It's easy for conservatives to understand... but only if they comprehend both sides of the issue!
Yes, the government will save money by providing universal health care. How it works is easy to understand — at least for those who try to comprehend both sides of the story. It all starts with something akin to a quote from an old motor oil commercial: “You can pay me now, or pay me later." It really isn’t that much different from investing a little now to avoid paying (or at least not receiving) a lot more later.…
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176 - roger nowosielski
But this goes against the conventional wisdom of crediting Caesar Augustus with inventing "civil service," or with what the British rule has been able to accomplish on behalf of their colonies, India most notably.
To an extent, the development of Indian democracy and many of its institutions are some of the results of British rule and their rendition of "civil service."
177 - Clavos
In fact, the bureaucrats have NO pressure on them, not even the pressure to "perform or you'll lose your job," which is the perennial problem with them, they don't have to do a good job, so they don't. Even their promotions are seniority-based, not merit-based, so they have no incentive to excel.
178 - Bliffle
I think you're out-of-date Clavos. Public employees (around here anyhow) are scared sh*tless about losing their jobs, along with healthcare, pensions, etc. The only ones who have sweetheart deals are the police and firemen.
Performance depends a lot on good management, and most management (both public and private) is simply horrible these days. People are made managers for the wrong reasons. Even in private companies.
IMO, nowadays the old mantra that private works better because of profit motive simply doesn't hold up anymore.
For example, the coffee shop I'm sitting in right now has dreadful service, like most of them. And they lose customers because of it: I've watched potential customers walk out because they couldn't place an order, and I've done it too!
179 - roger nowosielski
A Chinese guy may be the owner. It was the same with a coffee shop in Alameda a year ago. Once the new owner took over, the customers started leaving in droves. Didn't have a concept that customer is king.
180 - Clavos
I agree with your observation about management, bliffle. It's been that way for a long time in the private sector, and in fact is the prime reason for the failure of the American auto manufacturers -- their management has been rotten for decades.
However, my remarks about government employees were in regard to federal employees. In most places where I've lived, state county, and municipal employees have not had the kind of job security the feds do and the level of competence is usually much higher than in fed offices.
181 - Cannonshop
If the best argument on the fraud issue is that Medicare and Pvt. insurers suffer it equally, then that's a strong argument against centralizing MORE of it in Medicare's hands-private insurance is voluntary, taxation to fund government agencies is non-voluntary, and monopolies do not tend to become MORE customer oriented-they tend to be LESS so.
One of the legitimate roles of government, is to dismantle Monopolies so that there are choices. Notably, the only examples of that in the last three decades were Ma Bell and Microsoft. Meanwhile, instead we have the meme of "Too big to fail", and Government trying to BECOME the monopolist.
Bear Stearns, AIG, General Motors, Enron, Fannie Mae, Freddy Mac, IndyMac, BankAmerica, Citigroup, now Health Care?
I didn't think, Bliffle, that when you folks on the left were shouting about "Socialism for the rich" that you meant it as a statement of intent, I thought that was a protest against collusion between abusive corporations and government.
The proper role of government, is to establish and enforce standards, not to try to compete against private providers of goods and services (y'know, the people who generate the economic activity that provides the taxed incomes needed by government to function?)
182 - Bliffle
In fact, the insurance companies are unregulated oligopolies, able to divide up markets as they see fit, to exclude competitors, dictate prices and terms to their customers, and to legally bribe politicians with their fantastic funds. They may also freely bribe government officials with promises of high-paying jobs.
Under current law they are excused from the limitations you mentioned by the 1945 McCarran-Ferguson statute which forbids the federal government from attempting to regulate any insurance company.
They are, in fact, no better than a government agency, and in many ways are much worse. For example, they are able to extract higher fees from their transactions than any agency you may imagine.
AS bad as a government agensy would be, the overhead cost would be much lower, and it would be subject to the rule of citizens.
