Healthcare Sharing Networks - Have You Used One?
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I was wondering what weird communism they had up there in Canada.
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And free market capitalism only really doesn't work when government, etc get in the way. If the big dogs can use the government to paperwork to death the little companies, those little companies never stand a chance to grow based on the merits of their company and take on the big dogs.
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Technically you don't head any further towards communism or away from capitalism by nationalising healthcare as, by definition, it is a utility and cannot be related to capitalism. It's actually anti-capitalistic to attempt to do so as it is not a free market and treating it as such is actually a form of corruption, not capitalism in any way. Capitalism requires a free market or else it is a sham and a sham capitalism is actually the thing farthest from.
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@scottalanmiller said:
Technically you don't head any further towards communism or away from capitalism by nationalising healthcare as, by definition, it is a utility and cannot be related to capitalism. It's actually anti-capitalistic to attempt to do so as it is not a free market and treating it as such is actually a form of corruption, not capitalism in any way. Capitalism requires a free market or else it is a sham and a sham capitalism is actually the thing farthest from.
absolutely - our system is completely broke - as you said - it's sham capitalism.
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@Dashrender said:
@scottalanmiller said:
Isn't privatization the existing problem? There is no public oversight. Everyone can do anything that they want because healthcare is seen as a product to be marked up, rather than as a critical public utility.
we still argue on this point. Though I could be convinced to go the other side if it was heavily regulated like power companies - and should be completely non for profit. But our government has shown time and time again how it also can't be trusted to do the right thing.
I don't believe that that is true. The government is rarely given a chance to do something like this and when it is it is heavily curtailed. What you have to keep in mind is that the government has equal influence whether we privatize or nationalize or whatever. What changes is not the amount that the government is involved, but the number of others that are involved. You can't remove the government from the system, but you can reduce the corruption it hides behind and the problems introduced by other layers which both enables and exposes the government.
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@Dashrender said:
And free market capitalism only really doesn't work when government, etc get in the way. If the big dogs can use the government to paperwork to death the little companies, those little companies never stand a chance to grow based on the merits of their company and take on the big dogs.
Correct, government has to let it work. AND the government has to handle the things that are outside of capitalism. Something things just can never be that.... the legal system, for example, must always be part of the government.
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My insurance through work is much cheaper than that. That's $180/month for one person. I pay like $12/week for Medical, Dental and eye insurance as well as disability (short & long) and 4x annual Pay Life insurance. With medical I have I believe a $500 deductible. Medications have no deducible that has to be met and is usually less than $20 per medication co-pay.
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I'm not suggested that the US government is good or would handle it well, just that any potential for abuse is already there and isn't created by removing the other layers that are involved. We reduce the number of people with the ability or incentive to do things wrong.
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@scottalanmiller said:
I'm not suggested that the US government is good or would handle it well, just that any potential for abuse is already there and isn't created by removing the other layers that are involved. We reduce the number of people with the ability or incentive to do things wrong.
I don't think it could be worse than it is today, that's for sure. What I wonder - how many medical breakthroughs are happening outside the USA? Serious non biased question - I have no idea what the answer is.
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I don't either. That's one that is very tough as the facilities in the US often tout the US system as developing the breakthroughs used all over the world, but it has also kept us from others (Cuba has done some amazing cancer research, for example.) How much does the American system really encourage breakthroughs that would not happen otherwise? Also, how many breakthroughs does it squash - it is well known that the US has developed some rather common fake procedures (a knee surgery is a common one where there is evidence that the surgery isn't just a scam but bad for patients) and that the US pharmaceutical industry has completely destroyed tons of research, made lots of their own problems and made an entire industry that is dysfunctional as they work to sell drugs rather than the cure disease.
Very hard to say.
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There is another question.... how important is medical research compared to providing good healthcare? Like you, I just don't know. Is research really making a huge difference? Does it even offset the poor healthcare that is being provided to enable it?
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Do research and healthcare overlap a lot? I think they could be separate but co-dependant entities.
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@MattSpeller said:
Do research and healthcare overlap a lot? I think they could be separate but co-dependant entities.
Not so much overlap but are related. We are taught in the US that it is the money going into healthcare that fuels the research. Not that healthcare itself does the research.
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Or, what they are likely implying, is that the corrupt system in the US where doctors make lots of money by being resellers (drugs, parts, procedures, machines) fuels the research of those things by making the doctors sales people and the real money going to the drug makers or whatever.
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@scottalanmiller said:
I don't either. That's one that is very tough as the facilities in the US often tout the US system as developing the breakthroughs used all over the world, but it has also kept us from others (Cuba has done some amazing cancer research, for example.) How much does the American system really encourage breakthroughs that would not happen otherwise? Also, how many breakthroughs does it squash - it is well known that the US has developed some rather common fake procedures (a knee surgery is a common one where there is evidence that the surgery isn't just a scam but bad for patients) and that the US pharmaceutical industry has completely destroyed tons of research, made lots of their own problems and made an entire industry that is dysfunctional as they work to sell drugs rather than the cure disease.
Very hard to say.
Hard not to believe this too - it's tantamount to the NSA spying on it's own people - they only care about their own existence, not the betterment of society.
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Yeah, I have no proof that it isn't true, but it sure does not feel like it is very likely to be true in any way. What are the chances? The logistics of the system and the way that everything works does not, at all, make it feel like this would be the result of such a system. There is no incentive to lower the cost of healthcare - in fact there are huge incentives to increase it!
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@Minion-Queen Will your American Health insurance actually cover any of your expenses while you are over there?
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No it will not even if I did. I do not have insurance here at all in the states.
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@dafyre said:
@Minion-Queen Will your American Health insurance actually cover any of your expenses while you are over there?
HA!
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We are looking into ex-pat insurance. Looks like it is far better than insurance in the US.
