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

To: Webster Groves who wrote (22187)	8/24/2011 9:54:28 PM
From: Brumar89	1 Recommendation Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 42652

No one can deny that a nation's health care system isn't to blame for traffic accidents and acts of violence. But even if you ignore that, life expectancy for Americans of various demographic backgrounds compare favorably to foreigners of similar backgrounds elsewhere. I believe that opposition to a single payer health care system in the US is a political position based on ideology and has little to do with economics. No point in further discussion, In your heart you know you are right - really, really right. My opposition to a single payer health system is also personal and practical ... I don't want to see worse health care for my family. Most Americans are in that situation. I agree there's no point in arguing as you know you have the right idealogical position regardless of what facts are presented.

To: Webster Groves who wrote (22187)	8/25/2011 8:35:41 AM
From: Lane3	1 Recommendation Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 42652

I believe that opposition to a single payer health care system in the US is a political position based on ideology and has little to do with economics. No point in further discussion, In your heart you know you are right - really, really right. So is opposition to a free-market system. There are true believers on both sides of this question. Yes, ideologues on both sides know that they are really, really right. And they twist the economics to fit their prejudices. Even if we were to look at this from a strictly economic perspective, we would have to decide if we cared more about the country's economics, the patients' economics, the taxpayers' economics, or those of the providers, and that's an ideological question, as well. And then there are the economics of the current stakeholders, which is not ideological but is political. I think there is no question that a free-market system would provide the best overall quality for the least money but we will never be able to achieve that politically and, even if we could, the transition would be too jarring. Too much water under the bridge. Too many invested stakeholders and too much ideology. So the question becomes what is the best among feasible options. Best I can tell, there is no satisfactory feasible option. I never took "new math" in school, so I don't understand adjusted rates. I just look at the real numbers. You have to compare apples with apples for the numbers to be useful. If you can't control variables, the bad numbers are worse than no numbers.

To: Webster Groves who wrote (22187)	8/27/2011 5:21:35 PM
From: TimF	Respond to of 42652

I never took "new math" in school, so I don't understand adjusted rates. I just look at the real numbers. First you have to establish that the numbers are accurate, are comparable (they measure the same thing in the same way) and are relevant and meaningful. If you try to say that the system of health care payment is significantly "better" in one country than in another, and you use statistics like life expectancy and infant mortality to support your claim, you only have solid support if you can either show that the difference in numbers from each country is almost completely due to the difference in health care payment systems, or you have to find all the other significant factors and adjust for them. The problem with such an effort is that it would seem that those stats are not primary determined by how health care payments are conducted, and that there are so many things that could effect the stats that it would hard to even identify all the important factors let alone accurately adjust for all of them.