Obama-Care, dead?

[HarveyH42]

The problem has been building for a long time, there isn't a quick fix. There are many areas that need a lot of work, and should be addressed separately. They are trying to push to many changes, together. Too much of what some people want, and not enough what most people need. All the parts in that last draft, which was for buying votes... The ones who offered, and the ones who accepted, should face a judge. Well, pretty much all the democratic Senators, and of course our President for encouraging, participating in it. Didn't the Illinois governor get thrown out of office for selling Obama's seat? Kind of the same deal here, isn't it? The votes are to indicate agreement and approval, not profit and personal favors. We all know it goes on, and don't most of the usually get into trouble when caught?

Think they should just drop it for now, let the voters decide this fall, if we want the same people working on it again, maybe get some fresh ideas, with a new batch of legislators. Would strongly suggest voting for some new people this time, maybe we can shack things up a little. If they had a good idea, it would have been so tough to pass. The Democrats still have the majority, and the White House, should tell you it's pretty weak stuff. They need to pick a few main points to focus on, that will reduce doctor bills, and insurance rates (would seem to go hand in hand), since the insurance companies will need to pay out less. Maybe something where an insurance company can't drop your coverage, unless you don't pay your premiums, and have to keep you on if you are receiving treatment and unable to work (can't pay premiums, if you don't have an income).

Pre-existing conditions is a very difficult point. Insurance covers future needs, and only works if you pay in. Think this point should be dealt with separately. Seems more like a charity situation, since money isn't going into the deal, only going out.

 

[smanches]

Like the student loan industry. Was just reading this article.

Industry Lobbying Imperils Overhaul of Student Loans - NYTimes.com

 

[tcmtech]

Good lord! the student loan system. There is another department of the our government that cant find its butt with its own hands.

 

[Hero999]

I am not against working towards something to cover pre existing conditions. Being a good little capitalist I believe a business, any business is in business for one reason above all else and that is to make a profit. An insurance company taking on a client with a pre existing condition is just plain stupid from a business standpoint.
Ron

Don't get me wrong I'm all for capitalism, I'm no socialist, although some people might brand me as such.

The trouble is I don't think free markets work for everything and health insurance is one of those things that markets don't work. An insurance company wants to pay out as little as possible so they're only going to provide insurance to healthy people who need healthcare. The system needs to be changed so that care is given to those who need it rather on their ability to pay. I don't know what the solution is for the US, I'd like to see a government insurance programme set up but that would put many insurance companies out of business. I like the idea of better regulation of the insurance industry and a public insurance for those who can't afford it.

 

[shortbus=]

The Medicare/Medicaid system works, even though it's Government run. About 1% overhead and good coverage.

Private health insurance has over 30% overhead and limited coverage. If they even will take you as a subscriber.
The higher overhead comes from big shots pay/bonus, and bribing legislators. They don't care what it cost, just pass it on to the customer.

 

[HiTech]

I didn't know there were existing welfare programmes for healthcare?

It sounds like the government should just expand them.

Expand? Expand them they did... indeed! Look at this link that provides everything including pet food if someone is approved for it! There are too many abuses of the system and not enough close monitoring for it. At least the state doesn't pay for cigarettes!

**broken link removed**

 

[Mikebits]

One problem with medicare and medicaid is that for some people earning little over minimum wage they do not qualify as low income and therefore are excluded. Only alternatives are to spend most of the paycheck on insurance, do without medical care or quit their job. These are poor alternatives. The average Joe and Josephine are caught between a rock and a hard place. We should spend less resources going after pimps, prostitutes (At least they work), and pot smokers, and more on welfare, medicare, and insurance fraud. Those are the real criminals as they suck the system dry.

 

[Hero999]

It sounds like spending more on welfare will help to combat the social problems you've described above because women won't have to sell themselves and people won't have to deal drugs to get by if they don't have a proper job.

 

[Reloadron]

I don't see spending more on welfare as a solution to anything. The welfare (social services) system is already a big enough mess of fraud and waste. The idea should be to get people working and off the welfare rolls. Years ago we actually had creative thinking in the US and there was no welfare. People worked for their take and there was no free ride. Anyone in here ever been to Hoover Dam? Tell me how it was built. How about the parkway systems on LI NY, anyone ever driven on them and where did they come from? Has anyone ever heard of the WPA, TVA, or programs like them? That is what we need. The government needs to quit giving away what amounts to free money and get people working for their money. Programs like welfare and medicaid are a joke laced with fraud and corruption.

