Health care reform shifting private costs to the government without tax increases to cover it is simply a recipe to kill government.

There is not enough emphasis on the consumer side of the problem of an economy floated on unsound borrowing. If investors default (somehow) then we can look at your version a bit more. But consumers are taking advantage of the laws to default on contracted obligations, fault or no-fault.

And a big point remains, will it REALLY save all that much money and/or provide that much better service?

Got something to back it up?

What's the point of making miniscule marginal cost reductions (which aren't really reductions, merely reducing the increases)?

I'm not a fan of "health care is a right" because it's not in the Constitution and it's clearly not a natural right. I think there is a big difference between "provide for" and "promote" and that we need to take it seriously, whether we propose an Amendment or not.

Beyond natural rights, we can look at rights of citizenship or rights of residence, as privileges accorded as effective but conditional rights.

The thing is that healthcare is a scarce resource so it must be allocated or rationed somehow, whether by the law of the jungle, community say-so, economic power, or other means (singly or severally). Paying for it via taxes has pluses and minuses, as does the current mishmash of methods.

I think the health care issue is a great one to use to focus on the problematic role of lobbying by big business, or lobbying by ANY business. Businesses are not citizens, they don't vote, and they are not real persons (even the sole proprietorship is not a real person, it's separable from the proprietor even if the IRS treats it otherwise). It's pretty clear that if you could strip out business lobbying, that the US would move very quickly to a baseline Single Payer system of some kind as a 'safety net' with private funding in addition to that being an option. What is not clear is how the dust would settle as to R&D, special case issues, and intrusive government invasions of personal choices (like -- obesity management becomes required in some cases). But given that many industrialized countries have some large role for government in health care, it's unlikely that the US would suddenly become non-competitive on medical technology or innovation.

In a word, cost-efficiency.

btw, I cannot accept your definition of profit, because wages are profit really. You're talking about return on capital investment, a limited aspect of profit. While usury is bad, some return is good. The question is whether the existing structure supports too much excess profit/wages/etc. and whether an alternative would be "better". Since the main argument against private insurance etc. is the "31%" overhead claim (even if exaggerated), there is nothing in there about profits since overhead is a cost not a profit.

Just how much of premium payments are diverted to excess profit?

"Ceci n'est pas un politician." [stenciled on a glossly portrait of Palin...

The question remains whether one can count on borrowing oneself out of a recession, or by contrast one should just let the economy contract back towards reality and then move forward from there. That is, the long-term cost of borrowing sometimes exceeds the short term stimulus' beneficial effects even if it's 100% viagra.

The cost to go to supposedly more efficient and useful means of medical record keeping is supposed to be in the initial setup, buying computers and software and loading stuff into them. I think it's bull. I don't believe the savings are all that big in general. And then no more handwritten charts everything has to be entered into a database so there will be ongoing costs which might eat up most or all of the alleged savings over current methods. And just how often do you need old x-rays STAT? Rather it's an attempt to erode privacy and doctor-patient privilege (once the data is online the NSA will have a back door and so will others). Of course once someone else pays for your health care, you don't deserve total privacy anyway, and if tax dollars pay for it, why shouldn't your medical records be public?

Okay, I'm not entirely against improving how records are generated and kept, and sometimes speedy access to records is a good thing.

Is this the optimistic or pessimistic CBO estimate of whatever BS public option notion?

Besides being ad hominem and thoughtless, it looks most like a personal riff on a long tangent from what I wrote. If it were meant as a direct reply, I have to say you're confusing 2000-2007 with the crash of Sept. 2008 and following. It's also not at all clear what we have "given" companies besides loans and equity purchases which seem to be in process of being paid back (small steps).

And on and on and on...

That's how I'm reading it (in an attempt to "credit" it with sense!!)

I mean, even if the government processes more taxes, this isn't a giveaway stimulus bill, is it?

Since the dollar is backed by the full faith and credit of the government, there is a grain of truth but also a grain of lie in that post.

The poster is probably a fan of Austrian economics and/or fears hyperinflation.

No. Investors got whacked. Consumers borrowed out the yin-yang to run the economy overboard, and were swept overboard too. Faulty borrowing screwed investors when debtors stopped paying back the interest, and principal, on the loans used to live high (or to stall collapse).

Okay, maybe that picture is a bit overboard on the overboard theme. The point is that the economy was overinflated for many years based on unsound consumer borrowing and expectations. And so producer borrowing was sucked in too, as producers geared up for future fantasy consumption. Fortunately it looks like only a few trillion which if amortized over 3-4 years is only a big hit not a total loss.

The trillions of excess apparent GDP which were in reality just churning and fluffing require a major renormalization of effective real GDP and expectations.

I don't see why something like an L is not the correct shape regardless of what kind of economic structures emerge.

If the new era is supposed to be decreased power of professional lobbyists, grass roots lobbying needs its voices at the table, and not just via astroturf on either side.

It's very convenient to pretend that health care does not involve allocation of scarce resources. Then you can give it away practically for free.

Medicare for all would shift huge amounts of the economy around, for worse or better. Public option is ill-defined, which one with what features?

$8000 per capita, figured over what expenditures and what population base for what benefits with how much fraud etc? Insureds only? Medicare/Medicaid included? What?

Technically he might have a point that Zandi's 'anyone' would more correctly be 'widely' in that context.

The report also basically identifies the address of the person who complained as being just to the west of the "crime" scene address.