From the available statistics, you are one of the majority that doesn't like the solutions currently being presented by our government. The majority certainly doesn't think the health care system needs to be fixed now at the expense of the economy. I manage my business and family by not dealing with facts in isolation. 60% of my employees may feel they need new office desks, but not if it means they won't get a Christmas bonus. That kind of tunnel vision is going to cost a lot of elected officials seats in 2010. I had an epiphany last night as I watched Penn and Teller's series entitled "Bullshit". It featured a guy who healed people with crystals, who charged 160$ per healing session. The guy lives in Arizona and does 500-700 sessions per year. My epiphany was that those 500-700 people, as well as the "crystal healer" himself, vote and sit on juries using their reasoning skills(or lack thereof) to decide if people are innocent or guilty. /Shudder My point is, whether it be drinking cyanide spiked cool aide on behalf of Jesus, killing innocent civilians to go to heaven for Allah, healing your mental and physical ailments by paying someone $160 to swing a crystal over your head, or pushing health care that costs over a trillion dollars and doesn't insure everyone while we continue to loose hundreds of thousands jobs and devalue our currency, there will always be some percentage of the people who buy into it hook line and sinker. In that spirit, I'll just say that I respect your right to your opinion, and save my comments for someone to whom they might mean something.
Non sequitur. With health care approcahing 1/5th of the GDP one can hardly make such a distinction. Yet, that is exactly what you are doing here. You speak to the "economy" in the widest of brush strokes, offering absolutely no positive solutions, all while suggesting that we ignore an issue that 75% of Americans see worthy of attention, and 68% fo who see it as needing to be addressed now, and that accounts for the better part of 20% of the US GDP. Health care can hardly be viewed in isolation to the other issues you would raise.
First off, you claimed earlier that health care costs account for 16% of the GDP. Now you are claiming 20%. Did the 25% growth in your number happen out of your need to spin it as larger than it is, or are you claiming health care has gone from 16 to 20% of GDP since you last posted? Secondly, you have yet to provide a link backing up and explaining your 16% claim. What does it mean to you? From the way you throw it around, it seems that either a) you are just speaking from Democrat provided talking points, or b) you think that "fixing" health care will somehow "fix" the economy. I know you won't own up to a), so why don't you explain your ideas on how b) works? Are thinking that spending a couple Trillion dollars to create a new government agency is going to somehow or other create jobs (other than government jobs)? Maybe it will stimulate investment into Medical related industries.... I'm just DYING to hear the delusional response to this question. Wide brush strokes? No positive solutions? Here is a wide brush stroke positive solution you might have heard me mention once or twice. QUIT SPENDING MORE THAN YOU TAKE IN!. Here is another one. QUIT BAILING OUT COMPANIES THAT FAIL WITH TAXPAYER DOLLARS (*** unless its my company that is failing. These are tried and true solutions that aren't even complicated. Hell, they aren't even partisan. Willy, for all I know, you have five kids, only two of which are getting passing grades in school. The other three would do better if you could put them into private school, or pay for tutoring, or stay home from work and tutor them yourself. The problem is, you don't have the cash to do any of the above. Now I KNOW you believe that all five your kids deserve a college diploma from a top ten school, but the way it looks right now, its not going to happen. What I want you to do is follow your own advice and fire up a printing press in your garage that cranks out crisp clean $100 bills and see how far that gets you. Yes this country faces more than one problem. Your solution is to introduce more problems.
More accurately, I stated,"the better part of 20%." Given the rapidly escalating percentage of the past 5 years, 20% is coming sooner than you might expect. Here is one... Going to the source... Quite simply, if we don't take steps to fix the problem, the problem will in time consume us. I happen to favor a single payer system based on shared risk - one that eliminates the profiteering by companies not directly involved in providing health care services (i.e. the insurance industry). Short of that, serious regulation of the insurance industry has to be a part of any real solution. There are any number of other areas within the health care system deserving of regulation as well. Pharms stand out as one, but we could also include physician owned, all in one clinics (that facilitate profit taking at multiple levels of the system, encouraging abuse), etc. But, in the end, it will probably all come down to controlling administrative costs.
