Author Topic: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill  (Read 7464 times)

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Offline txradioguy

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #50 on: June 27, 2017, 06:25:35 pm »
Psst. Vote's been postponed. http://www.gopbriefingroom.com/index.php/topic,269266.msg1370401/topicseen.html#msg1370401

Not a smart move IMO for the GOP-E types that want to get Obamacare lite passed.
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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #51 on: June 27, 2017, 06:42:09 pm »
Kick that can, GOP.

I'll be generous and say there might be ten people in the senate who actually work for the people who elected them. The other ninety work for the lobby 100%
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Offline Hondo69

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #52 on: June 27, 2017, 09:33:56 pm »
I'll be generous and say there might be ten people in the senate who actually work for the people who elected them. The other ninety work for the lobby 100%

Man you are in a generous mood

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #53 on: June 27, 2017, 10:30:50 pm »
Man you are in a generous mood

Yeah.  When I get past five I begin to have problems coming up with names.
"I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #54 on: June 27, 2017, 10:32:39 pm »
There is a constitutional amendment I would support. 

Congress will make no law without including the passage of Constitutional authority for such law.

And they will all point to General Welfare and Interstate Commerce, no matter how ridiculous.
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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #55 on: June 28, 2017, 02:23:56 am »
Government is the source of the problem.

I contend that there are multiple problems, not just one.

One problem was people not getting care.  So Ronald Reagan signed legislation to force hospitals to treat people at ERs.  That solved a problem...but caused another.  Hospitals had a cost forced upon them by an unfunded mandate from government.

There was no incentive for people not to go to the ER.  People were not buying health insurance, and then costs were going onto others.

Obamacare was a way to force people to be responsible, as Americans didn't want people either dying in the street or dumping costs onto others. (Yes, I realize it also addressed other issues, like pre-existing conditions.)

Quote
Believing they will also be the solution seems silly.

Going back to pre-Obamacare doesn't solve the issues that led to the passage of Obamacare.  Anyone who thinks so is either ignorant or dishonest.  Repealing Obamacare will be dumping costs onto others, irresponsibly.  We must also, to be fair and intellectually honest, either allow for people dying in the streets, or else pick up those costs as taxpayers. 

But it seems many people want someone else to pay.
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Online roamer_1

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #56 on: June 28, 2017, 02:34:50 am »
I contend that there are multiple problems, not just one.

No, it's always government. Artificial regulation has unintended consequences.

Quote
Going back to pre-Obamacare doesn't solve the issues that led to the passage of Obamacare.  Anyone who thinks so is either ignorant or dishonest.  Repealing Obamacare will be dumping costs onto others, irresponsibly.  We must also, to be fair and intellectually honest, either allow for people dying in the streets, or else pick up those costs as taxpayers. 

But it seems many people want someone else to pay.

No, it doesn't solve all the problems. It does solve the single big honkin problem that is costing folks THREE TIMES what they used to pay and resulting in substantially less coverage or no real coverage at all... which was caused by the government. An entirely unworkable 'solution' that should be utterly annihilated.

If you want to fix things, you don't start out this way.

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #57 on: June 28, 2017, 02:44:06 am »
No, it's always government. Artificial regulation has unintended consequences.

Yes, it does.  But there were problems before government involvement.

Quote
No, it doesn't solve all the problems. It does solve the single big honkin problem that is costing folks THREE TIMES what they used to pay and resulting in substantially less coverage or no real coverage at all... which was caused by the government. An entirely unworkable 'solution' that should be utterly annihilated.

If you want to fix things, you don't start out this way.

A lot of those costs were there before...but they were just being borne by someone else.

Sure, we can roll the ACA back, but that doesn't solve it all.  Government would still be involved.  Roll back all government involvement, and you have the problems that led to government involvement in the first place!

I'm curious...what do you believe is the conservative path:

A) Let people die in the streets if they can't afford healthcare (or if they irresponsibly didn't purchase coverage).
B) Make only religious and caring people pick up the tab for those who can't afford healthcare while others don't help.
C) Force hospitals to pick up the costs of those who can't afford care.
D) Share the burden of those who can't afford care across the populations of those with means.
E) Make people get coverage to prevent them from becoming a burden on others.

