we could break off from the world, but we could be doing much better.

Marginal said:
If the discussion's tabled, it probably won't be easy to start up again, and will likely never get done.
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Clinton tried it 15 years ago. I guess we'll see what happens this time.
 
Psylocide said:
And when they can't afford it... then what?
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Guess they should get jobs.

This also brings up the points of immigration reform, and becoming a more indepenent country. It's not about creating "busywork," it's about making jobs for these people that will improve our economy and self reliance. I'm not saying we could break off from the world, but we could be doing much better.
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Weatherizing houses will only take you so far. Goofy border fences etc really won't accomplish this.

Clinton tried it 15 years ago.
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All the more reason to push it through while you can.
 
If Obama wants to fix healthcare at this time, cool. But I go to his site for info, and there isn't any definitive info on how he is going to about making change but is pushing hard for it. All he's saying that he's going to change some shit. What?

If this is supposed to be Change I Can Belive In, then tell me how in the world you are going about doing so. Don't just make changes for the sake of making changes. Americans can go a little bit longer without healthcare, especially when they don't take care of themselves in the first place.
 
Malice said:
If Obama wants to fix healthcare at this time, cool. But I go to his site for info, and there isn't any definitive info on how he is going to about making change but is pushing hard for it. All he's saying that he's going to change some shit. What?
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I'm not surprised you don't find much on Obama's site. The actual legislation's largely out of his hands. It tends to be more effective to look at the actual legislation being crafted to achieve those ends rather than glancing at Obama's site since the president can't introduce legislation.

Here's a quick overview.

http://bulletin.aarp.org/yourhealth...-BULL&HBX_OU=50&HBX_PK=house_health_care_bill
 
Marginal said:
It tends to be more effective to look at the actual legislation being crafted to achieve those ends rather than glancing at Obama's site.

http://bulletin.aarp.org/yourhealth...-BULL&HBX_OU=50&HBX_PK=house_health_care_bill
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That still doesn't really put up a good argument for how the plan is going to be funded for 10 years. I seriously doubt anybody believes that the taxes they propose would procure anywhere near what its supposed to according to the legislation. People already like to complain about how rich people are good at not paying their taxes through shenanigans, but you'd also start to see small businesses on the margin just deciding to pay the corporate tax.

And then what? Push the marginal tax rate on rich people past the 52% that this plan would effectively do? Note that 52% is already pretty much higher than every country in the E.U. and we will be getting nowhere near the benefits that these countries give out. Sounds like a plan that should work well. The usual response is just something like, whatever rich people can pay for it, and I'm just going to say that this argument is usually an ideological argument that goes nowhere.

Also, love how democrats like Sebelius are all really keen at making an 8% payroll tax seem to have a negligible effect on the economy. I have no idea how anybody can argue that increasing the cost of employing somebody by 8% or more (if companies decide to provide healthcare) could not have a significant effect in a time of high unemployment.

People who argue that healthcare for everyone will actually save us money needs to actually explain that logic. The effect is at most ambiguous, but it seems to me that it will most likely just be a cost we'd have to pay for rather than free money like people try to put it out to be.

Just look at Medicare, it becomes obvious that providing people with healthcare actually increases the amount of medical expenses incurred because they are paying for health services at a lower marginal cost. I feel a lot of politicians are forgetting that they need to pay not just for the health services in demand now, but also account for the change in demand resulting from an effective change in prices.
 
Psylocide said:
Actually Malice makes a good point, this is really the least of our concerns right now. If you don't have health insurance, quit fucking bitching and get a job. But, Obama wants to be seen as a humanitarian, a president for the people, and a force holier than God himself. He doesn't care about how much money is spent, obviously, look at any of his proposals... I liked his direction during the election, now that he's in, let the BS begin.
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I'm sure the 10% of Americans as of June who find themselves without employment would appreciate your compassion in the current economic climate. They surely must be out of work because they are all lazy loafing whiners who spend their days "fucking bitching" and therefore not looking for work. Apparently making good on your campaign promises is nothing more than a PR stunt, aimed at positioning ones self as the new messiah. I think it's pretty clear what side of the fence you're sitting on, and considering you can't even seem to keep his campaign positions straight, what side you've been sitting on. "Immigration", "leeching", "deadbeats". That little "I liked his direction during the elections" line, a sad and half-hearted attempt to hide your trunk and tusks, sir.

But you needn't worry that much if you don't want to see an end to privatized healthcare. Obama can't force anything through congress without making concessions to private healthcare, because private healthcare has it's tentacles so deeply entrenched in the congress. The largest deadbeats to worry about aren't the jobless Joe Schmoes but the large corporations that are demanding they receive subsidies so that they can compete with a government plan. That said, anyone catch Obama's Address on healthcare the other day?
 
