One has to define profit versus usage and extortion. Technically competition must be involved in the equation. Even with that manipulation can be still be a factor. Man can also engineer complexity to the point of almost being beyond comprehension by the masses.

Lets make Health care run by a "non=profit corp. I'll be the Chairman of the not-for-profit corp. Of course, I will need a salary to run the corp, and I need a house to entertain in the style I need to attract investors, and I need a nice office and staff, and benefits--but since is a not-for-profit corp, no one will care what those expenses actually are. Its the best new con game in this economy.

Sort of like a religion. You need the trappings and accouterments to shear the sheep?

There's lots of data. You should start somewhere like Nationmaster. While it may be a challenge to compare individual details and their costs and effects; at the macro level, it's easy to see that people in Western Europe, Canada live longer, healthier lives, and that less of their real income is used to pay for heath care, whether through taxes or self paid services.

I like Hans Rosling's visualizations on the subject. Hans Rosling's 200 Countries, 200 Years, 4 Minutes - The Joy of Stats - BBC Four - YouTube See also gapminder.org and Hans Rosling at TED.
lifespan is easy to measure. Quality of life, not as easy. It is what it is.

So, one or two layers of scum-sucking, corrupt, opportunist *******s; vs the many more layers we currently have? Sounds like an improvement. Though, at this point, almost anything would.

It's been my experience that doctors are surprisingly clueless about the minutiae of health insurance, beyond what they'll get paid for each service they perform. Making a blanket statement that rates will go up a certain percentage seems to display personal political bias more than industry expertise.

The notion that our health should be dependent on a profit driven system does not make any sense.

A profit driven health care system relies on the premise that you can only get health care if you can afford to pay for it directly yourself. It would roughly be equal to saying that the only people who can attend school are the children of parents with enough money to pay for it.
With all the technology involved in medicine nowadays, only the uber-rich can pay directly out of pocket for health care. Some kind of insurance system is necessary for everyone else. What kind of insurance system is most efficient in providing care?

I carry insurance and find it cheaper to pay directly in some cases. I am not uber rich.

HIDA scan was going to hit me for 300 in copay and office visit charges for a supposed 2000 dollar scan. I paid 290 cash including the discount for paying same day.

The GB surgery came to 8700 and some change and I could have paid 3200 cash directly.

The insurance processing and billing tactics (basically hostage negotiation) costs the hospital big. They jack the bills way up to compensate. This is without the government owning the insurance exchange. The government saw a huge opportunity to hijack a great scam and took it.



I always ask the cash price.


iPhone 4

Its great only if I am one of the layers of scum-sucking.......http://www.peachparts.com/shopforum/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

I don't know if your daughter is correct with the 40% number, but the concept appears to be sound. They certainly won't hang at a mere 4% increase. BTW, my daughter is mostly democrat.

Well, I guess we will now see if our health depending on Obamacare makes any sense.:rolleyes:

When at some point later in life you find that they choose not to treat you, it's possible that you would have a different opinion about it.:)

It sounds to me like the 40% number was just a place holder in the explanation to indicate that the rates will go up substantially. I'm afraid that she will be quite correct about it.

I think that this is a TOTALLY plausible scenario.:)

This is a classic example of why private for profit insurance is a big problem.

You pay religiously every month sometimes an incredibly amount of money, and when you get sick, you get to fight tooth and nail for services you pay towards without complaint on a monthly basis. Your example is you end up bypassing and paying out of pocket, and you are happy with that arrangement?

If you cant afford to enter into this pleasant relationship with the demon, and you still get sick, the Government ends up picking up most of the tab in the end.

I just defies belief that so many people will argue against their own interests in the support of making these private companies richer and richer.

Private insurance can be run properly, just look at car insurance, but with health care, its grown into a horrendous monster, and IMO, it can't remain without being culled and made the serve the people once again. Right now, an insurance company serves its bottom line, not your health problems. If its not working as a private service without being overwhelmed by greed, it makes more sense to make it a public service instead, after all, no one can say that the US government is run with profit in mind.

If someone hits your car and they have insurance and are definitely at fault, you can pretty much assume you will be receiving a check.

If car insurance were run the same way as health insurance, you would get dozens of denials of coverage, and dozens of reasons why they won't have to buy you a new car, but only new seatbelts, or only one tire, or please send them 50 letters from the mechanic describing why 4 tires are needed, ect ect ect.

Yeah, have the government take it over. That'll fix it.:rolleyes: