Healthcare Crisis 101… How Will It All Shake Out?
ARGHHHHHH! Here we go again!
The Great American “Healthcare” Debate! Every talking head blathering “Healthcare” this and “Healthcare” that!
This debate is NOT about “Healthcare.” “Healthcare” is what you need when you are sick or hurt. Sure, “Healthcare” has gotten expensive, too expensive, but that is an entirely different problem than the one that has been consuming Washington, D.C. and the Media since the Democrats rammed ObamaCare down our throats.
The seemingly unending debate is not about “Healthcare.” It is about WHO PAYS FOR IT. What you are seeing in the Media is just another political shell game in which all the participants are talking about everything EXCEPT the actual problem.
It is infuriating to watch these idiots, even idiots we like who are supposed to be on “our” side, yammer on and on, struggling to pull the wool over our eyes. DO NOT BE MISLED. Please attend to Frank Bates and “Healthcare Crisis 101.”
Here is the real problem. There are a lot of people in this country who genuinely cannot afford ANY “Healthcare” of even the most basic kind AT ANY COST. Further, rising “Healthcare” costs have gotten so great that ordinary, thoughtful, responsible, productive, hard-working people of moderate means cannot afford what we call a major “Healthcare” issue.
Enter the Insurance Companies. Insurance Companies bet on “risk.” They make deals with their customers to bear the customers’ “risk” of incurring “Healthcare COSTS” in return for “premiums.”
They are betting that the total premiums collected from ALL their customers will exceed the total amount they have to pay out when their customers get sick or hurt and require “Healthcare.” The difference is “profit.” If an Insurance Company bets wrong, it goes OUT OF BUSINESS.
But don’t miss the point – in order to get Healthcare INSURANCE, someone still has to pay the premium. That is where the money comes from to pay “claims.”
Before ObamaCare, people got their Health Insurance through an Employer as an Employment Benefit (and the Employer paid the premium) or purchased it “privately” and paid the premium themselves (usually at a higher rate – less bargaining power).
But the people at the bottom, who couldn’t afford Healthcare at any cost (either because they were already on Welfare, or not working, or just not earning enough) COULDN’T AFFORD A HEALTHCARE INSURANCE PREMIUM, EITHER.
So, here is what happened. The Democrats and other Socialists wanted “Socialized Medicine” on the European Model, in which the Government runs the hospitals and doctors, and unelected bureaucrats decide who gets what treatment and when.
It is described as “FREE,” which sounds pretty good but really means that the “Haves” pay for the “Have-Nots.” That’s because the Government has NO MONEY OF ITS OWN and is “Universal,” supposedly meaning it is available to all but really meaning “universally crappy.”
This was “HillaryCare.” America shot it down in flames. ObamaCare was their fall-back position. It is the same exact idea, cloaked as “Universal Healthcare INSURANCE.”
They just stuck the Insurance Companies in the middle of an unfathomably complicated mess so it would look like “business as usual,” then taxed the hell out of the “Haves” to pay for the “Have-nots” and cover the Insurance Companies’ losses, which, predictably, were HUGE. America fell for it. All its promises were FALSE, and now the wheels are falling off America.
The Democrat Socialists are doubling down, and weak-kneed “moderate” Republicans are caving in. We need to get rid of “moderate” and “Establishment” Republicans because they are either closet socialists or are concerned only about getting reelected.
That means they are too stupid to serve in high office because the “Have-Nots,” who are the beneficiaries of ObamaCare and “Medicaid” and PAY ABSOLUTELY NOTHING, are not going to vote for them, anyway.
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Your description of what’s going on with this healthcare crap is sooo true!!! Thank u for explaining it so well!
I only earn $20K before taxes and YES I have health issues. I have only been able to get a part time job and have NO insurance through work. I have 2 garnishments on my paycheck: student loans and taxes. Without Obamacare I could not have insurance at all. I have worked all of my life and done my best to help others, and been taken advantage of to the point I have nothing except clothes and a few odds and ends. This IS NOT how I saw my life and I have busted my butt with NO help from others. Some of us do not have a choice but to have Obamacare in order to have our health issues even marginally dealt with. I am not married and have no kids to help me. I am 58 years old. If someone can come up with a way that honest, hard working people who HAVE put into the system for their whole life can have what they need I would be all in. For now Obamacare works for me.