The fact is that the goal of every business is to eliminate competitors and control their markets. In order to reap the benefits of competition people must frustrate those goals, and, in the case of insurance companies, our hands have been tied by a 60 year old law, written in a totally different age.
183 - Clavos
In that case, it seems to me bliffle, that our goal should be to clean up what we have, starting with repeal of McCarran-Ferguson, and proceeding to and into a setup similar to that of the airline industry before deregulation (with the flaws therein corrected), rather than spending the immense fortune it will take to implement a totally new government-run and -paid health care system.
But, I doubt that will happen.
184 - Cindy
172 - zing
thanks for that recommendation. i found a documentary, there is no authority but yourself about them. looks interesting from what i've watched so far.
communes, that reminds me--i found this book in my h.s. library, Home Comfort: Stories and Scenes of Life on Total Loss Farm. it so profoundly affected me that from 14 to 19 my plan was to live on a commune, as soon as i finished college. but fate intervened.
185 - zingzing
ooer. i'll watch that as soon as i can. thanks!
186 - Glenn Contrarian
Strawmen. All I see from the right are strawmen.
Medicare fraud is a strawman - they can only see this and that instance of fraud, but they cannot see the larger picture.
So I guess I'm going to have to do some research to show them that Medicare - that bureaucracy tasked with paying for the care of 97% of all the nation's elderly and most of the nation's disabled (like my three medically-fragile Foster kids to the tune of perhaps a half million per year (one child alone costs a quarter million)) does so QUITE efficiently - MORE efficiently than the private health care agencies do.
But I've got to prove that claim. Not only do I have to use reliable sources, but I've also got to ensure that I'm not inadvertently drawing the wrong conclusions from the compilations of the data.
Once I'm ready, I'll light a fire to the strawman of Medicare fraud.
187 - Cannonshop
183: That'd be MY solution, Clavos, or at least, part of it. The other part would be to take what's being proposed for funding a giant Bureaucracy, and use it to provide grants and 'stimulus' to colleges to expand/improve medical and science programmes, along with additional scholarship initiatives to bring more students into those programmes from lower and middle class backgrounds (you know, people who aren't accustomed to buying a new BMW every five years).
And maybe a bit to encourage effective, but low-volume drugs for rare but tragic conditions actually being produced.
BEFORE doing the latter bits, though, instituting reforms and regulation to the Insurance Industry to fight exploitive crooks, and giving those reforms actual TEETH comes first-same for fixing the SEC and Financial industry. (Funny thing to think about- Real Estate people have to comply with strict ethical guidelines and get licensed-neither is true of mortgage brokerage, stock-brokers, or financial advisors-notice where our crisis happened? Yup...)
We have a Congress that can't balance their chequebooks or comply with the tax-laws they themselves write and pass-putting that as 'oversight' to an expanded agency is stupidity.
188 - Bliffle
Looks like Clavos and Cannonshop are preparing to lead the charge to revoke the 1945 McCarran-Ferguson act and bring the insurance companies under federal regulation so they can be broken up under federal anti-trust laws.
I wonder what their first move will be in this noble endeavor? Shall we wait and see?
189 - Cannonshop
188 Considering that I think that would be a splendid move, Bliffle, My first move is going to be writing my "better" Senator (that'd be Maria Cantwell) with the idea as a practical alternative to loading the Government (an entity already drowning in debt) with the job of doing what insurance can't/won't/hasn't been doing.
SOME regulation is good, especially if it is written to be enforceable and the responsible agency is actually held accountable for enforcing it. NO regulation is bad, just as TOO MUCH regulation is bad.
I don't actually expect to GET ANYWHERE with it, mind you, but it's what I'm actually able to DO (and still, you know, make a living and have a family and all that other shit that the media doesn't think is important.)
Question being: would YOU do the same with YOUR congresscritter or Senator? If so, maybe you could get some friends to do it-Conservatives are like herding cats-we may all like to go to the 'Tea Parties' but when it comes to unified action, we stink on ice-Leftists are FAR better at organizing, and let's face it, this goes right into the realm of 'moderate' and could actually BE bi-partisan.
