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but a 'national health care system' wont control the COSTS
insurance IS expensive, because you are ASKING someone else to take the RISK for YOU, asking someone else to pay 10's of thousands even though you have only paid hundreds
Exactly the same principle as national health care but without the need to return a profit to investors, maintain a sales and marketing staff, pay for lobbying and political donations, duplicate administrative services, pay executives multimillion dollar contracts.......
I don't think so. ANYTIME government has gotten involved in enterprises of the private sector you have just the opposite -- runaway costs and in some cases a lowering of the quality of services. Look at what education costs have skyrocketed to in just a couple of decades because of government backed student loans? There is no reason for schools to keep costs down when they know they'll get paid. Instead, the burden shifts to the student who ends up taking the better part of his whole life to pay for his education..which shouldn't cost anymore than a few hundred dollars per course.--certainly not $60,000 per year!
Secondly, if you want to see what healthcare in Canada is like, do a search on YouTube. Never mind that their taxes are double what ours our but in order to get immediate emergency care you have to pay EXTRA or sometimes wait for days to be seen. Most people that don't want to have to wait 2-3 years for elective surgery go elsewhere to get it done. It is far from a panacea. Look at this John Stossel clip for starters.
The John Stossel program is the biggest bunch of misinformation ever given out by anyone. Many of us in Canada saw the 20 20 program and were stunned with disbelief. The last guy that did such a great hatchet job was Joseph Goebbels, the Nazi propaganda cheif.
Number one, the government does not run the healthcare system. it only helps direct tax dollars to our non profit single payer Health Insurance company, just as the US government directs tax dollars to fund hospitals and other public health institutions. Our system. like yours, is a FOR PROFIT Capitalistic system.
The only part of our system that is non profit is the insurance part and some non profit hospitals. Other hospitals are for profit and private/profit partnerships. Health care executives get the same kind of multi hundred thousand dollar pay checks for running huge hospitals and regional health districts as anywhere else. The Doctors all run their own private FOR PROFIT businesses or clinics.
For instance, my wife has had cutting edge heart surgery with the lates micro surgery equipment and had her choice of hospitals, surgeons and specialists. After her first successful operation she was supposed to get a follow up operation. However, when she got some unwelcome news from one specialist she got a second opinion from another and had the follow up heart procedure in about three weeks. She is cured. I got a hernia, popped over to my doctor...he popped me upstairs to old Sam the Surgeon and two weeks later I had my hernia done, and even there I had a choice of watching my own operation or sleeping though it.
Sure there may be holes in the system, but it sure works well for us. If it is so bad why does your American Consul general stationed here use it? Also, I have never heard of any of the thousands of Americans that live here keep their US health plans. And I really loved the bit about how patients are flown to the USA for treatment. They are. But that is when there is a spike in multiple births and our FREE ENTERPRISE and FOR PROFIT system PAYS for the patient to be flown there.
In fact we like the Single Payer system so much we have Single Payer Auto Insurance too.
Our system might not be your choice but I was amazed to see John Stossel, a man I thought was fair, do such a lying hatchet job on the Canadian health system.
Oh yes. another thing. There is no complicated plans. Get sick. Get treated. Get well.
My insurance costs $76.00 a month for two and all the perscription meds I can take for $400.00 a year.
If I have bad health habits my booze and smokes are heavily taxed...What else? Oh yeah. My taxes are similar or less than yours because familys get big tax credits for children and as an Employer my costs are way cheaper than USA Employers because all employees come with their own portable medical plan.
So please compare systems fairly. Phone a Canadian friend. Lets see. A happy, longer lived, no worry Canadian or a poor debt ridden bill collector harrassed American? You choose. Are there any Canadians lining up to buy American Health Insurance of any kind? Is that a NO I hear?
Exactly the same principle as national health care but without the need to return a profit to investors, maintain a sales and marketing staff, pay for lobbying and political donations, duplicate administrative services, pay executives multimillion dollar contracts.......
What's going to stop the government from jacking up rates? They have zero competition. Can you imagine in a year like this with multi-trillion dollar deficits? They are already looking for any reason they can to raise our taxes.
On the flip side there are hundreds of options for private health care.
What's going to stop the government from jacking up rates? They have zero competition. Can you imagine in a year like this with multi-trillion dollar deficits? They are already looking for any reason they can to raise our taxes.
On the flip side there are hundreds of options for private health care.
Yes, Obama wants to do a lot of the things for which he criticized Hillary during the campaign. He was against them before he was for them.
At least Hillary was honest about it.
If you are in that situation, what you do is keep your COBRA going until it runs out but a few months before it does, call an INDEPENDENT insurance agent who specializes in the area of health like I do, and have them find the best individual plan that gives you the most coverage for the least cost. They can shop around and find the companies willing to A) accept you B) give you the best rates abd coverages given your pre-existing conditions or C) suggest you get coverage from a high risk pool depending on what kind of state you are looking in.
