Can Vouchers Work for Health? The Scandinavian Experience (health care system, death, solution)

[BigJon3475]

Since the mid-1990s we have seen many experiments with new mechanisms to enable free user choice and to control welfare costs, among them the introduction of voucher
schemes. Indeed, free choice through voucher-type arrangements is in its heyday in Denmark and Sweden. This is no coincidence.

Explicit voucher schemes with physical coupons are very rare in the Scandinavian countries as is also the case in most other advanced welfare states.1 Denmark and Sweden have,
however, introduced voucher-type arrangements that function in a similar way. They concern special per user subsidies, income-dependent earmarked benefits or special tax credits.

http://www.policy-network.net/upload...%20&%20Vad.pdf

I'm not for using Scandinavian countries as an example for what America should do but I find this very interesting considering the plans introduced in Denmark and Norway are the same type as Ryan's and liberals use those countries as some sort of beacon for what our health care system should look like.



And if you're questioning the source...

Policy Network is an international thinktank dedicated to promoting progressive policies and the renewal of social democracy.

http://www.policy-network.net/content/342/about%20us

[shorebaby]

Very interesting. Isn't possible that Ryan hit upon a solution that would satisfy liberals if they would the fact that Ryan is a Republican? Can they possibly open themselves to the possibility? Nah.....

[ovcatto]

Originally Posted by shorebaby

Very interesting. Isn't possible that Ryan hit upon a solution that would satisfy liberals if they would the fact that Ryan is a Republican?

No. Ryan's vouchers coupled with the Republican vow to dismantle the Affordable Health Care Act wouldn't satisfy liberals if it were where proposed by Dennis Kuncinch or the late Paul Wellstone.

[Neuling]

I don't know any country whose health system is not in trouble. They are trying various systems, but they don't really change the causes.
Some people simply visit a physician too readily and often. Plus, there is this odd attitude that one can abuse one's own body and then have the right to be repaired.

[TempesT68]

Originally Posted by BigJon3475

http://www.policy-network.net/upload...%20&%20Vad.pdf

I'm not for using Scandinavian countries as an example for what America should do but I find this very interesting considering the plans introduced in Denmark and Norway are the same type as Ryan's and liberals use those countries as some sort of beacon for what our health care system should look like.



And if you're questioning the source...

Policy Network - About us - About Policy Network

The Ryan/far right plan is the complete opposite of what most americans want, like the wildly successful ones in europe, that's single payer or at least the public option. Ryan's plan continues healthcare to be completely privatized, for-profit organizations while rationing services to people (aka death panels)

[JohnPaul]

Originally Posted by Neuling

Some people simply visit a physician too readily and often.

exactly

[ChristineVA]

You do realize that Scandinavia has this in place:

<H2>The Beveridge Model

Named after William Beveridge, the daring social reformer who designed Britain’s National Health Service. In this system, health care is provided and financed by the government through tax payments, just like the police force or the public library.
Many, but not all, hospitals and clinics are owned by the government; some doctors are government employees, but there are also private doctors who collect their fees from the government. In Britain, you never get a doctor bill. These systems tend to have low costs per capita, because the government, as the sole payer, controls what doctors can do and what they can charge.
Countries using the Beveridge plan or variations on it include its birthplace Great Britain, Spain, most of Scandinavia and New Zealand. Hong Kong still has its own Beveridge-style health care, because the populace simply refused to give it up when the Chinese took over that former British colony in 1997. Cuba represents the extreme application of the Beveridge approach; it is probably the world’s purest example of total government control.

</H2>
I'm sure the use of vouchers in a National Health Care system would be a very interesting way of changing up how people get their healthcare there. People can take the vouchers and line up their care on their own versus let someone at the NHS schedule it for them.

One difference for them is that they have something to fall back on (the NHS) if the vouchers don't work AND since they have government-run healthcare, they don't worry about someone turning down their voucher.

In the case of vouchers here, it could only work if health insurance companies were FORCED to take the voucher and not deny anyone AND that the voucher covered what needs to be covered. In the U.S. there is no fallback right now if, say, a $10,000 voucher doesn't buy much healthcare for a senior.

[Supachai]

The problem with comparing America to Scandinavian countries is that we don't have the same people. Social programs work in societies that are more homogeneous and people feel responsible to their countrymen. There are less people willing to abuse the system when you feel shame in doing so. If you look at Sweden, new immigrants disproportionately use welfare services. This is because they don't feel any sense of obligation to their host country; they don't have issues with exploiting a people who are not their own.

[subsound]

I don't think the problem is the term voucher, it is the fact that the voucher is a set amount. So if some one had a voucher for X amount that covers their health care now, and in 2030 you get the same amount on the voucher...what about at minimum inflation, let alone other costs?

The other voucher plans matches increases in inflation and core costs, which seems to be left out of this rather narrowly defined look.

[ovcatto]

Yes, yes, of course the blame is always with the patient.