At last, a source for your numbers, along with explanations. Let me first off provide a link to the source of the data used in the article you published, since it comes unvarnished. Now to your claims and solutions. So is death. It doesn't change the age that I am today, so if we are going to bother talking about numbers, please use the correct numbers. It depends on which problem you are referring to. There seem to be several, though 16% of GDP spent on health care, according to the information you provided, I would not list as one of the problems until I had more information. When you say the % of GDP spent on health care is going up, there are any number of causes for that, and not all of them are problematic. You'll notice by the link I provided that the US spends more money on prescription drugs than any of the other OECD countries save one. Is that because we need them more? Are they over perscribed? Are they one of the many new "recreational" pharmaceuticals such as Viagra or Levitra? Since we are on the topic, how many of these rising medical costs go along with the plastic surgery craze that has arrived in the last 20 years including breast augmentation, rhinoplasty, botox, lyposuction, and many of the other "procedures" many of our citizens now submit themselves to on an annual basis. The answer is, we don't know, because that data isn't provided. Our doctors are paid more than most other countries physicians, but then again, our malpractice laws are set up in such a way that very expensive malpractice policies have to be carried by any practitioner working in a specialty with a higher possibility of death (Cardiologist, Radiologist, Anesthesiologist). You'll also notice our doctors graduate from medical school with more debt than almost any other nation on the planet, which might explain the shortage of doctors, specifically general practitioners, who will graduate with over $100k in debt to work in a job that pays around $100k per year. This mind you after a decade of education. Given that alternative becoming an attorney seems an easy choice. The single biggest reason we should worry about that 16% number is because the government is currently taxing the population to pay for Medicare, and rising medicare costs make the system unsustainable without higher taxes. This is the issue with getting the government involved in the first place. When the taxpayer is involved, cutting costs becomes necessary regardless of what that means. Caps on doctors salaries? Elimination of certain types of drugs? Raising taxes? You mentioned the high administration costs incurred by our current insurance administration system. The question everyone has been asking is, why are our insurance companies exempt from anti-trust laws and not permitted to compete across state lines? Its like they were set up to become monopolistic fat cats so that the govt. could take over their business. In most other industries, when you get a monopoly, you break it up to increase competition, not have the government take over the industry. So when the government doesn't pay for some medical procedure you feel is critical, and you want to sue, how many of our taxpayer dollars should the insurance company(the government) spend defending itself from your law suit, or would you then be the one Democrat in favor of Tort reform that limits your potential settlement? Wow. Wow. You just presented a solution that shouldn't cost money to helping the "Health care crisis" in our nation. Of course I'm guessing that when you say "regulating" you are not referring to breaking up monopolies and providing more competition across state lines, but rather caps on compensation for execs and limits on profits for the same companies? I hope I'm wrong. BTW, you'll get no argument out of me in eliminating unscrupulous tactics used to rid insurance roles of expensive patients, though the realist needs to acknowledge failure to do so will drive up premiums. One mans opinion. There are many ways to control administrative costs. Real competition usually forces companies to do things as cheaply as possible, and I think that is something we have yet to see regarding health insurance companies in this country. I still cant figure out how some people think having our ever efficient federal government administer anything actually reduces net costs.
First no one is "trying to blame" Republicans for anything. I'm saying they are not completely innocent bystanders here and you know that's what I meant you just can't counter that fact so this absurd bullshit ensued. Fact: If the Republicans weren't filibustering and forcing a 60 vote majority on EVERYTHING the dems wouldn't need all 60 votes. And just to help you get your facts straight, the democratic caucus which is where this (not really) 60 vote majority number comes from actually has 2 Independent Senators. One of whom happens to be Joe Lieberman (yes the same one who endorsed John McCain over Barack Obama in the Presidential race). Add to that about 8 conservative Democrats and you see the truth. Not a ridiculous Republican talking point. The Democrats have 4 people willing to vote against hcr. The Republicans have 40. So again..... please save the "Democrats have 60 votes so they are all powerful" nonsense for someone who can't count or doesn't have a rudimentary understanding of our nation's political structure. Thanks. Nah, instead I'm going to point and laugh at your hysterically transparent attempt to spin while reacquainting you with the REST OF THE QUOTE YOU LEFT OFF... "Let's not forget they added HUNDREDS of amendments throughout this process. The bill, as the Democrats wrote it, doesn't even exist anymore." That statement illustrates the point I was making. I'm sure you left it off accidentally.... Well now I'm lost. It looks like you didn't have a counter to my statement that conservatives should be rejoicing at this failure to move health care forward. I suppose this is where you stop talking?? Drat.. No such luck I see... you just decided to counter by pointing out how liberals would rejoice at something you would consider equally appalling. So I'm right and you'll raise me a jab at liberals. Touche sir, ya got me.. It's an insane tool you may have heard of. It's called a vote. Something we don't get to do at all when corporations are allowed to make our health and well being a profit based business. But just so I have this straight you're saying, in other words, don't change it over to the government. i.e. keep the status quo. amirite??? And hey who knows maybe we'll get lucky and keep the Democrats in power. Because while you're pointing out payoffs take a look at this lil factoid.... The Democrats