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Offline RoosGirl

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #58 on: June 28, 2017, 02:59:24 am »
I think in a really free country there are hard choices, choices that we don't like to have to make, but life being what it is, must be made.  The truth (for me, YMMV) is that there isn't one person that *deserves* healthcare (clarifying to mean deserves at the expense of someone else).  While I don't relish the thought of someone not being able to afford the "best" health care available, I equally don't relish forcing someone else to pay for someone other than themselves and those they are directly responsible for.  I also think that with a lower tax burden people are more willing to give to give to local charities.  This is better for the community as it puts more responsibility of humanity back into the local community.  I think bottom line though, there is no "perfect" fix; there is either freedom (Constitutional) or there is not.
« Last Edit: June 28, 2017, 03:08:04 am by RoosGirl »

Online roamer_1

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #59 on: June 28, 2017, 03:05:51 am »
A lot of those costs were there before...but they were just being borne by someone else.

The costs are astronomical because of interference in free market principles.

Adding more interference will necessarily drive costs further, mark my words.

Quote
Sure, we can roll the ACA back, but that doesn't solve it all. 

All it would solve is the biggest boondoggle which is a very long step in the right direction.

Quote
Government would still be involved.  Roll back all government involvement, and you have the problems that led to government involvement in the first place!

There are many ways to solve this, most of which remove government regulation, and monopoly.

Quote
I'm curious...what do you believe is the conservative path:

A) Let people die in the streets if they can't afford healthcare (or if they irresponsibly didn't purchase coverage).

No one is 'dying in the streets'. Hyperbole much?

Quote
B) Make only religious and caring people pick up the tab for those who can't afford healthcare while others don't help.

A big part of it is removing the regulation on churches so that they could once again enter the health care market. HUGE difference with churches running hospitals instead of businesses. Charity s part of what they did, and what they would do.

Quote
C) Force hospitals to pick up the costs of those who can't afford care.

Necessarily so in emergency care. If a patient cannot enter into contract because the patient is unconscious, how exactly does that work, performing work has has not consented to? Certainly come of that can be absorbed. and write off is not necessarily bad for business.

Quote
D) Share the burden of those who can't afford care across the populations of those with means.

Force others to pay for it, you mean

Quote
E) Make people get coverage to prevent them from becoming a burden on others.

What else would you have the government mandate? because it won't stop here.
Why must the solution be socialism?

Better to look toward deregulation. Plumbers cost more than carpenters because of licensing, and only licensing. WHY? Any idiot can plumb a house. Same with doctors. Same with pharma. Open other avenues for competition, and watch the costs plummet.

Offline Smokin Joe

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #60 on: June 28, 2017, 10:10:22 am »
I contend that there are multiple problems, not just one.

One problem was people not getting care.  So Ronald Reagan signed legislation to force hospitals to treat people at ERs.  That solved a problem...but caused another.  Hospitals had a cost forced upon them by an unfunded mandate from government.

There was no incentive for people not to go to the ER.  People were not buying health insurance, and then costs were going onto others.

Obamacare was a way to force people to be responsible, as Americans didn't want people either dying in the street or dumping costs onto others. (Yes, I realize it also addressed other issues, like pre-existing conditions.)

Going back to pre-Obamacare doesn't solve the issues that led to the passage of Obamacare.  Anyone who thinks so is either ignorant or dishonest.  Repealing Obamacare will be dumping costs onto others, irresponsibly.  We must also, to be fair and intellectually honest, either allow for people dying in the streets, or else pick up those costs as taxpayers. 

But it seems many people want someone else to pay.
For starters, if people were dying in the streets, it's only because they didn't make it to the hospital.
When we ran an ambulance call, we didn't ask for insurance or check people's wallets, we stabilized and transported. If we could keep 'em going long enough to get them down the red line or on the helicopter, they got care, period.

Obamacare didn't pay for health care, it is an insurance scam.

The words health care and health insurance were used interchangeably to obfusticate the issue.

There is no reason I should have to pay nearly 30K a year for a healthy family of 4 to have a 14K deductible for health insurance, except that someone else who has not lived a particularly healthy lifestyle is really padding out that tab, or the middlemen in the system are taking one hell of a cut.

That insurance would be for a family with a history of less than 8K a year in medical costs, for quite a few years.
In the interest of making sure people who didn't have health insurance, got health insurance, there were multitudes who had 'lesser plans' to take care of the big events, and who paid the small stuff out of pocket, who lost their insurance.

