Obamacare and you

[Grey Fox]

 

[merithyn]

In very vague terms, here's SpiessCare:
Expand Medicare to provide bare-bones health coverage to the poors (I know Obamacare sort of does this).  Encourage HSA participation, deregulate the hell out of private health insurance.  Eliminate the individual mandate but make it difficult to get treatment unless you have health insurance or cash.

I work for a health insurance company and I disagree with the bolded bit.

[derspiess]

I work for a health insurance company and I disagree with the bolded bit.

I'm sure you do.

[Barrister]

You wouldn't like it.

I will like whatever works.  Well ok within reason, I suppose we can always just kill all humans.

In very vague terms, here's SpiessCare:
Expand Medicare to provide bare-bones health coverage to the poors (I know Obamacare sort of does this).  Encourage HSA participation, deregulate the hell out of private health insurance.  Eliminate the individual mandate but make it difficult to get treatment unless you have health insurance or cash.

That doesn't really sound like it's going to work unless you really get serious about allowing people to die from lack of treatment.

Health care is one of those really tough public policy issues.  Obamacare is flawed, but single payer has some serious flaws as well.  I don't know if anyone has figured out a really good system that provides good care and keeps costs under control as well.

[Valmy]

In very vague terms, here's SpiessCare:
Expand Medicare to provide bare-bones health coverage to the poors (I know Obamacare sort of does this).  Encourage HSA participation, deregulate the hell out of private health insurance.  Eliminate the individual mandate but make it difficult to get treatment unless you have health insurance or cash.

Man I don't know how they can encourage HSA's anymore than they already do.  Those things are pretty sweet. 

This would definitely get the costs under control I just question its political viability.  The problem has always been: what happens when Bob McPennyless shows up in the emergency room suffering from a heart attack or something?  The problem is the answer of 'tough cookies buddy' just doesn't seem to fly and that undermines most non-Commie solutions.

[Valmy]

I work for a health insurance company and I disagree with the bolded bit.

I'm sure you do.

Well yeah it is an industry that profits from NOT providing services.  That can provide some pretty perverse outcomes.

[derspiess]

I suppose the hospital could have some little bit of leeway to save Bob's life in that scenario.

[DGuller]

I suppose the hospital could have some little bit of leeway to save Bob's life in that scenario.

Well, here you go.  Now you're successfully back to square one.

[Jacob]

The derspiess plan sounds like plenty of people will die from preventable causes and lots of issues will go un- or under-treated. The combination of deregulation (meaning people can be excluded from plans and the ignorant can be taken advantage of) and making it harder to get treatment unless yourbplan allows it or you have ready cash will lead to fewer people getting the healthcare they need.

[derspiess]

I suppose the hospital could have some little bit of leeway to save Bob's life in that scenario.

Well, here you go.  Now you're successfully back to square one.

I said make it difficult, not impossible.

[Jacob]

I suppose the hospital could have some little bit of leeway to save Bob's life in that scenario.

Well, here you go.  Now you're successfully back to square one.

I said make it difficult, not impossible.

From a systems point of view difficult simply means 2 in 10 will get what they need, while impossible means 0 in 10 will.

[Barrister]

The derspiess plan sounds like plenty of people will die from preventable causes and lots of issues will go un- or under-treated. The combination of deregulation (meaning people can be excluded from plans and the ignorant can be taken advantage of) will lead to fewer people getting the healthcare they need.

But you understand what concern he has though - that under current systems people have fewer incentives to actually take care of their own health.  You can be a smoker for 40 years, never have insurance, then be diagnosed with throat cancer and be guaranteed treatment.

[Valmy]

The derspiess plan sounds like plenty of people will die from preventable causes and lots of issues will go un- or under-treated.

To be fair this is already a big problem.  Dealing with doing any sort of medical thing, with all the bureaucracy and expense and nonsense, is something we all tend to avoid as much as we can.

[celedhring]

The derspiess plan sounds like plenty of people will die from preventable causes and lots of issues will go un- or under-treated. The combination of deregulation (meaning people can be excluded from plans and the ignorant can be taken advantage of) and making it harder to get treatment unless yourbplan allows it or you have ready cash will lead to fewer people getting the healthcare they need.

Once as a society you decide that everybody should have healthcare, honestly a universal system is the best. Most countries in Europe (dunno about Canada, but I suspect it will happen there too), provide universal healthcare for a similar % of GNP (or even less) than the US devotes to their very limited public healthcare programs (pre-ACA).

[celedhring]

The derspiess plan sounds like plenty of people will die from preventable causes and lots of issues will go un- or under-treated. The combination of deregulation (meaning people can be excluded from plans and the ignorant can be taken advantage of) will lead to fewer people getting the healthcare they need.

But you understand what concern he has though - that under current systems people have fewer incentives to actually take care of their own health.  You can be a smoker for 40 years, never have insurance, then be diagnosed with throat cancer and be guaranteed treatment.

I think not dying of cancer is a fine incentive.