Expertinent: Why Neither Candidate May Deliver on Universal Health Coverage

re: Expertinent: Why Neither Candidate May Deliver on Universal Health Coverage

marcharino — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 20:33:51 GMT

Certainly, employer-paid health insurance is the most lucrative and beneficial of all scenarios for the American worker. However, these types of jobs will vaporize in the next decade because of the imminent financial crisis, and self-employment is becoming the way of the present and future as major corporations downsize and sever more young and older employees.

However, someone has to pay the fees and expenses for healthcare because healthcare professionals work for high pay and salaries. However, self-employed people have figured out, and others don’t realize yet, that as an uninsured individual seeking health care on a cash basis , that there are mechanisms in place for negotiation of one’s health care at better prices and more value than the group rates. Paying for your care with cash can have its up side. Health insurance can be outrageously expensive, and even if one pays over $1000 per month for "coverage," many find out that insurance can renege on coverage for a multitude of reasons (preexisting condition, out of plan --limits of coverage, deductibles, etc.). Hence, I can’t help but wonder how much it would cost to just pay for one's office visits and procedures on a per Diem basis. I also must wonder how far over $12,000 would take one on a per Diem with an illness, especially for the young and relatively healthy.

Now, before you scream, "I don't have $10,000, I know that less than $10,000 would take many uninsured quite far, and except for the expectant mother or catastrophic or terminal illness, paying for one's medical care can have its financial benefits. I know many that don't spend anywhere near $10,000 per year on health insurance yet pay $1,000 per month on health insurance!

re: Expertinent: Why Neither Candidate May Deliver on Universal Health Coverage

congressive — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 06:12:25 GMT

Universal healthcare could have been provided EASILY with the $700 BILLION now being offered to Wall Street. If this nation HAD universal health coverage, almost a MILLION bankruptcies due to medical bills would have kept 56% of those who were homeowners IN THEIR HOMES, and kept their homes out of foreclosure, avoiding this entire mess.

Canada takes away our jobs in the auto industry because the industry doesn't have to provide health care coverage there, allowing them to be MUCH more competitive.

Why not us? Because we are short attention span idiots.

re: Expertinent: Why Neither Candidate May Deliver on Universal Health Coverage

Mark Scism — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 14:51:43 GMT

"Barack Obama and John McCain have put forth radical ... proposals."

I wonder whether "radical" is the right word to use here. According to the same article, McCain's plan will basically act as a catalyst to the status quo: MORE uninsured Americans, especially low-income earners. Obama's plan is also not "radical," it would just alter, slightly, the current arrangement that Americans have with health insurers, though at least more people would be covered.

As for the interviewer's comment that "in Massachusetts, costs have already gotten out of control," this frames government-initiated health care planning as wasteful and negative. Meanwhile, I have yet to read an article in this magazine (or any others) that wonders aloud whether perhaps military costs have gotten out of control in this country -- they account for roughly half of the federal budget and outdo the next 17 biggest spending countries.

I eagerly look forward to the day that Americans publicly debate the utility of newer fighter jets and foreign military bases as "radical ideas," while publicly provided universal health care becomes the budget item nobody in the press has the spine to bring into question.