I still believe that if congress had to have the same health insurance as the American people we would see an end to this problem, immediately!!! How can we the people make that happen. Let’s put us all on the same playing field and wee what happens then.
First I am 77 yrs old, Whats middle class any more
?. think fairly it would pobably include the hard working blue collar and most adm type people making incomes of 50k to 150k. I have kids in thire 40s, 50s that make money in this range and it blows my mind what Obama care has cost them with not only increased premiums of $1500 a month, but $6000+ deducts. No wonder the insurance companies are wringing their hands in profit, just how many people will ever make their deducts, not that many. To add insulte to injury then they have copays and coinsurance etc that kicks in. I think this use to be almost called catastrophic insurance. Plus the poor DRs have to submit rediculas charges to try to cover costs, largely due to our Govt endless stream of paperwork. And folks its not just Drs. all our small businesses that employ most Americans are inundated with paperwork, I guess to keep some govt agency employees paid. Guess where there insurance comes from (including our Congrssional folks). Its all a crock, think we all need to support term limits, eliminate super pacs (just how did the Supreme Court authorize these) and go back to basic America work ethics. Growing up I don’t remember not paying the Dr. when checking out. I also believe many Drs in those days were more humanitarian in setting up low charges for those not working and setting up their own payment plans. With exceptions I believe our current Drs. would be the same if given the chance. THE PHARMACUTICAL COMPANIES, THIER ADS (IF YOU WATCH MUCH EVENING TV YOU GET MAYBE 9 MINUTES OF CONTENT AND PROBABLY THAT MUCH OR MORE IN BIG PHARMA ADS-SOMETHINGS WRONG???) AND WELL PAID CONGRSSIONAL CRONIES WILL NEVER LET IT HAPPEN. Nothing new hear, just feel for my kids, grandkids and 90% of AMERICANS.
PS: WE ARE ALL IMIGRANTS OF SORT, BUT THERE IS A LEGAL WAY AND OUR SOCIALISTS, DEMOCRATS OR FEELING SORRYFORS JUST DON’T GET IT. YOU HAVE TO EARN AND PAY YOUR WAY.
I can’t correct my post, but I need to clarify that my husband is a senior (62 years old) and that our income has gone from nearly $100k a year to about $28k a year, not $2k.
I am neither Republican nor Democrat, but I have watched the healthcare debate for many years. I have always felt that they are failing to address the real problem, which is out of control healthcare costs. Americans pay many times more than people in other countries do. There are certain things that I do not think should be for profit, and that is healthcare. I am an accountant by trade, and this has been my experience with employers in the Nashville area. In 2001, my first job out of college, my employer in Brentwood provided insurance at a reduced rate for the employee only. When I asked for help getting family coverage, he offered to “loan” me the money. I declined, he seemed incredulous “but don’t you want insurance?” “Yes, but I don’t want to go into debt to do it.” In 2008, I was working for a family owned business in Hendersonville. This business did not offer insurance benefits to its employees at all, yet the owner had top of the line insurance for himself. I remember him fussing about Obsmacare. Fast forward almost 10 years. My husband, a Veteran, had a heart attack almost two years ago, and due to complications with his bypass surgery, he is now disabled. I lost my job due to disability discrimination, and luckily was able to at least negotiate a severance package. My COBRA payments were $1150, which I paid until March, when I had to decide between paying for health insurance or making my mortgage payment. Since my children, who are employed, would be losing their coverage, I looked at the coverage. It was a joke. My son would have had to pay $200/mo for insurance, just to get a credit of $150/mo at the end of the year, which he couldn’t afford. He is a senior but too young to qualify for Medicare by age, and has to wait another year before his disability qualifies him for Medicare. We have had to go without insurance until last month when my husband and I qualified for Medicaid. My two sons are still without insurance. My oldest son started a new job as a supervisor recently, so hopefully he’ll qualify for insurance soon. I have been out of work for 8 months, I have been looking for rmployment but continue to be turned down. I have been in my field for 20 years, yet am on the verge of losing everything I have worked so hard to gain. Try going from nearly $100k a year to $2k. Am I a “haves” or a “haves not”? It’s easy to dehumanize the issue, but l want to put this out here. Even my prepping has been put on hold because I am simply trying to survive, and I am terrified of what the future holds for me and my family.
Healthcare article is right on. The American people have been duped. The other thing is if people didn’t have health care before Obamacare and went to the hospital they were taken care of anyways. And most kids had healthcare through government programs. What it did was open the flood gates to all the illegals and now the people who don’t want to work think they are entitled to run to the hospital/emergency rooms for any little thing because after all it is “free”. I personally know people who do this. The average guy paying out of the nose for insurance can’t afford to go because of the very “HIGH” deductibles that we have now.
You’re absolutely right Frank, but the real question few people are asking is why does the government have to be involved with healthcare at all. Why not allow free market solutions guide private citizens to buy what they can afford. Like catastrophic plans!
JEFF YOU’RE EXACTLY RIGHT, IT IS RIDICULOUS FOR US TO PAY FOR ILLEGALS , ALL THE REFUGEES AND THE SLACKERS THAT TAKE ADVANTAGE OF GENEROUS AMERICANS. OBAMA HAS EVERYONE BELIEVING HEALTH CARE IS A RIGHT, IT IS A PRIVILEGE . AMEN. WAKE UP AMERICA. WE DID NOT HAVE HEALTH CARE WHEN I GREW UP., YOU PAID THE DOCTOR DIRECT. YOU HAVE TO WORK FOR IT.
An excellent analysis of what HAS happened, Frank. But what is needed is a realistic plan for how to “fix” such a broken system. I was disappointed that your “on point” commentary did not include a proposed solution.
The argument seems to boil down to the claim that the US “Cannot Afford Healthcare “any better than what Slovenia Has. The US is simply TOO POOR. Those who control the Wealth in the US simply do not have enough to pay for it. Even though the fact is that , now , FIVE individuals control as much Wealth as HALF the people in the Whole World. Does that make sense?!
Healthcare Crises 101, where the united States finds itself because of a lot of political bigotry makes me glad that fifty years ago I ended up living in Canada instead of the U.S. quite by accident. Up here we have socialized healthcare, which per person yearly costs, is less than one third of that in the U.S. and is mostly paid out of tax revenue. This means that regardless of income, everybody gets the same treatment and care regardless of their income, and that treatment is mostly comparable to that received in the U.S., and sometimes surpasses it in quality. In other words, a beggar off the streets gets the same care as a multi-millionaire. I am old, aged 76, and after a life-time of working, these last few years, I have ended up in hospital many times for the removal of cancerous outbreaks in various areas of my stomach. My income is just a little government pension, and there is no way that I could have afforded to pay American healthcare at this time. For me, Canada is the greatest country of the world because of the genuine care that it provides to anyone and everyone when they need it, even exceeding the U.K., where I was born.
If you attack Obamacare (Affordable Care Act) and not say anything about “free” medical insurance the Congress members get, you are then cherry picking and misleading the big picture. The big picture is that it is all about TAX on the “rich”. By the way, most of the congressmen are millionaires. Do they represent the constituent? How sad.
You hit the nail on the head, desrcibing who pays is the issue. All the complainers who claim they are being “denied” healthcare are really saying they don’t/can’t pay for it. I believe that everyone, no matter of how little means needs to pay something, even if it is a small some for every bit of healthcare service they receive.
It’s not the Governments responsibility to take care everyone I have no insurance and haven’t for years .If I go to the Dr. I pay, plain and simple if your are too sic to get well you die. Plain and simple. Our so called Government employees don’t have the courage to proclaim such a thought.
Govt employees pay for healthcare.
I shouldn’t post comments using my smart phone, the type is too small, in my earlier post I said our premiums for our family of three were $500,00 per month, I wish! our monthly premium was $5500,00, It wiped us out.
Let me tell you something. I am a white male ‘have-not,’ pushing 60 and I have been unemployed for five and a half years now. I can not get healthcare insurance or O’bummer care either. To get O’care which is just an insurance co. subsidy, you have to be employed and have an income that they can figure off of, to get your rate. No income, no healthcare, no O’care!
The only way to fix the health care industry is to get the guberment completely out of it. Their constant interference in trying to fix a problem they created in the first place only made things worse. Medicare was the first nail in the coffin. Now, O’care has completely destroyed the industry and the only fix the Repub’s could do, or should I say will probably do, is to put things back to pre-O’care. Nothing truly fixed or improved. Though I fully support Pres. Trump, I do not believe he can fix the healthcare problems, especially when having to deal with the Senate and Congress.
