Universal health care good the Canadians have it and like it.

Nice, logical, post with no disrespectful insults Atlantis. you set a good example...

"USSR, being a dictatorship was heavily subsidized and everything was state owned (if you know communism then there you go). We're also dealing with a "super state" which was forged together by aggression and fear, which is not the case with the USA. In a "united nation" like the USSR was, the people were very un-cooperative with each other."

Actually, if you read about the history of the US government (especially the 19th and 20th centuries), there have been several occasions where the Feds forced policies onto the States. This legacy of coercion by the FedGov is why there are nullification and secession movements in many states.

Before anyone thinks that I'm making an "Obama-propaganda", I'm gonna wash my hands.

I don't know if it's "good" or "bad" and I neither say that "this is what USA needs". Perhaps it's not good for USA, because it won't work. Maybe it would. I DON'T KNOW and I can't foretell it. (I don't know how others could???)

What I'm pissed about is something else.

Instead of bickering, finger pointing, accusing and smearing, why doesn't the opposition tries to come up with maybe an alternative??


Hell, somebody pays me a some good money, give me a month and I throw 4 alternatives together, which has nothing to do with socializing healthcare!

I believe you..but don't forget, Europe and Russia is different. Not to mention there I would hardly compare the 2 , when in USA the states had the option for cesession, and LOL...there is no "option" to secess from the Soviet Union or any preceeding empire unless you go into a world war.

This seems to be a common opinion of anything you disagree with...

Can't teach an old dog new tricks?

Where is it flawed? Educate and inform us where you see the failed logic.


The article is too long and with so many errors, it would take me all night to rebut and I wanna go out and have a beer.

I will say this, we have had socialized medicine in the US since Medicare was adopted in 1966. People over 65 have come to realize that this is a fantastic benefit and you better not even think about messing with it.

Trying to draw a comparison to Soviet health care is nothing but a scare tactic.

When you get to be an old dog like me, perhaps you will become better educated.


Interesting.

You do understand medicare and medicade are two very big reasons we are in our crisis right now don't you?

Our hospital loses money for every medicare patient it accepts.

So, while you disagreeing with the comparison, you also made a very good point.


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they didn't lose any on me . i just had an operation a year and a half ago . 10 days in the hospitel $250000 . but my doctor only made $4800. for the operation . I think that tells you whats wrong . the doctors don't get there share .


I'm willing to bet they still lost money. Or maybe they just like to screw my state over.

If a procedure costs the hospital $25,000 medicare, as well as our state coverage plans, will fork over about $15,000.

The reason everything costs so much is simple. There are hundreds of people that need to get paid for every tiny little thing. For starters, you have Nurses, Nurse assistants, Med techs, Physician assistants, usually paramedics (they are often used for transfers), and a staff of doctors. For surgery you have the Primary care physcian or ER doc that recommends surgery. Then you pay for the anesthesiologist, nurse anesthetist, surgical nurses, as well as several surgeons. These are all people that come into direct contact with you. Nutritionists that feed you, and secretaries that help the nurses all take part in your visit. And that doc that made $4,800 for your visit probably paid about $1,800 for is malpractice insurance.

Now, we need to talk about billing. All the insurance companies need to make a profit. This is how their employees get paid. This means, on average, you will pay out more than you recieve. This means most people lose money. Now, the government goes heavy in bureaucrats.

For instance, there are over 6,000 bureaucrats that oversee the school system in New York City. The private schools are responsible for educating 1/5th of the students in that city. When you ask them how many people oversee their system, they will tell you 28. Medicare and medicade are no exceptions. You have a much bigger staff that needs to get paid.

This means the programs are much more expensive to run then your usual insurance companies. Basically they can't afford it. politicians, instead of cutting funding to this or that so they can afford it, don't want to look bad. (Remember when they were spending our social security on other things?) This is where hospitals pick up the bill. Kinda like taxing them without officially taxing them. They do this same thing to our poor through inflation. (This is also how the U.S. taxes foreign countries.)

Basically we need to keep things simple. There are practices today, that don't accept insurance for every day visits, and their doctors only charge about $35 for a routine checkup. You figure, in these private practices, you see a doctor, a nurse, and a secretary, and perhaps a physician assistant.

Insurance was never designed to pay out for every visit. In fact all the insurance companies were originally supposed to do is pay for catastrophic incidences that would break you financially. This way instead of charging you $500 a month, you would only get charged $50 a month. You cut out the middle men in this case, making our system more efficient.

Middle men = billing offices, Insurance employees, malpractice insurance employees, etc.

The more middlemen you have, the more opportunity you have for people gouging prices to work in their favor as well...

Indeed, but i didn't think we were supposed to be comparing ourselves to different systems....

We have it here too BTW. It's called the VA.