Prexisting Conditions & Insurance

[JJ Husker]

I absolutely completely disagree almost everything you just said. but I am sorry I called you an ass before, That was meant in jest, but not really funny looking back.

Fair enough and don't worry, I have thick skin. I can understand and do have compassion for your fellow human beings and those less fortunate but I cannot understand how you can disagree with anything I said let alone most everything. I guess it doesprovide further evidence of the widening ideological gap in our country though.

[redblooded]

I absolutely completely disagree almost everything you just said. but I am sorry I called you an ass before, That was meant in jest, but not really funny looking back.

Fair enough and don't worry, I have thick skin. I can understand and do have compassion for your fellow human beings and those less fortunate but I cannot understand how you can disagree with anything I said let alone most everything. I guess it doesprovide further evidence of the widening ideological gap in our country though.

 

I thought the first couple paragraphs or so were promising, then I hit a wall. Honestly I just meant to reply to apologize. I was too busy fuming about starwars to troll political forums.

[gobiggergoredder]

Semi, but not totally, off topic. Why couldn't it happen here?

 

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-01-10/greek-crisis-has-pharmacists-pleading-for-aspirin-as-drug-supply-dries-up.html

[Mavric]

I would just like to see a little different approach to how we resolve these things. I think the first step for all of these social programs should be to determine how much we are going to agree to spend on them and how many people we can realistically help.

This seems to be the logical solution to me. I doubt very many would argue that the government (and, by extension, taxpayers) should do something to help those who really need it. Obviously this goes beyond the scope of just health care. My issue is the government has gone far beyond trying to help those who really need it and are trying to do way too much (i.e., more than the government can afford). It goes exactly backwards from how anyone (or any business) has to run their budget. You can't decide what you want to do then figure out how to pay for it (well, I guess you can but it doesn't work out very well); you have to figure out how much you have to spend and figure out what you can do with that money.

 

 

Generally it has lowered the standard of living for the masses and still allowed a proletariat class to exist. One resultant of the government rather than capitalists. I don't think it can be avoided that there will always be haves and have nots. It is the nature of the beast. It's been that way since man walked on earth. The thing about capitalism is that you always have the hope and possibility to raise your rank in life. In socialism, it is highly unlikely and largely out of a persons control. And you can feel that me calling it "socialism" is extremist but, I do not believe you can dabble in it. It will continue to grow until it overshadows every aspect of life. Once 50%+ of the people can eek out enough of an existance on the backs of of others, I believe it is just a matter of time for the rollercoaster plunge to the bottom. Why work when the unemployment check buys just enough? Why pay for health insurance when you can get care (no matter how lousy) without it? Why buy a house you can actually afford when somebody will bail you out or forgive your debt? Why work your ass off to get ahead when so much of the spoils get redistributed from you to the masses? Why save for your retirement when you can live large today and the government will send you a check later? The greed problem in this country is not limited to the ultra wealthy. Anytime you supply a person with something they did not earn, you encourage less personal responsibility and more expectations of not having to do it yourself. I don't think that will work long term and history has proven me correct.

I think this sums up my opinion as well.

[krill]

And you can feel that me calling it "socialism" is extremist but, I do not believe you can dabble in it. It will continue to grow until it overshadows every aspect of life.

 

Hope you don't use public roads, have an education from a public school, have kids in public schools, use electricity from Nebraska's public power system, use a public library, receive mail, plan to have health care past the age of 65, visit a park, enjoy fire protection, police protection, armed services protection, want government help if a tornado / flood destroys your home / community...the list goes on. In fact, why are you even here, a fan of Nebraska football which represents a public land grant university!? You're one step removed from cheering for socialism. It doesn't make sense to me.

 

Europe is falling apart due to these very policies.

 

Yeah...Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, The Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, all suffering a great deal with low unemployment and higher standings of living than America, and higher quality health care. I'm fairly certain Europe is not a country. Maybe it truly is something only we can do, paying twice as much for something (health care), which by virtually every metric is worse than what other countries have, and still be absolutely convinced it's better and we need to go further down the ladder to make it better yet.