Total cost for the family of 4 was about 14 K for catastrophic coverage and actual costs, COMBINED.

Half what the insurance alone (not counting deductibles and co-pays) would cost under Obamacare, for the whole shooting match.
So who is getting fat off this deal?

For starters, Obamacare mandates coverage that may not be needed by the individual, ever, (by that I mean things like prenatal care and contraceptives for post menopausal nuns), and that ordinarily would not be present in a plan a family or even a group might seek. OB coverage? not at our age. Contraceptives? Nope. Drug or alcohol rehab? No, thanks, don't do either. Prescription drug coverage? No thanks, aside from the occasional antibiotic, we don't do those either.

All of these considerations are high dollar items, and the more paperwork filed, the more expensive they are to provide coverage for.

Since ours covered events which led to ER visits, day surgery (or more) or hospital admissions, the rest was pretty much out of the HSA. This meant a reduction in paperwork, not only for the insurance company, but the hospital, too. Give me the bill, I pay the bill. Done. If for some reason I had not been able to pay, I could talk with the provider and set up a payment plan. People did this on a regular basis.

But Obamacare, the outfit that couldn't put up a working website, was geared with the Omnibus in mind, with everything covered in the insurance, and which added a whole bureaucracy in the middle.

There is little the private sector can't do more efficiently, faster, and cheaper than the Government, and this is just another example. Except the private sector can't strongarm the public, not like the IRS.

Overall, If we had just paid the bills for those who couldn't (something we were all doing anyway, either through Medicaid or on our own doctor bill), it would have been cheaper, but there was a whole subsidy scam set up which amounts to medical welfare, and is structured similarly with means testing for benefits, and which also masks the actual costs from those who are subsidized--costs which go beyond the cost of health care, because at the bottom of it all are the federal bureaucracies dealing with means testing and the distribution of subsidies.

Well, we didn't qualify for a subsidy, nor medicaid, we just fell through the cracks while the plan we had which worked went the way of the dinosaurs who watched the bolide come in. No work for a year=no money coming in, but we didn't qualify for any of it. Now people who had insurance can "die in the streets" and be penalized for the privilege.

I refused to pay 28K a year for insurance, especially with a 14K deductible. That's nuts for a family whose normal medical costs were under 8 K a year.

Would you save 20 grand a year?

I knew you would.
 
Typical of Democrat programs, there are unintended consequences. The whole setup catered specifically to poor people (who were already covered under medicaid, for the most part), and "working poor" who may still be working part time, or who may have lost their full time job because the employer could not afford to buy them the Cadillac plans mandated--job loss being another unintended consequence, along with the loss of "inferior" insurance plans. 

This is what happens when you have people with a benefit package to die for, who don't have to show a profit in what they do, making rules for people who never had a 'wish list' plan, but who do have to run in the black on the bottom line.

But the other thing is that there were people who were going to be covered who have conditions who were uninsurable under ordinary policies because of lifestyle choices. I'm not talking about little Billy with the childhood cancer (Ever hear of St. Jude's Hospitals for Children? The Shriners have one, too.)
I'm not talking about needle junkies who were going through rehab on the State tab anyway (which has burgeoned into a whole 'nother scam).

I'm talking about a trillion dollar medical liability that largely belongs to a group who is disproportionately represented in Washington DC for a disease that is primarily related to behaviour.

Yes, that one.

One million three hundred thousand and growing segment of the population who caught a disease either because they shared needles or homosexual contact, for the most part. and the bill for the known and already existing population is estimated at one trillion dollars. If they need a program to pay for that care, set one up and leave the rest of us out of it as much as possible. But had that been done, the backlash would have been predictably severe.
In the meantime, the whole bit about people dying in the streets evokes imagery that might engender a more sympathetic response from the people about to get it up the a$$, whether they swing that way or not.

Repeal this crap, lock, stock, and barrel.
« Last Edit: June 28, 2017, 10:16:24 am by Smokin Joe »
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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #61 on: June 28, 2017, 11:22:02 am »
For starters, if people were dying in the streets, it's only because they didn't make it to the hospital.
When we ran an ambulance call, we didn't ask for insurance or check people's wallets, we stabilized and transported. If we could keep 'em going long enough to get them down the red line or on the helicopter, they got care, period.

