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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: cnyndwllr who wrote (135079)	3/27/2010 2:44:50 PM
From: Lane3	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 543163

You could tailor that solution to fix the problem but why? I was not proposing that solution. I do not know why you thought I was. My objective in this entire line of discussion, once again, was simply to falsify the notion that the underlying problem is profit. That's all. I'd gotten sick of hearing that meme re this problem in particular and the health care system in general. Setting up a matrix for who, when, where, and to what extent something manifests or doesn't is a very basic problem-solving technique. If something occurs in men as well as in women, for example, then the underlying problem cannot be gender-related. Duh. For instance, the new laws restrict the rights of all insurance companies to take such actions There were old laws to that effect, too. The incident that precipitated this discussion was an example that occurred in a jurisdiction where it was already against the law but happened anyway. So passing a law restricting insurance companies from doing would be redundant and wouldn't correct the situation. The shortfall was enforcement, not lack of legislation. The profit versus non-profit discussion was relevant to the issue of driving down the cost of securing health care coverage. It was, indeed, very relevant to that. That is exactly what would be gained by getting rid of profit. It's cost right off the top. Assuming, that is, that by "discussion" you're referring the country's discussion about health care reform, not this colloquy you and I have been having. It has nothing to do with the latter. Those who wanted a public option or government supported insurance cooperatives wished to put pressure on the insurance companies to either lower their profits Re the public option, if that was the key objective, then that solution is over-engineered and way beyond the requirements. Using a cannon to kill a mosquito, to use your words. I suspect that the objective was something else and that the reduced cost due to eliminating profits was merely a line item on the advantage side of doing what folks wanted to do anyway. their opponents argued that the private insurance companies could not compete with a non-profit public option because the government program wouldn't remain self supporting and would be propped up with tax dollars. According to them that public subsidy would leave us all with government run and government funded health insurance and the private companies would go out of business. I was among those who insisted that it compete fairly without a public subsidy. My rationale wasn't even close to what you describe. You have it backwards, I think. The public option would not be able to compete with private companies, not the other way around, so it would end up being propped up with public monies when it fell behind. The reason I didn't oppose a public option if it could have been implemented with the caveat that it be forced to compete, was because I wanted to see them go head to head as a demonstration project. even that was a step too far in the eyes of those protecting the insurance companies under the banner of anti-socialism, free market efficiency and preserving freedom No, it was legitimate fear that the public option would not be forced to compete and thus made to appear to be more successful than it really was, thus allowing the country to be bamboozled re single-payer. I'm suspect that won't answer whatever question you actually have but it's the best I can do. I no longer have any clue what question you're answering but your comments were interesting so I responded. <g> oligopolistic markets aren't necessarily bad, the problem is that they have the potential to behave badly They do. Which is at least one reason why it boggles my mind why folks want to cede so much power and money to them. We're just begging the fat cats and the pols to be misbehaving co-oligarchic-dependents. But, of course, our insurance companies aren't subject to federal antitrust restrictions. One area where collaboration was possible. Fixing that had supporters on both sides.