Obama '08?

@ican711nm,

Sure ican.. the failed impeachment must be why Clinton left office with 60% approval ratings.

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@parados,

That may all be true, but we need private insurance to compete in our capitalistic society. Medicare may have lower administrative costs now, but we all know they will eventually go bankrupt at the current rate of spending. In private insurance, they will always compete for rates that provides for profit and low admin costs. They can't charge more than the market will bare.

Over and above all of that, I've not seen many government run operations that are run efficiently. One of the biggest government run operation is our defense department; they waste billions almost every year while many in our country are losing their jobs and their homes. Most of our infrastructure is deteriorated and breaking down. There is something absolutely wrong with this picture.

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@cicerone imposter,

Quote:

That may all be true, but we need private insurance to compete in our capitalistic society.

We do? Why?

Quote:

In private insurance, they will always compete for rates that provides for profit and low admin costs. They can't charge more than the market will bare.

Yes, but they have manipulated the market to make 'what it will bear' higher and higher. You can't look at the 100% rise in HC premiums in the last decade and conclude that competition is helping to keep prices down.

Cycloptichorn

2 Replies

@Cycloptichorn,

How do you account for the fact that the profit margin for all health insurance companies have remained static as premiums continued its upward spiral? You don't think competition is in play?

How does the health insurance industry differ from all capitalistic industries?

Have you looked into the increased cost at the hospital level during this same period as premiums increased by double digits?

1 Reply

Quote:

http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=19861&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=DPD
More Proof We Can't Stop Poverty by Making It More Comfortable
On Jan. 8, 1964, President Lyndon Johnson delivered a State of the Union address to Congress in which he declared an "unconditional war on poverty in America." Then, the poverty rate in America was around 19 percent and falling rapidly. Last week, it was reported that the poverty rate this year is expected to be roughly 15 percent, and is climbing, says Michael D. Tanner, a senior fellow with the Cato Institute.

Between then and now, the federal government spent more than $13 trillion fighting poverty, and state and local governments added another couple of trillion.

Yet the poverty rate never fell below 10.5 percent.

The federal government now has 122 separate antipoverty programs ranging from Medicaid, the largest and most expensive antipoverty program, to the tiny Even Start Program for Indian Tribes and Tribal Organizations.

Combined, these 122 programs spent more than $591 billion in 2009, and are projected to cost even more this year.

That amounts to $14,849 for every man, woman and child in America.
Given that the poverty line is $10,830, it would have been cheaper just to mail every poor person a check for $11,000.

During his first year in office, Obama's administration increased spending on welfare programs by more than $120 billion, says Tanner.

Some of the increase, of course, is due to the recession. But the administration has also made conscious policy choices to ease eligibility and expand caseloads. The end result is that one out of every six Americans is now receiving some form of government assistance.

The real work of fighting poverty must come not from the government, but from the engines of civil society, says Tanner.

Source: Michael D. Tanner, "More Proof We Can't Stop Poverty by Making It More Comfortable," Investor's Business Daily, September 17, 2010.

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@cicerone imposter,

cicerone imposter wrote:

How do you account for the fact that the profit margin for all health insurance companies have remained static as premiums continued its upward spiral? You don't think competition is in play?

Not really, no. As the premiums go up, even with profit margins remaining the same the total amount of profits rise, resulting in larger payouts for investors and executives.

Quote:

How does the health insurance industry differ from all capitalistic industries?

It doesn't. Conservatives make the same argument all the time re: the oil industries. It isn't true there either.

Quote:

Have you looked into the increased cost at the hospital level during this same period as premiums increased by double digits?

You don't think the two are inter-related?

Cycloptichorn

1 Reply

@Cycloptichorn,

So you named two industries that you claim are non-competitive. That doesn't support your claims. When people invest in companies, they expect a higher return; that's also capitalism.

1 Reply

@cicerone imposter,

cicerone imposter wrote:

So you named two industries that you claim are non-competitive. That doesn't support your claims. When people invest in companies, they expect a higher return; that's also capitalism.

That's the problem. Should the purpose of an insurance company really BE to provide the highest return on share, at all other costs? This is a major driver of the bad things in our HC industry - the never-ending and pervasive need to turn a profit, and not only that, but for your profits to be RISING every quarter and every year. It places immense pressure upon the companies to pay for as little actual medical care as possible, which isn't really the result that I think we want as a society.

Cycloptichorn

3 Replies

@Cycloptichorn,

It is what you have chosen as a nation Cyclo.

The alternative seems to be immense pressure upon the taxpayers to pay for as much actual medical care as possible.

So much so that our austerity cuts announced today took 8% off defence and added 0.3% to healthcare. Although we have been assured that soldiers in Afghanistan won't be on reduced rations.

It's a long, long winding road between those two.

And medical care feeds on itself because the more care there is the more there will need to be more care.

A dilemma of our time.

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@Cycloptichorn,

When you say "all other costs," it's evident you have not looked into why we have higher medical care costs. There are several factors that increases costs at the hospital level; a) the US population is getting older, and older people require more medical care, b) increase in disease prevention, c) treating the chronically ill, and d) obesity of our population increases health problems.

On the insurance side of the equation, government subsidy of health insurance encourages more use, and that includes the poor, disabled, and the elderly.

Another factor is the R&D of high tech equipment and pharmaceuticals to treat disease. Those costs are transferred to the hospital/patient.

Finally, I believe in competition in our capitalistic society - irregardless of how governments get involved with health care. I have always advocated for universal health care, and that will never change.