Obamacare didn't pay for health care, it is an insurance scam.

The words health care and health insurance were used interchangeably to obfusticate the issue.

There is no reason I should have to pay nearly 30K a year for a healthy family of 4 to have a 14K deductible for health insurance, except that someone else who has not lived a particularly healthy lifestyle is really padding out that tab, or the middlemen in the system are taking one hell of a cut.

That insurance would be for a family with a history of less than 8K a year in medical costs, for quite a few years.
In the interest of making sure people who didn't have health insurance, got health insurance, there were multitudes who had 'lesser plans' to take care of the big events, and who paid the small stuff out of pocket, who lost their insurance.

Total cost for the family of 4 was about 14 K for catastrophic coverage and actual costs, COMBINED.

Half what the insurance alone (not counting deductibles and co-pays) would cost under Obamacare, for the whole shooting match.
So who is getting fat off this deal?

For starters, Obamacare mandates coverage that may not be needed by the individual, ever, (by that I mean things like prenatal care and contraceptives for post menopausal nuns), and that ordinarily would not be present in a plan a family or even a group might seek. OB coverage? not at our age. Contraceptives? Nope. Drug or alcohol rehab? No, thanks, don't do either. Prescription drug coverage? No thanks, aside from the occasional antibiotic, we don't do those either.

All of these considerations are high dollar items, and the more paperwork filed, the more expensive they are to provide coverage for.

Since ours covered events which led to ER visits, day surgery (or more) or hospital admissions, the rest was pretty much out of the HSA. This meant a reduction in paperwork, not only for the insurance company, but the hospital, too. Give me the bill, I pay the bill. Done. If for some reason I had not been able to pay, I could talk with the provider and set up a payment plan. People did this on a regular basis.

But Obamacare, the outfit that couldn't put up a working website, was geared with the Omnibus in mind, with everything covered in the insurance, and which added a whole bureaucracy in the middle.

There is little the private sector can't do more efficiently, faster, and cheaper than the Government, and this is just another example. Except the private sector can't strongarm the public, not like the IRS.

Overall, If we had just paid the bills for those who couldn't (something we were all doing anyway, either through Medicaid or on our own doctor bill), it would have been cheaper, but there was a whole subsidy scam set up which amounts to medical welfare, and is structured similarly with means testing for benefits, and which also masks the actual costs from those who are subsidized--costs which go beyond the cost of health care, because at the bottom of it all are the federal bureaucracies dealing with means testing and the distribution of subsidies.

Well, we didn't qualify for a subsidy, nor medicaid, we just fell through the cracks while the plan we had which worked went the way of the dinosaurs who watched the bolide come in. No work for a year=no money coming in, but we didn't qualify for any of it. Now people who had insurance can "die in the streets" and be penalized for the privilege.

I refused to pay 28K a year for insurance, especially with a 14K deductible. That's nuts for a family whose normal medical costs were under 8 K a year.

Would you save 20 grand a year?

I knew you would.
 
Typical of Democrat programs, there are unintended consequences. The whole setup catered specifically to poor people (who were already covered under medicaid, for the most part), and "working poor" who may still be working part time, or who may have lost their full time job because the employer could not afford to buy them the Cadillac plans mandated--job loss being another unintended consequence, along with the loss of "inferior" insurance plans. 

This is what happens when you have people with a benefit package to die for, who don't have to show a profit in what they do, making rules for people who never had a 'wish list' plan, but who do have to run in the black on the bottom line.

But the other thing is that there were people who were going to be covered who have conditions who were uninsurable under ordinary policies because of lifestyle choices. I'm not talking about little Billy with the childhood cancer (Ever hear of St. Jude's Hospitals for Children? The Shriners have one, too.)
I'm not talking about needle junkies who were going through rehab on the State tab anyway (which has burgeoned into a whole 'nother scam).

I'm talking about a trillion dollar medical liability that largely belongs to a group who is disproportionately represented in Washington DC for a disease that is primarily related to behaviour.

Yes, that one.

One million three hundred thousand and growing segment of the population who caught a disease either because they shared needles or homosexual contact, for the most part. and the bill for the known and already existing population is estimated at one trillion dollars. If they need a program to pay for that care, set one up and leave the rest of us out of it as much as possible. But had thatbeen done, the backlash would have been predictably severe.
In the meantime, the whole bit about people dying in the streets evokes imagery that might engender a more sympathetic response from the people about to get it up the a$$, whether they swing that way or not.