No wonder I couldn't find any info on it because you would never in a million years catch me on AARP's website because I'm gangsta like that.

So basically this plan will be paid for by shifting the burden onto other people, other adjustments, and penalties. Ha. I guess that's an easier plan than actually fixing the broke system we have in place. And people being penalized for not having healthcare is ridiculous. I'm healthy. I don't need to be constantly paying for something I'm rarely going to use.

But to force this on people is ridiculous. This is a bad plan.
 
iKotomi said:
People who argue that healthcare for everyone will actually save us money needs to actually explain that logic. The effect is at most ambiguous, but it seems to me that it will most likely just be a cost we'd have to pay for rather than free money like people try to put it out to be.

Just look at Medicare, it becomes obvious that providing people with healthcare actually increases the amount of medical expenses incurred because they are paying for health services at a lower marginal cost. I feel a lot of politicians are forgetting that they need to pay not just for the health services in demand now, but also account for the change in demand resulting from an effective change in prices.
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Medical expenses are increased when you're paying for them at a lower marginal cost? You're going to have to explain to me how paying a 15% mark-up increases costs vs say a 50% mark up. Now if we can actually start making some sense, you can pay a visit to these guys:

http://www.commonwealthfund.org/

And they should be able to help you out. A few bullet points I'll mention right now because I'm in a hurry: Freedom of choice, transparency, lower employer premiums, best practices and oversight. The alternative is we stick with the current system and weild/shoe horn a bunch of regulatory bodies and legislation onto it. They have articles relating to nifty tidbits such as this:
The United States leads all industrialized countries in the share of national health care expenditures devoted to insurance administration. The U.S. share is over 30 percent greater than Germany’s and more than three times that of Japan. This issue brief examines the sources of administrative costs and describes how a private–public approach to health care reform—with the central feature of a national insurance exchange (largely replacing the present individual and small-group markets)—could substantially lower such costs. In three variations on that approach, estimated administrative costs would fall from 12.7 percent of claims to an average of 9.4 percent. Savings—as much as $265 billion over 2010–2020—would be realized through less marketing and underwriting, reduced costs of claims administration, less time spent negotiating provider payment rates, and fewer or standardized commissions to insurance brokers.
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For the record though, I'm not too crazy about forcing people to sign up for health insurance myself. So no matter what happens to the bill I'm fine with it. If the attempt includes forcing people to sign up under threat of penalty then I'll shed no tears over it's defeat.

That still doesn't really put up a good argument for how the plan is going to be funded for 10 years.
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Amazingly I never hear conservatives wondering how the military is going to be funded for the next 10 years. It's an interesting note that none of those EU countries are spending anywhere close to what we do on our military.
 
Ghengis_John said:
Medical expenses are increased when you're paying for them at a lower marginal cost? You're going to have to explain to me how paying a 15% mark-up increases costs vs say a 50% mark up. Now if we can actually start making some sense, you can pay a visit to these guys:
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The consumer of the medical services sees a lower marginal cost because it is subsidized by the government. I think its obvious that that means the government is paying for the rest of it. It's a historical fact that people go to the hospital much more when they are insured than when they are not. Just look at Medicare and the horrible shape its in as far as funding goes. Part of that is the baby boom, but a very significant problem is the fact that people are buying medical services that they don't need because its true cost isn't reflected in what they pay. The government designed it not expecting the total medical expenses to to balloon the way they did, but that's really just what happens in general when someone else is paying your bill for you.

Furthermore, its not even an issue of the government lowering health insurance premiums. The current plan relies on the fact that people with private insurance (from the employers in particular) will continue to get it. The marginal cost to them would not change significantly unless the government's plan offers a significantly lower deductible. The people I am referring to are the ones that didn't have health insurance before, you will definitely be seeing a lower marginal cost, and change their behavior accordingly.

This plan doesn't even kick in until 2013, since they need to tax people for 2 years before they have the kind of money to support it, so even if there was some sort of savings involved for people with health insurance through competition, those effects would not be seen any time soon.

And if people jump ship from their private insurance to public insurance? That's even more money that the bill does not account for.

