If EVERYBODY weren't FORCED to pay for your fire department, would they put out YOUR fire for FREE???

Just to be clear, I do care, I just recognize that isn't what's happening here and the math doesn't allow for it.

If we can't finance it with a progressive tax on the highest earners and millions paying in for no coverage in return, we still won't afford it by expanding coverage. That is a fact, I don't get to choose the facts.

That is neither affordable, nor "health care."

What the OP is suggesting is a full blown takeover and distribution by govt. I suspect we can all agree that what's happening at the VA (a system meeting all the previous criteria) doesn't constitute "health care" either.

It isn't a question of humanity, that's an appeal to emotion, it's a question of math and my pointing it out doesn't mean I don't care. Just putting it out there.

This post was edited by ForkNdaRoad at January 5, 2017 7:21 AM MST

@FNdR -- You still haven't answered the question. Which of the 3 workable solutions for health care payment do you favor?

If you don't want a government/public utility model and you refuse to compel people into a private insurance pool, then by default you advocate fee-for-service.

Nor are you immune to appeal to emotion (or, at least, hyperbole). Claiming that the VA system "doesn't constitute health care" is bull***t. Yes, it's flawed. Yes, many people in the system don't get the treatment they need. But it IS health care. It covers about 9 million people. Not every case in the VA is a horrific bureaucratic nightmare. Nor is VA health care unique in having horror stories. PLENTY of people with private insurance have issues with delayed/denied services.

I agree with you much of this is a question of math. But there is math you are neglecting. For example, the US spends about DOUBLE per capita on health care as most similar rich industrial societies, yet our health outcomes are mid-pack at best. That suggests there is a great deal of "fat" in our system where savings could occur. Moreover, your appeal to math neglects the COST of people being sick. If spending $1,000 on someone's health nets us $5,000 in productivity gains because the person is productive (instead of lying in bed sick), that's a profitable investment. If paying for a poor taqueria worker's health screenings so he gets his Hep C treated stops him from giving it to dozens of people who eat at his taqueria, that's a significant math "win" for society.

Now, are you FINALLY going to answer the question?  Or are you going to continue to retort with "...but Obamacare sucks"? This post was edited by OldSchoolTheSKOSlives at January 5, 2017 9:49 AM MST

I have answered your question three times, I simply rejected your three straw-men. I am capable of answering for myself. Voluntary coverage pays for itself. It is your subsidized system that requires a new math to sustain itself.

And the VA is beyond flawed, it is the result of an unsustainable model. It isn't some insidious attempt to kill off our veterans or the product of an insensitive group of haters sneering down their noses at the 'peons' (in your words), it's the product of a failing, unsustainable system that simply can't succeed for lack of resources.

Much of it isn't math, ALL of it is the math. There simply aren't enough heads paying in to make it work and I don't think an entire industry should be torn apart brick by brick because legislators can't accept that. They couldn't make affordable mere subsidization of only those with the greatest need, they certainly can't micromanage the almost 20% of our economy the health care industry comprises.



This post was edited by ForkNdaRoad at January 5, 2017 8:53 AM MST

@FNdR -- OK, since you insist upon "voluntary" insurance (which devolves into fee-for-service), you are either deluded (you believe a voluntary insurance system can work despite the easily-understood logical exercise showing it can't) or you are indifferent to the suffering fee-for-service produces (i.e. poor/old/sick/unlucky people will not get treatment).

Duly noted.

Still trying to pigeonhole me? OS, I'm surprised, you know better.

The bottom line is this, the current model is still failing to provide affordable insurance coverage. If you'd like to pitch a solvent model that actually meets its stated goal (provision of coverage to those in need, return of coverage to those paying in) by all means, go for it. But this model doesn't do that.

Forcing people into a market isn't going to provide quality care and isn't going to make care more affordable, competition might, we could explore that, but compulsion won't.

Hello again, F:

You're RIGHT when you say, "voluntary coverage pays for itself", as long as the voluntariness goes both ways.. For example, it would ONLY "pay for itself" if insurance companies DIDN'T volunteer to cover people with pre existing conditions.  It would only work if they DID volunteer to CAP your benefits, and volunteered to throw your kids off your policy at 18.

If that's the system you support, SOME people are gonna DIE in the street.  Certainly, if you HAVE cancer, and the insurance company doesn't HAVE to cover you, you'll DIE..  We've already been over the fantasy that a cancer patient can get cancer treatment at the ER.

So, when you say it pays for itself, it can ONLY do that if people DIE in the streets.. 

excon

I am in favor of healthcare for all.  Most industrial countries have it.  Would it be perfect?  Heck no!  But I am truly frightened for what will happen to the people that may lose what they have.  ObamaCare is flawed.  Congress wouldn't let that go through without a lot of changes to it and it still benefits private insurance companies.  I am very troubled by billions of dollars made by insurance companies on the backs of people that can barely afford the premiums.  

Would you be in favor of regulating big insurance?