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Since my father and three siblings have died from cancer I feel that I should get a pap test every year to be safe. The only way I can get this test is to pay for it myself since my insurance will only pay for this test every two years.
Nonsense. Your car needs oil every 3000 miles or so to be sure it runs well: do you expect your car insurance to pay for it? Insurance ought to be for the unexpected. Standard, yearly treatments can be accounted for through proper management of a normal person's finances. Then, if you happen to be unfortunate enough to develop cancer, insurance is there to cover the cost.
But the idea that insurance should cover yearly, anticipated expenses is no minor contributor to the problem of health insurance in this country.
How did or does that address people that do not have employer sponsored health care (and no insurance because of lack of affordability or ability to pay), those with pre-existing conditions and the costs to purchase on the market with clauses and being charged more, etc.
it seems that that hurts the employee - by taxing a benefit they receive.. in essence a pretty big tax increase on the middle class.
By taxing Cadillac plans, we are providing additional funding which hopefully could be used to increase coverage for the uninsured, andadditional subsidy funding for them as needed.
The $7.5 credit was chosen by JM because any plan costing more is a Cadillac plan. IMO, Health Care should be like anything else of value your employer pays you or for you.taxable. It should not get preferential treatment as it does now.
I wanted to invoke a little more deeper conversation than.. this is bad lets scrap it to get people thinking about what is truly GOOD about it and what can be better, vs. just getting rid of it all together and stepping backwards.
As regards the ACA... it might turn out to be OK but it'll take 30 years to know.
So far though... all we really know is that it not only maintains but actually strengthens the same overriding
nanny state involvement of "HI provider companies" in every corner of our lives and similarly it maintains and strengthens the role of employer based policies. So long as these two conditions remain I see it as ultimately doomed. Some consider that a necessary intermediate step to a accepting the 100% medicare shift.
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But not one has offered any well thought out alternative that goes to fix
the problems of health care in this country.
Actually I thought that I had.
At least within the limits this venue allows for that sort of depth.
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I wanted to hear what others felt might work as an alternative.
That is a much softer standard but it isn't likely to lead to any hard answers either.
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I just hope to have that contribution be able to take care of me without exceeding what
I am capable of paying. If I can't and I kept falling through the cracks, then I'd become a burden on soceity...
A very big problem we have is a very large group has benefited for decades by having "someone else"
(like an employer based policy) almost invisibly paying for their medical care needs and until rather recently
with no conception of the cost involved or participating in those costs beyond a relative token.
Another is the expectation by so many that insurance should be used for so many categories of treatments
and care (like the diabetes care) are planned in advance and therefore budgetable.
Shift the responsibility for these common and basic things more fully to individuals
and shift the OMG stuff to Medicare... and the entire nature of treatment and payment has changed.
In my view for the better.
IMO, Health Care should be like anything else of value your employer pays you or for you: taxable.
It should not get preferential treatment as it does now.
Which gets right to the root problem which started as a labor/compensation get around.
If a company is paying $X for or toward a plan... that $X should be shifted to straight payroll.
Both the employee and the employer will pay some tax on it...
and the employee will then have $Y available to spend independently.
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Originally Posted by Proud2beAMom
How did or does that address people that do not have employer sponsored health care...
It doesn't. That is a whole other problem.
Those people also don't have comparable wage rates or training or twenty other common benefits.
Last edited by MrRational; 11-10-2013 at 10:03 PM..
Which gets right to the root problem which started as a labor/compensation get around.
If a company is paying $X for or toward a plan... that $X should be shifted to straight payroll.
Both the employee and the employer will pay some tax on it...
and the employee will then have $Y available to spend independently.
Plus we would eliminate the discrimanatory practice where married employees are compensated more than single employers, by means of subsidized benefit cost. We vote as single, we should solely get benefits as single individuals.
Plus we would eliminate the discrimanatory practice where married employees are compensated more than single employers, by means of subsidized benefit cost. We vote as single, we should solely get benefits as single individuals.
