Thats about how I see it.

The problem with the government is they cannot run anything well. I don't want to have to deal with health cares version of the DMV if I need it, no thanks.

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2016 Corvette Stingray 2LT
1969 280SE
2023 Ram 1500
2007 Tiara 3200

The only way to get to the insurance companies (ICs) is to keep submitting your claim...

I had five friends and one relative...all in the insurance biz.

Their insight...

About 90% of the denied claims never are re-submitted for challenge...right there, the ICs saved a ton of cash...

Now, the fun part...

The remaining 10% just have to keep at it...re-submitting their claim, filling out more forms, listening to "shyster" pseudo-docs, that never have seen you, for "their" interpretation of why you should be dancing with the stars and that you're faking the amputated leg...

Through attrition, the ICs manage to get the "complainers" down to two or three folks...then the lawyers get involved...

The lawyers get their share, you get a bottle of asprin and a boot in the ass (You probably had to do a "copay" on the asprin... ) and the IC executives get a nice "bonus" for keeping the premium payout low.

Nice work, at the top, if you can get it.

What do you want to bet that "O" and the gang will get some sweatheart deals w/the ICs before all is said and done with this Health-Care crap?

THE NEW HEALTHCARE MANTRA FOR THE TAX-PAYING PUBLIC:

We the taxpayers, will support the few and tactless in their search and acquisition of healthcare and welfare for their own, while we, those same taxpayers, will scramble around, Canadian-style (think BACON), and hope our number comes up before OUR NUMBER comes up!

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M. G. Burg
'10 - Dakota SXT - Daily Ride / ≈ 172.5K
.'76 - 450SLC - 107.024.12 / < .89.20 K
..'77 - 280E - 123.033.12 / > 128.20 K
...'67 - El Camino - 283ci / > 207.00 K
....'75 - Yamaha - 650XS / < 21.00 K
.....'87 - G20 Sportvan / > 206.00 K
......'85 - 4WINNS 160 I.O. / 140hp
.......'74 - Honda CT70 / Real 125
.
“I didn’t really say everything I said.”
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ~ Yogi Berra ~

Arguments can be made that they also pay a 3rd group to game the system. It’s probably not an obvious relationship but the insurance industry and the AMA are pretty tightly integrated. Vast sums of money moves from the insurance companies to practitioners bank accounts. In part due to this, as of 2005 only about 15% of doctors are practicing members of the AMA. The AMA is alleged to work to limit the number of new MDs brought in the system and claims to lobby on behalf of docs. The AMA has one of the most widely read medical journals.

Changing the perception of the AMA as the speaker for the majority of docs and making more consumers aware of its role as a lap dog will go a long way to help illuminate consumers of how the insurance industry wields influence.

Please dont enlighten us.

I am sure we can all conclude from you past posts what your opinion is.

If I wanted to hear what the talking megaphone head hypnotists on TV have to say
I would have watched.

I dont need you to try and explain to me how the liberals are going to destroy healthcare in Amerika, and that is going to destroy the entire country.

Who do you think pays for that carp your watching on TV ?

Can you please try to look past the smoke and mirrors and see that there are some
people that are trying to delude you ?

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When the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace.
Jimi Hendrix

A foolish statement. Your knowledge of our health care system is clearly flawed. These erroneous beliefs seem quite entrenched with a certain portion of your population. This has allowed large and profitable health care interests to equate Canadian-style health care with an attack on your freedom, which always resonates with a large portion of your population, and profit immensely in the process.

I always stay on the sideline with these discussions until invariably someone uses the "C" word and uses false information about Canadian health care to turn it into some sort of bogeyman to scare people into continuing to embrace a health care system that puts profit ahead of patient care. I'll be the first to say our system isn't perfect. It is far from perfect and it needs to be improved. But I wouldn't hesitate to choose my system over yours in a heartbeat.

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Jonathan

2011 Mazda2
2000 E320 4Matic Wagon
1994 C280 (retired)

Why pick on the DMV. Maybe gov health care will be like the gov run
ARMY,NAVY,AIR FORCE?

Doubt it. The armed forces atract a different type of individual.

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2016 Corvette Stingray 2LT
1969 280SE
2023 Ram 1500
2007 Tiara 3200

What?

I hope it's more like the DMV. The military hires expensive contractors and is not concerned with wasting taxpayer money. I'm sure the DMV's are more cost-efficient and I can go there any time, take my number, and be seen.

Some of you may not know this, but Medicare is actually remarkably cost-efficient. Its administrative overhead is only 3% compared to the 10-20% of private insurance companies.

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2004 VW Jetta TDI (manual)

Past MB's: '96 E300D, '83 240D, '82 300D, '87 300D, '87 420SEL

I can sympathize with how you feel. There's a tremendous amount of ignorance and misinformation out there on this topic, mostly thanks to Fox News and similar-minded talking heads. If more people traveled the world or at least saw some unbiased documentaries on this topic like Frontline, it would help us have a meaningful discussion, rather than constantly having to debunk right-wing myths and fantasies.

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2004 VW Jetta TDI (manual)

Past MB's: '96 E300D, '83 240D, '82 300D, '87 300D, '87 420SEL

About 15 years ago they fixed the DMV here. Now you go in and push buttons on a little kiosk to say what you are there for. It tells you the wait time (usually not much) if you want to wait then it gives you a number ticket. You sit wherever you want, and shortly therafter they call you to a window. Works great. And I just renewed my license on the internet so I didn't even have to go in.