Do you people realize that, for what they spent on the O’care system, every single citizen in the US could have been issued a million dollar health care debit card, that could only be used for medical, dental and pharmaceutical and we would now be enjoying truly free health care. And without the guberments paperwork and stupid hoops that the Doctor’s got to jump thru. Also, except for the few bad Doctor’s and health care providers, you would actually enjoy better and cheaper healthcare. Doctor’s would no longer have to employ a team of insurance and paperwork filers just to collect their money and they wouldn’t have to overcharge for their services, just to get what they should from Medicare.
Congress needs to completely repeal the Affordable Care Act and allow 90% of Americans to obtain their insurance through employers or private purchase. The remainder will need government help until we pass HB 25, The Fair Tax Act, that will restore our economy and allow people to earn a middle class income. As people earn a fair wage, they will drop off welfare. Most people do not want to be on welfare, so our welfare rolls will decrease over time.
What do you mean by “awaiting moderation?” Just curious.
So, are you saying that if you are too poor to pay anything for your health care you should get no healthcare? Are you willing to accept the consequences of that kind of denial of health care needs? Health care is either a privilege or a right of every American. Take your choice and live with it. For me, I believe that America will be a far better place if everyone has a chance for decent health care (and a good public education). Every American should be paying for good healthcare and good education beginning with their first tax return. If this means universal (single payer) healthcare, so be it.
Already have a supply of Power Greens on hand thanks.
Totally on target. I am tired of GOP Representatives and Senators being self serving. They need to find new employment. BTW, they take their Congressional health insurance with them….and they are not paying. ObamaCare needs to repealed and replaced where everyone pays…not just the ‘Haves’. Time is now, for the ‘Have-nots’ to step up and pay their fair share —get a job and contribute.
FRANK,
You’re doing same thing everyone does. The bloody medical industry and the pharmaceutical companies own most of the government. and they are raping the world. Legislators get to office by kissing their collective asses and Pharma owns the FDA.
Insane high prices are paid by the insurance companies who then tick it to the public who vote for the government that controls it all, the big Pharma. When they want , not need, more money they just raise the costs some more and the wheel turns again…….Come on, get your ducks n a row, IT’S A GREAT BIG ROUND ROBIN EATING US INTO THE GRAVE. Money that should be going into something more meaningful to a family than the wealth of these fat cats.
I know. I am in a nursing home where I have been for two years. With little more than room, room and board, I am in debt OVER
$ 345,000. I get absurd bills everyday from the owners of the home here ( a big conglomerate in Maine) and the assorted hospitals that I have to go to occasionally for tests and just put them in a box.
I don’t know what is going to happen ?
Our DC hacks have had 6 years to work on this problem. They could invited scores of brilliant minds
into an ideation consortium to develop a workable outcome. Pure arrogance.
Frank you are so right about healthcare debate. I spoke just about these same words this afternoon!
Agree with your assessment on the health care debate. The problem is when the government starts a program its impossible to get tid of it. The takers raise holy hell.
Thank you Frank. This is the best, plain language explanation of the current discussion of Health Insurance ever written. The solution to rising premiums, diminished care, bureaucratic interference and other ailments of the so-called healthcare system in the US should be dissected and analyzed so succinctly!
Thanks for making sense of how health care medical treatment is paid. Is there a way I can help to get this message out to all people needing medical care?
You are absolutely right on the button.
Out health care premium for a family of three was $550.00 per month. It was a. Basic insurance policy nothing fancy. The reasoning for that being that my husband was self employed therefore there was no “pool ” of insured people to share the cost and risk in the insurers system. What about the other thousands of self employed people? Was my husband the only self employed person in America? HSrdly. The insurance companies don’t want to group people if they don’t have to. There’s much more money to. E made insuring people individually.
Our monthly cost was so high that it ended up wiping out our savings including our retirement funds. We had to sell ohr home.
My husband had a heart attack and died. I am now a widow with.a dependent child. We. barely make it through the month. We no longer have health coverage.
At one time my husband worked T an advertising company that had Blue shield as a client. The account people from the Blue Shield office came in one day quite giddy saying “we have to spend a lot of money on advertising because we made too much money. ” The health insurers want the people to think they are barely getting by. That is a myth. They hide their profits in many things including advertising which they then write off and pay less taxes. Yet it’s the people who suffer from this. Don’t blame the poor because they have no insurance . Put the blame where it belongs on greedy insurance companies.
It’s time to give our energies to the Convention of States movement. Just head on over to http://www.cosaction.com to find out why.
