Zappykins said:
badgenome said:
richardhutnik said:
The narrative now being spun is that everything Obama is doing is an entitlement and welfare. He doesn't want people to work, but wants to tax those that do, and owners, to build of bunch of people who remain on the government dole, so they vote Democratic and stay in power. This is because this tax money enables these lazy and shiftless people to living high on the hog, not being required to use the health service in place that they are meant to use, called the emergency room. So everything Obama does, has to fit into this, including killing bin Laden.
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Or it's an entitlement program because insurance companies are being prohibited by law from doing what they're supposed to do: assess risk. When a 60-year-old diabetic smoker with half a lung is paying the same for an insurance policy as a healthy 20-year-old who has never touched a cigarette in his life, it's pretty clear who is paying for whom.
Of course, Republicans are totally on board with this part because they are a bunch of feckless shitheads.
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I think you have a point - which is why we pobably should do away with the health insurance companies completly. If the same money went to health care and related cost, as apposed to the current system where much goes to insurance companies' waste and stockholder's pockets. Even if it's less efficiant, we could give everyone better health care than they have now, and a $500 refund.
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Except you couldn't be further from the truth. Which is another reason the health insurance law was stupid.
Health insurance profit margins are actually very low.
I mean, to quote one of the most liberal economists out there.
"The health-care sector is absurdly profitable. According to this data at Yahoo Finance, the sector-wide profit margin is 21.5 percent. But the insurance industry is one of its least-profitable parts: Its profit margin is at 4.54 percent. Hospitals are also a bit strapped, with an average margin of 3.5 percent."
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2011/02/health-insurance_industry_stil.html
And 4.5% is actually a GOOD Year for profit margins. Usually it's 2-3% at best.
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_otfwl2zc6Qc/SoMLoWBKM4I/AAAAAAAAK4g/wKdZyg5LxQ0/s1600-h/profits.bmp
Healthcare cost is usuaully driven by the adoptation of new technology, of procedures done, and perscribing of drugs.
The only real way to cut healthcare costs is to ration these things... which Americans don't particularly want to do.
