Woot!
Breaking News
Oprah Quitting TV Show In 2011
Donna Edwards Is MY Congresswoman
August 7th, 2009
41 Comments
Oliver Willis
Like Kryptonite To Stupid
-
-
Breaking News
- Mall Cops: Mall Of America Series Coming To TLC
- 2009 WWE Survivor Series Results
- Video: Jennifer Lopez Falls On Stage At 2009 American Music Awards
- Dashawn Vasconcellos: NYPD Shot Teen 11 Times
- Disney Adapting High School Musical For China
- Katie Price Quits I’m A Celebrity
- Patrizia D’Addario Claims Silvio Berlusconi Had Feet Massaged By Lesbians In Orgy
- Eric Wood Leg Break Video
- Bulls Run Wild On Set Of Tom Cruise/Cameron Diaz Movie
- Will Smith Dead Rumor Circulates
Live News
Legislating by anecdote: what can go wrong?
When a small business owner writes in saying they’ll have to lay off half their staff in order to afford the new taxes, is their story no less meaningfull?
Small business faces no additional taxes under health care reform.
Hey — SaveFarris, when Joe the Plumber writes in with that kind of sob story will you believe him? It costs money to make money and the bullshit-bourgeoisie and the wealthy business class has had a free ride since the days of Ronald Reagan. It’s time for them to ante up their fair share. Sad that we’ll be unable to recover the twenty five years worth of their tax avoidance that helped to dig us into such a deep hole.
I guess I’ll have to tell my friend to start cutting salaries to get under that $400K limit. THAT’LL help the economy!
Wait. Why aren’t there any teabaggers shouting “Tyranny! Tyranny!” at her? I guess the union thugs scared them off, eh?
Oh goody! Sarah Palin is looking for the real killers:
Obama’s death panel? I hadn’t heard that one yet.
Dude, my company already pays $3500 to match my contribution every year. The government could put everyone on a public plan, eliminate the huge mark up the insurance agencies take, negotiate a better price for coverage, and do the job just as well. Businesses save money from a plan like this, since they don’t have to match contributions anymore. I save money, because they aren’t taking out a few hundred dollars from my checks every month. And if I have to leave my job to, say, care for my disabled wife, or a general layoff or whatever, I’m still covered.
It’s not even about small government or scary socialism, or whatever anymore. It amounts to that being a better deal for me. And it’s a much better deal for a lot of people who aren’t insured, who don’t have a job right now, and insurance companies won’t cover because of pre-existing conditions.
“Donna got her marching orders from the Bilderberg Group to send us to death camps. My new film will show you how paying 4 figures a month for health insurance is good for you”-Alex Jones
“I guess I’ll have to tell my friend to start cutting salaries to get under that $400K limit. THAT’LL help the economy!”
Or, he could provide medical insurance. See, that is a penalty against companies that don’t provide any insurance. At all.
So, your friend has how many people working for him without health coverage? Maybe he’s got a lot of temp workers on staff, maybe some perm employees at low wages. Or a lot of low paid workers, like a fast food franchise or something.
I guess I’ll have to tell my friend to start cutting salaries
Wait, let me guess…this is the same old ubiquitous, non-existent “friend” everybody knows, whose slot in college got taken by some unqualified minority.
Come on, people. LOL!
This has all been about killing Trig Palin. All of it.
There never was any plan to reform health care.
It was all just about the liberals killing Trig Palin, because they’re all Nazi eugenicists and they have oppressed poor Sarah Palin her whole life.
You all stand exposed now.
And unfortunately, Michele Bachmann is mine. What’s the opposite of woot?
Exposed? Damn it… Now I have to put my pants back on.
Awesome. My late mother was named Donna too. She died of MS, but luckily we lived in Canada at the time so she didn’t spend her last days thinking about hospital bills. Jeez that’s depressing. Poor little girl.
No one knows what it will cost, if we want to use medicare as a model multiply the CBO estimates by 891%.
891%?
OK, I bit. I can’t find this number you’re referring to. Where did you pull this number?
“The cost of Medicare is a good place to begin. At its start, in 1966, Medicare cost $3 billion. The House Ways and Means Committee estimated that Medicare would cost only about $ 12 billion by 1990 (a figure that included an allowance for inflation). This was a supposedly “conservative” estimate. But in 1990 Medicare actually cost $107 billion.”
http://www.reason.com/news/show/29339.html
OK… I have to call BS now. Just a little though, nothing personal. The initial number was based on a number of assumptions that weren’t anticipated at the time. Which would be true of private insurers as well. How exactly have they fared? That is, how fast have insurance rates risen since 1966?
Hey Quaker,
You asked me to show my cards in a previous thread. Any comment? You seemed to disappear after I showed you a royal flush. Cat got your tongue?