[Malth]

Thank you for making an honest response and admitting to a preference for some socialism and logically explaining it. I can respect that. Personally, I am just a bit more leery of heading further down that road in any aspect. I agree some things like healthcare probably require some stipulations for the common good. But I am just not convinced that those means will get us the end that we want or need. If you have some history to share, showing where these types of social policies have actually delivered long term, viable results, please show where and when it worked. Europe is falling apart due to these very policies. Countries that took them to the extreme (ie USSR) really crashed and burned. I believe the socialism the US has dabbled in is more responsible for our current wealth gap and the continued marginalization of the middle class than anything greedy capitalists have ever done to us. I know that goes against the current blame the rich, make the rich pay for everything, storyline of late. The result of any socialism has not been an elevated standard of living for everyone or really anyone except for the very bottom rung. Generally it has lowered the standard of living for the masses and still allowed a proletariat class to exist. One resultant of the government rather than capitalists. I don't think it can be avoided that there will always be haves and have nots. It is the nature of the beast. It's been that way since man walked on earth. The thing about capitalism is that you always have the hope and possibility to raise your rank in life. In socialism, it is highly unlikely and largely out of a persons control. And you can feel that me calling it "socialism" is extremist but, I do not believe you can dabble in it. It will continue to grow until it overshadows every aspect of life. Once 50%+ of the people can eek out enough of an existance on the backs of of others, I believe it is just a matter of time for the rollercoaster plunge to the bottom. Why work when the unemployment check buys just enough? Why pay for health insurance when you can get care (no matter how lousy) without it? Why buy a house you can actually afford when somebody will bail you out or forgive your debt? Why work your ass off to get ahead when so much of the spoils get redistributed from you to the masses? Why save for your retirement when you can live large today and the government will send you a check later? The greed problem in this country is not limited to the ultra wealthy. Anytime you supply a person with something they did not earn, you encourage less personal responsibility and more expectations of not having to do it yourself. I don't think that will work long term and history has proven me correct.

 

We've been dabbling in socialism for a long time, mainly because it can provide services that the free market won't, or if they do, it's rather costly. As a country, we really need to get past this knee-jerk reaction anytime anything even remotely resembles it, regardless of what it is or what it does. Pure capitalism CANNOT address all of our needs. Love it or hate, this is a simple fact. It certainly does work well for a lot of things, but let's not treat it like it's the magic solution for everything.

 

And to address the bolded part, well, I hate to break it to you, but Canada and Europe can boast superior upward mobility stats.

 

Read:

http://moneyland.time.com/2012/01/05/the-loss-of-upward-mobility-in-the-u-s/

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/05/us/harder-for-americans-to-rise-from-lower-rungs.html?hp

 

 

A lot of you also need to understand just how exactly it's decided if something is affordable or not. Government spending is not constrained by the amount of tax revenue it can raise. In fact, federal taxes don't even pay for anything. When you send a check to the IRS, this money is effectively destroyed and removed from the economy. When the government spends money, it pushes a button and voila! New money added to the money supply (aka deficit spending). The only thing that restricts government spending is inflation. I know that the federal debt is a really big number that people look at in horror, and then freak out when the government continues to run a trillion dollar deficit, demanding spending cuts and a reduced debt, but a quick look at inflation figures shows that there isn't really an issue. Even though the debt has risen by several trillion dollars over the past decade, inflation has not been an issue. Not only can we afford the current debt, we can afford more debt. Take care to not be misled by the word "debt" as it pertains to the federal government, it's not quite what you'd imagine it to be. It's not something we should be overly concerned with paying off, really, just that it doesn't grow too quickly.

 

The government is here for us. It can extend healthcare insurance to everyone, and it can handle a large portion of the costs. Stop being afraid of the "debt" and "socialism" boogeymen.

