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California's single-payer bill dies

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Re: California's single-payer bill dies

#61

Post by s1artibartfast »

mindslight wrote: post #60
s1artibartfast wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a big proponent for an at-cost public option medicare, and always disappointed that it is rarely taken seriously. That said, only a minority of Medicare funds come from payroll taxes. The biggest contribution is from other taxes. See page 7: https://files.kff.org/attachment/Issue-Brief-Facts-on-Medica... .

Taking page 7's 85% figure for high earners, the $578.30 Part B premium figure for high earners, the $77.90 Part D premium for high earners, and the $499 Part A premium for people who didn't pay in, creates a total monthly premium of $1271. This is for old people or disabled people who have many more chronic health problems. Surely this figure can be drastically reduced for younger people without chronic health probl…

Like I said, I'm a huge proponent of a an at cost Medicare option. I don't understand why this is a poison pill for so many people on the left especially. In my mind it is the way the government should operate: provide a non coercive option that helps people.

It can be easily separated from the economic redistributive function of government and stand alone. If at a later date, the Feds decide to Levy a tax to cover people that can't afford it, they always can. Seems like a perfect test case to see if the gov can compete with the private market on cost and satisfaction.

Re: California's single-payer bill dies

#62

Post by mindslight »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #61
mindslight wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Taking page 7's 85% figure for high earners, the $578.30 Part B premium figure for high earners, the $77.90 Part D premium for high earners, and the $499 Part A premium for people who didn't pay in, creates a total monthly premium of $1271. This is for old people or disabled people who have many more chronic health problems. Surely this figure can be drastically reduced for younger people without chronic health probl…

Like I said, I'm a huge proponent of a an at cost Medicare option. I don't understand why this is a poison pill for so many people on the left especially. In my mind it is the way the government should operate: provide a non coercive option that helps people. It can be easily separated from the economic redistributive function of government and stand alone. If at a later date, the Feds decide to Levy a tax to cover p…

I agree with where you're coming from.

I think there's a huge desire to solve everything in one fell swoop in some imagined perfect plan. I'll get similar pushback when talking about common sense market based reforms for the healthcare industry, completely orthogonal to who's paying. A predictable response is always "yeah, so when you fly through your windshield you can whip out your phone in the air and search for which hospital has the best rates", completely ignoring that most healthcare is non emergency and even in many emergency situations people still make decisions to avoid being financially screwed.

There's so much low hanging fruit of things that patently do not make sense and would be politically-neutral for people, yet fixing them would disempower some middleman and no new pockets would get filled, and so there is no political support.

Re: California's single-payer bill dies

#63

Post by actually_a_dog »

Axsuul wrote: post #52
actually_a_dog wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you ever stopped to consider for even one second that maybe capitalism is the problem? That maybe there should be an obligation? As I said in my other comment, you can't keep squeezing people for more and more and more and expect it to be sustainable. What good are fancy new drugs and treatments when nobody can afford them, even with insurance?

Would we still have these new drugs without capitalism? There still needs to be incentive and capitalism is the best model we have for that. It's the government that needs to implement policies however to make them more available for everyone. Humans can't be relied upon to develop novel solutions for the good of everyone -- there has to be something in it for them. That's just how they operate unfortunately. Long-te…

Where's the incentive if people can't afford them?

You're thinking too small if you think capitalism is the only system with incentives. You're locked into the idea that capitalism is the only possible economic system, and you can't see that there can be alternatives (a.k.a. "capitalist realism").

Why do you think it's reasonable that we could fix a problem created by capitalism by doing more capitalism?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalist_Realism

Re: California's single-payer bill dies

#64

Post by actually_a_dog »

colechristensen wrote: post #56
actually_a_dog wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not a sustainable phenomenon, though. Americans can't continue to pay an increasing portion of their income to healthcare while exporting the benefits to everyone else. That's simply absurd. It's all right here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/02/24/this-char... You can't keep squeezing people for more and more and expect to get anywhere in a sustainable fashion. This is the road to collapse. Wha…

All economics is cyclical, prices will rise until the pressure causes them to reverse the trend. Pretend any economic trend over a short period will continue forever and they’ll all be unsustainable.

