Let's Talk Obamacare

[blackstar212]

http://www.forbes.com/sites/sallypipes/2015/06/29/obamacares-true-costs-are-finally-coming-to-light

That is why we need to eliminate insurance companies from the equation.

[Brian]

That is why we need to eliminate insurance companies from the equation.

Yep!

 

I don't have "gas insurance" to keep my tank filled up or "bread insurance" -- nor do I go get in the government gas lines and bread lines. When I need or want gas, I buy it. If I know I'm gonna be tight on funds, I might need to adjust my spending or driving habits accordingly. When I need or want bread, I buy it. Those Americans who can't afford gas likely also can't afford a car but there is probably public transportation generally available. Those Americans who can't afford bread are probably eligible for various forms of government assistance but there is private assistance available, too.

 

See how this works? The answer to "some people might have a legitimate issue" is almost never "the government should take it over."

 

BTW, have you looked at the Venezuelan utopia lately? Or Cuba? Or North Korea?

[blackstar212]

Yep!

 

I don't have "gas insurance" to keep my tank filled up or "bread insurance" -- nor do I go get in the government gas lines and bread lines. When I need or want gas, I buy it. If I know I'm gonna be tight on funds, I might need to adjust my spending or driving habits accordingly. When I need or want bread, I buy it. Those Americans who can't afford gas likely also can't afford a car but there is probably public transportation generally available. Those Americans who can't afford bread are probably eligible for various forms of government assistance but there is private assistance available, too.

 

See how this works? The answer to "some people might have a legitimate issue" is almost never "the government should take it over."

 

BTW, have you looked at the Venezuelan utopia lately? Or Cuba? Or North Korea?

Those are not utopia.

 

That is a case of a right wing individualist telling their people they are left wing collectivist and it is all for you but they are lying through their teeth so they can eat lobster and steak while the people eat rice.

[Brian]

Those are not utopia.

 

That is a case of a right wing individualist telling their people they are left wing collectivist and it is all for you but they are lying through their teeth so they can eat lobster and steak while the people eat rice.

Your personal definition of "left-wing" & "right-wing" is wacked but you are otherwise correct! All of these collectivist efforts turn into dystopias. There's a reason for that...

[Taomeow]

 

BTW, have you looked at the Venezuelan utopia lately? Or Cuba? Or North Korea?

 

I haven't looked at Venezuela or North Korea, I did see info on Cuba.   In 2016 it was named as the country that has the best health care system in the world.  Yes, between quality and availability, it was calculated to be number one, who'd have guessed.

Edited February 16, 2017 by Taomeow

[Brian]

I haven't looked at Venezuela or North Korea, I did see info on Cuba.   In 2016 it was named as the country that has the best health care system in the world.  Yes, between quality and availability, it was calculated to be number one, who'd have guessed.

Dig a little deeper and you'll find the data is very skewed. Here's a specific analysis on infant mortality in Cuba vs. the US:

https://brian.carnell.com/articles/2002/cuba-vs-the-united-states-on-infant-mortality

 

Similar underlying oddities are generally overlooked.

 

This is a common tactic, of course. When the US reduced the nationwide speed limit to 55 MPH in the 1970s, we also changed the way we counted traffic fatalities. Used to be you counted if you died from injuries sustained but the new method only counted you if you died within a small timeframe. Not surprisingly, the lower speed limit had a HUGE impact on highway deaths but only a fraction of it was really related to the speed limit.

[blackstar212]

Dig a little deeper and you'll find the data is very skewed. Here's a specific analysis on infant mortality in Cuba vs. the US:

https://brian.carnell.com/articles/2002/cuba-vs-the-united-states-on-infant-mortality

 

Similar underlying oddities are generally overlooked.

 

This is a common tactic, of course. When the US reduced the nationwide speed limit to 55 MPH in the 1970s, we also changed the way we counted traffic fatalities. Used to be you counted if you died from injuries sustained but the new method only counted you if you died within a small timeframe. Not surprisingly, the lower speed limit had a HUGE impact on highway deaths but only a fraction of it was really related to the speed limit.