 

 

I know some of you are going to have issues with the stuff I wrote about taxes and whatnot, so before immediately dismissing it, I suggest you read a few things.

 

http://pragcap.com/resources/understanding-modern-monetary-system

http://rodgermmitchell.wordpress.com/2010/08/13/monetarily-sovereign-the-key-to-understanding-economics/

http://moslereconomics.com/wp-content/powerpoints/7DIF.pdf

 

This will take a decent amount of time to work through, but it's worth it. On the surface, it admitedly sounds insane, which is why it's important to understand the underlying basics of how it fits together. At some point it'll click, and that will be that. Also, keep in mind that MMT merely describes how the economy works, how to go about using it is a separate matter.

 

An example of MMT actually being used in the real world: http://www.marketwatch.com/story/john-thomas-financial-successfully-incorporates-modern-monetary-theory-mmt-into-forecasts-2012-01-05

[Malth]

Hope you don't use public roads, have an education from a public school, have kids in public schools, use electricity from Nebraska's public power system, use a public library, receive mail, plan to have health care past the age of 65, visit a park, enjoy fire protection, police protection, armed services protection, want government help if a tornado / flood destroys your home / community...the list goes on. In fact, why are you even here, a fan of Nebraska football which represents a public land grant university!? You're one step removed from cheering for socialism. It doesn't make sense to me.

 

“This morning I was awoken by my alarm clock powered by socialist electricity generated by the public power monopoly regulated by the US Department of Energy. I then took a shower in the socialist clean water provided by the municipal water utility. After that, I turned on the socialist radio to one of the FCC- regulated channels to hear what the socialist National Weather Service of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration determined the weather was going to be like using socialist satellites designed, built, and launched by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. I watched this while eating my breakfast of socialist US Department of Agriculture-inspected food and taking the socialist drugs which have been determined as safe by the Food and Drug Administration.

 

continued: http://aleksandreia.wordpress.com/2009/09/18/the-evils-of-socialism/

[JJ Husker]

And you can feel that me calling it "socialism" is extremist but, I do not believe you can dabble in it. It will continue to grow until it overshadows every aspect of life.

 

Hope you don't use public roads, have an education from a public school, have kids in public schools, use electricity from Nebraska's public power system, use a public library, receive mail, plan to have health care past the age of 65, visit a park, enjoy fire protection, police protection, armed services protection, want government help if a tornado / flood destroys your home / community...the list goes on. In fact, why are you even here, a fan of Nebraska football which represents a public land grant university!? You're one step removed from cheering for socialism. It doesn't make sense to me.

 

Europe is falling apart due to these very policies.

 

Yeah...Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, The Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg Greece, England, Spain, Italy, Portugal, Ireland [Fixed it for ya], all suffering a great deal with low unemployment and higher standings of living than America, and higher quality health care. I'm fairly certain Europe is not a country. Maybe it truly is something only we can do, paying twice as much for something (health care), which by virtually every metric is worse than what other countries have, and still be absolutely convinced it's better and we need to go further down the ladder to make it better yet.

Your response to my first quote doesn't even apply. Of course there are infrastructure and service items that it is logical to join forces on. Sharing and spreading costs for these items makes sense and last time I checked there were not a bunch of special interest and low income exclusions from participating in the cost sharing of these items. If you can't see the difference between highways or first responders and something like Obamacare or social security, I really doubt you'll listen to anything that makes sense. And BTW, I do not use NPPD for my electricity unless they are now servicing Colorado.