Repeal this crap, lock, stock, and barrel.

@Smokin Joe

First of all, if you want to avoid HIV, refrain from gay sex.  Political correctness kills people because it will blame the disease on anything except the behavior that largely causes it.  Also, when dealing with people who tend to be unstable to the point of deliberately infecting each other with HIV, what can you do?

A friend of mine in New Jersey is a nurse.  I've heard her say over and over that no one is refused care at the hospital.  In fact, there were a couple of homeless men who used to abuse the policy.  They would show up, claiming to be sick so they could be admitted.  Then they used the hospital for their own personal hotel and treated the nurses like waitresses.

As for more routine/ non-emergency care, why do people never mention free clinics?  I did a search and came up with a list of  107 free clinics in my state.  They've been around a long time, but it's as though they don't exist.

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #62 on: June 28, 2017, 11:43:08 am »
A friend of mine in New Jersey is a nurse.  I've heard her say over and over that no one is refused care at the hospital.

Yes...Ronald Reagan signed legislation forcing them to do so.   That's the government in health care that some people here want to remove.  Others seem to think that care happens by magic, for free, just because the hospital gets socked with the costs.

Quote
In fact, there were a couple of homeless men who used to abuse the policy.  They would show up, claiming to be sick so they could be admitted.  Then they used the hospital for their own personal hotel and treated the nurses like waitresses.

Exactly.

Quote
As for more routine/ non-emergency care, why do people never mention free clinics?  I did a search and came up with a list of  107 free clinics in my state.  They've been around a long time, but it's as though they don't exist.

Yup. Government in heath care.
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Offline Smokin Joe

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #63 on: June 28, 2017, 11:44:44 am »
@Smokin Joe

First of all, if you want to avoid HIV, refrain from gay sex.  Political correctness kills people because it will blame the disease on anything except the behavior that largely causes it.  Also, when dealing with people who tend to be unstable to the point of deliberately infecting each other with HIV, what can you do?
let them pick up their own tab and not infect the health insurance industry with their demands. That sounds cold, but there is a reason some people were considered "uninsurable" because of risk levels that approached certainty for some behaviours, or the 'preexisting conditions' of already being infected. There is, in DC,  one of the highest population percentages of the GLBTs in the country. (between 8 and 10 percent--San Francisco is actually less 'gay') which may explain the disproportionate representation that group seems to have. This is a 'transfer of wealth' to pay for HIV/AIDS treatment, at the expense of people who would never engage in the behaviour to contract the disease. It's a 'payback' for the 'breeders', not to mention the house rake in the insurance middleman scheme.
Quote
A friend of mine in New Jersey is a nurse.  I've heard her say over and over that no one is refused care at the hospital.  In fact, there were a couple of homeless men who used to abuse the policy.  They would show up, claiming to be sick so they could be admitted.  Then they used the hospital for their own personal hotel and treated the nurses like waitresses.
When I was EMS, we never had, nor have I ever heard of, a hospital refuse to treat a patient. That included helicopter transport to what was then the nation's premier trauma unit (ShockTrauma at Hopkins) and treatment there. If they died in the streets, it was because they didn't make to the hospital.
Quote
As for more routine/ non-emergency care, why do people never mention free clinics?  I did a search and came up with a list of  107 free clinics in my state.  They've been around a long time, but it's as though they don't exist.
Good question, but it would interfere with the whole 'poor waifs dying in the streets' meme.
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Seventeen Techniques for Truth Suppression

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.

C S Lewis

Offline thackney

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #64 on: June 28, 2017, 11:45:35 am »
I contend that there are multiple problems, not just one.

Agreed, but I see government interference in the industry/market as the biggest.

Quote
One problem was people not getting care.  So Ronald Reagan signed legislation to force hospitals to treat people at ERs.  That solved a problem...but caused another.  Hospitals had a cost forced upon them by an unfunded mandate from government.

I see that as a mistake by Reagan.  Getting the government to replace charity is harmful to society.  People need to help others, for their own benefit as well as the benefit of those receiving.  The idea that this charity should first past through the government and be forced upon everyone is a mistake.

