Now come on, Rob, they’re only paying twice the going rate for health insurance. Have a heart. :^)
Robert Perry - 01:02pm on 02/16/2006
That’s over $12k per person… You can buy quite a bit of health care coverage for $12k....
Sphagnum - 02:02pm on 02/16/2006
The article would have creedence had it not been written by a lobbyist for the health insurance industry.
Adam Brackemyre lobbyist for
"The Council for Affordable Health Insurance (CAHI) is a research and advocacy association of insurance carriers active in the individual, small group, MSA and senior markets. CAHI’s membership includes insurance companies, small businesses, providers, nonprofit associations, actuaries, insurance brokers and individuals."
woof: Nice smear by association; very McCarthyesque. How are those smaller entities going to get the ear of the humungous federal govt? The info is either true or it’s not; who wrote it isn’t the issue.
robert108 - 03:02pm on 02/16/2006
Not a smaer. Just pointing out this guy has a dog in the fight.
WOOF - 03:02pm on 02/16/2006
Rob said,
Socialized medicine, or any type of government-backed health care program for that matter, has never worked.
It seems that this isn’t true. There are a lot of nations with socialized medicine ahead of the U.S. in the CIA factbook rankings for Infant Mortality and Life Expectancy.
CV Rick - 04:02pm on 02/16/2006
One factor with infant mortality is that we aren’t exactly comparing apples and apples. Many times a premie in the US is counted as a mortality when that same baby would not in another country (such as Canadia)
There are also factors such as Crack babies that aren’t really fair to blame on the US healthcare system.
That being said I think Rob was referring to the fact that quality goes down ON AVERAGE while costs go up. It’s conceivable that treatment for babies may not go down while they government health care plan doesn’t try to cure the terminally ill.
OK the real reason why I wanted to post this was to point out to any deadbeats in North Dakota that there’s a great subsidized health care plan in Vermont.
The.Whistler - 04:02pm on 02/16/2006
Woof: "The article would have creedence had it not been written by a lobbyist for the health insurance industry." You denied he had credence because he was associated with some groups that represent free enterprise. That’s smear by association. You said nothing to dispute the truth of what he wrote. That is a smear.
CV Rick: If socialism worked, then the most powerful nation on Earth would be a socialist country, like the Soviet Union. Oh, wait! They went broke. Oh well. Anything other than free enterprise produces long term shortages, high prices, or a combination of both. Econ 101. Separating the consumer of the service from the payer is inefficient. Taxpayers can only pay so much, then they opt out. It is also immoral to make people pay for something when they aren’t using it, especially when the payment is really confiscation.
robert108 - 04:02pm on 02/16/2006
I would agree with Whistler that infant mortality isn’t a particularly good statistic to use for comparing medical systems. Neither is, for that matter, life expectancy. The problem is that other factors play a major role in life expectancy beyond medical care, such as lifestyle, nutritional habits, etc. In fact, medical care may be fairly far down in the list compared to the amount of stress, obesity, smoking, abstinence and other factors that reduce life expectancy.
Carrick - 04:02pm on 02/16/2006
To even suggest that Dirigo Health is anything close to a single payer system which would cover everyone is totally wrong. The biggest problem is it is still a voluntary program
The way I understand Dirigo, it is simply the state of Maine, contracting with private insurance companies to offer health care at a guaranteed rate, and asking health care providers, doctors and hospitals, to try and control their costs better. Yeah, that’ll work.
The only differences between what Dirigo offers and what we have now, is those within 300% of the poverty level are charged a rate which is subsidized by the state of Maine depending on their income level. But if you’re already getting free health care, where is the incentive to start paying for it?
As long as enrollment in health care is voluntary, costs will continue to be shifted to those who are already paying for it. And HSAs, the answer suggested by the writer of the article, will do nothing to stop that.
All HSAs will do is take money out of the current health care system, by removing more of the shared costs, eventually forcing even larger increases in all health insurance rates, HDHPs and standard health plans, somewhere down the road.
Now come on, Rob, they’re only paying twice the going rate for health insurance. Have a heart. :^)
That’s over $12k per person… You can buy quite a bit of health care coverage for $12k....
The article would have creedence had it not been written by a lobbyist for the health insurance industry.
Adam Brackemyre lobbyist for
"The Council for Affordable Health Insurance (CAHI) is a research and advocacy association of insurance carriers active in the individual, small group, MSA and senior markets. CAHI’s membership includes insurance companies, small businesses, providers, nonprofit associations, actuaries, insurance brokers and individuals."
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Council_for_Affordable_Health_Insurance
woof: Nice smear by association; very McCarthyesque. How are those smaller entities going to get the ear of the humungous federal govt? The info is either true or it’s not; who wrote it isn’t the issue.
Not a smaer. Just pointing out this guy has a dog in the fight.
Rob said,
It seems that this isn’t true. There are a lot of nations with socialized medicine ahead of the U.S. in the CIA factbook rankings for Infant Mortality and Life Expectancy.
One factor with infant mortality is that we aren’t exactly comparing apples and apples. Many times a premie in the US is counted as a mortality when that same baby would not in another country (such as Canadia)
There are also factors such as Crack babies that aren’t really fair to blame on the US healthcare system.
That being said I think Rob was referring to the fact that quality goes down ON AVERAGE while costs go up. It’s conceivable that treatment for babies may not go down while they government health care plan doesn’t try to cure the terminally ill.
OK the real reason why I wanted to post this was to point out to any deadbeats in North Dakota that there’s a great subsidized health care plan in Vermont.
Woof: "The article would have creedence had it not been written by a lobbyist for the health insurance industry." You denied he had credence because he was associated with some groups that represent free enterprise. That’s smear by association. You said nothing to dispute the truth of what he wrote. That is a smear.
CV Rick: If socialism worked, then the most powerful nation on Earth would be a socialist country, like the Soviet Union. Oh, wait! They went broke. Oh well. Anything other than free enterprise produces long term shortages, high prices, or a combination of both. Econ 101. Separating the consumer of the service from the payer is inefficient. Taxpayers can only pay so much, then they opt out. It is also immoral to make people pay for something when they aren’t using it, especially when the payment is really confiscation.
I would agree with Whistler that infant mortality isn’t a particularly good statistic to use for comparing medical systems. Neither is, for that matter, life expectancy. The problem is that other factors play a major role in life expectancy beyond medical care, such as lifestyle, nutritional habits, etc. In fact, medical care may be fairly far down in the list compared to the amount of stress, obesity, smoking, abstinence and other factors that reduce life expectancy.
To even suggest that Dirigo Health is anything close to a single payer system which would cover everyone is totally wrong. The biggest problem is it is still a voluntary program
The way I understand Dirigo, it is simply the state of Maine, contracting with private insurance companies to offer health care at a guaranteed rate, and asking health care providers, doctors and hospitals, to try and control their costs better. Yeah, that’ll work.
The only differences between what Dirigo offers and what we have now, is those within 300% of the poverty level are charged a rate which is subsidized by the state of Maine depending on their income level. But if you’re already getting free health care, where is the incentive to start paying for it?
As long as enrollment in health care is voluntary, costs will continue to be shifted to those who are already paying for it. And HSAs, the answer suggested by the writer of the article, will do nothing to stop that.
All HSAs will do is take money out of the current health care system, by removing more of the shared costs, eventually forcing even larger increases in all health insurance rates, HDHPs and standard health plans, somewhere down the road.