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The issue IS that the free market concept doesn't work well in regulating a non-discretionary item like healthcare. So forget the term "bargaining power." Go with "sledge hammer" if you'd prefer. You are absolutely correct that one of the ways that a public option would drive down health care costs is by reducing provider fees. Fair enough that that raises a number of issues but to keep it simple ...
... in a world where some are content to deny available medical care to those who can't come up with the money, I have no problem a government "bargaining" or "sledgehammering" a so-called free healthcare market.
That is very correct and part of the issue why many docs do not want a more universal system. Docs also need to be satisfied in this equation. And if they are not adequately compensated they will bring on a shtstorm.
I am explaining my situation, because it's illustrative of a huge problem in the way we make insurance available and affordable. Because insurance for most people is employer-subsidized, it creates a vulnerability to coverage interruption that can set off a chain of events that leads someone diagnosed with a pre-existing condition to be denied future coverage when their employment status changes. This is a situation faced by nearly every working person multiple times over the course of a career. The ACA pre-existing conditions clause prevents insurance companies from playing these kinds of games, which is why I am very worried about it being overturned. Let me be very clear: I can afford my COBRA payment for the length of time it is available to me, which is eighteen months. That is enough time for me to complete my treatment protocol and hopefully be in long-term remission before I must obtain a new policy. At that point, the newest administration will have had plenty of time to deconstruct the ACA and put a new plan in place, and who the hell knows what that's going to look like. I'm anxious about it, not just for me, but for everyone. We have a dysfunctional health care system in this country, and the major concern at least as far as this thread indicates seems to be freaking birth control!
My belief is it will take the new administration at the very least 2 years to make changes to the ACA. Just be careful in that if your husband acquires new employment and new health insurance, that this in fact may effect your current coverage more in the immediate future than a change to the ACA would be way down the road. If I'm not mistaken, a family can not use COBRA and another health insurance plan at the same time. If this happens, look very close at your new policy.
Actually, since the stated purpose of the ACA was to get people who were UN-insured insurance (that's if you believe Obama, LMAO), then the vast majority of people were not these people who were just randomly in between jobs for one month and happened to not be able to afford COBRA. It was people who were never insured and who were already sick and were being given "insurance" (which it's not really, since the condition already had occurred).
However, like many Americans, the only thing you care about is not whether something is right or wrong but "will I personally benefit??" If so, then you are all for it.
NJ, how do you handle your health care insurance? Are you currently covered by an employer-sponsored policy?
Or anyone who wants to admit to a hospital. Actually, you really only have a choice if you work solely in an office and are private, which is becoming more and more the exception. 50/50 Medicaid either means you're in a rural area or you're in an urban area, either place mainly having people on Medicaid so that not seeing them would mean very few patients.
Hospitalists might be required to care for Medicaid patients. But if I were a private doc not taking Medicaid, that would not be a reason I could not admit my patients to a hospital. I am not aware of any area besides maybe the inner cities where Medicaid predominates.
Docs also need to be satisfied in this equation. And if they are not adequately compensated they will bring on a shtstorm.
That's actually not true. You can force doctors into doing whatever you want, as demonstrated by the government "carrot and stick" model with Medicare. First, they reward you for doing what they want, then they switch to punishing you for not doing what they want. At best, doctors will retire, but who cares? Then you just replace them.
There you go with that work for free thing again. In a nationalized system, the doctors get paid. Doctors in Canada get paid, doctors in the UK get paid, etc
Has to be enough though. Very touchy issue I can guarantee. The reality being that the difference between crap and adequate reimbursements is very small compared to overall HC costs.
That's actually not true. You can force doctors into doing whatever you want, as demonstrated by the government "carrot and stick" model with Medicare. First, they reward you for doing what they want, then they switch to punishing you for not doing what they want. At best, doctors will retire, but who cares? Then you just replace them.
With Medicare, CMS has continually adjusted reimbursements in favor of docs. Borderline most of the way, but so far it continues to work for most docs after 50 years. We only have one doc in town that doesn't take Medicare.
Every alternative plane to the ACA I have seen from the repubs, covered people with pre-existing conditions. So rest easy.
I hate to keep posting this, but it really applies here: How To Tell Fake News From Real News In 'Post-Truth' Era : NPR "Is the story set in the future? It's hard to get firsthand reporting from there. Any story that tells you what will happen should be marked down 50 percent for this reason alone."
We don't know what, or if, the Pubs will come up with. Put away the crystal ball.
Location: Live:Downtown Phoenix, AZ/Work:Greater Los Angeles, CA
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Quote:
Originally Posted by InformedConsent
Yeah, achievement and success. Overtaxed, BY FAR.
Untrue, just a right wing talking point. Poster was indicating things like cigarettes, alcohol and polluting
Last edited by FirebirdCamaro1220; 12-20-2016 at 08:41 AM..
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