Quote
There was no incentive for people not to go to the ER.  People were not buying health insurance, and then costs were going onto others.

Obamacare was a way to force people to be responsible, as Americans didn't want people either dying in the street or dumping costs onto others. (Yes, I realize it also addressed other issues, like pre-existing conditions.)

Going back to pre-Obamacare doesn't solve the issues that led to the passage of Obamacare.  Anyone who thinks so is either ignorant or dishonest.  Repealing Obamacare will be dumping costs onto others, irresponsibly.  We must also, to be fair and intellectually honest, either allow for people dying in the streets, or else pick up those costs as taxpayers. 

But it seems many people want someone else to pay.

Keeping Obamacare is also dumping cost onto others, irresponsibly.  The difference is it adds to the cost with an inefficient and ineffective middleman that has no incentive to improve.
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Offline Jazzhead

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #65 on: June 28, 2017, 12:12:53 pm »
Yes, it does.  But there were problems before government involvement.

A lot of those costs were there before...but they were just being borne by someone else.

Sure, we can roll the ACA back, but that doesn't solve it all.  Government would still be involved.  Roll back all government involvement, and you have the problems that led to government involvement in the first place!

I'm curious...what do you believe is the conservative path:

A) Let people die in the streets if they can't afford healthcare (or if they irresponsibly didn't purchase coverage).
B) Make only religious and caring people pick up the tab for those who can't afford healthcare while others don't help.
C) Force hospitals to pick up the costs of those who can't afford care.
D) Share the burden of those who can't afford care across the populations of those with means.
E) Make people get coverage to prevent them from becoming a burden on others.

ObamaCare, of course,  takes the approach in (E) -  that's the hated individual mandate.   But as Suppressed implies, it IS a fundamentally conservative solution,  bolstering the private insurance market under a regime of community rating by broadening the risk pool.   

 The Dems' alternative if this doesn't work is single payer.  What are the solutions proposed by conservatives?   Most here, it appears, essentially favor (C) -  forcing the cost on to hospitals obliged to treat the uninsured,  and distorting the private insurance market in the process.    How the hell is that an acceptable alternative?

And how can any private insurance market rationally function without real penalties for free riders?   It is astonishing - well, astonishingly dishonest intellectually -  to read some here complaining about measures to address free riders,  and even characterizing such behavior as somehow noble.   It IS rational behavior (everyone wants something for nothing), but also exceedingly selfish.   

No private insurance system can function if folks can purchase insurance only when they need it.   As has been pointed out - that's not insurance at all, but pure and simple welfare.   
« Last Edit: June 28, 2017, 12:15:07 pm by Jazzhead »
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Offline Jazzhead

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #66 on: June 28, 2017, 12:18:42 pm »
There is no reason I should have to pay nearly 30K a year for a healthy family of 4 to have a 14K deductible for health insurance, except that someone else who has not lived a particularly healthy lifestyle is really padding out that tab, or the middlemen in the system are taking one hell of a cut.


Or maybe there's a third reason - too many damn people with exactly the same attitude as you. 
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Offline thackney

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #67 on: June 28, 2017, 12:19:23 pm »
Most here, it appears, essentially favor (C) -  forcing the cost on to hospitals obliged to treat the uninsured,  and distorting the private insurance market in the process.    How the hell is that an acceptable alternative?

While my choice lies outside those choices, back when it was (C), it added ~6% to the total cost of those hospitals.  Current choices have cost to get health care FAR exceeding that added cost.

http://www.aha.org/research/reports/tw/chartbook/2011/chapter4.pdf


« Last Edit: June 28, 2017, 12:20:06 pm by thackney »
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Offline Jazzhead

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #68 on: June 28, 2017, 12:25:32 pm »
Here is a fact sheet on uncompensated care provided by hospitals ,  put out by the American Hospital Association.

Since 2000, hospitals of all types have provided more than $538 billion in uncompensated care to their patients.  However, significantly,  that number does NOT include other unfunded costs of care, such as underpayments from Medicare and Medicaid. 

