30 minutes ago, DarthDude said:

Not only do I pay large amounts of tax money for the healthcare system

I am super curious what country this is now by the way, especially seeing how the vast majority of European countries work with private healthcare insurance and not through taxation.

3 hours ago, Daeglan said:

the difference is competition. In a government run thing there is none. In a private corporation there is nothing stopping someone else from providing the service. Also private corporations tend to suffer the consequences for bad behavior. Where as government entities do not.

There is some benefit to competition, but healthcare by the lowest bidder isn't something that those that really need care are going to want. You end up with deprofessionalizing tasks and assigning them to less qualified personnel along with stretching those personnel beyond safe limits. But hey, it's cheaper until the lawsuits come along...

23 minutes ago, HappyDaze said:

There is some benefit to competition, but healthcare by the lowest bidder isn't something that those that really need care are going to want. You end up with deprofessionalizing tasks and assigning them to less qualified personnel along with stretching those personnel beyond safe limits. But hey, it's cheaper until the lawsuits come along...

Are you happy with $8000 dollar tvs now going for $500? Would you like it if $10,000 medical procedures going for $1000? Because the methodology that got us to $8000 tvs for $500 is what we are advocating. I don't know why this is scary for people.

46 minutes ago, Daeglan said:

Are you happy with $8000 dollar tvs now going for $500? Would you like it if $10,000 medical procedures going for $1000? Because the methodology that got us to $8000 tvs for $500 is what we are advocating. I don't know why this is scary for people.

There is no price competition in the current US model, except for cosmetic surgery and laser eye surgery both of which behave as you describe ie lower costs vs past costs. There is also no insurance coverage for those procedures.

If you want an actual capitalist health system you need to get rid of all insurance coverage, all malpractice insurance, tort reform, and end student loans.

4 minutes ago, Eoen said:

There is no price competition in the current US model, except for cosmetic surgery and laser eye surgery both of which behave as you describe ie lower costs vs past costs. There is also no insurance coverage for those procedures.

If you want an actual capitalist health system you need to get rid of all insurance coverage, all malpractice insurance, tort reform, and end student loans.

you wouldnt necessarily need to get rid of insurance. but you do need to get rid of the monopolies they have in states. Open up insurance to operating in all 50 states and you end up with 30 insurance companies competing for business. Health insurance needs to operate like car and house insurance. you dont use insurance for your cars oil change.

Meanwhile medicine prices are causing bankruptcies for many regular folks in the USA.

2 hours ago, Daeglan said:

Are you happy with $8000 dollar tvs now going for $500? Would you like it if $10,000 medical procedures going for $1000? Because the methodology that got us to $8000 tvs for $500 is what we are advocating. I don't know why this is scary for people.

See, this here is you showing you do not have a clue how any of this works and how costs for, say, a CAT scan are set. In the US system, prices for medical services are completely unrelated to and exponentially higher than what that stuff actually costs.

4 hours ago, micheldebruyn said:

See, this here is you showing you do not have a clue how any of this works and how costs for, say, a CAT scan are set. In the US system, prices for medical services are completely unrelated to and exponentially higher than what that stuff actually costs.

And here you go making assumptions about me you have no clue about.

1. I know hospitals have a hidden list of what they charge for services. (Wouldnt fly if we were paying the bills.)

2. I know that list of charges is multiplied by 10 to start and insurance companies get a "discount that still has the service cost significantly more." Wouldn't fly if we were paying directly

3. If hospitals had to actually compete because you got rid of the certificate of need they couldnt do this. Government intervention designed to keep competing hospitals out.
4. if you had insurance companies actually having to compete for buisiness they wouldnt do this. They have government rules to prevent across state lines insurance. Kind of like how cable companies work.

5. If we only used insurance for catastrophic events so paid for most services out of pocket they couldnt do this.
6. If we used health savings accounts this would work better because people would price shop for services. Instead of doing the insurance network crap.
7. If we paid cash for most services doctors would need huge staffs to process insurance paperwork and so costs would be cheaper.
8. If we used cash we wouldnt have this whole coding industry creating a bunch of make work to try and get money out of insurance companies.

So basically my point about how using the same method we use for tvs to make things cheaper is actually correct. Because we currently have a bunch of BS used to obfuscate the costs so that you can make informed decisions like you do when you buy a tv and a bunch of people are inserted between you and your doctors increases costs with out increasing value. And a bunch of government regulations designed to limit competition. A lot of this wouldnt fly if we were directly involved in making cost choices.

It is almost like My mom was a Dr and and RN for 40 years and the whole time we talked about what was happening and how it was jacking up costs and decreasing efficiency. How things like government meddling in Emergency rooms drove a bunch of hospitals out of business and created the urgent care system. So how bout we get rid of a bunch of this BS driving up costs and take control of our own health care.

12 hours ago, Daeglan said:

Are you happy with $8000 dollar tvs now going for $500? Would you like it if $10,000 medical procedures going for $1000? Because the methodology that got us to $8000 tvs for $500 is what we are advocating. I don't know why this is scary for people.

Getting those procedures for greatly reduced costs comes with greatly increased risks. If the new TV fails on me because of shoddy manufacturing, it's no big deal as I can just get a replacement (or several) and still have a savings. If a procedure goes bad, then it may well have a permanent negative effect on my life (and through it, upon those that depend upon me) that may be worse than the initial problem.

