no one should die because they cannot afford health care, and no one should go broke because they get sick. If you agree, please post this as your status for the rest of today.
This piece of propaganda is so full of misinformation. First, every hospital is required to care for anyone regardless of ability to pay. Therefore, how can you say people die because they cannot afford healthcare? Secondly, if you cannot afford heathcare we have systems to pay for you: Medicaid and Medicare. If you are still dying, then there must be a problem with Medicaid and/or Medicare. Finally, preventing people from going broke if they get sick is a appeal to emotion that is fraught with problems. If I get sick, should I be paid my full salary? It is not the cost of care alone, it is these costs plus the lost wages. So who is going to pay my salary when I get sick? If we did that we would bankrupt every company in the US.Today, I watched this video:
What a terrible argument! First, using the post office as an example of well run government institutions is a bad idea. Second, the problem with insurance companies are not their profits. It is the government endorsed monopolies that drive costs up. If the market structure were more competitive there would be less money for political campaigns, not to mention the oversight that is this is the case, then it means that government run health insurance would still be subject to political pressures from the rich and corporations such as drug companies. Third, the idea that only the rich can invest is just nonsense. Anyone with a 401k is probably invested in some insurance companies. That's why retirement savings for many plummeted when AIG went down. Fourth, any economist will tell you that if the market were more competitive, that just denying claims would not result in higher profits and that given a choice, people would switch from one provider to another, making denying claims less profitable. Fifth, even the writers of this didn't believe it when they said that the government would spend a higher percentage of tax revenues on healthcare rather than administrative costs. "Probably much more." Ever hear of government waste? Sixth, the Medicare argument is a terrible one to make. There is some debate, but you have to look beyond just the dollars in and dollars out or you are missing the picture. Seventh, the problem with comparison to private free market insurance is that we don't have that now and any comparison of our current state to free market insurance is simply incorrect. Also, police, fire and water treatment are run by localities and states, not at the federal level. So a blanket statement about how well they are run is comparing apples and oranges. Eighth, people do buy fire insurance. This is a horrible straw man argument that only can serve to inspire panic, and, money from your paycheck DOES go to pay the fire company!!! Again, people, this is NOT free!!! I mean it is so funny how the narrator even says, "free for everyone, paid for by our tax dollars." How can you miss this disconnect?!?!
So anyway, one of my main problems is the fact that all of these seem to suggest, if not outright state, that these things are free. Nothing is free!! There is a cost to providing all government services but no one wants to talk about just how that will happen. Medicare and Medicaid are so expensive they are nearly bankrupting the states and the federal government! I would guess that no one who is advocating for this universal healthcare would like to be on Medicaid. Guess what people...Medicaid denys your claims too!!
The first step in heath care reform has to be to lower costs. One of the most effective ways to do this is by throwing a little antitrust legislation at the insurance companies. Let's start with that and go from there.
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