Want to know why your private insurance (non-Medicare or Medicaid) is so high?   You're paying for all the above.   What's happening is selective socialism -  some of us are paying more to finance uncompensated or under-compensated care provided to others.   
« Last Edit: June 28, 2017, 12:31:54 pm by Jazzhead »
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Offline Suppressed

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #69 on: June 28, 2017, 12:27:34 pm »
When I was EMS, we never had, nor have I ever heard of, a hospital refuse to treat a patient. That included helicopter transport to what was then the nation's premier trauma unit (ShockTrauma at Hopkins) and treatment there. If they died in the streets, it was because they didn't make to the hospital.

...

Good question, but it would interfere with the whole 'poor waifs dying in the streets' meme.

Again, again, again...government prevents that, with a legal requirement of hospitals to treat people.  Prior to that, there were periods in America's history when people DID die in the streets, being refused treatment.  Here's an example of what can happen: http://www.manilatimes.net/penniless-nobel-laureate-dies-after-private-hospital-refused-to-treat-him/223747/

Sure, you can say private charity will pick up slack, but there's no way that will happen with the level of costs today.  And those costs aren't all from a lack of competition or government regulation.  People have clamored for better and better healthcare...1970s care is still cheap.  It's the advancements that cost.

So yes, the choice is government involvement, or people dying in the streets.  And if you suggest government involvement, are you prepared to pick up part of that tab, or are you pushing it off onto someone else, like a hospital?
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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #70 on: June 28, 2017, 12:28:29 pm »
Yes...Ronald Reagan signed legislation forcing them to do so.   That's the government in health care that some people here want to remove.  Others seem to think that care happens by magic, for free, just because the hospital gets socked with the costs.

Exactly.

Yup. Government in heath care.

@Suppressed

Right.  We have plenty of it now, so Obamacare isn't needed and should be repealed.

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #71 on: June 28, 2017, 12:33:15 pm »
Or maybe there's a third reason - too many damn people with exactly the same attitude as you.

@Jazzhead

Virtue signaling comes cheap on an internet forum.  But I just wonder how thrilled you are IRL to pay through the nose for others' healthcare.
« Last Edit: June 28, 2017, 12:34:13 pm by CatherineofAragon »

Offline Jazzhead

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #72 on: June 28, 2017, 12:35:58 pm »
@Suppressed

Right.  We have plenty of it now, so Obamacare isn't needed and should be repealed.

But ObamaCare still attempts to address the "selective socialism" aspect of the current system (see my post above), by "forcing" everybody to be responsible and carry insurance.   Conservatives don't like that assault on their liberty,  but are perfectly willing to allow others to pick up the tab for the sick.   
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Offline Jazzhead

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #73 on: June 28, 2017, 12:38:43 pm »
@Jazzhead

Virtue signaling comes cheap on an internet forum.  But I just wonder how thrilled you are IRL to pay through the nose for others' healthcare.

I'm not.  I pay more - my employer pays more - for health insurance because of folks who refuse to cover themselves and then demand treatment when they get sick.   No, I don't want folks dying in the street - and some here seem perfectly comfortable with the concept, especially for those "less virtuous" than themselves.   
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Silver Pines

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Re: Senate adds penalty for going uninsured to healthcare bill
« Reply #74 on: June 28, 2017, 12:40:48 pm »
let them pick up their own tab and not infect the health insurance industry with their demands. That sounds cold, but there is a reason some people were considered "uninsurable" because of risk levels that approached certainty for some behaviours, or the 'preexisting conditions' of already being infected. There is, in DC,  one of the highest population percentages of the GLBTs in the country. (between 8 and 10 percent--San Francisco is actually less 'gay') which may explain the disproportionate representation that group seems to have. This is a 'transfer of wealth' to pay for HIV/AIDS treatment, at the expense of people who would never engage in the behaviour to contract the disease. It's a 'payback' for the 'breeders', not to mention the house rake in the insurance middleman scheme. When I was EMS, we never had, nor have I ever heard of, a hospital refuse to treat a patient. That included helicopter transport to what was then the nation's premier trauma unit (ShockTrauma at Hopkins) and treatment there. If they died in the streets, it was because they didn't make to the hospital. Good question, but it would interfere with the whole 'poor waifs dying in the streets' meme.

@Smokin Joe

I agree; if you're going to engage in gay sex, know up front you're walking a train trestle.  If a train hits you, you bear the burden for it.

The only TV news I watch is local, and I have never seen a single story about someone in the community dying because healthcare was too expensive.  Not one.