(Yeah, I don't think it'll work either...but I'll give it a go anyway. Nothing to lose and all...)
190 - Dan(Miller)
According to this article, a bill now before the Senate would impose a fine of $1,000 (more for families) on those who do not obtain the prescribed "affordable health care" insurance.
The Congressional Budget Office estimated the fines will raise around $36 billion over 10 years. Senate aides said the penalties would be modeled on the approach taken by Massachusetts, which now imposes a fine of about $1,000 a year on individuals who refuse to get coverage. Under the federal legislation, families would pay higher penalties than individuals.
*****
The fines would be collected through the income tax system.
I hope that the Congresscritters find the time to read and understand the legislation before voting. It probably won't affect us, since my wife and I have adequate medical insurance in Panama, which costs us about $1,200 per year. Still, I think it's a dumb idea.
Dan(Miller)
191 - Silas Kain
Well, as a resident of Massachusetts and a beneficiary of Romney's so-called health plan, let me tell you something -- it's all smoke and mirrors. The coverage that is "affordable" and available to residents so as to avoid the 'penalty' is a joke.
Health care is a national problem and one that has to be addressed at a Federal level in order to assure 'universal health care'. Look, I don't like the concept, it frightens me, and I fear what we'll get as a result. The bottom line is that we are lagging behind 30+ other countries in health care. Forget about placing blame, just fix the damn system once and for all.
192 - Clavos
just fix the damn system once and for all.
A worthy goal, and one I'm sure we can all support.
Problem is, nobody, including Obama, the Republicans, the Democrats or anyone in government has yet come up with a plan that will fix it.
193 - Bliffle
Cannonshop draws the wrong conclusion:
#181 - Cannonshop
If the best argument on the fraud issue is that Medicare and Pvt. insurers suffer it equally, then that's a strong argument against centralizing MORE of it in Medicare's hands-...
Actually, quite the opposite. Private insurance fraud is hidden, the InsCos are under no obligation to reveal fraud publicly, so they hush it up to improve their image. But Medicare is REQUIRED by law to make fraud public, AND they are required to pursue fraud to prosecution. Every state is REQUIRED to have certified fraud detection systems (these are provided by competitive private companies, incidentally, not public agencies).
Thus, by moving health insurance to a public agency fraud will be exposed and prosecuted and reduced. Public agencies are not able to sweep fraud under the rug.
reducing fraud will reduce costs to everyone.
194 - Bliffle
"just fix the damn system once and for all."
That would require revoking McCarran-Ferguson. Do you think that our congressmen, saturated in insurance company bribes, have he guts to do it?
Or do we need to outflank them with the "Public Option"?
195 - Bliffle
If Clavos and Cannonshop are desirous of cleaning up the existing system before changing things, then here's a place they can start: the drug companies have not only been gouging us with their arbitrarily high prices, they have also been bribing the makers of generic drugs to not compete with them!
Apparently they consider themselves above the law, namely the Sherman Anti-trust law.
Read it and weep:
Wall Street Journal
The heat is closing in on the drug indsutry’s practice of paying generic manufacturers to delay competition for branded drugs.
Companies say the practice is legal. But the U.S. Department of Justice took a skeptical view when it weighed in Monday on a pending case brought by CVS and Rite Aid. The drug stores (which make higher margins on generics) challenged a deal in which Bayer paid Barr to delay producing a generic version of the antibiotic Cipro. Here’s more on the case from Dow Jones Newswires.
The Federal Trade Commission has been attacking the deals for a while now " witness Bristol-Myers Squibb’s $2.1 million payment earlier this year to end the FTC probe into its negotiations to delay the entry of generic Plavix.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the Atlantic, the European Competition Commissioner is expected to release a report this week on competition in the drug industry, notes Bloomberg News. The report is likely to take a hard look at the pay-for-delay deals "