Actually employer sponsored healthcare should be done away with period.
EVeryone should have to buy their own plan and it shouldn't be tied to a job.
It would make the U.S more competitive. I'd rather have morem pay in my pocket and be able to shop for a plan that works for me and my family, then be left to the choices my employer made for us when he shopped for employee coverage.
I get that is what the opposition feels. But healthcare is the difference between life and death.
Healthcare is the difference between life and death, but the ACA isn't about healthcare, it's about healthinsurance and who pays. Show up at the ER and you'll get whatever you need regardless of insurance or ability to pay. No one gets left on the curb to die.
Healthcare is the difference between life and death, but the ACA isn't about healthcare, it's about healthinsurance and who pays. Show up at the ER and you'll get whatever you need regardless of insurance or ability to pay. No one gets left on the curb to die.
THat is a myth
Indeed.. if you walk into an ER you'll be treated.
You'll also have a bill that you most likely would be unable to pay.
So then who pays for it? Costs of that untreated care are passed on into higher charges for the rest of us.
The government sends subsidies to hospitals in the Billions for uncompensated care.
AND.. if you have a chronic condition or say a cancer diagnoses when you walk into the ER you are sent home with instructions to contact an oncologist. You aren't treated for your cancer, you aren't given your daily shot of meds, you aren't given your pills to treat high blood pressure or whatever ailments that you have once you walk out the door.
I know a girl with severe endometriosis. She is in pain and it's starting to effect her kidneys. The doctors/hospital want $20,000 down payment on the $40K surgery to treat it or they won't do the surgery. OH.. she gets treated for her pain when she walks into the ER.. but can't get the surgery to fix the main problem... and the longer this goes on, the more severe the damage is to other organs - and particularly her kidney. NO insurance because she couldn't get it (she didn't know about hte PCIP following the 2010 implementation of ACA - which is too late to enroll now)... and so she'll have to wait till Jan 1 when the new policy kicks in.. She doesn't earn enough for medicaid either.
So.. it's a big myth thinking you'll get treatment for whatever ails you.
Correct. He didn't say that part of the equation because it should be obvious.
And we're back to square one: Whose on first.
Don't forget how who will or might pay for it.
And how much it all might cost... or need to cost.
Often times those for a one payer system are accused of wanting a free ride on someone else's dime.
It's a complete mischaracterization of what we actually want. I don't know if its just on purpose, or people honestly feel that suddenly there will be a whole slew of people getting care that they alone will be paying for (well, they and other conservatives).
Everyone should have some responsibility in paying for their care. That responsibility should be proportionate to how much money they make. I believe in the NHS it's 11% of your income (combined with other taxes like VAT tax).
For that , you walk in and you get treatment. THer'es no paperwork to deal with,there is no looming large bill that will suck you dry.
But it's also not free.. you paid into it because you work and you pay a tax.
Yes, I understand their tax is more regressive as a result.. but their social programs are more progressive.
I'm not nor is anyone really looking to pass on the cost for ourselves to someone else, but we would like to be able to pay what we can afford to our care and still receive that care, even if we can't fully afford the current retail price. Europeans have understood this for decades. We are the only industrialized country in the world that hasn't . As a result we have a healthcare system that ranks 46th in the world.
The ACA has allowed me the opporutnity to have skin in the game where I previously was blocked or denied.. not because I didn't properly prioritize or not because I didn't want to pay the money..but because I couldn't. Because no matter WHAT I cut out of my budget, I would still fall short of the amount needed to either get my meds without insurance.. OR afford the insurance that would give me access to the meds.
Prior.. i was at the mercy of Pharma company and my doctor (who did give me free meds - thank god or I would have been in deep doo doo)... I skipped check ups and bloodwork because I couldn't afford it. And, if I were to have an illness befall me (possible with my condition) or something happen, I would be in the hospital being patched up.. but never be able to pay the bill - leaving someone or something else holding the bag.
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