Comments on: Gov. Palin on Health Care Reform

By: Phil Fraering

Phil Fraering — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 21:08:38 +0000

It’s a good thing Republicans weren’t able to flip the vote electronically and get this political clown in office. But, can we finally flip the switch on her and retire her as lying laughing stock embarassment she really is?

All the previous iterations of the public option (and the coexisting private options) weren’t brought to us by Republicans; Sarah Palin didn’t bring us Medicaire or Medicaid or HMO’s. Democrats DID. Why should we trust you this time around when every previous attempt to reform the health care system results in something you think is a failure?

And fifteen years down the line, when Obamacare turns out to be a failure too, are you still going to be blaming republicans the way you blame us for your HMO today?

By: Marty

Marty — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 17:26:18 +0000

I read a while back that one of the reasons Medicare has such low administrative costs is they have almost zero process for reviewing the eligibility of new procedures or medical reasoning behind things being claimed– like only a couple of MD’s for the whole system, far fewer than any of the big private insurers use to review technical issues; and, that they just pay all claims without any cross-checking, which is why every few years there is a multi-billion scandal involving duplicate or false billing. A private company puts a rational amount of effort into stopping fraud and staying current with the industry, to stay competitive and profitable. The government has no such motivation, the closest is to avoid embarrassment which is why every now and then they come up with a billing scandal.

Low admin costs is a false goal, obviously you can’t let G&A get out of control, but lower isn’t necessarily better, and the devil is always in the details.

More generally, the private sector can and will make mistakes, but it takes government to REALLY foul things up.

By: raaa

raaa — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 16:13:13 +0000

[Deleted]

By: Carl Ortona

Carl Ortona — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 04:50:09 +0000

am not sure about the first point — Phil has addressed a host of unrelated but very important issues — but it is like he is completing Palin’s speech for her; as to the second point, to quote “such policies include giving all individuals the same tax benefits received by those who get coverage through their employers” — while we are that wish, shouldn’t/can’t we all wish for a unicorn, too? I work three jobs, at will, my wife has a public service job that provides us our so-called “insurance” — it is a joke, yet we are qualified as those “happy few” who are insured … uhmmm, point three: a combination of “buying health insurance across state lines” (ever had a choice for health insurance? private companies and publicly funded institutions provide you a chinese take out menu) and reforming tort law — yes, it would be nice if there was a free market, but there is not now and there never will be; tort reform is a red herring — law suits are very costly, insurance even more so, but it does not constitute the sole/main/only cause why we pay more per person for health care in the industrialized world … am glad to see that Palin has stopped pretending that all human beings were entitled to live forever until the specter of gov rationing health care reared its ugly head … what a golden age we used to live in when every health insurance executive had read his Hobbes…. you know, every human being would live forever if only we would could avoid the state of nature where life is brutal, nasty and short …

By: Will Henson

Will Henson — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 04:43:28 +0000

LG:

Cannon’s and fellow Cato scholar Michael Tanner’s “Healthy Competition” is considered by many to be one of the best guides to approaching healthcare from a free-market perspective. I haven’t read it yet, so can’t offer any opinions or reviews, but it’s high on my “To Read” list.

-Will Henson

[Will. Thanks for link / tip. Lex]

By: Jonathan

Jonathan — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 04:34:38 +0000

By: Phil Fraering

Phil Fraering — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 04:26:58 +0000

Ahem. Sorry. I lapsed into another language for a sec.

By: Phil Fraering

Phil Fraering — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 04:26:13 +0000

HI THERE…. FDR STARTED INSURANCE-AS-A-JOB-BENEFIT, LBJ STARTED MEDICAIRE AND MEDICAID, TED KENNEDY STARTED HMO’S, BUT THE PROBLEMS WITH ALL OF THESE ARE ALWAYS THE REPUBLICANS FAULT? THE ONLY ARGUMENT I SEE FOR A PUBLIC OPTION IS THAT YOU APPARENTLY CAN’T AFFORD TO GET YOUR CRANIAL-RECTAL INVERSION TAKEN CARE OF… BUT OF COURSE, THEY PROBABLY DON’T COVER THAT SORT OF THING, IT’S HOW THE SOCIALISTS GET VOTERS.

By: robert miller

robert miller — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 04:12:39 +0000

PALIN DOES NOT HOLD A POLITICAL OFFICE ANYMORE AND HAS NO STRONGER OPINION THAN YOU OR I,
SEEM LIKE WE SHOULD CALL THE CANADIANS IN FOR ADVICE AND KICK
THE DAMNED INSURANCE LOBBIEST AND REPUBLICAN BUTT KISSERS OUT..

By: Phil Fraering

Phil Fraering — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 02:46:45 +0000

One thing I have not seen yet in the health care debate:

Health insurance companies _and_ Medicaire/Medicaid both appear to use their collective bargaining power and legal position to shift a greater fraction of medical costs onto people without collective bargaining. It makes sense for each insurance company to try to do this, but it leaves those outside the collective bargaining with little option but perhaps to agitate for some sort of all-encompassing public option.

(interesting prisoner’s dilemna they’ve set up there, don’t you think?)

Add to this that health insurance companies _and Medicaire/Medicaid/Social Security_ all act to increace the average cost of a procedure by relentlessly and constantly challenging whether they are liable to cover each and every procedure.

This a) adds administrative cost, and b) since the health care providers have to cover all the times they lose, they must be charging more on the other times. And invariably to those not covered by the various public or private options. Finally, the administrative layer thus added is not amenable to the usual mass-production efficiency methods used in the private sector.

The current public option claims a very low administrative overhead but I suspect they’re not counting the increaced administrative overhead needed by all the private companies they use as subcontractors.

Any comments?