What really scares the hell out of me is looking at everything the US Government attempted to take over and manage. Cost went up, inept leadership was put in place and the cost was astounding. What happened when the government took over the rail roads? The best classic is if anyone ever heard of the Mustang Ranch. Google Mustang Ranch and see how the US Government managed to literally screw up a whore house. Now that is classic. How do you go broke running a whore house?

When the government begins rewarding irresponsibility I have a problem with it. When they tax me more to do it, I really have a larger problem with it.

Just My Take
Ron

 

[Hero999]

Welfare isn't always a waste of money and a drain on resources, if it's set up correctly, it's actually an investment.

Suppose someone can't work because they're sick, uneducated or homeless? If the government invests in them by providing them with education healthcare and a basic home, when they are able to work they'll be able to pay the money back in taxes.

A good welfare system improves social mobility which is actually good for the economy not bad. Having a system where the poorest of people are actually have a chance of becoming very wealthy benefits the economy more than a system where everyone born poor remains poor.

It's true that there'll always be a small minority of lazy people who'll never work but it's probably cheaper to give them money than spending more money on policing and prison when they turn to crime to make a living.

 

[Reloadron]

Welfare isn't always a waste of money and a drain on resources, if it's set up correctly, it's actually an investment.

Suppose someone can't work because they're sick, uneducated or homeless? If the government invests in them by providing them with education healthcare and a basic home, when they are able to work they'll be able to pay the money back in taxes.

A good welfare system improves social mobility which is actually good for the economy not bad. Having a system where the poorest of people are actually have a chance of becoming very wealthy benefits the economy more than a system where everyone born poor remains poor.

I agree to a point. What I was stressing with mention of the WPA, TVA and programs like the CCC is that I don't believe handing out what amounts to free money to people solves anything. I don't have a problem helping people who fall on hard times, I have a major problem giving free money to people who choose (there is a choice) to irresponsibly bring a half dozen children into the world when they can't afford one. I also don't believe welfare should become a livelihood for many which it is. Just handing a check and benefits to people month after month solves nothing. Has anyone here read and understand what the programs I mentioned were? Welfare as it is now hasn't fixed (or even repaired) anything so why would I believe expanding it would solve any problems?

You want people to be productive then get them working and teach them needed skills. Quit giving them what amounts to free money and benefits.

How about something like this, we invent the HPA (Haiti Progress Administration). Since we are so hell bent on rebuilding Haiti we may as well benefit from doing it. We start sending people who are jobless, unemployed and on the system to Haiti for 3 month or 6 month periods to work side by side with the Haitians rebuilding their country. These people get paid a fair wage and learn construction skills. Makes more sense than just writing a blank check and giving away money. This assumes the government could manage it. That done do the same here. We have plenty needing attention in the US without crossing any borders.

WPA = Works Progress Administration
TVA = Tennessee Valley Authority
CCC = Civilian Conservation Corps

You want productive people? Then teach them job skills like construction.

I sure as hell drifted away from Obama Care with all this huh? What that comes down to is people want medical benefits and care? Let them work for it. I don't care if they begin with menial task but they should be doing something for what they get.

Just My Take
Ron

 

[shortbus=]

Quote Reloadron " What that comes down to is people want medical benefits and care? Let them work for it. I don't care if they begin with menial task but they should be doing something for what they get."

Must be a Ohio thing I've said that for years. But if you look up "communism" that is a pretty good description.
Every one thinks of communism as what Russia had, but, it was a Soviet country.

 

[tcmtech]

Back in the old days they often referred to that as the 'workhouse" programs. Or around here that was the term for it.

If you couldn't find work they always had something for you. Usually low end crap work but still it was honest and dependable work.
The workhouse was also where the honestly disabled and unfortunate where weeded out for the just lazy or useless by design.
If you where a reasonable worker with any skills it wouldn't take long for you to get noticed and most likely picked up by a business or company to work for them as a normal employee.
If you where honestly handicapped or had some true level of disability you would still be screened for that useful work you could do.
If it was a physical handicap you could still get a honest job as an office worker or similar type profession.
If it was a mental problem you would get more menial but still honest physical work with some employer or you got carted off to the nut house.
If you where just lazy and useless, well you either starved to death or lived at the workhouse and do the worst of the worst at the least possible pay until you died or get your act together.

