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Politics : A US National Health Care System? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Road Walker who wrote (2501)	10/29/2007 8:57:01 PM
From: TimF	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 42652

The point I was replying to was a claim that insurance companies should "insure" everyone. Other than the semantic point that paying for health care for someone who already has a problem isn't insurance, there is the substantive point that he's asking them to just hand over money. The idea that companies should have to hand over money to anyone who happens to be unfortunate is ludicrous. As opposed as I am to nationalizing health care insurance, it would be a better idea than forcing private companies to operate at a loss. Its not just the currently uninsured that would get "coverage" right before they need treatment. Everyone with insurance would drop it and then apply once a "pre-existing condition" develops, since insurance must be offered "regardless of their medical condition, and NOT at an exorbitant price." Not having insurance doesn't mean not having physical health. Of course having greater ability to pay for medical care does have a connection to you future physical health but the two things are not identical or always and automatically intertwined. But health care is a massive expense, and one that often grows as a percentage of the economy as wealth and technology grows. Health care, like every other scarce good has to be rationed (at least if you consider rationing by price to be a form of rationing). If you give it away or make it very cheap than you have too much demand compared to supply. Instead of rationing by price you might ration by waiting lists, but whatever method you use there isn't an endless pile of health care services to "compassionately" distribute.