Obamacare the worst of both worlds.

[DanieltheDragon]

Obamacare is not single payer. Obamacare is not Medicare/Medicaid for all. Obamacare is not a magic bullet that will solve our insurance woes.


There are some positives for sure:

Regulations on pre-existing conditions is widely popular.
Allowing children to stay on their parents health insurance after adulthood is huge.


Here is the nagging problem, while obamacare seeks to regulate the insurance industry like a single payer system it simultaneously tries to preserve a market profit driven approach, that also involves subsidizing insurance companies to keep rates artificially low.

Now there is more than one way to skin a cat for sure. This approach just seems to be the least efficient way to do it. Nor have we even really improved our cost of care Bloomberg has us 50 out of 55, we haven't really improved on the WHO ratings either. The only thing Obamacare really managed to accomplish is put 24 million folks on expensive ineffective health insurance.

In the end all Obamacare is, is a giant beuracratic handout to the insurance industry. Americans deserves something better.

[bluethread]

[Replying to post 1 by DanieltheDragon]

The bottom line is healthcare is a commodity(service) and insurance is just a bet on whether one will need that service or not. The basic question is an economic one. How should commodities be distributed? Should they be distributed by the market place, or should they be distributed by government. If it is the latter, how does one determine the standards to be used in that distribution. What Obamacare tries to do is split the baby. The problem with that splitting the baby, in the analogy, is not the solution, but a means to determining who cares about keeping the baby alive. In the case of government distributed healthcare, no one has a vested interest in doing that. It's someone else's money.

[4gold]

[Replying to post 1 by DanieltheDragon]

My wife and I use Obamacare, and we have to laugh at what it does and does not cover. My son's cerebral palsy is covered at 50%, but her birth control is covered at 100%. How does that make any sense? My only guess is that women's health has greater lobbying influence in DC than CP.

[DanieltheDragon]

[Replying to post 1 by DanieltheDragon]

My wife and I use Obamacare, and we have to laugh at what it does and does not cover. My son's cerebral palsy is covered at 50%, but her birth control is covered at 100%. How does that make any sense? My only guess is that women's health has greater lobbying influence in DC than CP.

Birth control is cheaper than a pregnancy guess which the insurance company would rather pay for. CP is rare and lifelong they don't even want to cover it to begin with. Be glad it's covered to begin with.

[4gold]

[Replying to post 1 by DanieltheDragon]
Birth control is cheaper than a pregnancy guess which the insurance company would rather pay for. CP is rare and lifelong they don't even want to cover it to begin with. Be glad it's covered to begin with.

Preventive medical treatments are usually less expensive than the result without the preventive treatments. If my son did not go to physical therapy, the costs of his CP would be much greater. We used to have 80% coverage of CP before we got kicked off our plan and put on the exchange.

[Bust Nak]

In the case of government distributed healthcare, no one has a vested interest in doing that. It's someone else's money.

The politician's job is on the line if they messes up healthcare. It is very much their money. More to the point there are lots of people who are not motivated by vested interest in money.

[DanieltheDragon]

In the case of government distributed healthcare, no one has a vested interest in doing that. It's someone else's money.

The politician's job is on the line if they messes up healthcare. It is very much their money. More to the point there are lots of people who are not motivated by vested interest in money.

Unfortunately until our election process is reformed to deal with fundraising only those with a vested interest in money get elected.

[bluethread]

In the case of government distributed healthcare, no one has a vested interest in doing that. It's someone else's money.

The politician's job is on the line if they messes up healthcare. It is very much their money. More to the point there are lots of people who are not motivated by vested interest in money.

No, we are not talking about what they get paid, we are talking about the cost of the program. It is true that there are people who are motivated in other ways than financially. However, very few would act irresponsibly, if they were personally paying for it. Quite frankly, with the possible exception of local politicians, their salary is not their greatest form of compensation. They make much more by catering to special interests than they do to their constituents. Also, once elected, getting reelected is not that difficult as long as they continue to hand out the candy, again at taxpayer expense.

[Tired of the Nonsense]

Obamacare is not single payer. Obamacare is not Medicare/Medicaid for all. Obamacare is not a magic bullet that will solve our insurance woes.


There are some positives for sure:

Regulations on pre-existing conditions is widely popular.
Allowing children to stay on their parents health insurance after adulthood is huge.


Here is the nagging problem, while obamacare seeks to regulate the insurance industry like a single payer system it simultaneously tries to preserve a market profit driven approach, that also involves subsidizing insurance companies to keep rates artificially low.

Now there is more than one way to skin a cat for sure. This approach just seems to be the least efficient way to do it. Nor have we even really improved our cost of care Bloomberg has us 50 out of 55, we haven't really improved on the WHO ratings either. The only thing Obamacare really managed to accomplish is put 24 million folks on expensive ineffective health insurance.

In the end all Obamacare is, is a giant beuracratic handout to the insurance industry. Americans deserves something better.

If Republicans were smart they would set up some kind of a single payer system, which is of course what most democrats wanted all along, and take all of the credit for themselves. Republicans are anything but smart of course, and a single payer system smacks of socialism.

If Republicans effect any change at all it will probably be a watered down version of Obama care that no one likes. And Democrats will be left with a significant campaign issue in 2018. At some point even low income white folks might begin to suspect that they have been played. Maybe.

[McCulloch]

[Replying to post 9 by Tired of the Nonsense]

Sadly, no one has ever lost an election by underestimating the intelligence of American voters.