I would like to see some of those programs comeback myself.

The Workhouse - www.workhouses.org.uk

 

[Reloadron]

Quote Reloadron " What that comes down to is people want medical benefits and care? Let them work for it. I don't care if they begin with menial task but they should be doing something for what they get."

Must be a Ohio thing I've said that for years. But if you look up "communism" that is a pretty good description.
Every one thinks of communism as what Russia had, but, it was a Soviet country.

LMAO... Don't even get me going on Ohio politics. I live in Cuyahoga County where I get to pay the highest taxes in the state. Now if that isn't bad enough I work in Euclid Ohio where I get to pay the highest city income taxes in the state even though I don't live in Euclid, Ohio.

Now as to the former Soviet Union. The concept was everyone worked for the state and in return the state was supposed to take care of you. Now that sounds good and actually looks good on paper. Unfortunately their medical care sucked! Sometime read the old paperback book called Mig Pilot and understand why the guy defected to the US with an entire Mig aircraft.

Eventually the system collapsed. The former Soviet Union kept gobbling up countries and converting them to communism. They literally went broke. Everyone was fat, dumb and happy right till the bottom fell out. Why work when the system will take care of you? This goes back to nothing is free, there is no free. Somebody somewhere is picking up the tab.

Just My Take
Ron

 

[Reloadron]

Back in the old days they often referred to that as the 'workhouse" programs. Or around here that was the term for it.

If you couldn't find work they always had something for you. Usually low end crap work but still it was honest and dependable work.
The workhouse was also where the honestly disabled and unfortunate where weeded out for the just lazy or useless by design.
If you where a reasonable worker with any skills it wouldn't take long for you to get noticed and most likely picked up by a business or company to work for them as a normal employee.
If you where honestly handicapped or had some true level of disability you would still be screened for that useful work you could do.
If it was a physical handicap you could still get a honest job as an office worker or similar type profession.
If it was a mental problem you would get more menial but still honest physical work with some employer or you got carted off to the nut house.
If you where just lazy and useless, well you either starved to death or lived at the workhouse and do the worst of the worst at the least possible pay until you died or get your act together.

I would like to see some of those programs comeback myself.

The Workhouse - www.workhouses.org.uk

I think I was an indirect product of those programs.

My father was from a poor family in New Bedford MA. His father died when he was three years old. When he was 17 he enlisted in the CCC to help support his mother a seamstress who worked a textile plant and his younger brother. He learned auto and truck mechanics. Then in 1942 immediately following Perl Harbor he enlisted in the Marines. He survived the entire South Pacific island hopping campaign. He returned home and ended up marrying my mom. My mother was the daughter of a NYC (Brooklyn NY) doctor and came from a wealthy family. Also in the 40s was well educated with a college education behind her. I guess we could say she was spoiled.

Despite an education from the CCC in automotive and truck engine repair the Marines made my dad a radioman so upon discharge he pursued Electronics and managed to start a family and do college at night after work. He earned his EE and managed to buy a home and raise 4 children. The guy was an incredible person who had no problem with hard work. He learned early the importance of working and self pride. He passed those values on to 4 children. To me I was proud he was a part of the greatest generation.

The point here is not family history 101 but the value of programs like those I have mentioned. They work and today they would get people off welfare rolls and maybe produce productive citizens. For those who choose not to work they can starve and freeze to decrease the surplus population.

Ron

 

[tcmtech]

The point here is not family history 101 but the value of programs like those I have mentioned. They work and today they would get people off welfare rolls and maybe produce productive citizens. For those who choose not to work they can starve and freeze to decrease the surplus population.

Thats where my mixed feeling come from on the health care issue. I see most developed and civilized countries already have such programs that have at minimum proven themselves to be as effective as what we have now but without the personal costs involved and most tend to be far more effective than what we currently have.

The people I know that are on welfare live better than I do in almost every way.
They have near full medical coverage for nothing, they have food stamps that get them the good food for near nothing, They have fuel assistance that pays to heat their homes, they have energy savings programs to get new windows, siding and insulation put on their homes. They have no reasons to get better jobs or even a job if they play their cards right because unless they start making middle class income levels they wont get to live any better than they do now.

What does that have to do with government health care? If I am paying my taxes and doing my part to contribute I would like to get a little of that free stuff I am paying for given back to me.