Yeah

 

http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0934744.html

 

Cuba has the US beat in child mortality.

 

Our system is weak compared to universal systems.

 

If our country applied half to what we put into our military we would have the greatest health care in the world.

 

Funny how people say our military (run by the government) is the best but if you want the government to run health care they run and scream and say it is incompetent.

 

This is just one of the many lies of the right wing.

Edited February 16, 2017 by blackstar212

[Brian]

Yeah

 

http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0934744.html

 

Cuba has the US beat in child mortality.

 

Our system is weak compared to universal systems.

 

If our country applied half to what we put into our military we would have the greatest health care in the world.

 

Funny how people say our military (run by the government) is the best but if you want the government to run health care they run and scream and say it is incompetent.

 

This is just one of the many lies of the right wing.

Too bad you didn't bother to read the link you responded to. Makes you look rather silly to those people who did...

[Brian]

Once the Federal government has fixed the healthcare system it uses for veterans and has Medicare & Medicaid operating as promised, it might be in a position to make the case to the American citizens that it is ready to take over the whole ball of wax. At that point, the citizens of the several States may choose to ratify a Constitutional Amendment. Until then, though, it is illegal regardless of which Party tries to do it.

 

Pretty simple, really.

[Taomeow]

Dig a little deeper and you'll find the data is very skewed. Here's a specific analysis on infant mortality in Cuba vs. the US:

https://brian.carnell.com/articles/2002/cuba-vs-the-united-states-on-infant-mortality

 

Similar underlying oddities are generally overlooked.

 

This is a common tactic, of course. When the US reduced the nationwide speed limit to 55 MPH in the 1970s, we also changed the way we counted traffic fatalities. Used to be you counted if you died from injuries sustained but the new method only counted you if you died within a small timeframe. Not surprisingly, the lower speed limit had a HUGE impact on highway deaths but only a fraction of it was really related to the speed limit.

 

Thank you for the link, but the info presented therein is skewed in its own right.  "The doctor will spend a lot of time and money trying to revive a 400g infant?"  The doctor will spend the money?

 

To revive a 400g birth weight infant is not health care.  It is a scam.  Mortality rate of 50% in such infants is not mortality rate in infants, it is mortality rate in medical experiments.  The surviving 50% will have to live in hell for the rest of their lives -- and pay for it too.  The doctor "saving" a non-viable fetus (that's what a 400g birth weight human infant is in nature) is not the one who is going to pay.  

 

Actually, I have to stop.  I'm upset and horrified by yet another medical fact I didn't know.  Thank you for presenting it, now I'll try to calm down and go about my day. 

[Brian]

A question for my European friends...

 

Does the European Union provide universal healthcare coverage to the inhabitants of all its member countries?

[dawei]

I would disagree categorically that health care costs went up with the affordable care act. Some made a slight veer in the upward direction but more because of obstruction in so many states.

 

I'm not sure what you mean by health care costs... insurance or the provider side of care ?

 

I would agree that insurance went up but I've not looked at whether provide care went up.

 

I had assumed, and I'm sure someone's going to throw a few more links after that,  that insurance companies found themselves paying out more than previously because they had to cover anything and they in turn jacked up insurance costs.

[Brian]

Thank you for the link, but the info presented therein is skewed in its own right. "The doctor will spend a lot of time and money trying to revive a 400g infant?" The doctor will spend the money?

 

To revive a 400g birth weight infant is not health care. It is a scam. Mortality rate of 50% in such infants is not mortality rate in infants, it is mortality rate in medical experiments. The surviving 50% will have to live in hell for the rest of their lives -- and pay for it too. The doctor "saving" a non-viable fetus (that's what a 400g birth weight human infant is in nature) is not the one who is going to pay.

 

Actually, I have to stop. I'm upset and horrified by yet another medical fact I didn't know. Thank you for presenting it, now I'll try to calm down and go about my day.

