[jeffkrol]

big whoop it will be the same old same old....
But just for an unbiased overview:
BBC News - Q&A: US healthcare reform
So what are the problems with the US system?

Healthcare costs for individuals are rising dramatically.

Premiums for employer-provided schemes have risen four times faster than wages, and are now double their cost nine years ago.

The percentage of employees with an annual deductible greater than $1,000 increased from 1% to 18% between 2000 and 2008.

As a nation, the US spent some $2.2tn (£1.36tn) on healthcare in 2007. That amounts to 16.2% of GDP, nearly twice the average of other OECD countries.



AARP's take on it:
http://bulletin.aarp.org/yourhealth/policy/articles/rising_health_care_costs..._Health_Email6


As Congress debates reforms designed to expand insurance coverage and slow the rising cost of health care, business executives and economists say the crippling annual increases in insurance premiums are a silent tax on American workers and the companies that hire them. Today the average premium for employer-sponsored health insurance is $13,375 a year for family coverage, with employers paying nearly 75 percent, or $9,860, according to a new study by the Kaiser Family Foundation.

“We can’t sustain this broken system,” says Richmond. “I sure hope something happens.”

“All my clients are struggling to deal with this,” says Matt Swinnerton, a broker who sells health care plans to businesses for the Precept Group in San Ramon, Calif. Rising health care costs, he says, are “the silent killer of compensation for employees.”

Permitting premiums to continue to climb unchecked “is simply unsustainable for families, for businesses, for state budgets and for our national economy,” Vice President Joe Biden said in a September speech to state insurance commissioners in the Washington suburbs.

Jim Sugden, a health underwriter in Denver, says he’s often surprised when employees complain about the high cost of COBRA, a government mandated benefit that allows workers who have lost their jobs to continue getting group insurance rates through their employers. “It’s just the translation of the real cost to you of current health insurance. It just shows you what your employer was paying for your health insurance all along.”

Premiums rise 131 percent; wages, 38 percent

According to the Kaiser study, health insurance premiums across America have climbed 131 percent since 1999—far more rapidly than workers’ wages, which rose 38 percent, or inflation, which rose 28 percent in the same period.

Only 60 percent of U.S. firms offer health benefits to any of their workers, the survey reports. Among those firms, 21 percent said they reduced health benefits or increased cost-sharing because of the economic downturn, while 15 percent reported they increased the worker’s share of the premium.

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Last edited by jeffkrol; 02-22-2010 at 07:01 PM.

[Mallee Boy]

I, for one, would like to see a break down of those cost increases.

New technologies and treatments pay a big role but so does the attitude that because its health related we can charge the earth for it....and get away with it.

[Rupert]

Obama's new "plan" is nothing short of a bad joke, doing nothing to improve the system or control costs. I am writing letters and making calls, hoping it will fail miserably. When rank and file Republicans start losing their coverage, and they will, or start getting premiums they can't afford,...they already are......they will eventually be begging for a real plan with a Public Option, which is what 58% of Americans want right now. Until then, let them suffer huge increases, canceled policies, and personal bankruptcy at a record pace. It won't be long until they come begging for real change.....and since their party of the Rich won't give it to them, they will be begging the Democrats.
Regards!

[shooz]

I think he's still trying to pander to the lobbies.
At least he's trying, something.
I say expand medicare and that system the Government uses for their own.
That covers around 50%,or more, as it is.
The rest of us get left to the vultures as it stands.

[Parallax]

Obama's new "plan" is nothing short of a bad joke, doing nothing to improve the system or control costs. I am writing letters and making calls, hoping it will fail miserably. When rank and file Republicans start losing their coverage, and they will, or start getting premiums they can't afford,...they already are......they will eventually be begging for a real plan with a Public Option, which is what 58% of Americans want right now. Until then, let them suffer huge increases, canceled policies, and personal bankruptcy at a record pace. It won't be long until they come begging for real change.....and since their party of the Rich won't give it to them, they will be begging the Democrats.
Regards!

