Americans value life. This even extends to individuals who cannot or otherwise will not provide for their own safety and health. Because of this, most of us agree that the most basic health care needs should be available to people who can't afford it. What Americans have been doing for a while now is treating people who need to be treated and handing the bill to middle and upper class citizens who pay through higher taxes, higher insurance premiums and higher healthcare costs.
Democrats want to reduce the number of uninsured by increasing the taxes and the size, scope and power of the government. This does not address the core problem, and in fact it creates more.
My moral compass requires that I admit we must care for those who cannot or will not care for themselves - but we can be doing so at a far lower cost.
Imagine a scenario: State and Federal "urgent care" facilities operating in low-income areas, and "public wings" added to private hospitals for over-night and intensive care. Their equipment is outdated, medicine less effective and amenities less comfortable. They are staffed by volunteers, interns and one or two head doctors who are paid a discounted rate for their services. Patients who use these facilities do so because they can't afford all of the luxuries of a private facility, but need the basic care and are willing to accept the risks and discomforts involved. The doctors and nurses at these facilities are protected by stronger medical malpractice suits, and literally no insurance is required for those who come in.
"Isn't this just government healthcare to the max?" you might ask. No. Given the choice, anyone who could afford a visit to a private hospital would do so. Immediately, there's a means-tested approach to low-income healthcare that would lower the cost of insurance and lower taxes, by lowering the cost of serving those who can't serve themselves.
Low-overhead, government run health facilities in low-income areas will change the face of the healthcare industry without expanding government power or tax dollars.
June 8, 2009 | In Health & Medicine
Discuss
Eve Luppert on June 8, 2009, 7:44 PM
A SINGLE-PAYER SYSTEM WILL DRIVE INNOVATION IN THE NEW ECONOMY
I’ve been an HR professional for the past 20 years. I have fought with insurance companies through most of that time. More recently I’ve seen the impact on people who have lost their jobs and for the first time are really having to face the outrageous cost of health insurance for the first time. I think there is a willingness and understanding of the benefits of a single payer system in the US for the first time.
Many of us would very much like to give up the corporate life and start our own, new businesses, creating tomorrows jobs. We know a change in how we work and what we do is coming and we want to be at the forefront of it.
However, the difficulty in keeping ourselves and our families protected from health care costs will inevitably drive many great people back into corporations where their great ideas will die a slow death.
The naysayers to national health care threaten that we will have no “choices”. But I believe that being forced to live the company life is not a choice that many who have been knocked out of their old jobs want to make.
From a fiscal point of view, a mixed system will ultimately create an adverse burden on any national health care system. People who can get company sponsored health care will certainly choose it. The single payer system will be filled with people who are underemployed, or can’t on their own afford low deductible plans with co-pays, and so continue to use the emergency room as the family doctor. Older people, who will have a harder time finding work again will need the national plan.
At the end of the day, the cost of the government to insure these people but not others will make price-tag go way up for the government plan. There isn’t an insurance company it the world who would allow you to put together a population like this and take your business.
But the right thing to do is not the same as the most politically expedient thing to do, and I don’t believe that congress is ready to give up that campaign funding in order to do the right thing. Sort of heart breaking really.
tim hall on June 11, 2009, 8:10 PM
We know that the CEO and top managers are over paid. That alone is 28% savings if we paid top management 2 million per year as opposed to 70 million plus another 75 million in stock options. Then the lavish buildings and the buying up of other businesses to keep from showing a profit is another 20% savings. Then there is the pharm. ripper, hell who knows how much they are actually taking us for.
My Idea for running both systems at the same time would be to lower premiums across the board. Expand on the medicare system to where a family of four would have to pay out a monthly premium of $300 instead of $500 to $800. The insurance companies would have to follow and cut their fat to compete. Also, we need to have mutual funds set up for the portion of insurance that families do not use. This way folks that take better care of their health, are not having to pay for this learning process that will take at least another 30 years.
The idea of capitalizing on health care is no different than capitalizing on defense or security. they are both misfortunes.
The strong scare tactics from the right are based on fear and individualism. They are afraid of loosing great care. The health industry is known for corruption in this area. Their feardoms are based on a low percentage of incidents occurring in other western cultures. These incidents are not nearly as devastating as the corruption in our HMOs. But their fears are strong enough to hold back a full national health plan. So this administration has to pass a two party system or nothing.
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