USA Health Care Delusion - Are you Afflicted?

originally posted by: DontTreadOnMe
a reply to: Aazadan

Who's gonna pay for it?
American middle class is already tax strapped, living from paycheck to paycheck, etc.

So then America must only be the greatest country in the world for the rich and the rich only, the middle class and the poor just scrape by, there's something very wrong with that picture.

I can sum up what is wrong with healthcare in this country pretty easily.

I needed a test done. I called to make the appointment and asked how much the test would cost. The woman on the phone said, "I don't know - what kind of insurance do you have?" I repeated that I just wanted to know how much the test cost. She maintained that she could not give me a price unless I told her what insurance I had. And that is the problem. There is no "cost" for that procedure, or any of a variety of others. The cost is however much they can get your insurance to pay.

I, and a few of my co-workers, decided to try something and it actually worked at least a little for all of us. Whenever we had to schedule something we would call and say we had no insurance and ask for the price. We were given a price. Then we called back with our insurance information and got a completely different price. We then had to call our insurance and find out how much of that would be covered. On many occasions it was cheaper to just say we had no insurance. We didn't get any closer to paying off our deductible but if we weren't expecting to anyway why not save a few bucks?

The second biggest problem is that many forms of insurance are not allowed to negotiate prices with providers. When a provider knows that you can bet your bottom dollar they will set the price as high as possible every time. And they do.

a reply to: Bluntone22

It was not a fools quest he did what he sought to do make a ton of money for insurance company stockholders and in that regard Obama care was a total success.the last 2 years that bigearred jackass was in office I was told that my current poo insurance was a cardiac type insurance and my company had to do away with it or pay a fine per employee enrolled then the next year the cheaper quality hmm insurance they replaced it with was also determined to be a cardiac plan and was going to have to be stopped all that was turned out to be away for us to be paying more out of pocket while insurers got by paying less for insurance at same cost. Obama should have been impeached and jailed for the fleecing he authorized insurance companies to get away with.

a reply to: Vroomfondel

That strategy only works when you're talking about small sums of money. Lets say you get in a car accident and you're hurt pretty bad. You need an ambulance and some life saving treatment on the way to the hospital. The closest hospital is 20 miles away from your wreck, and the ambulance is another 20 miles away. That's 40 miles of an ambulance at a typical cost of $25/mile, or $1000. Boarding the ambulance is another $1500. The cost of the treatment while taking your ride is another $2500. Just to get to the hospital, you've already spent $5000 and there's no shopping around in that situation, you may not even have been conscious to make the decision to be taken rather than die.

Once you get to the hospital, suppose you need surgery. That's another $10,000 minimum, plus $1500 a night in the hospital. Maybe you're there for a week before you're released. The bills are piling up, you're already looking at $30,000.

You cannot negotiate in that situation.

originally posted by: CornishCeltGuy
a reply to: Realtruth
It sounds awful, but you can't be having commie style tax funded healthcare like the rest of the world, that would be bad obviously...if people can't afford to pay for their treatment they should die instead of sponge money off the people who work.
Let them die, socialist healthcare is evil because it treats people free at the point of need. I wish we had a system like the US, I hate the National Health Service in the UK, commie bastards. Why should my taxes be used to treat other people, bastards.
[/sarc]

There are more people in the u.s. who will never care once second about their health or ever contribute one penny then the ones who do.

The gap between those who pay and those who use is too big.

It will only make the few who contribute, go have to contribute much more.

In the u.s. there are more people who use roads and bridges then there are those who pay taxes on their maintenance.

In NYC schools there is an average of five students in a classroom of 26 who have parents who contribute to school tax.

You people want to pay more for the losers of society?

a reply to: Bloodworth
500 million people in the EU benefit from tax funded healthcare, same as Canada, Australia, NZ, even Ghana and Cuba.
Your system is obviously broken when people go bankrupt for having cancer or whatever. Systems can be changed, but only if people want that change.
Right now on ATS though I see people who would rather let fellow humans die than have an organised tax funded system which helps everyone free at the point of need.
I think such an attitude is barbaric, inhumane, and frankly shocking...and so does the rest of the developed world.

originally posted by: Bloodworth

originally posted by: CornishCeltGuy
a reply to: Realtruth
It sounds awful, but you can't be having commie style tax funded healthcare like the rest of the world, that would be bad obviously...if people can't afford to pay for their treatment they should die instead of sponge money off the people who work.
Let them die, socialist healthcare is evil because it treats people free at the point of need. I wish we had a system like the US, I hate the National Health Service in the UK, commie bastards. Why should my taxes be used to treat other people, bastards.
[/sarc]

You people want to pay more for the losers of society?

...

a reply to: Dem0nc1eaner

Actually you could be right about paying less tax (although I haven't looked into the UK's tax brackets).
From what I can see the tax brackets in the US are the same as here in Australia. I just used a tax calculator (US) and put in my details from my last tax assessment, with out currency conversions. It appears someone on my income with pay the same amount of tax in the US as in Australia. I don't receive any government benefits so pay in more than I receive back, but do have access to universal health care. Have to wonder where US citizens taxes go.

originally posted by: hopenotfeariswhatweneed

originally posted by: DontTreadOnMe
a reply to: Aazadan

Who's gonna pay for it?
American middle class is already tax strapped, living from paycheck to paycheck, etc.

So then America must only be the greatest country in the world for the rich and the rich only, the middle class and the poor just scrape by, there's something very wrong with that picture.

Prior to the implementation of ACA it was far less so. At least then, it was only the poor barely scraping by. Now its the middle class, too.