If the Democrats were willing to "solve" it, they would have last year when they could have done so unopposed. Like I said before, if you are unhappy with the health care system as it is right now, there is no one to blame but the Dems because they chose not to change it when they has an unobstructed pathway to doing so.

[shooz]

Do you really think that lobbies have no effect?
Look past the winger junk.

[Parallax]

Do you really think that lobbies have no effect?
Look past the winger junk.

Obviously they DO have an effect. That's the point. The fact still remains that they could have done anything they wanted to do, without so much as input, let alone interference form the Republican side. They claim to have the best interest of the people at heart, yet they CHOSE to let lobbyists, special interest groups, and personal agendas get in they way of actually doing something. Once again, slowly this time for the comprehension challenged, they could have sent the President a bill that included, or excluded ANYTHING not prohibited by the Constitution that the wanted, but they CHOSE to waste the opportunity. The system exists as it exists today solely because the Democrats left it unchanged.

EDIT: Let me be clear that I don't think it would have been any different if it had been the Republicans with the Super Majority, but that doesn't change the fact that it wasn't the Republicans, it was the Democrats and in this instance they bear the sole blame.

---

Last edited by Parallax; 02-23-2010 at 08:56 AM.

[Rupert]

If the Democrats were willing to "solve" it, they would have last year when they could have done so unopposed. Like I said before, if you are unhappy with the health care system as it is right now, there is no one to blame but the Dems because they chose not to change it when they has an unobstructed pathway to doing so.

Well, it doesn't seem to register here that we elect those in Washington to fix broken things.....not just to represent their own interests and the interests of the lobbyists. So in that regard, the entire bunch failed to repair a broken and costly system that gets worse by the day. You can say Dems failed...or I can say Wingnuts failed, but it makes little difference when your premiums rise beyond your affordability, or worse, your policy is canceled. While we assign blame, they count their "payoff" cash from Giant Medical, and laugh at us for trying to blame each other. Your loss is no more satisfying than mine or anyone elses. If it is a major problem, whatever it is, it won't be repaired in Washington.....not unless you can outspend the lobbyists. Many of them are currently in fear.....they know China has the cash, almost all of it and their power is soon to diminish accordingly. Unfortunately, that is not good news for us either.
Regards

[Parallax]

Actually, I think there is one thing we can do that would have a major impact in Washington and might just get the message through. I have preached this for years:

Don't Vote For An Incumbent! Vote Democrat, vote Republican, vote Independent, vote Libertarian, I don't care. Just don't vote for an incumbent.
In just one election we could start over completely in the House, and get rid of 1/3 of the Senate homesteaders, and if that didn't get the message through to them we could clear another third out 2 years later.

Actually, I think there is one thing we can do that would have a major impact in Washington and might just get the message through. I have preached this for years:

Don't Vote For An Incumbent! Vote Democrat, vote Republican, vote Independent, vote Libertarian, I don't care. Just don't vote for an incumbent.
In just one election we could start over completely in the House, and get rid of 1/3 of the Senate homesteaders, and if that didn't get the message through to them we could clear another third out 2 years later.

I am going to vote strictly for the communist party.

Oh wait, they're already there.

[Das Boot]

For a peek at what our healthcare will be like we just need to look to our neighbors up north. A Canadian Premiere elected to pay for a procedure here in the states than to have it down in his home country:

An unapologetic Danny Williams says he was aware his trip to the United States for heart surgery earlier this month would spark outcry, but he concluded his personal health trumped any public fallout over the controversial decision.

In an interview with The Canadian Press, Williams said he went to Miami to have a "minimally invasive" surgery for an ailment first detected nearly a year ago, based on the advice of his doctors.

"This was my heart, my choice and my health," Williams said late Monday from his condominium in Sarasota, Fla.