My opinion on this health care thing is you have providers on one side (doctors) and you have patients on the other side. And you have a middle man taking both their money "for no particular reason" as Forrest Gump would say. I think people should pay their doctor the same way the pay everything else, cash or credit. And the only insurance you should get is catastrophic for stuff that costs above about 10K or whatever you can stand.

I would do this myself, since we have doctors around here that give a good price and don't participate with insurance (that's how they can afford to give a good price). The only problem is that catastrophic insurance is not considered "comprehensive insurance" and so is not "portable" to a comprehensive plan. So if I ever wanted "regular" insurance, it would be like I never had any, so I would have the exclusion period all over again.

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1998 C230 330,000 miles (currently dead of second failed EIS, yours will fail too, turning you into the dealer's personal human cash machine)
1988 F150 144,000 miles (leaks all the colors of the rainbow)
Previous stars: 1981 Brava 210,000 miles, 1978 128 150,000 miles, 1977 B200 Van 175,000 miles, 1972 Vega (great, if rusty, car), 1972 Celica, 1986.5 Supra

What he said.

BTW, if I wanted to buy some catastrophic coverage, where should I look?

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Whoever said there's nothing more expensive than a cheap Mercedes never had a cheap Jaguar.

83 300D Turbo with manual conversion, early W126 vented front rotors and H4 headlights 401,xxx miles
08 Suzuki GSX-R600 M4 Slip-on 26,xxx miles
88 Jaguar XJS V12 94,xxx miles. Work in progress.
99 Mazda Miata 183,xxx miles.

I'd look for some very high deductible insurance, preferably PPO. HMO is more known to deny expensive claims. But with either one you have to be careful about pre-existing conditions and disclose absolutely everything to them, otherwise they might cancel your coverage if you have an expensive claim.

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2004 VW Jetta TDI (manual)

Past MB's: '96 E300D, '83 240D, '82 300D, '87 300D, '87 420SEL

Couldn't have said it any better!

A lot of people see the need for a "bad guy" to place the blame and usually health insurance gets it. Fair enough, but at least educate yourself (I mean this in a GENERAL sense, not an attack on anyone here) about the workings of the system before preaching.

mgburg: your friends are probably in the insurance biz, not HEALTH insurance biz. I base this on the advice you received. The Health Insurance industry is a lot more challenging since people's lives are at risk. That being said, if insurance companies started approving every claim that was outside of the plan coverage, they would lose billions of dollars. 90% of resubmitted claims for appeal are settled after a call to the providers, who VERY often have bad billers/coders (anyone else see those commercials on TV advertising a "great career" in billing/coding?). That is a huge expense labor-wise, and mostly infuriates the customers. Since you'd see it in the claim, blame is placed solely on the insurance company when it isn't proper (just one example). The ones submitted for appeal and denied again are most often things that are not covered by the plan. IMHO someone who pays out the butt for health insurance (and face it we all do, those who have it) should at least know exactly what they are buying. Overall profit margins are in the vicinity of <1% for many of the better HI companies.

Kuan: If you were right then I wouldn't have a job.

The whole system is inheirently flawed. I can only hope that we come to a conclusion that isn't biased by any pressure by lobbyists, nor a lack of knowledge on our politicians' part. A lot of things would work in a nice rosy perfect world but there are many hidden nuances and elements that have only partially been taken into consideration up until now. Luckily my job has mainly to do with transparency rather than any of the evils, but it has painfully made me aware of the gaps in the system as well.

Sorry for the tl;dr post

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TC
Current stable:
- 2004 Mazda RALLYWANKEL
- 2007 Saturn sky redline
- 2004 Explorer...under surgery.

Past: 135i, GTI, 300E, 300SD, 300SD, Stealth

It kills me the way opponents of public health care go on and on about rationing - as if there's not rationing going on now.

Under any system there's going to be rationing. There's no way each and every person in the nation, or on earth, is going to get a $half million in medical care each year for the last several years of their life. Or that chronic street drunks are going to be ushered to the front of the liver transplant waiting list so they can "enjoy" a few more years of inebriation.

But I read of too many stories of people receiving expensive procedures that they don't need primarily because it's profitable to the medical community to give them those procedures. Or because they're trying to head off any and all malpractice suit possibilities.

The indigent in our nation rarely get any preventative care or counseling, instead they show up at ERs with advanced conditions either expensive or impossible to treat.

I'm thinking that some sort of two tiered system is inevitable in any implementation of publicly funded health care. The upper income level folks are simply not going to stand in line with indigents for medical care nor should they have to. Many, most prosperous people are prosperous for a reason and should have the right to purchase more speedy and deluxe medical care than is available to lower income people.

Perhaps we could require doctors who are trained in state funded facilities to devote the first 10 or so years of their practice to public health facilities. Then they could move on to higher paid positions treating the more affluent. Or faster relief from student loans could be a lure for working in public health facilities.

But this business of putting health care primarily on the backs of employers gives too much power to large employers IMO. And it makes us less competitive with Canada, Britain, and France (for starters) for some companies who have options on where to base their manuf. facilities. And forces people to stay in jobs that may not be in their best interest owing to fear at losing health insurance.

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Te futueo et caballum tuum

1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K