Thursday, August 11, 2011

Serious About Deficit Reduction? The Solution Is Single Payer

The editorial board at St. Louis Today states that everyone that has studied the deficit problem knows that in fact it is a health care problem. Letting the tax cuts expire would do it, but why even bother taking more from the rich? Private insurance bureaucracy and paperwork consumes an astonishing one third of our off the scale expensive health care system. The $400 billion savings associated with addressing that is alone enough to provide high quality care for every American. Canada and Britain, which have lower GDP and still spend a much lower % of their GDP on health care, still provide care for everyone that is at least as good as what we have here.

The editorial says we're getting a single payer plan one way or the other. There is no feasible alternative. Should we wait a few more years and sustain crappy care while exploding our total debt, or should we just fix it now, have better care, and eliminate our deficit. Maybe start paying down the debt. The answer should be obvious.

5 comments:

Chad said...

With the recipient class growing by the hand of the Progressive party yes there will always be a version of gov't ran health care - however when conservatives get back in power that number will fall.

Regardless of your belief and terrible math not to mention your inability to understand the fall out of a single payer system the down and dirty absolute fact is that it is unconstitutional and that is why it will never happen.

I am sure you read the co-authored ruling just a few days ago. This came from a Clinton appointed and a Bush appointed judge in the 11th circuit calling the mandate not only unconstitutional, but a direct attack to the freedom of Americans.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/12/health-care-law-individual-mandate-ruling_n_925507.html

Anyway to refute the basis of the article - first we are finding out every day that the gov't projection on the cost of healthcare has been way way off.

http://dailycaller.com/2011/08/08/researchers-obamacare-cost-estimates-hide-up-to-50-billion-per-year/

Second are the unknowns that are really not so unknown. In order to try and keep costs down the gov't will need to dictate what the cost of a procedure is, what the purchase price of medicine must be, what doctors are allowed to earn, what equipment can be purchased and where. It does not take a big brain lefty to know that there is a cause and affect of that.

Again I think your ideas are awful times 10, but I am not going to get in your way if you want to go out to the Private Sector to build a health care system that mirrors what you want. Get some investors together and open up the latest and greatest health care plan in the world - just don't steal from me to do it. Clearly you feel as if this type of medical model can save money and service Americans so it should be able to stand on its own without any help from me or my friends money.

Jon said...

Chad, your HuffPo link does not claim that single payer is unconstitutional. It says that Obama Care, which requires people to by crappy corporate insurance, is unconstitutional. Do you not understand the difference between single payer and Obama Care? I've already told you that Obama Care is Romney Care and this is a plan concocted by the right wing think tank the Heritage foundation.

It would not be surprising to me that their plan is a corporate give away, since they are a corporate front group. It would not surprise me that Obama wouldn't let us know the real costs. My claim that single payer would reduce costs is not based on projections from political entities but from universal experience and from every study I know of. Every country that tries it has dramatically reduced costs and better care as compared to us.

Once again your criticisms and objections are based on basic misunderstandings of the facts. This is the price you pay for getting your info from Ann Coulter, Mike Church, and Fox News. I've suggested you broaden your reading list. Until you do you'll retain these basic misunderstandings.

Chad said...

Then I am very pleased to misunderstand the facts from here until forever more.

If a single payer system was good, healthy and profitable it would have already been an option in the Private sector.

The gov't was designed by very smart men for a specific purpose and I thank the good Lord above almost daily that they understood just how dangerous men like you and the gov't could be. They did all they could to eliminate or at least slow the power of gov't and keep the freedom in the hands of the people.

Even a Left Wing Judge appointed by Bill Clinton understands just how dangerous and reckless any mandate on health care is.

Again - to the point - if a single payer type system can live and breath in the real world/private sector Jon - build it and you will be a Millionare. I will make another point yet again - your freedom to be you means that I have my freedom to be free from you. Just leave my money, health care, retirement, children, school choices, food choices, drink choices to me and my family and I will do the same for you.

Jon said...

You obviously don't know what single payer is. Figure out what it is first, then criticize it. If you don't know what it is why are you so aggressive in criticizing it?

This freedom statement you keep making is just a slogan. I'm not sure it makes sense. What does this mean?

My freedom to be me. What does that mean? I'm free to do whatever I want? Am I free to start a business that dumps toxins into the rivers and streams? Am I free to be a financier that makes billions taking risks that put the whole system at risk so that when the system is near collapse the public has to bail it out? Or else the whole economy grinds to a halt, but it's no problem for me since I'm a billionaire? Everyone else must suffer? Should I be free to do that?

I'm not free to do whatever I want because what I do affects others. You want to be free from others now that you've reaped the rewards of big government. You got your education. You rely on the infrastructure, police, hi tech. You got yours. Now you want to be free. But your actions affect others. If you want to go live in the Yukon and be free of everybody that's fine. But if you are going to live in America, reaping the rewards of what the government has provided, and engaging in actions that impact the lives of others, then those others should have a say in what your behavior is and what should be taken from you via taxes so that we can as a society function. There's virtually no taxes in some parts of the world. They don't have the kind of infrastructure we do. If you want to go there, fine. Instead you stay here, take all the gifts via government that were created that you enjoy, and you say that you shouldn't have to also contribute. Try Haiti, where you can be free from me and others that think we should work together a bit to make a decent society.

Chad said...

You act as if I made the rules, well here is a shocker I didn't. I just play by them wether I agree or disagree - now as an adult fighting for my children's future I want the gov't to shrink to 1776 levels and let me/my community take care of schools, to take care of our healthcare, to take care of our retirement, for us to decide if 1 part per million being dumped into a river is okay.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single-payer_health_care

To be clear - is this single payer? Yes I understand the concept. The moment the word State or Government is inserted as the executor - done. Regardless of how many paragraphs you write trying to disregard my thoughts - the US Gov't under the structure of the Constitution is NOT allowed to run healthcare - period.

My statement - I love that statement. Your freedom to be you allows me the freedom to be free from you is very relevant right now and will be over the next decade. Forget your poorly thought out diatribe that made no sense. What it means is that you have the right to your opinion and your life style, but that means I have the same right as you. Therefore you promise not to take money from me or make me by gov't participate in a program I have no interest in and I will promise to do the same. You want soc sec, Medicaid, single payer type health care, 49% of your state members to not pay income tax, you want farm subsidizes, you want ethanol money to go to those companies I say GREAT, but I don't want to participate in those things and will opt out. I will sign papers to say that I will not use soc sec and all those things in return you can't steal my money to fund them. That is all - I want to be free physically, emotionally and most importantly financially from you and your ideas. That is my freedom to be free from you.