If you are looking in one of the "bad" states mostly located in the Northeast, there will be fewer choices and costs will be higher but one of the carriers MUST accept you as these states haven't been smart enough to establish high risk health insurance pools yet. (They think they know BETTER than the majority of states in the rest of the country when the opposite is true.)
Also depending on the state, if you are looking in a "bad" state, you might find it hard to find an agent who will help you because carriers in these states have messed up their insurance markets so badly they have DESTROYED the individual insurance market and won't pay out any commissions to agents for helping someone with individual insurance. Many of the insurers have left those states for friendlier states and most agents won't waste their time helping someone where they know they will never be compensated.
So you'd have to keep calling agents, probably small group health agents, until you found both a knowledgable one and a generous one who was willing to help you. Or, you could call the insurance commissioner in your state and find out the carriers that provide individual health insurance and call them directly and deal with whoever you get on the phone who may or may not know what they are talking about. However at least they could handle sending you information and applications about their individual plans. Then just choose an HSA qualified plan and send in your application and see what happens. Be sure they know you DID exhaust your COBRA or that COBRA wasn't offered because the company went out of business or whatever the case is. Make sure you are doing this within 63 in some states to 90 days in others from the last day you were covered by your employers plan. Then they will no choice but to take you and cover everything. As soon as you get your certificate of creditable coverage from your last insurer, make a copy of it to send to the new insurer and keep the original with your important papers. The last day of your old coverage MUST be within 63 or 90 days of when this new plan starts.
This is wonderful advice for healthy people; thank you for the reply.
But my posts are in reference to someone who has health problems and won't be insurable. My main concern is--the system works great as long as one stays pretty healthy and have no health crises.
But to say that the system works great for those who never develop a health crises is like there is a house-fire insurance system that you can buy that will protect you in all cases except when you have a house fire. And you might shrug and say--well, how many people have house fires, no big deal, won't happen to me--and that's what your replies seem like to me. This system will work great for you as long as you are never truly ill.
Also, everyone eventually will be in their fifties and sixties (if they don't die young). Why work your whole life to lose it all in your fifties because that is the one decade you can't buy health insurance (maybe after being let go from work)? And what about your parents, if you are very young? Do you want them to lose their home to medical expenses? And what about teenagers who become adults? What if they have a pre-existing conditions? If you don't care about anyone but yourself--what if your child has a pre-existing condition and you can do nothing to help them when they turn 18?
What makes you think you can't buy insurance in your 50's? Also, 32 states have a high risk insurance pool (with more looking to add them) and in most other states you can get insurance with a pre-existing condition...the question is cost and the waiting period during which time the condition may not be covered. The same for adults coming off of their parent's policies. Availability isn't the biggest issue, it is cost.
And, what do people work for if not to provide for themselves later on? Yes, I'd expect my parents to invest their assets into providing for their own care, if needed.
FWIW...nothing in Obama care addressed the costs of health care, which is the majority of the problem. If costs can be reduced then more people can afford, on their own, to buy into the system.
My impression from your posts is that you are a very fearful person. The only people I've ever known to carry cancer insurance are either ignorant or making choices based on fear...you already said you were not uniformed. I don't know one person who would pay now for the option to have insurance later...that sounds very scammy to me and you are doing it because you fear you won't be able to get insurance later...??? You (and others) want to be able to cover every eventuality and that's not realistic, that's not life. You can try to prepare yourself as best as you can but don't live your life and make choices in fear...you'll never feel at peace.
Exactly the same principle as national health care but without the need to return a profit to investors, maintain a sales and marketing staff, pay for lobbying and political donations, duplicate administrative services, pay executives multimillion dollar contracts.......
Except that the current government run programs aren't any cheaper to run than private insurance. In many cases..they cost MORE, even without profit and investors and sales....blah, blah, blah. There is no savings in letting the government do it.
Let's have insurance for CATASTROPHIC issues only - Major medical.
Individuals take responsibility for their day to day expenses. Heck, there is some movement by physicans to stop taking insurance anyway - cash only.
Just because people really need to read this....it makes sense.
I still think we need to fix some of the other holes in the current system but in the direction of simplicity, not 2000 page bills that no one can understand and that still don't address the biggest problem, rising cost of health care.
To truly protect yourself, drop your employer's insurance and get your own individual plan. As long as you pay your premiums, even if you have a major illness, you CAN NOT be singled out for a rate increase with your own individual plan from a legitimate quality insurer. If you switch employers, just let the next employer know that you won't be needing their health plan because you have your own (and ask for cash instead).
My state is all screwed up and I can't buy a reliable private plan.
Here's what I think I will do now--move to the neighboring state and commute. I'll either do what you say, or buy that UnitedHealth waver. emilybh, I am healthy now. My my imaginanion is such that I keep thinking--what if I develop an illness, can't buy insurance in my fifties (rapidly approaching) and therefore have a destitute existance as a ward of the state?
I think this UnitedHealth product will protect me from that, at least, and I am willing to move to the next state to purchase it.
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