[JJ Husker]

 

 

A lot of you also need to understand just how exactly it's decided if something is affordable or not. Government spending is not constrained by the amount of tax revenue it can raise. In fact, federal taxes don't even pay for anything. When you send a check to the IRS, this money is effectively destroyed and removed from the economy. When the government spends money, it pushes a button and voila! New money added to the money supply (aka deficit spending). The only thing that restricts government spending is inflation. I know that the federal debt is a really big number that people look at in horror, and then freak out when the government continues to run a trillion dollar deficit, demanding spending cuts and a reduced debt, but a quick look at inflation figures shows that there isn't really an issue. Even though the debt has risen by several trillion dollars over the past decade, inflation has not been an issue. Not only can we afford the current debt, we can afford more debt. Take care to not be misled by the word "debt" as it pertains to the federal government, it's not quite what you'd imagine it to be. It's not something we should be overly concerned with paying off, really, just that it doesn't grow too quickly.

 

The government is here for us. It can extend healthcare insurance to everyone, and it can handle a large portion of the costs. Stop being afraid of the "debt" and "socialism" boogeymen.

 

 

I know some of you are going to have issues with the stuff I wrote about taxes and whatnot, so before immediately dismissing it, I suggest you read a few things.

 

http://pragcap.com/r...monetary-system

http://rodgermmitche...ding-economics/

http://moslereconomi...points/7DIF.pdf

 

This will take a decent amount of time to work through, but it's worth it. On the surface, it admitedly sounds insane, which is why it's important to understand the underlying basics of how it fits together. At some point it'll click, and that will be that. Also, keep in mind that MMT merely describes how the economy works, how to go about using it is a separate matter.

 

An example of MMT actually being used in the real world: http://www.marketwat...asts-2012-01-05

I checked out some of your links. I was hoping to find something I didn't know or already understand. I am disappointed. OK, we can agree that is how it works. Where we differ is that you don't see the consequences of simply printing more money. Yes it can and is being manipulated by adjusting interest rates etc. but it does affect our standard of living and everyday life even when inflation is not out of control. The other side of the balance sheet exists whether or not the fed or government acts like it doesn't. If there are no consequences for wildly printing money, increasing debt, and huge defecits, then why don't you push for the government to simply send checks, to everyone making less than say $75K per year to increase their income to that amount? According to your rationale that would eliminate poverty and have no affect on the rest of us. I know it can't work that way. If you disagree, you're wrong. If you agree, then you have to acknowledge that it won't work on any scale as a long term, viable policy. Fiat currency and monetary sovereignity are not the cure all you like to think they are and, in fact, are very dangerous things in the hands of anyone who even remotely thinks the way you have proposed using them.

 

You really have a lot more to learn about economics. Trust me, you aren't even warm yet.

[krill]

Of course there are infrastructure and service items that it is logical to join forces on.

 

Oh, but you said dabbling in any kind of socialism is a "roller coaster plunge to the bottom". It makes sense that the services you want from the government are logical, while other services are a decent into civil chaos.

 

You didn't seem to understand my point about Europe at all; it's not a single entity. It's like adding Canada, Mexico, and all of Central America to any malady that is particular to the United States and acting as though it is symptomatic to the entire bloc.

[JJ Husker]

Of course there are infrastructure and service items that it is logical to join forces on.

 

Oh, but you said dabbling in any kind of socialism is a "roller coaster plunge to the bottom". It makes sense that the services you want from the government are logical, while other services are a decent into civil chaos.

 

You didn't seem to understand my point about Europe at all; it's not a single entity. It's like adding Canada, Mexico, and all of Central America to any malady that is particular to the United States and acting as though it is symptomatic to the entire bloc.

I guess that is my fault for referring to Europe when I meant quite a few specific countries in Europe. I made the mistake of assuming that you would logically know of which specific countries I was referring to because of the context of my statement and since they have received a whole bunch of attention as of late. I'm pretty sure you are aware of the woes in Greece, Italy, Spain, England, Ireland, etc., right? You apparently know that Germany and most of the Scandinavian countries are not suffering the same plight as of yet. I guess I won't take for granted anymore that someone will not nitpick at the details rather than respond to what was intended.