And unfortunately, Michele Bachmann is mine. What’s the opposite of woot?
toow?
abanterer,
I can agree on the assumptions, I could even forgive 20 – 30% because of unforseen circumstances but almost 900%? That is just downright incompetence.
Imagine if you bought a house for 150,000 and when it was finished being built you got a bill for 1,000,000.
To me I just think Government run is a bad idea. Right now when insurers are exploiting patients we look to the government for protection, who will protect us when the government runs healthcare?
All politics aside, it a power no government should have over a free people. There are far better ways to provide healthcare to those who can’t afford it, and even better ways to drive down costs.
See, I still have quibbles here, S. I know that the program probably expanded as time went on; those assumptions were also based on the then current plan, and not the one we ended with. To use your house analogy, if I initially started with a basic 600 sq foot plan, and added onto it during construction to many times that, with an extra floor and a tennis court, then I shouldn’t balk at that cost.
And, we also don’t know how that fares against private insurers. I can’t exactly find those numbers, but I’m guessing they didn’t go up a few percentage points in 30 years.
We have much different philosophies on this, I’m afraid. The private insurers have had considerable time to attend to the criticisms leveled against them, and they have gotten worse. Granted, a government can become exploitative as well, but that is an issue of the public taking an interest in increased transparency and participation. Private sectors are rarely so benign to public interaction, though there are exceptions.
‘I guess I’ll have to tell my friend to start cutting salaries to get under that $400K limit. THAT’LL help the economy!’
Your friends’ business is grossing more than 4 hundred grand a year, and you think he’s suffering?
WTF?
‘And unfortunately, Michele Bachmann is mine. What’s the opposite of woot?’
Having Michelle Bachmann as your Rep. IS the opposite of woot.
My condolences brother.
‘“The cost of Medicare is a good place to begin. At its start, in 1966, Medicare cost $3 billion.’
In the mid-Sixties a gallon of gas was 30 cents and the average US income was $2,800.
If you’re so worried about costs, why isn’t the Iraq war being covered by Iraqi oil, as promised?
who will protect us when the government runs healthcare?
If only there were some way of influencing the government or in some way choosing who might make decisions about how a public plans works… You’re right, we should probably make sure there is some system in place whereby the public could in some way sway the decisions of government on this matter.
If I were a Republican trying to scare Democrats away from government authority over health care, couldn’t I just warn them “Hey, watch out, because someday us crazy incompetent Republicans may be back in charge of the government, and then you’ll regret putting health care in our hands! MWAH HA HA HA HAAAAAAA!!!”
abanterer, well done on the house analogy.
Im not saying do nothing, and I dont think anyone is. I think government can legislate change without carrying the burden of insuring 300 million people. I think this plan would be alot smarter with alot less financial liability.
1. Put a reasonable cap on malpractice suits.
2. Put a reasonable cap on needed medication like antibiotics and pain killers. If they want to charge $50 a pill for cialis and viagra I dont really care as long as the patient is on the hook for those recreational drugs.
3. Put a reasonable cap on hospital and doctors fees, no more charging a patient $20 for a pair of $2 socks or 10,000 for a CAT scan.
4. Give doctors and pharmacies tax deductions for treating the uninsured.
That is just a start from what I can think of, I am sure someone who is in the medical feild can make a much better list than that. The goverment can force change, with a minimal investment on manpower and a minimal burden on the economy.
jrfunkenstein,
So it is my fault for Congress’s poor numbers? You did read the part that read adjusted for inflation, right?
Why isn’t it being paid by thier oil? I would love to hear the answer to that question, and I am sure the families of Soldiers who have and are currently serving over there would also love to hear the answer. It is the least that Iraq could do for their sacrifice, as well as the U.S taxpayers.
I don’t see how some of the suggestions could hurt, but I doubt that it’d be enough. And it doesn’t address some of the concerns I had listed. And I really have an issue with malpractice caps, or tort reform in general.
abanterer,
I can agree with you on the costs and coverage, I am staring at thousands in medical bills because of an accident my daughter was in.
I think that we should start small, kind of like the constitution. Come up with a solution that tackles the big issues, while still keeping it simple. Give it time to see what works and what does not and then come back and make changes. We need something the majority of the public wants. I would be happy with a bill that 65 – 75% of the public supported.
That is one of the things that really pisses me off about Washington, look at the original constitution and ammendments. They were pretty simple and while I understand we live in more complicated times a 65,000 page tax code is just absurd; and so is 1,000+ page legislation, just because they want the average person totally confused or they want to hide funding to something unrelated.
The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama’s “death panel”
You know, fallacies aside, this statement would be alot more meaningful if Sarah Palin actually loved her children.
You asked me to show my cards in a previous thread. Any comment? You seemed to disappear after I showed you a royal flush.