Leaning right i ok but leaning too far, losing your balance and falling overboard on the right can become very dangerous and even worse than the people your critical of on the left! It has happened in this world’s history before. Be cautious and careful when viewing things in this world as only two tone in black and white!
Like it or not! We are our brothers keepers.
Some of our brothers are strong. While some are weak.
If you have the time to put the weak down? Then, you also have the time to build them up!
One day, we’ll all stand before God.
Judging your own heart, are you absolutely sure God would be pleased about the things You are saying and doing?
It’s a waste and a shame, that you aren’t taking better advantage of this tool, to try to unite all Americans, and just to divide.
You very well described the problem, but what is the solution? The Repubs have to come up with something which will keep them in office for another 6 years or any change will be for moot. Makes the solution more difficult than it would be for a CEO of a company. just sayin”
I’m 62 yrs old. I started working on a farm putting up hay, silage and working tobacco when I was nine. I never quit working, though I did quit the farm at 16, until this year. I was taught if you don’t work you don’t eat. I’ve known a lot of people that are to sorry to work and I believe a little hunger might motivate them. As far back as I can remember the government has had a rule that you don’t feed animals because it will make them depend on it. Why do you suppose the government wants everybody dependent for food and healthcare? I’m tired of paying for it.
I am a registered Democrat, but trust me I did NOT VOTE FOR obummer or Hillary. I am forced to pay over $3oo a month for medicare & supplements. I was paying $250 a month (forced payroll deduction) when working full time. The govt. has stolen billions from medicare to pay for obummercare. When I grew up in a family of 8, we did not have medical insurance. If injured we went to ER. That meant a broken bone, or stitches. These people that are whining need to get a job and earn their health insurance. No freebies. Drain the swamp. Make America Great Again!!! Social Security is not an entitlement we paid into it all our working life. The only Russian collusion is when Hillary gave 20% of our uranium to Russia. Prosecute Loretta Lynch for the tarmac meeting with Bill, and not investigating the targeting of conservatives by the IRS. Eric Holder for fast and furious. Hillary for emails and Benghazi. Meuller has conflict of interest and has hired all democrat attorneys against Trump and bff to leaker Comey. We should all be allowed to have health savings accounts. Add what I pay every month, over $4ooo a yr..ridiculous!!!
Amen!
I’m moving to Costa Rica-it seems like all other industrialized countries and otherwise have figured this out. Keep your libertarian values. I’m out! (But you do have good products that I hope I never have to use.)
Very well said…and in a simple way that everyone can understand!
You should publicize the names of all the politicians of either party who are covering their ass instead of fixing the problem. Print all their names!
This is NOT a debate about health care, except as it involves a possible range of impacts, good, middling and bad.
It is a debate about health insurance, its key features like deductables, portability, catastrophics, and pprior existing condition coverages, as well as preservation of personal or family choice in coverage, and whether there is a single payer or multiple providers to choose from.
One group in this debate wants us all to believe this is about health coverage, and wants to avoid serious discussion and provision for realistic economics. The other group wants economics to be a key consideration, as well as preservation of choice and “reasonable” choices and visibility in the consequences of those shoices.
Consistently threatening catastrophe does not help the discussion and decision process at all, which everyone but those on a self-chosen righteous mission know.
Health Care: Not once have I seen where the vehicle to finance Health Care for every one is even mentioned. Do our leaders bypass this subject so we will accept “3.8% of capital gains for Obama Care” as a benchmark for getting into the pockets of those who played by the rules….Oren
Why do we need National health care to begin with? Why can’t people be responsible for their own lives, and health. There are laws now that do protect needy children. This health care thing, in my opinion, is a massive cover up for those to lazy to be responsible for their own health. As for equality with those that have health insurance, get a job that offers health care. If that means getting an education to help get that better education, do so. The government’s job is NOT to provide health care. That is the responsibility of each person. The government has no business being in health care.
“We need to get rid of “moderate” and “Establishment” Republicans”.
Don’t worry, this will happen in 2018. America will also get rid of the rest of the Republican Party, after having seen how self-serving it is, how against the good of the American people it is. Meanwhile, more of the “haves” will become “have-nots” as their share of the American pie gets diverted to the 1%-ers. Don’t worry, they can always get their healthcare at the Emergency Room, much the same as millions do in Africa and India.
So what would Jesus do exclamation point