In 2006, [Massachusetts] lawmakers seeking to broaden health coverage made it illegal to be uninsured. It works like this: Employers have to offer you a health plan. If you are jobless or don’t like your employer’s plan, you must buy your own. If you don’t get one, you pay a stiff fine. This strategy—known as an employer and individual “mandate”—forms the backbone of the national health reform bills now making their way through Congress.
On paper, the experiment was a resounding success. According to an Urban Institute estimate, the number of uninsured residents quickly fell from 13 percent to 7 percent following the law’s passage.And yet, something strange happened. Despite having health insurance, roughly one in 10 state residents still failed to fill prescriptions, ended up with unpaid medical bills, or skipped needed medical care for financial reasons. Hundreds of millions of dollars were spent to insure more Massachusetts citizens, but many people still weren’t getting necessary care. What happened?
Assume you’re looking to buy insurance. The state has a handy Web site where you can find the cheapest plan. For a young family of four, that plan costs roughly $9,500 per year, which doesn’t include a minimum annual deductible of $3,500 before many benefits kick in. (The state helps cover some of the premiums for those who make very little money, but many still have to pay the other fees.) And if anyone is hospitalized or needs a lot of specialized care, you also pay 20 percent of that bill. In this relatively cheap plan, the family can be liable for an extra $10,000 per year of medical costs. This sort of “high deductible” health plan is clearly structured to discourage medical care.
The article goes on to detail the effects of the program, parts of which may end up in Obama’s plan. The author’s conclusion?
The expensive Massachusetts plan is not well-designed to systematically improve anyone’s health. Instead, it’s a superficial effort to clear the uninsured from the books and then clumsily limit further costs by discouraging care.
You know, LL, America became a great country because we were a nation of immigrants. We weren’t locked into “that’s the way it’s always been done by my family going back a thousand years so we’ll never change it.” Our power comes from seeing what works among the ideas brought to the table by many different people, and using what works.
#65, I can’t decide whether you’re funny or pathetic, LL.
Oh, I am very serious.
This country did not build itself up by copying other countries. We built it on the US Constitution, which does not give the Federal Government the power to do these things.
If it is so great over there, why aren’t you over there? I haven’t heard a good reason yet.
Personally, I think you all are just a bunch of lazy bastards. You would rather just sit in front of your TVs and whine about your lot in life while you try to figure out the best way to make things better without having to do left a finger.
It’s easier to justify your thieving ways by painting it as altruism.
Where if you really gave a rat’s ass about these people, you would donate more of your time and resources to helping them instead of forcing others to do it for you.
#67 LL This country did not build itself up by copying other countries.
This reminds me of the old joke about the Texas Legislature (motto: if you take all the idiots out, it won’t be a representative body). They were debating about whether to allow or mandate, I forget which, teaching foreign languages in schools. One good old boy piped up with a definitive answer: “Only English! If it’s good enough for the Bible, it’s good enough for me!”
LL, you might want to read some history about where the founding fathers got their ideas for the Constitution from. Brace yourself — most of them came from sissy Europeans.
Personally, I think you all are just a bunch of lazy bastards. You would rather just sit in front of your TVs and whine about your lot in life while you try to figure out the best way to make things better without having to do left a finger.
Thanks for a little peek into the LL mindset. A therapist could have a field day with this. I’m sorry you live in such a pinched and narrow and selfish little world, LL. Something bad must have happened to you when you were a kid.
he said Loser had a mind.
You know–“insurance” is about risk assessment, risk spreading, and risk avoidance while MAKING as much money as possible.
The government is about providing an essential service most appropriately to the resources available.
Not the same thing at all.
Funny how Alfie is as to religion and common sense and Loser is to liberty and the social contract.
#68, This reminds me of the old joke about the Texas Legislature (motto: if you take all the idiots out, it won’t be a representative body).
I’ll admit that’s funny. I live in Texas.
LL, you might want to read some history about where the founding fathers got their ideas for the Constitution from. Brace yourself — most of them came from sissy Europeans.
I’m familiar. They took what they liked and through out the rest.