Too bad you were playing blackjack.
All politics aside, it a power no government should have over a free people. There are far better ways to provide healthcare to those who can’t afford it, and even better ways to drive down costs.
Of course when asked about these magical remedies, you guys run with your tail between your legs.
“1. Put a reasonable cap on malpractice suits.”
As was pointed out somewhere, the reason for some of these gargantuan suits (which are actually quite rare) is because the victims are unable to work and purchase insurance. So insure everyone and the “damages” diminish automatically.
“2. Put a reasonable cap on needed medication like antibiotics and pain killers. If they want to charge $50 a pill for cialis and viagra I dont really care as long as the patient is on the hook for those recreational drugs.”
Well, maybe but many anti-biotics are reasonably priced as it is. Doesn’t your pharmacy give them away? Mine does.
“3. Put a reasonable cap on hospital and doctors fees, no more charging a patient $20 for a pair of $2 socks or 10,000 for a CAT scan.”
A lot of this is because of non-payers- the inflated costs are to subsidize the people who won’t or can’t pay the bill. Anyway, insurance companies get a better (though high) rate. Take away the non-payers and all of a sudden the hospital rates will come down. The published rates for hospitals are kind of like rack rate in a hotel- no one pays those rates except the people with the least options.
“4. Give doctors and pharmacies tax deductions for treating the uninsured.”
You may want to do a little more research. There already are tax deductions. Very few doctors practices I know pay any tax because of the work they do for the uninsured. It actually can be quite profitable because IIRC they can write off the “rack-rate” for their care.
Example: Jim doesn’t have insurance, so he goes to the local practitioner, who agrees to treat him for free. An office visit at this doctor is $100. The doctor writes off $100, which saves him about $35-40 in state and local corporate taxes. Meanwhile Joe, who has insurance, goes to the same doctor. His insurance company pays only $28 for the office visit plus makes the doctor wait 3 months for payment. Also, the doctor’s staff spends time filling out forms (in triplicate) in hope to get paid.
What I could find on how (as Rachel Maddow suggested last night) “end of life” or “advanced care” or “living will” consultation wording was introduced into health care reform legislation discussion by Republican Georgia Senator Johnny Isakson:
Isakson in part was apparently inspired to get involved on these issues thanks to the thorny questions raised by the ‘debate’ around Terry Schiavo.
AAAAAAACK!!!! DEATH PANEL!!!! DON’T KILL TRIG PALIN!!! ARGLE BARGLE BUREACRAT BLOGGLE KILL GRAMMAW!!!!!!
Obama’s death panel? I hadn’t heard that one yet.
Seriously? Which one has Down’s Syndrome again? She just upped the stoopid.
Dr. Zauis explains it all.
Maybe he’s got a lot of temp workers on staff, maybe some perm employees at low wages. Or a lot of low paid workers, like a fast food franchise or something.
Of course not, silly. They’re all undocumented Messicans.
No one knows what it will cost, if we want to use medicare as a model multiply the CBO estimates by 891%.
great. Now add back in the $400 billion a year in administrative costs, executive salaries and bonuses that WON’T be paid to private insurers.
That alone would cover most of it.
But in 1990 Medicare actually cost $107 billion.”
Of course, that would have nothing at all to do with a majority of the Baby Boom generation getting older and sicker and availing themselves of Medicaid and Medicare. That number can ONLY go up over 800% every twenty years. Population density has Absolutely nothing at all to do with anythingOMG LOOK OVER THERE!!!! IS THAT A RAPTOR?!
And yet Medicare is one of the most efficient uses of tax money around.
“Of course not, silly. They’re all undocumented Messicans.”
I didn’t want to speculate that specifically. I’m sure that his small business owning friend is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being he has ever known. A fine American and a great patriot.
You asked me to show my cards in a previous thread. Any comment? You seemed to disappear after I showed you a royal flush. Cat got your tongue?
Sorry, Willie. I didn’t disappear after you came back–I disappeared before then. I got tired of waiting around for you.
Can somebody help me puzzle out what Willie thinks he’s found here? This is supposed to represent…what was it again?
http://www.zerohedge.com/sites/default/files/images/July%20-%20August%20Combined.jpg
‘It is the least that Iraq could do for their sacrifice, as well as the U.S taxpayers.’
So fucking typical; Iraqis didn’t ask for their sacrifice, nor do they want it.
When you can wrap your brain around the idea of an occupying army not securing the love or respect of the people whose country they have invaded, whose brothers and sisters they have killed, and whose lives they have destroyed for the sake of their one lucrative resource, maybe you’ll have your answer. Particularly when you factor in the ever so irrelevant fact that IRAQ DID NOT ATTACK THE UNITED STATES.
I suppose you want them to pay for your kid to go to college too?