What's new
By:
USCHO Fan Forum

This is a sample guest message. Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!

  • The USCHO Fan Forum has migrated to a new plaform, xenForo. Most of the function of the forum should work in familiar ways. Please note that you can switch between light and dark modes by clicking on the gear icon in the upper right of the main menu bar. We are hoping that this new platform will prove to be faster and more reliable. Please feel free to explore its features.

The PPACA Thread Part III - Let's have a healthy debate!

Status
Not open for further replies.
Re: The PPACA Thread Part III - Let's have a healthy debate!

FreshFish said:
Finally, it is based on a static picture: there is no financial incentive to reduce costs or to innovate improvements. While government might fund basic R&D, it still has not on its own developed a single piece of equipment nor manufactured a single drug or vaccine.
Click to expand...

And how is any of that related to insurance providers?
 
FreshFish said:
The idea that government can "do it for less" is a myth based on faulty data. They intentionally omit losses to fraud from their calculation of administrative costs. That is a basic accounting error.

They also omit the cost of capital from their calculation of administrative costs as well.

Finally, it is based on a static picture: there is no financial incentive to reduce costs or to innovate improvements. While government might fund basic R&D, it still has not on its own developed a single piece of equipment nor manufactured a single drug or vaccine.
Click to expand...

Penicillin was first mass produced in the USDA research lab in Peoria.
 
Re: The PPACA Thread Part III - Let's have a healthy debate!

FreshFish said:
The idea that government can "do it for less" is a myth based on faulty data. They intentionally omit losses to fraud from their calculation of administrative costs. That is a basic accounting error.

They also omit the cost of capital from their calculation of administrative costs as well.

Finally, it is based on a static picture: there is no financial incentive to reduce costs or to innovate improvements. While government might fund basic R&D, it still has not on its own developed a single piece of equipment nor manufactured a single drug or vaccine.
Click to expand...

I understand how people fell for this stuff in the 80s -- there was an enormous astro-turfing effort behind it and unless you had been reading crank econ fliers and attending culty far right conferences, it sounded new and refreshing. But how anybody can still not only swallow this stuff after thirty years of its exposure as merde in the marketplace of ideas, but actually vomit it back up again without an inkling that it is a dead thesis, is really kind of neat. The epistemic closure of the right is complete: there is no way for them to know they are wrong because all the dollars are behind telling them they are right.
 
Re: The PPACA Thread Part III - Let's have a healthy debate!

Kepler said:
Suckers.
Click to expand...

This was already discussed - those in Trump counties had the worst health and most needs for healthcare. Interesting thing is that Trump appears to be faar more populist than the team he's building. It appears that his agenda will be the irony of trying to help big business and yet the little guy...whereas his cabinet's will be the twin goals of ideology while destroying the status quo. Obamacare falls squarely in the middle of that.

BTW, we're approaching the deadline for new insurance for the year. Shopping via the exchanges has given me the cheapest insurance this year that I've ever had.
 
Re: The PPACA Thread Part III - Let's have a healthy debate!

FreshFish said:
The idea that government can "do it for less" is a myth based on faulty data. They intentionally omit losses to fraud from their calculation of administrative costs. That is a basic accounting error.

They also omit the cost of capital from their calculation of administrative costs as well.

Finally, it is based on a static picture: there is no financial incentive to reduce costs or to innovate improvements. While government might fund basic R&D, it still has not on its own developed a single piece of equipment nor manufactured a single drug or vaccine.
Click to expand...

I wish I were 20 again. I'd be gone.
 
Re: The PPACA Thread Part III - Let's have a healthy debate!

5mn_Major said:
Interesting thing is that Trump appears to be faar more populist than the team he's building.
Click to expand...

Reagan all over again. Populist hood ornament hiding a pure Plute engine. That combination is very common; the yokels seem to always fall for it.

F-ck em. They have eyes; they could have figured it out if they weren't so mentally lazy.
 
Re: The PPACA Thread Part III - Let's have a healthy debate!

The amount of misinformation out there about HSAs is jaw-dropping. I'm reading through a Slot article on Jezebel and neither they or the commenters understand how an HSA works.