Not that ACA is the cause of our woes. It was just a fast forward button.

originally posted by: CornishCeltGuy
a reply to: Bloodworth
500 million people in the EU benefit from tax funded healthcare, same as Canada, Australia, NZ, even Ghana and Cuba.
Your system is obviously broken when people go bankrupt for having cancer or whatever. Systems can be changed, but only if people want that change.
Right now on ATS though I see people who would rather let fellow humans die than have an organised tax funded system which helps everyone free at the point of need.
I think such an attitude is barbaric, inhumane, and frankly shocking...and so does the rest of the developed world.

There would be too few people who pay, then those who would use a tax based health care.

It would bankrupt the system , hurt the people who do work for those who do not.

There is a huge population in America who from day one will never care one second about their health.

And bleeding heart liberals want to help these people with other peoples money.

And they try in strange ways. Like a sugar tax, in hopes it will deter people and save them money in the future when they become 45 a need dialysis.

Its peoples gods given right to drink jolt, liberals dont need to pick up everyone's consequences.

That's insane

a reply to: Bloodworth

I've just done some quick calculations so these are just ball park figures.

Based on an annual income of £32,000 per annum a UK tax payer would pay £4030 p.a. tax and £2829 p.a. National Insurance.
That leaves approximately £25,141 net earnings.....and no Health Care payments unless desired.

In Australia someone earning the equivalent amount would pay £10,214 tax and £1150 other taxes leaving net earning of £26,021 per annum....and no more additional Health Care.

The equivalent in the results in £1748 in taxes and £3173 in other stoppages.
A whopping £28,204 yearly net earnings.
However, and here's the kicker....average US Health Care is a couple quid short of £10,000 per annum....leaving £18,204.

a reply to: Freeborn

To make that work we'd have to stop taxing the people in order to provide stuff like military aid to Europe and Israel.

That is the problem: the money we COULD use to better our nation is instead doled out for favors abroad.

a reply to: bigfatfurrytexan

I think Europe should pay its own way in the world.

Despite successive governments running our Armed Services down we in the UK still pay more on defence than all other NATO nations except the US.

I don't think there's much chance that Trump will start spending less on defence and military in order to divert that money into Universal Health Care, do you?

No matter which way you look at it the US taxpayer isn't getting much bang for its buck and on this at least is lagging behind the rest of the world.

originally posted by: Bloodworth

originally posted by: CornishCeltGuy
a reply to: Bloodworth
500 million people in the EU benefit from tax funded healthcare, same as Canada, Australia, NZ, even Ghana and Cuba.
Your system is obviously broken when people go bankrupt for having cancer or whatever. Systems can be changed, but only if people want that change.
Right now on ATS though I see people who would rather let fellow humans die than have an organised tax funded system which helps everyone free at the point of need.
I think such an attitude is barbaric, inhumane, and frankly shocking...and so does the rest of the developed world.

There would be too few people who pay, then those who would use a tax based health care.

It would bankrupt the system , hurt the people who do work for those who do not.

There is a huge population in America who from day one will never care one second about their health.

And bleeding heart liberals want to help these people with other peoples money.

And they try in strange ways. Like a sugar tax, in hopes it will deter people and save them money in the future when they become 45 a need dialysis.

Its peoples gods given right to drink jolt, liberals dont need to pick up everyone's consequences.

That's insane

What's insane is thinking that the EU model of tax funded healthcare could not work in the US. There are 500 million people there all enjoying what you don't and living decent lives.
The US is what 360 million people, so the numbers argument doesn't stack up.
It could be done by individual states as it is done in the EU.
You have zero argument to say it wouldn't work because it works for every developed nation in the world except the US.

The only reason I see on ATS is because you don't want to pay taxes for the benefit of fellow humans. It is shameful as far as the rest of the world sees it.

a reply to: Realtruth

The richest country on earth, and the hard-working middle class can still lose everything they have, and go into hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt, because of a mismanaged, chaotic, and corrupt medical system. Some hard-working people seem to be brainwashed, and can’t see any deeper than their political parties’ agenda, thus creating blinders of ignorance.

You are right. CornishCeltGuy had a thread about the UK's NHS, which I had initially criticized.

However, both of you made some convincing arguments and I actually have changed my mind on the matter quite a bit. Frankly, with the amount of money we pay in taxes there should not be any Americans starving or lacking basic healthcare. We need to invest some of these exorbitant taxes we pay back into our people

I want to see every American (substitute American with "person" if you are in a different country) do well and lead a happy life. We pay enough taxes it is about time our people start seeing some benefits instead of endless funding to ABC XYZ government agencies, grants and other assorted payouts that do little-to-nothing to help our people out.

So I'm on board with healthcare. Provided of course we can work something that isn't a debacle like the ACA, and it has to be voluntary...none of that "penalty" crap for choosing not to participate. But having it available for all Americans is a good thing. Party line be damned.

Party lines/narratives is what got us where we are in the first place.

There are many overlapping areas where the left and right actually closely agree on. I personally think we should focus on finding those common threads, and pursuing them as a unified nation and people.

a reply to: JBurns

Yet another star for Comrade Burns off Freeborn.

There is hope for the world yet my friend.

a reply to: bigfatfurrytexan

It seems your representatives should focus more on betterment of the American people...

Government. The source of all of our problems.

originally posted by: bigfatfurrytexan
a reply to: Freeborn

To make that work we'd have to stop taxing the people in order to provide stuff like military aid to Europe and Israel.

That is the problem: the money we COULD use to better our nation is instead doled out for favors abroad.

That money doesn't cost anything anyways, if we weren't paying for it, it would just be more welfare checks to sign. At least the military gets us some work and foreign policy benefits for those welfare dollars.

a reply to: CornishCeltGuy

something you will notice which is very common among American's. they couldn't care less about the world burning around them as long as those flames aren't burning their precious property

we have a broken cultural system which produces psychopaths and narcissist at alarming rates