Aug 20, 2009 11:38
I can't profess to know much of anything about the health care bill that's become so controversial. Eventually I'll do my homework on it and know enough to argue for or against it. One thing I know about it is that there are no "death panels" in it despite what the female version of Dan Quayle says.
I also can't profess to know much about how insurance works, so feel free to correct me if I'm wrong on this.
If I'm not mistaken, the way a health insurance plan (like any other insurance plan) works. A bunch of people pay money into it regularly, and then it is disbursed by the insurance company when they get a legitimate claim. So 10 people pay $10 in one month to the company. That leaves $100 in the plan for everyone that month. Out of those 10 people, one of them needs a check-up that costs $50. So that leaves $50 profit for the insurance company that month. Essentially, a bunch of people pay a bunch of money into it, but very little ever need it at any one time.
But in a single-payer, socialized health program, every single person who pays taxes would pay into the system regularly, and then everyone would indiscriminately get to see a doctor.
Now correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the latter essentially the same as the former, but just applied on a bigger scale and without a profit motive?
We already have to subsidize hospitals in this country with tax dollars, and we spend more than any other country in the western world per person. The prescription medication (and over-the-counter) is a ridiculously profitable industry. It's not just the higher mark-up, but I think our culture thrives on ideas of easy fixes and a lot of our health ideas revolve so much around that. It seems to me that a socialized program would be more centered on prevention and less medication. And we wouldn't be able to turn people away because they need something as simple as insulin shots for diabetes.
I don't know if a government-run program is necessarily the answer, but we're not going to get anywhere with saying the other side is wrong all of the time. Most polls show a high majority of Americans agreeing that health care needs to be reformed, but we need to find a compromise on how to do it.