Anyways, I'm not saying they would be a good option for the federal system unless the Feds kick in a good amount every year. Like social security for medicine. Nicely done republicans.
 
Re: The PPACA Thread Part III - Let's have a healthy debate!

If I could design health insurance policy, I would never have the major source of health insurance be employers. That we have such a goofy system in the first place is a result of market distortions dating back to WWII and the wage and price controls implemented to keep inflation in check: while wages were capped, fringe benefits were not, and so employers trying to recruit and retain top talent expanded benefit packages.

That is both the beauty and the bane of market forces. Market forces help self-correct for new innovations and unforeseen opportunities, and when there are market distortions (always starting with good intentions), there are always unintended consequences.

How wasteful is it on a macro level to have so many employers hiring staffs of people do to exactly the same thing: help employees shop the insurance market on their behalf. and how does that affect people who want to move from one job to another seamlessly? We can roll over our 401k into a self-directed IRA or into a new employer's plan, but we cannot roll over our health insurance from one company to another or into a self-directed health plan? that is goofy.

just about every other form of insurance I can think of, there is a direct relationship between the insured and the insurer; only with health insurance (okay, and group disability income insurance too) do we have to go through an intermediary. Even with employer-sponsored benefits, the employer facilitates the arrangement but we still have a direct contract with AFLAC, say, we are not covered under a contract between the employer and the insurer.



Of course, transitioning away from that model now would be complicated. That would be the best way though to bring rational pricing back to the marketplace, except for pre-existing conditions, which is a whole different situation for everyone.
 
Re: The PPACA Thread Part III - Let's have a healthy debate!

I'm not sure it would bring back rational pricing.

I'm also not sure what this is supposed to mean;

FreshFish said:
How wasteful is it on a macro level to have so many employers hiring staffs of people do to exactly the same thing: help employees shop the insurance market on their behalf.
Click to expand...

We have even more people doing the same thing for car and home insurance. Insurance brokers are an entire industry on their own.
 
Re: The PPACA Thread Part III - Let's have a healthy debate!

Sh-t like this is gonna happen a lot. The GOP either needs to stop having town halls or screen its "random citizens" better.

In a remarkable exchange, House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) was asked during CNN’s Thursday town hall to explain to a cancer patient who said the Affordable Care Act saved his life how congressional Republicans could move forward with repeal of the law without a replacement plan ready.

Jeff Jeans, a lifelong Republican who said he worked on the Reagan and George W. Bush campaigns, said he opposed the ACA until he received a surprise cancer diagnosis at 49. He was given six weeks to live.

“Thanks to the Affordable Care Act, I'm standing here today alive,” he said. “Being both a small business person and someone with pre-existing conditions, I rely on the Affordable Care Act to be able to purchase my own insurance. Why would you repeal the Affordable Care Act without a replacement?”
Click to expand...

ACA is an arrow: more damage being pulled out than going in.
 
Re: The PPACA Thread Part III - Let's have a healthy debate!

Kepler said:
Sh-t like this is gonna happen a lot. The GOP either needs to stop having town halls or screen its "random citizens" better.



ACA is an arrow: more damage being pulled out than going in.
Click to expand...

He also bombed on questions about Planned Parenthood and DOCA. I'm still confused why people voted to have ACA, Planned Parenthood, DOCA, Social Security, and Medicare/Medicaid destroyed but apparently some of our citizens and non-citizens still have questions about it.
 
Re: The PPACA Thread Part III - Let's have a healthy debate!

scoobydoo said:
he also bombed on questions about planned parenthood and doca. I'm still confused why people voted to have aca, planned parenthood, doca, social security, and medicare/medicaid destroyed but apparently some of our citizens and non-citizens still have questions about it.
Click to expand...

"doca"?
 
Re: The PPACA Thread Part III - Let's have a healthy debate!

This is my favorite quote from Trump:

In the interview, Mr. Trump provided no details about how his plan would work or what it would cost. He spoke in the same generalities that he used to describe his health care goals during the campaign — that it would be “great health care” that left people “beautifully covered.”
Click to expand...
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top