Indeed! This is another example of the disfunction and bizarro-world stuff which results from decoupling the payer from the recipient. Making the Federal government the payer rather than corporatist insurance companies who are joined at the hip to that same government seems unlikely to solve this problem.

[Brian]

I'm not sure what you mean by health care costs... insurance or the provider side of care ?

 

I would agree that insurance went up but I've not looked at whether provide care went up.

 

I had assumed, and I'm sure someone's going to throw a few more links after that,  that insurance companies found themselves paying out more than previously because they had to cover anything and they in turn jacked up insurance costs.

I actually provided a link a few pages back which documented not only how the increased costs associated with Obamacare coverage outstrips even the supplemented premiums such that insurance companies are being forced to abandon the ACA exchanges to remain financially viable. This is compounded by the way the plan was engineered to subsidize States for additional Medicaid recipients and insurance companies for additional policyholders but to then roll those subsidies out after the barb has been planted, thereby all but guaranteeing collapse. One of the links I provided even showed how one "liberal" State was ordering insurance providers to increase rates because they recognized the carriers were unsustainable under the previous rate structures.

 

This is by design. Obamacare is intended to not just fail but to crash the entire private healthcare system in the process. They even said so.

[blackstar212]

Too bad you didn't bother to read the link you responded to. Makes you look rather silly to those people who did...

??

 

United States 6.2

Cuba 5.8

 

 

what I linked just has a list of all the worlds infant mortality rates Cuba's is less than the USA's?

[Spotless]

Dig a little deeper and you'll find the data is very skewed. Here's a specific analysis on infant mortality in Cuba vs. the US:https://brian.carnell.com/articles/2002/cuba-vs-the-united-states-on-infant-mortalitySimilar underlying oddities are generally overlooked.This is a common tactic, of course. When the US reduced the nationwide speed limit to 55 MPH in the 1970s, we also changed the way we counted traffic fatalities. Used to be you counted if you died from injuries sustained but the new method only counted you if you died within a small timeframe. Not surprisingly, the lower speed limit had a HUGE impact on highway deaths but only a fraction of it was really related to the speed limit.

Just a note:

 

Infant mortality stats rarely make clear in English the following:

The average age of the women giving birth -

In the USA many women are giving birth late in their birth giving window.

In many countries with the lowest rates the largest contributing factor is - most of the mothers are giving birth between 18 and 22 years of age or there about - they simply have far less risk factors inherently.

[Brian]

??

 

United States 6.2

Cuba 5.8

 

 

what I linked just has a list of all the worlds infant mortality rates Cuba's is less than the USA's?

<sigh>

 

Not the link you provided, the link I provided -- the link in the message you responded to. It explains part of the reason why Cuba is listed higher than the US in infant mortality. As TaoMeow correctly noted, the practice in the US of expending enormous amounts of time and money on babies who probably won't make it is a problem but it also has a tremendous impact on our infant mortality statistics. Some nations, in contrast, don't even count babies who die on the day they are born, which hugely skews the statistics in the other direction. Comparing those numbers, then, is farcical.

 

As Twain said, there's lies, damn lies, and statistics.

[blackstar212]

<sigh>

 

Not the link you provided, the link I provided -- the link in the message you responded to. It explains part of the reason why Cuba is listed higher than the US in infant mortality. As TaoMeow correctly noted, the practice in the US of expending enormous amounts of time and money on babies who probably won't make it is a problem but it also has a tremendous impact on our infant mortality statistics. Some nations, in contrast, don't even count babies who die on the day they are born, which hugely skews the statistics in the other direction. Comparing those numbers, then, is farcical.

 

As Twain said, there's lies, damn lies, and statistics.

That article is from 2002???

 

I will fact check it.

[Brian]

That article is from 2002???

 

I will fact check it.

Knock yourself out.

 

It was the first link I found in a thirty-second search for a known phenomenon. I'm sure you can find other, more recent examples if you really look.

Edited February 16, 2017 by Brian

[Brian]

No, Obamacare Has Not Saved Lives