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@parados,

The news a couple of days ago featured the FBI arrests of about 40 people nationwide following an extensive investigation of an organized scam that had already extorted over a hundred million in fradulent medicare claims. It is certain that the costs of this investigation and the efforts in identifying the illegal transactions and finding the culprits were not included in the governments Medicare overhead figures. Government agencies don't cross charge one another for the performance of their assigned functions. The costs in question instead appear as part of the Justice Department/FBI budget. Private insurers do their own (generally far more effective) up front prevention of fraud and abuse and, as well, their own followup investigation of fraud when it occurs. Moreover these efforts are a major part of their overhead.

This is merely an isolated example of the profound differences between cost accounting in ther government and in the real world. They are not at all comparable. It works both ways too, Some years ago there was a press furor over a $950 toilet seat the Navy bought for installation in P-3 patrol aircraft. A cost that far exceeds anything then conceivable in the real world. However, the fact is the government accounts for the cost contractors continuing engineering//logistical management program -substantial services - a a markup on the cost of everything it buys from them. Furthermore the article in question was a complete airline type lavoratory module with walls & sink. In short in such comparisons things aren't what they seem to be. A great deal of outright deception is practiced by protagonists of various issues with such comparisons - often knowingly and deliberate, sometimes just as a result of superficial unthinking comparisons. Parados has given us an example.

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@parados,

The news a couple of days ago featured the FBI arrests of about 40 people nationwide following an extensive investigation of an organized scam that had already extorted over a hundred million in fraudulent Medicare claims. It is certain that the costs of this investigation and the efforts in identifying the illegal transactions and finding the culprits were not included in the governments Medicate overhead figures. They instead appear as part of the Justice Department/FBI budget. Government agencies don’t cross charge one another for the performance of their assigned activities. Private insurers do their own (generally far more effective) up front prevention of fraud and abuse and, as well, their own follow-up investigation of fraud when it occurs. For them these costs are a major part of overhead.

This is merely an isolated example of the profound differences between cost accounting in the government and in the real world. They are not at all comparable. It works both ways too; some years ago there was a press furor over a $1,650 toilet seat the Navy bought for installation in P-3 patrol aircraft. A cost that far exceeds anything then conceivable in the real world. However, the fact is the government accounts for the aircraft contractor’s continuing engineering//logistical management program -substantial services – by applying a markup on the cost of everything it buys from them. Furthermore the article in question was a complete airline type lavatory module with walls & sink. In short, in such comparisons things aren't what they seem to be.

A great deal of outright deception is practiced by protagonists of various issues with such comparisons - often knowingly and deliberate, sometimes just as a result of superficial unthinking comparisons. Parados has given us an example.

1 Reply

@georgeob1,

So nice, he said it twice.

Cycloptichorn

1 Reply

@Cycloptichorn,

True. I'm not yet a master of the edit function here.

1 Reply

@Cycloptichorn,

Cycloptichorn wrote:

[That's the problem. Should the purpose of an insurance company really BE to provide the highest return on share, at all other costs? This is a major driver of the bad things in our HC industry - the never-ending and pervasive need to turn a profit, and not only that, but for your profits to be RISING every quarter and every year. It places immense pressure upon the companies to pay for as little actual medical care as possible, which isn't really the result that I think we want as a society.

Cycloptichorn

The free market combination of the continuing need to attract consumers who have other choices available to them, together with the "never-ending and pervasive" need to turn a profit has repeatedly shown itself to be far more effective in delivering innovation, effective servises and products and low prices than any alternative approach. This history of the 20th century provides ample proof of this proposition.

In theory what could be simpler and more cost effective than a planned economy with one agency managing overhead functions for all and rationally planning the optimum allocation of resources ? In comparison the duplication of management functions in thousands of competing companies seems horribly wasteful.

In practice the top-down central planning and control systems produced only shoddy services and products, waste, and the loss of freedom. At the fall of the Soviet Empire the socialist Germans were producing Trabants - small ugly vehicles with highly polluting two-cycle engines, while their cousins in the West were making BMWs & Mercedes. (The Soviets were producing Ladas using a design and literally the factory they bought from FIAT for the manufactire of a then 12 year old FIAT 124 under a new name.)

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@georgeob1,

Cyclo was stuck for something to say George.

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@georgeob1,

Quote:

The free market combination of the continuing need to attract consumers who have other choices available to them, together with the "never-ending and pervasive" need to turn a profit has repeatedly shown itself to be far more effective in delivering innovation, effective servises and products and low prices than any alternative approach. This history of the 20th century provides ample proof of this proposition.

I find it extremely difficult to reconcile this position with the fact that countries whose medical insurance industries are not primarily driven by the profit motive tend to provide care which is comparable or better than ours for less than half the price.

In terms of an insurance product - what, exactly, is the 'innovation' that they provide? Can you point to any innovation in the realm of Health Insurance by these groups, and show how it led to low prices?

You ought to speak of the actual health-care systems in other countries around the world and the results that they have experienced if you want to make comparisons between our system and a centrally-planned one; off-topic discussions of the Russian auto industry are not especially convincing for your case (though I know you love to throw them in whenever possible). How do you account for the fact that other countries get a better product, with lower prices and less hassle (by far)?

Cycloptichorn

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@georgeob1,

There are other sorts of "profit" besides money George. But I agree on balance with what you said. A middle way is probably best.

The agencies which check our food and drugs have to be government run. Unless they're abolished.

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@Cycloptichorn,

The "insurance product" is the consumer's choice from many offered in the "free" market place.

1 Reply

@cicerone imposter,

cicerone imposter wrote:

The "insurance product" is the consumer's choice from many offered in the "free" market place.

Okay, fine. So what is the 'innovation?' How are modern insurance products saving money by keeping costs down? How are they providing better and more effective insurance than what existed before?

I believe the clear answer is that they are doing NONE of these things. At all.

Cycloptichorn

1 Reply

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