For those of you that say it won't happen here with a similar system, you're FOS. The only difference is going to be, we won't have anywhere to go to pay for quality care.

Here's the link for those who care:
'My heart, my choice,' Williams says, defending decision for U.S. heart surgery

[jeffkrol]

For a peek at what our healthcare will be like we just need to look to our neighbors up north. A Canadian Premiere elected to pay for a procedure here in the states than to have it down in his home country:



For those of you that say it won't happen here with a similar system, you're FOS. The only difference is going to be, we won't have anywhere to go to pay for quality care.

Here's the link for those who care:
'My heart, my choice,' Williams says, defending decision for U.S. heart surgery

We've been down that road before. Do a search here. You may see that this statement is pointless propaganda......
Stupid politicians doing stupid things mean little to the educated.....
And you might as well just add..............
Williams said his decision to go to the U.S. did not reflect any lack of faith in his own province's health care system.

"I have the utmost confidence in our own health care system in Newfoundland and Labrador, but we are just over half a million people," he said.

"We do whatever we can to provide the best possible health care that we can in Newfoundland and Labrador. The Canadian health care system has a great reputation, but this is a very specialized piece of surgery that had to be done and I went to somebody who's doing this three or four times a day, five, six days a week."
Americans go all over the world for this stuff, they just don't tell you.......

[Das Boot]

Ok, ten years from now are we going to have this kind of specialized healthcare? What about 20 years from now? What about this new system is going to attract perspective new talent in the healthcare field? Why would someone want to spend 10 years as a resident learning a specialty when they could make the same money straight out of school in general practice? They'll probably be better off going to law school seeing that there is absolutely no tort reform in this bill. They could specialize in medical malpractice and make a killing off the taxpayers.

[jeffkrol]

Ok, ten years from now are we going to have this kind of specialized healthcare? What about 20 years from now? What about this new system is going to attract perspective new talent in the healthcare field? Why would someone want to spend 10 years as a resident learning a specialty when they could make the same money straight out of school in general practice? They'll probably be better off going to law school seeing that there is absolutely no tort reform in this bill. They could specialize in medical malpractice and make a killing off the taxpayers.

Europe has some fine doctors and surprisingly some do it because they LIKE TO. I know, completely un-american but I'm sick of a lot of doctors just going into the field for cash. Maybe that's why there are so many malpractice suits. Maybe they deserve it. No matter to the MD. He just goes over state lines and starts over again in an area of lower rates. Malpractice ins. can be as low as $10,000 per year to as high as a couple $100,000.. Gee docs. that can afford a few 100 grand and yet still live better then most of us. Funny how that works.. No problems here.
Personally if there only here for the cash, they can go back to where they came from. I hear md wages in India are not so hot.
Physicians / Doctors Salaries & Incomes in USA and the World
PHYSICIANS DOMINATE THIS TOP 50 HIGHEST PAID JOBS LIST at MDsalaries - The Physician Salaries Blog
some of the MD's around here were better real estate flippers then doctors.
There is sooo much FUD out there it's not funny..........
START HERE, read and then get back to this thread:
Myths Debunked - Rising Cost of Medical Malpractice Insurance Is Due to High Jury Awards
https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/politics-religion-etc/89059-tiny-fun-bit-...tml#post908034
I will post this here though. THink hard about it.

Case you don't like that chart;
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_hea_dis_dea-health-heart-disease-deaths
And what we are #1 at:
Plastic surgery, obesity, teen pregnancy , teen births, SPENDING.
Delude yourself all you want but most do not get what they pay for, at leat compared to other countries.
http://www.nationmaster.com/red/country/us-united-states/hea-health&b_define=1

[Mallee Boy]

This is an interesting read, it is a bit old now, but it does a good job of demonstrating the issues and challenges that all developed countries face with health care expenditure.....and why we are all going to hit a wall at great speed if we keep going the way we are.

http://www.kff.org/insurance/snapshot/chcm010307oth.cfm