There is even some research, though not plausible, that basic ideas of the Constitution came from the Iroquois federation.
I’m sorry you live in such a pinched and narrow and selfish little world, LL.
Yes, I am selfish. I do things that make me feel good inside. I take care of my family. I take care of my employees. I help out my friends because it makes me feel good to do so. I donated 10 hours a week for a solid year to social services last year because that made me feel good to do so.
I don’t ask anything in return for this. I don’t ask any recognition.
How much time did you donate?
Something bad must have happened to you when you were a kid.
Whatever it was, it made me want to help people in need, on my own, without being forced to.
#68, is it your point that there existed Europeans in the 18th century who wrote extensively against the ills of the European Monarchies, or that in 1787 there was an extensive list of Constitutional Republics in Europe from which the United States could model itself after?
Eventually, as the healthcare plans go forward they’ll stop calling it insurance because it’ll become something else. Besides, isn’t the purpose of insurance to protect your assets? Not pay for Advil.
I think that the only reason this is such an issue is because people don’t know how to manage their money. Why would I need a low deductible if I have $5,000 on hand for emergencies?
The government calling the plan insurance is just a back door approach for making healthcare a right and forcing providers to give service.
#70–Stumbling Towards Liberty==”Whatever it was, it made me want to help people in need, on my own, without being forced to.” /// Well done, better than most. I for one never help anyone unless it advances my own particular agenda. As you recognize other people’s needs/benefits when you respond INDIVIDUALLY, now all you need to do is pull your head out of your ass and recognize that “social needs” not met by the aggregate of individual actions should be provided by the SOCIETY for the VERY SAME REASONS you provided it individually. You really are being somewhat schizophrenic on this issue of living in society vs living on the island in your mind.
That will happen when you are blind to all the social support you have received in your life and erroneously think “you did it on your own.”
Poor little LIEBERTARIAN. Age 3 emotionally.
Well, if nothing else, a universal system would likely have a benefit of increasing labor mobility, as people won’t find themselves stuck in jobs just to retain employer benefits. Of course, if you are a big believer in the efficiency wage concept (which I’m not), not having healthcare as an employment benefit could have the potential effect of causing a decline in overall worker productivity since there is less to lose if you get fired.
So much to consider beyond just the typical political posturing.
#33–SL==seriously==what tendencies of capitalism are worse than monopolism? You chide Li’s and my analysis while offering kneejerk spasmodic naysaying with nothing of value.
I suppose remaining silent after repeated challenges is by fault agreement and recognition YOU are just being silly, but actual engagement/learning comes from express dialectic–not assuming everyone else is wrong. Gee, if I did that, I might never learn anything either.
#73, haha, that’s why I like you bobbo. Because you and I both understand what this place is – not a forum for solving actual problems, but a place to proclaim our opinions as self-evident truths, and to maybe call other people names in the process, all while feeling overly smug in knowing that we are right. Bravo!
#22 Greg Allen said,
“Only a federal mandatory, universal, health insurance program will reform our disastrous, absurdly expensive conservative health insurance system.”
It is hard to believe a sentence like that can be said of our government. You stupid liberals carp all the time about freedom, respect for others, and your intelligence but you embrace totalitarian government like a long lost lover. Why do you advocate federal control of everything? Why do you admire everything except this country?
Don’t you have any spine? Can’t you provide for yourself? What a bunch of self absorbed children.
#75, bobbo, what analysis did you provide? Li said that having a single seller in a market was bad, and I said that he should also agree then that having a single buyer should also be just as bad.
You just chimed in because you probably read a new word you hadn’t seen before.
Hey SL==I like you too. Actually, sad whenever I have to correct you. Ok, so you won’t answer the direct question as asked, but on the collateral issue you feel more firm on, I think your characterization of Li’s comment is fair, but you missed the mark on my own contribution.
I knew that monopoly had its opposite as most “words” do and actually had a case study about a single buyer/many seller scenario. The word for that was not in my mind but “understanding” the concept involved rather than parroting words I don’t understand has always been key.