1 hour ago, HappyDaze said:

Getting those procedures for greatly reduced costs comes with greatly increased risks. If the new TV fails on me because of shoddy manufacturing, it's no big deal as I can just get a replacement (or several) and still have a savings. If a procedure goes bad, then it may well have a permanent negative effect on my life (and through it, upon those that depend upon me) that may be worse than the initial problem.

It's almost like healthcare motivated by profit rather than the health of the patient isn't a good idea.

2 hours ago, HappyDaze said:

Getting those procedures for greatly reduced costs comes with greatly increased risks. If the new TV fails on me because of shoddy manufacturing, it's no big deal as I can just get a replacement (or several) and still have a savings. If a procedure goes bad, then it may well have a permanent negative effect on my life (and through it, upon those that depend upon me) that may be worse than the initial problem.

We dont have this proble with Lasik and cosmetic surgery. It is almlst likenyour fears dont really have a basis in reality.

1 hour ago, penpenpen said:

It's almost like healthcare motivated by profit rather than the health of the patient isn't a good idea.

It is not a problem with lasik and cosmetic surgery and that operates on the same methods as TVs...almpst like your fear is silly. Seeing as how health matters for profits.

Stop using elective procedures to support your point. (Though the fact that you do says to me you can't make it without going to them.)

Talk about non-elective and health care necessary for living.

10 minutes ago, StarkJunior said:

Stop using elective procedures to support your point. (Though the fact that you do says to me you can't make it without going to them.)

Talk about non-elective and health care necessary for living.

Ok how bout the surgical centers that dont take insurance and cost a quarter what normal hosptitals cost? They dont just do elective procedures.

I know we live in interesting times when I begin to agree with HappyDaze. It's not often, but good to know it can happen.

Not that the discussion about politics and economics isn’t fascinating, but isn’t that a subject for other kinds of forums

even if uhc existed in universe anyway, we mostly either play :

- option 1: criminals and fringe dwellers, who don’t want to explain where the blaster and shiv wounds come from

2- option 2: rebels who wouldn’t have access to empire hc

3- option 3: force sensitive who would avoid hc doctors « just gotta flag you to the empire, blood sample says you’re midichlorian high count people »

so, to sum up: people that don’t want official doctors

2 minutes ago, MB -Fr- said:

Not that the discussion about politics and economics isn’t fascinating, but isn’t that a subject for other kinds of forums

4 minutes ago, StarkJunior said:

One can hope

2 hours ago, Daeglan said:

We dont have this proble with Lasik and cosmetic surgery. It is almlst likenyour fears dont really have a basis in reality.

While it can be argued I need both lasik and plastic surgery, I make do without both, without it hurting my productivity or quality of life in a significant way. Why, it's like they're not actually healthcare at all, as I'm considered perfectly healthy without either.

20 minutes ago, penpenpen said:

While it can be argued I need both lasik and plastic surgery, I make do without both, without it hurting my productivity or quality of life in a significant way. Why, it's like they're not actually healthcare at all, as I'm considered perfectly healthy without either.

It is almost like you would rather pay through the nose needlessly for healthcare instead of having it be more abundant cheaper and better quality with the quality steadily improving. If it works for Lasik and cosmetic surgery and the surgery centers that use no insurance and are cheaper and are not just elective procedures. So yes my suggestions is already being tried and working. But people like you fight the idea needlessly out fear. Not sure why you fear cheaper healthcare but that seems to be what you do.

On 3/11/2020 at 5:12 PM, Daeglan said:

except Chavez didnt turn that around at all. He was able to hide what was going to happen for a time. But not very long.

He started with economic crises and oil companies that only paid 1% tax, I'm sure Exxonmobil deserved such a privilege and that their profits would trickle down to the workers, and got it to over 9% economic growth by 2005. The added money was spent on various social programs to improve the quality of life for the population, also some prestige projects and bragging rights like subsidizing heating oil for poor families in the US. So it did turn around, but the economy was still based on the petroleum sector and the Dutch Disease struck again. Together with some rather poor decisions made towards the end of his life when he had some rather aggressive cancer and a successor who has done a rather poor job of things.

3 minutes ago, Daeglan said:

It is almost like you would rather pay through the nose needlessly for healthcare instead of having it be more abundant cheaper and better quality with the quality steadily improving. If it works for Lasik and cosmetic surgery and the surgery centers that use no insurance and are cheaper and are not just elective procedures. So yes my suggestions is already being tried and working. But people like you fight the idea needlessly out fear. Not sure why you fear cheaper healthcare but that seems to be what you do.

Why, pray tell, do so many millions suffer day-to-day and die from otherwise affordable procedures basically everywhere else in the world?

3 minutes ago, StarkJunior said:

Why, pray tell, do so many millions suffer day-to-day and die from otherwise affordable procedures basically everywhere else in the world?

many reasons. doesnt mean we need to use government to solve it

18 minutes ago, Daeglan said:

many reasons. doesnt mean we need to use government to solve it

What are these many reasons? And where do the problems stem from? How do we ensure the millions of people have affordable health care? What happens when you can't give an answer because our system doesn't work?

17 minutes ago, Daeglan said:

many reasons. doesnt mean we need to use government to solve it

Well, the problem by using profit-motivated private sector solutions is that from a profit perspective, effective healthcare is simply bad business. If you practice good preventative health care for instance, you're robbing yourself of the opportunity for selling more expensive treatments down the line. The same thing with curing patients. That's just a bad business decision if you can treat them ad infinitum.