Simplicity of Solution II
First of all, let's stop calling health care reform by the wrong name. It is NOT health CARE, it is health INSURANCE. It is a mistake to call it anything else.
We are making it way to complicated. The solution is very simple, really. Medicare works very well. If the pool of insured became younger and more healthy, the costs of Medicare would drop proportionately. Finding the actual cost involved would require actuaries to figure out. Once done, allow people to buy into Medicare. Small business would jump into the pool. Self employed would jump right in. Make a sliding payment scale for anyone else and you have a very reasonable solution to a very painful problem.
So, what's all the hubub, Bub?
We are making it way to complicated. The solution is very simple, really. Medicare works very well. If the pool of insured became younger and more healthy, the costs of Medicare would drop proportionately. Finding the actual cost involved would require actuaries to figure out. Once done, allow people to buy into Medicare. Small business would jump into the pool. Self employed would jump right in. Make a sliding payment scale for anyone else and you have a very reasonable solution to a very painful problem.
So, what's all the hubub, Bub?
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LOL, this is too funny.
Who do you think is paying for Medicare right now? Queen Elizabeth?
At the moment, there are 3.9 working persons to cover 1 Medicare recipient, through taxes. Because of the sheer number of people retiring, we will have only 2.4 workers paying per recipient in 2030.
So even if you confiscate everyone's premiums by forcing them to pay into the pool, the math is still working against you because we have a combination of aging, inflation and price increases.
July 25, 2009 10:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
Nice misdirection lalo. ;) Now watch me pull a rabbit out of my hat. Whether the costs of a 'Medicare for all' type plan are distributed at 3.9 workers/beneficiary or 1 worker/beneficiary has nothing to do with the actual costs of operating the program relative to a multiple private insurance payer system, which BTW most estimates place the administrative overhead costs at about 25% of our healthcare dollars spent, (as opposed to medicare which comes in at about 2-3%).
July 26, 2009 10:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
Lalo, you obviously neglected to read the part about the pool getting younger and healthier, thus changing your 3.9 to possibly 5.8 or 6.2 or 7.9 depending on the size of the pool. Bottom line is that once the emotion is removed from the argument, the numbers won't lie. Yes numbers can be manipulated, but again, take the emotion out and facts live. Stay healthy my friend.
July 26, 2009 12:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
We have 300 million people in this country now. Those who work, pay for Medicare already. By taking everyone's insurance premiums, you are going to shift some of the costs. But tax are the major source of funding for Medicare and all working Americans already pay them.
Unless you have a magic formula to change the demographics, I can't see how redirecting private premiums into a public service is going to generate the revenue you're looking for.
Perhaps there is something else you mean when you talk about getting the pool younger?
July 26, 2009 2:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
"The pool getting younger" refers to making Medicare the Public Option that would be available to all -- young, old; healthy and sick. Thereby making the risk of payment less per person within the pool, because there would be many people in it who don't get back what they would be currently putting in.
You know, just like health insurance, which I paid over $7,000 into last year, and had less than $300 of claims. Well, just like health insurance except that Medicare wouldn't be spending a million dollars a day lobbying Congress to kill health care reform. And Medicare wouldn't be paying millions of dollars to its "executives," or for advertising, or other overhead.
Again, Lalo. We know what you're against. What are you FOR?
July 26, 2009 2:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
I think you are confusing the cost of delivery of health care (problem #1) with the cost of insurance premiums (problem #2). They are obviously related, but they are not the same thing.
July 26, 2009 3:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
Again Lalo, you seem to miss the gist of the argument. Paying for health care is done by INSURANCE. Single payer, universal, public option are all ways to INSURE people from risk. Health care comes from doctors and hospitals. Insurance PAYS the doctors and hospitals. When you pay INSURANCE premiums, You get access to care paid for by the pool of insured. Medicare is INSURANCE.
July 26, 2009 5:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
P.S. You are paying for private health insurance in addition to payroll deductions for Medicare, anyway. The only difference would be lower costs and portability with Medicare.
July 26, 2009 12:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
I have been wanting to scream for a while about the MSM's interchangeability of the words "healthcare" and "coverage".
I have a little different take. I think that healthcare should be a right provided by the central authority/government and not a for profit business. There should not be a need for a term like "healthcare insurance coverage".
I believe that a universal healthcare system, provided by expanding Medicare or merging Blue Cross/Blue Shield (your primary provider of health insurance coverage to government workers) and others with Medicare in some kind of hybrid systemm is the best way to provide heathcare to America.
But you are basically right. Medicare works much better than what people think in general. It would work even better if it was Universal.
July 26, 2009 1:38 AM | Reply | Permalink
There seems to be some misconception as to who pays into medicare; it is not just the deductions from payroll, medicare recipients pay premiums and have co-pays;
http://questions.medicare.gov/cgi-bin/medicare.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=2100
July 26, 2009 9:17 AM | Reply | Permalink