When the government steps in to occupy what was previously a market driven cess pool of fraud, it is INAPPROPRIATE to continue to use market concepts/words/attributes to that relationship. I think that adds to what Li said, is part of my analysis, and completely missed by you.
Slow down, reread, respond to direct challenges, learn, admit, grow. When do we stop doing that?
#79, what is inappropriate about it? A market, no matter how manipulated and inefficient it is, is still a market, and so things that affect them are valid points of discussion.
But most specifically to the claim of “The greatest sin of capitalism is the tendency towards monopoly.” Why are monopolies necessarily bad?
Regional electrical providers, whether public or private, are generally all considered natural monopolies because with the huge expense in infrastructure just to provide the service, you actually realize better economies of scale through a single provider than with several smaller ones.
The government grants monopolies regularly to the creators of intellectual property. Municipal governments oftentimes grants monopolies to private contractors for a term and then mandates their use by the public. And sometimes, consumer choice establishes a de facto monopoly for a time simply because any alternatives aren’t compelling enough to be competitive.
Markets with a monopolist are generally inefficient, and it is true that the larger they are, they more can use their clout to cause havoc in other places. But are they all bad, or just sometimes? Clearly not. And as an aside, the government engages in far more manipulation of markets than the Microsofts of the world could ever dream of, and I will certainly argue that consumers aren’t necessarily being made better off for it.
Li’s second claim was that our current healthcare system has a monopoly over whether we live or die. I’m not even sure I know what that means exactly, but if you want to point at an inappropriate use of an economic vocabulary word, well there you go.
63,
No. America became the most powerful because Europe was destroyed during the war. Everything in the world was “Europe”. The destruction of that continent opened up the market for the US.
And sadly, while Europe has rebuilt and became modern, America is still stuck in 1955.
#80–SL==thank you for some honest consideration and response. Its all definitional isn’t it. Positioning yourself as a practitioner of the dismal science I don’t need to do more than remind you that a “market” traditionally has informed buyers and sellers both free to contract as they please.
Doesn’t describe healthcare regardless of the number of buyers or sellers.
Again, you demonstrate the lazy rhetoric of zealots who shovel forth defective arguments by selecting what fits and ignoring the rest. That sounds more harsh than the simple truth it contains and this is more a limit of the blog format than what I’m sure are more complex and layered thinking on your part.
“But most specifically to the claim of “The greatest sin of capitalism is the tendency towards monopoly.” Why are monopolies necessarily bad?”/// You are reading into the statement your judgment of being bad. Do you recognize you are projecting and wrestling ony with your OWN beliefs/statements? Li implied but did not say monopolies were bad–he only stated their greatest sin. He was correct. You disagreed, likewise only by strong implication so I asked you a direct question you still haven’t answered.
So much easier to be direct.
Some “markets”/arrangements are best served by monopolies than by competition. A monopoly by the government is very different than a monopoly by a private individual/corporation. Picking and choosing and slip slopping around to reach a point you desire is propaganda when done on purpose, just plain silly when done unconsciously.
Reality: a society wide provision of access to healthcare is good for society and the provision of these services are not maximally provided by a for profit free market system. Anything other than a single payer/government system will be suboptimal and a political fraud. Sadly, its the road Obama is currently on.
Amazing that many posters on this site, as with many voters in this country refuse to believe what they see in front of them – instead blaming anyone who speaks up as being a denier….or a heretic. Just like what happened in the Dark Ages.
Ahhh, but that’s history…something that nobody pays attention to anymore.
#54, Liberty Loser,
So, you think these other countries are better off than we are?
Yes. As far as I know every one of them has better health statistics than does the US. Longevity, infant mortality, trauma survival, obesity, etc. About the only area the US is ahead is in the area of exotic surgeries.
#85, I would probably place more blame for our obesity level on U.S. agriculture policy than on the healthcare system.
#69, Bobbo,
Funny how Alfie is as to religion and common sense and Loser is to liberty and the social contract.
Very apt.
The USA, where poverty has become a terminal illness. No reason to try to convince them about socialized medicine working elsewhere. No community values. It’s the kind of attitude that best represents the american people – If you got problems and can’t cut it, that’s your problem not mine. Only one value matters to the americans $.
