SD: haven't seen you around in a while. I remember you being involved in the General's campaign efforts. What's he up to these days? He seems to be laying low.
www.reuters.com/article/healthNews/idUSTRE5863CN20090907 French Healthcare system has a huge deficit and growing....they need to fix it.....
Lazy - The problem with your tax credit idea is...it doesn't create a huge bureaucracy that will vote as a block to sustain itself (ie vote Democrat). This isn't about coverage....its about creating near permanent majorities sustained by various voting consitituencies that look to acquire at the polls that which they can not acquire through other means.
Zork what percentage of you healthcare costs are covered after you hit your deductible 100% or 80/20? Are you capped at an annual amount, or just an umbrella $1 million benefits cap? The problem is that for the 70% that are "pleased" with their healthcare coverage they often don't have any idea about the answers to the above questions. Thus they only become displeased when they actually NEED their insurance benefits and find they are going to get hammered with medical bills even with the policies they were satisfied with. In this case the lack of knowledge about the limitations of their policies are not known because they have not breached that need, when they do they will fall into the dissatified category if they are being forced into bankrupcty by medical bills even when they have health insurance.
SD Horn: I have yet to hear any plan being touted offering credits. In fact some plans, including one the president was fighting his own party against included taxing employees for what was currently is getting paid on their behalf. I have heard some talk of deductions, but nobody is offering credits, because the government wants the money. Social Security: The models predicting SS lasting into 2043 are the ones predicitng higher tax revenues and not factoring in increasing deficits (including the most recent trillion dollars run up in the last 2 years). Its great your grandfather (and mine) got their SS benefits, but honestly, if both your grandfather and mine had been able to invest that money on their own, it would have been there for them. Having government take my money and "save" for me, and then not properly handling my money, is not anything that makes me proud. It is tyranny for any entity to take what it has not earned, from the pockets of the man who worked hard for it and place it anothers pockets. If it was a King doing it, we would revolt. If it is a government giving it to those who have failed to take steps in their own life to provide for themselves it is somehow acceptable ? You and I will just have to agree to disagree that Social Security has been a success, or that it will be solvent in the near future. As for your assertion that Medicare and the other government run healthcare options are somehow just as efficient or solvable, then I urge you to spend any free time reading or listening to any of the management of any of the profitable hospitals in your area and hear what they say. My brother is a COO for the most profitable Hospital system in Dallas and he can tell you they lose money on Medicare and Medicaid. They are forced to take those patients since they are not a private members only hospital, but he says the money they get "reimbursed" to cover the procedures done on Medicaid/Medicare patients is most the time not even enough to cover costs of medical devices they use, not even counting the costs of doctors, staff, housing, anasthesiologists, etc. It's only workable because hospitals eat the cost the lose on those patients, and make it back from Insurance companies. So from what I know from my brother, who knows a hell a lot about what it takes for a hospital to be able to run efficiently and economically, you are wrong about the viability of Medicaid/Medicare. IF the private insurance option goes, my brother said they won't be able to afford to do even half what they do now. They will have to find way to cut costs, which will mean either less staff (meaning less quality care or less procedures available to be done) or a lot of other ways which will worsen the quality of healthcare. There is just simply not enough money to pay for everyone and maintain the level of quality and access we have now. We would have to increase taxes incredibly to just be able to run the program at any kind of sustainable level with ay semblance to what we have now. So if everybody is willing to give 50% of their income to Uncle Same (including those who make over 50,000), then maybe we can have the Healthcare that's being touted. Or we can cut back somewhere else, but I have yet to see any politician (Republican or Democrat) not named Ron Raul willing to cut any programs or cut any spending in any real way that cuts into the federal budget.
Summer, I pay 85$ a month for a high deductible HSA plan through my company and with United Healthcare. My company contributes 50$ per month into my HSA and I contribute the max this year, 5600$, so that my medical expenses are paid pre-tax and to help pay for money for next year. The HSA funds can be invested with the growth being tax free. The deductible for my family is 4k, meaning I pay the first 4k out of my pocket per year for medical treatments, visits(with no copay but total pay till I reach 4k), and pharma. Then it goes to 100% paid. There may be better deals out there but I'm satisfied with the one I have. What I pay now is not close to 10% of my salary, nor does my employer pay another 10%. Why should we pay more than we do now so others can decide not to pay for their own plans.
