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

To: i-node who wrote (7430)	7/8/2009 4:53:52 PM
From: TimF	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 42652

I think you make a good point - for $100,000 hospital stays. OTOH there are many reasonably expensive (in every day terms), items that cost a lot less than $100k, and that people could pay for out of pocket with catastrophic insurance to cover things like that hospital stay that would cause great pain to most and bankrupt many. Or even if people want some insulation and not just pure insurance, having an open market (less cost increasing regulation, open-interstate insurance market), and getting employers mostly out of the business of providing/subsidizing insurance can be beneficial. If you don't get it through your employer you don't lose it with your job. Also the subsidies involved put upward pressure on costs. (The problem here is that the higher the cost the more demand their is for subsidies, and you get a vicious circle.)

To: i-node who wrote (7430)	7/8/2009 7:45:16 PM
From: Lane3	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 42652

Only that there is no evidence there would be SIGNIFICANT savings There isn't any evidence because we haven't tried it so there's no place to get evidence. There are too few people buying their own insurance to have an impact on the market so that isn't evidence that it wouldn't work. There aren't enough people to make an effective demonstration project. Plus we have state laws now that limit what insurance companies can offer. I think in lieu of evidence we have logic and logic says that if insurance worked as a competitive market that prices would rationalize. But I can't prove it.