Amazingly I never hear conservatives wondering how the military is going to be funded for the next 10 years. It's an interesting note that none of those EU countries are spending anywhere close to what we do on our military.
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This new healthcare plan will most likely be paid exactly the same way as our military-deficit spending. I won't link you to a 20 page pdf written by some thinktank that doesn't address the points I made, but rather our own CBO. http://cboblog.cbo.gov/?p=328. That should give you an idea of what adding another healthcare program to the government's bill might do to our budget.
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Ghengis_John said:
For the record though, I'm not too crazy about forcing people to sign up for health insurance myself. So no matter what happens to the bill I'm fine with it. If the attempt includes forcing people to sign up under threat of penalty then I'll shed no tears over it's defeat.
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The only way for health insurance to work is for healthy people to pay into the system without taking money away from it. This is a basic fact of insurance in general, and why during disasters you often see small insurance companies go bankrupt (everybody in the insurance pool has the same condition).

To have an insurance policy on such a wide scale requires this large pool, especially when you are trying to make premiums not dependent on pre-existing health conditions. Actually, this was mentioned in that pdf you linked me.
 
Ghengis_John said:
I'm sure the 10% of Americans as of June who find themselves without employment would appreciate your compassion in the current economic climate. They surely must be out of work because they are all lazy loafing whiners who spend their days "fucking bitching" and therefore not looking for work. Apparently making good on your campaign promises is nothing more than a PR stunt, aimed at positioning ones self as the new messiah. I think it's pretty clear what side of the fence you're sitting on, and considering you can't even seem to keep his campaign positions straight, what side you've been sitting on. "Immigration", "leeching", "deadbeats". That little "I liked his direction during the elections" line, a sad and half-hearted attempt to hide your trunk and tusks, sir.?
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You are much appreciated.
 
@Ghengis

You are mistaken sir. You don't need to be a Republican to see that the immigration situation is atrocious, illegals being the worst part of all (obviously). I care about what happens to my money... is that a Republican stance? Democrats don't care about where their money goes or giving jobs, welfare, homes and cars to people who have entered this country illegally? And don't tell me about the economic climate. If you lost your job, go get one. You could work at McDonalds for all I care, at least make an effort.
 
You realize the unemployment rate is the percentage of people out of work and actively seeking employment, right?
 
Psylocide said:
I'd love to believe that is the case.
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It is. Unemployment = people collecting unemployment benefits. To continue collecting, you have to prove you're actively searching for a job. If you can't, you don't get to collect benefits anymore, and you're no longer counted in the unemployment figures as a result.
 
Marginal said:
It is. Unemployment = people collecting unemployment benefits. To continue collecting, you have to prove you're actively searching for a job. If you can't, you don't get to collect benefits anymore, and you're no longer counted in the unemployment figures as a result.
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Right, and you can actively half-ass it so you can keep collecting unemployment.
 
Psylocide said:
Right, and you can actively half-ass it so you can keep collecting unemployment.
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They can't do that indefinitely. They cut off the benefits after a period of time. (13 weeks)

Even among those who ride it you to the end, the numbers aren't huge, and not all do so specifically to live high on the hog off the government dime.

http://www.policyalmanac.org/social_welfare/archive/unemployment_compensation.shtml

BENEFIT EXHAUSTION

Due to the limited duration of UC benefits, some individuals exhaust their benefits. For the regular State programs, 2.3 million individuals exhausted their benefits in fiscal year 1999, or 32 percent of claimants who began receiving UC during the 12 months ending March 1999.

A study of exhaustees was completed in September 1990 by Corson and Dynarski, under contract to the U.S. Department of Labor. The purpose of this study was to examine the characteristics and behavior of exhaustees and nonexhaustees and to explore the implications of this information. The samples were chosen from individuals who began collecting benefits during the period October 1987 through September 1988. Overall, 1,920 exhaustees and 1,009 nonexhaustees were interviewed.

The study's authors reached three general conclusions:

A large proportion of UC recipients expected to be recalled to their previous jobs. The unemployment spells of these job-attached workers were considerably shorter than those of workers who suffered permanent job losses, and few job-attached workers exhausted their UC benefits. Workers who were not job-attached—in particular, workers who were dislocated from their previous jobs or who had low skill levels--were likely to experience long unemployment spells, and a significant proportion of these workers exhausted their UC benefits.
2. Most workers who exhausted their benefits were still unemployed more than a month after receiving their final payment, and a majority were still unemployed 2 months after receiving their final payment. Moreover, workers who found jobs after exhausting their UC benefits were generally receiving lower wages than on their prior jobs.
3. State exhaustion rate trigger mechanisms would not be clearly superior to the State IUR triggers in targeting extended benefits to areas with high cyclical unemployment. Substate trigger mechanisms for extended benefits would do a poor job of targeting extended benefits to local areas with high structural unemployment.
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Show me these mythical folks who collect unemployment forever.
 
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