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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: neolib who wrote (215870)	2/1/2007 4:19:45 PM
From: geode00	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 281500

You seem to be unable to make a cogent argument out of your opinions: 1. You finally agree there is no free market in the US or anywhere in the world. 2. You say you can't understand why I just don't go out and start an insurance company that takes advantage of the huge markups, poor service and denial of care of existing insurance companies. I keep telling you that Medicare IS available to get rid of private insurance. It simply takes political will and nothing more. There is no need to reinvent the wheel when the wheel is there and only needs expanding and fixing where it is broken. --------------- Many of the advanced treatments we offer those who can afford it are not available elsewhere. What advanced treatments? You mean the $8K/month that family was paying for and on the backs of R&D and basic research done at taxpayers expense? You say this as if it were a given but it's not. Yes it's true if you're in Cleveland versus the Sudan but not if you're in other industrialized countries which is the apples to apples comparison. The US still ranks very poorly in terms of OUTCOMES. You keep saying things as if they were true but you don't support what are only your opinions with facts. Part of the problem with the healthcare system is that it is a for-profit enterprise that wants people to be chronically ill so that they will be chronically treated. That is not a 'healthcare' system, that is a 'for profit' business. This is a huge problem in the drug industry which had enough power and corruption to buy a congressman for $2m/year to push through the ridiculous Medicare bill. THAT is not a free market. THAT is corruption. Mandatory healthcare does not address the issues OF COST, inefficiency, price gouging, denial of care, poor outcomes. You finally admitted that there is no free market yet you expect this nonexistent free market to save the system. Health insurance premiums rose 96% under Bush. Who can afford that? As I said GM spends more on health care than it does on steel. Starbucks spends more than it does on coffee. You may whistle along blithely but it's a disaster that's looming especially as the generation of soda pop drinkers and fast food eaters slam into their 50s and 60s. That doesn't make any sense.

To: neolib who wrote (215870)	2/1/2007 4:31:29 PM
From: Sun Tzu	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

>> I have never claimed that there is anything like an ideal free market. But the US economy is not a bad approximation You think?! I guess the last creature to acknowledge water is the fish (more on this in my next post). I did a quick search and this is what I found for 2005: Federal Spending = $T2.6 State & Local Spending = $T1.7 Total Government Spending = $T4.3 Now choose a multiplier for the GDP [see en.wikipedia.org ] This is often belived to be between 5 and 10, but let's be generous and choose 2.5 (i.e half of typical minimum) Then the effect of government spending on GDP is 2.5*4.3 = $T10.75 Now let's compare that with the US GDP which was $T12.49. In other words, government spending indirectly accounts for at least 85% of the GDP!! That hardly looks like "free market" to me. Now since this was a just back of the envelope calculation, I know that I have missed something there, so everyone is welcome to do a detailed analysis. Off the top of my head, I can say I did not account for the transfer of payments from the federal government to state and local governments. So some portion was double counted. But then again, I was generous with the multiplier number. ST