obviously have a few bad apples who are influenced by the health industry but the MAJORITY of them want to pass health care with the public option. The Republicans on the other hand... well.... THEY ALL (every single one of them) are voting against hcr... Now use your instinctual common sense and tell me which party is more influenced by the insurance lobby. Sounds like someone was for the public option.... Sounds like someone likes the idea of choice between "them" and the government. Not just "them". amirite??? Where did the urgency come from? Well let's see.... we have to look at the presidency in almost dog year fashion. Because according to conservatives the current administration is a failure just one year in. So we have only the next 3 years to get it done before he gets voted out and we elect President Palin and it never gets done. Seriously though, the simple answer to your question is because right now we have a quasi majority of votes and a Democratic president who is for health care reform. Why do you think we haven't come this close to health care reform since Roosevelt? But would I like to see you try to argue that we should wait for Republicans to regain power so they can fix health care? Yes please
Ahh George. Your post is so full of conflict and talking points, it would be a waste of my time to address them all. For the sake of brevity, and to illustrate your style, I'll focus in on just one. Not wanting to change health care to a tax payer funded, government run insurance company = Keep it status quo? Really? Do you think about this stuff before you write it? Do you have any other insane comparisons provided to you by the left wing blogs you speak from? I mean, if you are going to publish pure nonsense, you should at least try and use something that is arguably logical. "If you are not for our solution, you are for NO solution!". Who thinks up this crap? How stupid do you think people are? Here is a wise latin phrase those pushing this crap through should think about. "Primum non nocere". Something very similar to this phrase has been incorporated in the Hippocratic oath doctors take. It means, "First, do no harm". Believers in that philosophy would figure out a way to deliver health insurance reform without spending several trillion dollars in the middle of a recession. My guess is that changing the law to enforce existing anti-trust laws, and opening up interstate competition would cost the taxpayers almost nothing. Putting caps on the amount of money that could be paid to the attorneys of either side of a malpractice tort would dramatically lower costs all around, but that would really piss off the lobbyists who are busily paying Democrats to keep that type of stuff out of this "Reform" bill. There is a reason over 60% of Americans are opposed to this legislation.
Logic will be lost just like when someone can't understand what "illegal" means when the subject of "illegal aliens" is brought up. People are so programmed they can't even see the word in context at all, it somehow becomes invisible. It also makes me think of the "cartoon physics" that the CT use for the towers coming down. The inability to be taught some of the most basic things is astonishing. No wonder the public schools have had to dumb down everything. (Or is this the result of that dumbing down?)
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-health-insure17-2009dec17,0,2204157.story I thought all the president wanted was "Choice and Competition". So these congressmen and women are in opposition to the President or do they just like high insurance premiums. What a bunch of hypocrites. They use the argument that insurance companies issuing policies from states with fewer consumer protection laws will put the California based companies out of business. Well Duh! That is called choice. Consumers will be able to choose a policy with fewer consumer protections for less, or a more expensive policy with more consumer protections. Like buying between a Ford, Chevy, and Toyota. Its called choice. Odd that they didnt seem too concerned when California companies would have to compete against an insurance company funded by taxpayer dollars that never has to make a profit.
Given that there are only about 30 companies in the US that offer health insurance, there is not going to be much in the way of competition. I don't know how many of those 30 are in fact parts of an umbrella corporation set up to operate in local jurisdictions, but I would guess quite a few. Golden Rule, for instance, is a subsidiary of UnitedHealth. WellPoint has several Blue Cross subsidiaries. Soooo, it may well be that California doesn't want a company ducking regulations by using an out of State subsidiary, which does make a bit more sense now, doesn't it. The Feds simply have to provide meaningful regulation of the insurance industry rather than leaving it up to individual States. The current system is incredibly open to abuse if companies are allowed to do this. It won't be about consumer choice - it will be about corporate choice.
So your argument against interstate competition is that the insurance companies are also allowed around the anti-trust laws? Convincing.
Unfortunately, other Healthcare reforms are still on the table, when it really has no right to be at all. When, in the Constitution, does it say that the Federal Congress is allowed to do anything such as this? I don't know. I thought Thomas Jefferson was pretty clear, when he said that the Federal Government can only provide for the General Welfare of the country, as long as it was one of the ones enumerated in the Constitution. All other powers belonged to the States or the individual. This is highly illegal and treasonous to defy the Supreme Law of the Land. In the same way, I would be fine if individual States had the public option or these Healthcare reforms. They can do it if the want, but it's utterly unconstitutional to cut corners with the Constitution and do this crap, when the Federal Government was not created to provide for any such public option or interference into the free market. If they really did want to do something, they would stop aiding any corporations whatsoever, and any immoral institutions will fall by itself when it finds out that acting like a bunch of czars will probably put my customers off.
~ The conference committee on this bill should be a real donnybrook and that is without any Republicans....Public option remains in the house version by the way but probably hasn't a chance - but for one vote.
~ Disaster looms for health-care and the Democrats, and the midterms are barley in sight....down with the independents, they should not be allowed to vote.