#84, SL<
End consumers are also looking to access these service, and can shop around for whatever insurance plans their think is the most affordable/comprehensive for the money they have to spend, or their employers can do this and offer it as an employment benefit, or I suppose if they are wealthy enough, they can just pay directly for everything and cut out insurance all together.
If only.
Part of the problem is finding a decent insurance plan for a reasonable price. Then having the insurance plan that actually pays for the plan when called upon.
On paper this looks good. In practice, the American health insurance scheme has been a failure. The leading cause of bankruptcies in America is by those whose co-pays were more than they could afford. Think about that, insured people going belly up because their health care insurer wouldn’t pay the bill.
And you want to keep that?
#89, I’ll certainly agree that if an insurer, after performing whatever risk assessments they do to determine premiums/copays, agrees to the obligation to pay for future medical costs for the term of the policy, then it should be held to those obligations.
#84–SL==hint: Its all definitional. Now that “should be” a broad enough canvas for your to paint agreement should that be your wish. Complete disagreement with what I posted is for retards. I’ll assume charitably that you are just caught up in your own argument.
Each line is worthy of a chapter, but I decline for time management, so I’ll just demonstrate but one fallacy of your interpretation:
“it starts with your assumption that a requirement be that agents are informed and free to choose.—then you proceed with an example of how you get hungry and that is all you need to know except you do know the value of beef etc.” /// Its a good example because when you “are sick” you don’t know if you really are sick or if so from what nor what you have to do to get better. When you are hungry, you need to eat. When you are sick, maybe the best course of action is NOT to see the doctor, or to have surgery, or to take a pill and on and on.
But at least you are consistent. Not thinking that the market “by definition requires informed participants” and then posting in like manner. Heh, heh.
#91, bobbo, it doesn’t take a retard to disagree with a statement that is fundamental untrue.
“But at least you are consistent. Not thinking that the market “by definition requires informed participants” and then posting in like manner. Heh, heh.”
Oh, you’re so clever. See, I told that I enjoy these journeys down pointless tangents.
My brother in law tells me about a friend with an English mother who dies because she has to wait so long to get a cancer checked out that nothing can be done when she finally gets her turn.
Meanwhile I’m reading about a 16 year old getting a free boob job for her mental health.
The best I personally can say is I’m going to pay more taxes under the bill and get nothing.
YMMV.
#95
What’s funny/sad is that so many people think (hope) your examples will be improved when a government bureaucracy takes over.
Every bitch and moan that’s made to Senators and Congressmen about the evil, heartless, money grubbing insurance companies will just be replaced…….with even more bitching and moaning about the evil, heartless, money grubbing bureaucrats. An entity who is not intimidated, nor can they be fired by Senators and Congressmen.
In other-words, you’re voluntarily choosing to remove the last safety net that protects citizens – replacing it with more of what is causing the system to buckle.
And people think the tattoo man(earlier post) is self-destructive.
#61 – Irrelevant survey. Those who don’t live in cities at all are better off then any city dweller.
#81 – Europe didn’t rebuild – America rebuilt Europe.
The sad fact is we’ll get some kind of national health care. It will suck just like the other national health care. When the two year waits for treatment and other rationing starts, we’ll see how you all like it. It’s all inevitable. It’s all “fair” though, because we voted for these morons.
#98, Again, the right wing nuts have no plan themselves.
So, do you take stupid lessons or are you just that way naturally.
• Create a tax credit for health insurance: Instead of encouraging people to participate in the government health insurance program, individuals and families could receive a refundable tax credit to purchase health insurance. This would give them the freedom to choose a plan that makes the most sense for their individual needs.
• Reform the tax treatment of health insurance: Currently our tax code is biased in favor of employer-provided health insurance and against those who purchase healthcare from the individual market. Congress should extend the tax treatment of employer-provided health insurance to individual health insurance. This would make individual insurance more affordable.
• Enable individuals to purchase health insurance from any state: State regulations can greatly raise the cost of health insurance. Instead of being limited to policies issued in their state, individuals should be able to purchase insurance from anywhere in the country.