The top 20% have no need for a government health care system being they have the personal resources to get good coverage as it stands now. The bottom 10% also get nearly the same coverage as the top 20% do because of government programs.
What I want is those of us in that middle 70% to get the same as them or that those on the bottom 10% get the same as us.

 

[HarveyH42]

It seems like a lot of the people who really need some assistance, have trouble getting it, because there are so many getting help, who grew up on welfare, as did their parents. I can see helping people out for a few months, or even a year or two if there are children, but generations not finding work... The assistance should be the bare essentials, better than nothing at all, but not as good as people working to get by without seeking government help. You get tired of oatmeal for breakfast everyday, gives you the incentive to find a better way to live. Same with Health Care, if you want the insurance bad enough, you work to qualify for a job that provides it. My job provides it, and you don't need any training or skills to start, just reasonably good health, read/write English (suspect that's not strictly enforced). Our company has 23 such warehouses across this country, and we aren't the biggest in this field. I've had plenty of other jobs in the past, with similar requirements and benefits. Maybe it's the employers that should be required to set up some sort of insurance option for the employees. Insurance doesn't work, if everybody doesn't pay in.

 

[Reloadron]

Thats where my mixed feeling come from on the health care issue. I see most developed and civilized countries already have such programs that have at minimum proven themselves to be as effective as what we have now but without the personal costs involved and most tend to be far more effective than what we currently have.

That gets a little complicated. This subject shows up in countless forums and in one forum I am active in we have a considerable number of Canadian members. The majority of the hard working ones despise their national health care program. They wait to see a doctor (sometimes days) they wait for needed surgery and they wait and wait. Many who are of the ways and means cross the border and would rather pay here than take what is offered there.

This is also interesting:

The top 20% have no need for a government health care system being they have the personal resources to get good coverage as it stands now. The bottom 10% also get nearly the same coverage as the top 20% do because of government programs.
What I want is those of us in that middle 70% to get the same as them or that those on the bottom 10% get the same as us.

What we seem to miss is that top percentage include the US Congress and Senate. Those people have no intent of taking what they propose to the common people. They are all millionaires several times over and I give 10:1 they won't be using what they propose. Why should I have it shoved down my throat?

Personally I don't want to spread the wealth to quote the president. Matter of fact I don't want anything. I don't see the proposed system as being better. I see it as another fiscal disaster of tax and spend. I would like to see fiscal responsibility and see people take responsibility for their actions.

Back on topic, health benefits are not a constitutional right. Life, liberty and the "pursuit" of happiness is as good as it gets. Nothing in there about a free ride. Give people an opportunity to work, teach people, provide opportunity but leave people to do as they will.

Just My Take
Ron

 

[Hero999]

The Soviet system collapsed because of the Gorbachev reforms gave people the freedom to protest and change their government. The Soviet economy performed so poorly because the system was set up so people couldn't better themselves because it eliminated the competitive forces present in a healthy free market economy

Soviet healthcare may not have been perfect but it rapidly deteriorated after the Soviet collapse when a programme of privatisation was initiated, although it's difficult to know whether this was due to the overall failure of the economy or the reform of the system.

The workhouse system in the UK was one of the worst human right abuses perpetrated by our government in recent history. Employees had to work long hours, were malnourished and often given cruel and demeaning punishments, if they didn't work hard enough. No one volunteered to go to the workhouse, people were forced to go because they were caught begging or working as prostitutes.

 

[Reloadron]

What does the workhouse system of the UK have to do with anything? What I proposed and what I mentioned were the CCC, WPA and TVA which is like apples and oranges compared to a workhouse system. The workhouse was like a debtors prison. The programs I mentioned were a bootstrap type program. People who worked the programs I mentioned built a good part of the US infrastructure. They were paid and learned job skills. They also ate well. Point being is they actually did something for the money they received.

We live in a country with a literally collapsing infrastructure and I mean physically collapsing. What I am saying is stop the free meal ticket and put people to work doing something. Since they are going to get a free meal ticket why not let them work for it and learn new skills for those who choose to. The rest can starve, I don't care.

The Soviet system was in disarray long before Gorbachev came along. Gorbachev took a shot at capitalism which takes time and some honesty to grow. The reason people fled the former USSR was to escape poor living conditions. I don't see people fleeing this place. Not unless they have an urge to go from frying pan to fire.

Within the US I just don't see free medical or something like expanding welfare as a solution to much of anything. Where is the incentive to work when people have a free meal ticket?

Beats the hell out of me.

Just My Take
Ron