I'm sorry, but a "cyclical trend" that lasts nearly the length of a human life is not a cyclical trend. What this is is the tendency for the rate of profit to fall coming home to roost. These are probably the last days of capitalism as we know it.

Re: California's single-payer bill dies

#65

Post by s1artibartfast »

mindslight wrote: post #62
s1artibartfast wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like I said, I'm a huge proponent of a an at cost Medicare option. I don't understand why this is a poison pill for so many people on the left especially. In my mind it is the way the government should operate: provide a non coercive option that helps people. It can be easily separated from the economic redistributive function of government and stand alone. If at a later date, the Feds decide to Levy a tax to cover p…

I agree with where you're coming from. I think there's a huge desire to solve everything in one fell swoop in some imagined perfect plan. I'll get similar pushback when talking about common sense market based reforms for the healthcare industry, completely orthogonal to who's paying. A predictable response is always "yeah, so when you fly through your windshield you can whip out your phone in the air and search for w…

yeah, I guess it could have to do with big flashy ideas that capture the imagination. More cynically, I guess there is a perverse incentive in that marginal improvements reduce the pressure for major reform.

My favorite simple reform that everyone hates: encourage the training of more doctors and nurses. Wages are a major driver of healthcare costs, and there are a number of constraints on the supply.

Another is to bar hospital price discrimination between different insurance providers and cash payers. The idea that hospitals milk some customers to subsidize others is absurd

Re: California's single-payer bill dies

#66

Post by actually_a_dog »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #47
actually_a_dog wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bizarrely, 90% of Americans only favor Medicare for All if it means not abolishing private insurance: https://thehill.com/hilltv/what-americas-thinking/428958-pol... Yet, 94% of Medicare recipients "report being very satisfied or satisfied with the quality of their medical care": https://www.kff.org/report-section/medicare-covered-older-ad... At the same time, 19 out of 22 studies in a systematic review concluded tha…

>Yet, 94% of Medicare recipients "report being very satisfied or satisfied with the quality of their medical care I think the part you are missing is that 83% of Medicare recipients have supplemental insurance to cover their medical needs. The recipients know specifically the scope of Medicare and what they would loose. https://www.kff.org/medicare/issue-brief/a-snapshot-of-sourc...

I don't see the relevance. There's no reason Medigap coverage couldn't either continue to exist, or be subsumed into Medicare under M4A.

Re: California's single-payer bill dies

#67

Post by s1artibartfast »

actually_a_dog wrote: post #66
s1artibartfast wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Yet, 94% of Medicare recipients "report being very satisfied or satisfied with the quality of their medical care I think the part you are missing is that 83% of Medicare recipients have supplemental insurance to cover their medical needs. The recipients know specifically the scope of Medicare and what they would loose. https://www.kff.org/medicare/issue-brief/a-snapshot-of-sourc...

I don't see the relevance. There's no reason Medigap coverage couldn't either continue to exist, or be subsumed into Medicare under M4A.

I offered a possible explanation to the question that puzzled you. That is the relevance.

The simple and plausible answer is that 94% of Medicare recipients report being very satisfied or satisfied with the quality of their "medical care" but most would not want to rely on medicare exclusively and have their private insurance abolished.

What is really bizarre is that 67% of Medicare-for-all supporters think they would be able to keep their current health insurance under Medicare-for-all!

Other related facts:

60% of Americans would oppose a national Medicare-for-all plan if it require most Americans to pay more in taxes

Roughly half of Americans would oppose medicare-for-all if told it will increase the taxes that you personally pay, but decrease your overall costs for health care

PDF: https://www.kff.org/slideshow/public-opinion-on-single-payer...

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