 

It has nothing to do with what government services I want or what benefits me more. When I comment in forums like this, I try to view the big picture and not simply only propose or defend things that only benefit me or certain classes of people. My outlook is for what I feel would be ideal and best for everyone. Example; sure I want to draw on my social security and will take every dime I can get. I've paid into it and, as far as I am concerned, that money is owed me. However, my preference would be that social security is phased out, without screwing anybody that has significantly participated, and the responsibility for saving for retirement is returned to the people who will actually be needing those funds to retire on. I know for a fact that I am a better steward of my savings than any government entity ever will be. As far as the people who do not have the means to save for their own retirement, that is why I feel we need to determine exactly how many people we can afford to and want to support, and then institute policies that make it happen. Currently we throw everyone into a one size fits all, inefficient government run system, and have a sh#t sandwich of unsustainable entitlement programs. As far as descending into socialism, I guess that is dependent upon a persons tolerance or desire for it. I realize we have been dabbling in it for quite awhile. I also realize it has been increasing and seems to be the go to prescription for more and more people and more and more issues. I think it is approaching a point of no return. Apparently you don't see it that way. Fine. But don't make the mistake of thinking that makes me or others like me some kind of bad guys. We aren't the heartless, greedy, rich, monsters that people want to paint us as. We simply have a different vision of what is sustainable and how we can get there. The best way I can put it is; Some of us believe the USC offers us the "pursuit of happiness" and the liberty and freedom to work towards achieving that. Many others believe "happiness" is the promise and it is owed to them. Opportunity vs Entitled. That is the basic difference I see.

[Cactusboy]

 

 

My understanding is that insurance is risk management - where the buyer pays the seller to mediate the risk of loss. If the loss has already occurred, then it is not insurance. It is a company paying for a person's condition.

 

My question is what makes insurance for pre-xisting conditions a fair proposal for anyone but the uninsured? Seems like taking of advantage of a business to me, and I cannot see how a business model supports insurance for pre-existing conditions can ever sustain itself without massive government aid. Is PCIP insurance federally financed?

 

It wouldn't make sense to buy car insurance after an accident, home insurance after a fire, or life insurance after the death of a family member. Why is this type of health insurance different?

 

Any facts and insights would be welcome.

 

That's why there should be single payer. Which is what the majority of americans have wanted for many years.

[Mavric]

 

 

My understanding is that insurance is risk management - where the buyer pays the seller to mediate the risk of loss. If the loss has already occurred, then it is not insurance. It is a company paying for a person's condition.

 

My question is what makes insurance for pre-xisting conditions a fair proposal for anyone but the uninsured? Seems like taking of advantage of a business to me, and I cannot see how a business model supports insurance for pre-existing conditions can ever sustain itself without massive government aid. Is PCIP insurance federally financed?

 

It wouldn't make sense to buy car insurance after an accident, home insurance after a fire, or life insurance after the death of a family member. Why is this type of health insurance different?

 

Any facts and insights would be welcome.

 

That's why there should be single payer. Which is what the majority of americans have wanted for many years.

Reference?

[Sub-Husker]

That's why there should be single payer. Which is what the majority of americans have wanted for many years.

 

Unfortunately the majority of Americans do not fund the reelection or control the media coverage of our congresscritters.

[carlfense]

 

 

My understanding is that insurance is risk management - where the buyer pays the seller to mediate the risk of loss. If the loss has already occurred, then it is not insurance. It is a company paying for a person's condition.

 

My question is what makes insurance for pre-xisting conditions a fair proposal for anyone but the uninsured? Seems like taking of advantage of a business to me, and I cannot see how a business model supports insurance for pre-existing conditions can ever sustain itself without massive government aid. Is PCIP insurance federally financed?

 

It wouldn't make sense to buy car insurance after an accident, home insurance after a fire, or life insurance after the death of a family member. Why is this type of health insurance different?

 

Any facts and insights would be welcome.

 

That's why there should be single payer. Which is what the majority of americans have wanted for many years.

Reference?

I'm also wondering if that is correct.