Having practiced medicine for over 30 years, Ron Paul gives his perspective on the past and future of medicine in this country, and the effects of government and special interests on quality, costs and access.
Date: 6/18/2009
Ron Paul: I’d like to talk a little bit about the medical care crisis that we’re facing. Sometimes I’d like to think that it may be a government crisis rather than a medical care crisis, but we do have a mess in medicine and there is a lot of talk about what’s going on, not only throughout the country but here in Washington.
But first I’d like to describe how I see the problem developing and what has happened. A lot of people are arguing that free markets can’t deliver medical care, which I disagree with and the problems that we face today are not a consequence of the marketplace. They’re a consequence, they’re a failure of the government.
This idea of managed care was introduced during the Nixon years and this was a program designed to force people into medical care and provide PPO and HMOs and tax credits for certain groups and not any others. So we have been enduring managed care over these last 35 to 40 years and what has developed from this has been corporate medicine.
The individuals who were best able to gather up the money passed out by the government and were mandated by the government, they became the chief lobbyists. So the drug companies are lined up, the health insurance companies lined up, the health management companies lined and it turned out that they started running the show and actually made it less efficient.
So there is too much management and at the same time, too much of the money was going into these corporations, which was sort of the middlemen and the patients have suffered, the doctors have become unhappy.
The main complaint I hear is that medical care costs too much. “I can’t afford my insurance”, and there’s a lot of truth to this, but one thing that most people don’t talk about is why are the costs high? Why are the costs of medical care higher than say the cost of bread or computers or television sets or whatever?
The truth is it’s a reaction to government. It’s a reaction to our monetary policy. We do inflate the money supply. We do have price inflation. But prices go up, more so in certain areas that the government gets involved in than in others, so the government is more involved in education and medical care, so you have more inflation there and that is part of the problem.
Over these years, there has been less competition in medicine and that has been gradual over a hundred years or so where people couldn’t enter the medical field without getting all kinds of licenses and protecting special groups. But if there’s more competition and there’s less insurance, actually costs go down.
If you look at some of the procedures provided by the plastic surgeons or the eye surgeons who do keratotomies and they’re not under coverage of the insurance company, those prices actually go down.
We don’t have insurance for medical care. We have distorted that word. Insurance is supposed to measure risk and you’re supposed to buy that protection. So if you want medical insurance, you would be insuring against bad accidents or major surgeries or against cancer or something like that. But today, people expect prepaid services. They want every penny taken care of. They want the drugs paid for and then that invites abuse. When third parties pay the bills, doctors, labs, and hospital, and everybody else, all of a sudden, they charge the most, not the least.
I experienced medicine before they had managed care and patients were always charged the least and nobody went without medical care. The churches and volunteer hospitals and other groups took care of the people, but now, everybody has to have this so-called insurance, which doesn’t do a whole lot more than boost prices and then cause shortages and then there’s a demand for what? For more government and that’s where we are today.
So we’re going from corporate medicine, which was deeply flawed and not working and now, the proposal here is to go to government medicine, which is socialized medicine. This has not really worked well any place else. People, yeah, they surely get care if they want to wait and watch, but today, even and in spite of our shortcomings, people come to this country still for top medical care, but that would soon change if we want to equalize everything by leveling it and making sure that everybody gets poor medicine rather than extra medicine, extra and better medical care.
But we could do better. What we could do is introduce the notion that patients do have rights. Anything that comes out of Washington here, and something will, what we ought to fight for is the fact that we have a choice. We shouldn’t be forced into a program. If the government starts a program, we ought to have the right to opt out of the program.
We should be very generous with tax credits. Give tax credits for the entire amount of money you spend on medical care, so you can be independent. The concept of medical savings account is a good concept and we should promote that and encourage that and we should demand privacy.
I mean, this is one of tools that the government agents always used and they’ve already set the program up. It’s been passed already where there would be essentially no medical privacy. So there’s a lot of things that could be done through the tax code, the tax credit and also protecting the individual’s privacy.
Now, the one other thing that we could do, we could pass legislation that would actually help along these ideas with the problems that we have with malpractice suits. What we ought to do is talk about getting rid of the anti-trust laws against the doctors where they could negotiate with their patients and get the attorneys out of the ball game where you would agree on an arbitration board and get a tax credit for buying an insurance policy like that.
So there are ways you can, through the market place, literally reduce this fear mongering and excessive costs that are involved in litigation against doctors because right now, believe me, if you get a bump on your head, you come to the emergency room because of the third-party payment, we’re fearful as doctors of missing something due to the attorneys. Believe me, you can’t walk out of the emergency room without a $10,000 or $15,000 bill and that is not the way it should be.
There are alternatives. Now, I do want to say that the Campaign for Liberty did such an exceptional job when it came to HR 1207 at the grassroots’ level. So I suspect that the Campaign for Liberty, if they get behind some of this free market approach to medical care, they can do a tremendous job in changing the course here in Washington because right now, we are on a course towards socialized medicine and it doesn’t have to be that way.
I never dreamed we’d see the results that we have seen at the grassroots’ level, which then affected Washington with now over 230 co-sponsors for HR 1207. The same thing could happen with medical care, so I would encourage all who believe in freedom and liberty understand that medicine is no different than any other service. Freedom really works and does a much better job than coercion and just another gigantic government program and socialized medicine can’t work.
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The American Citizen’s Healthcare Payment Plan
Phase 1:
1. – Allow all Ins. Cos. to sell nationwide to any and all people groups or organizations.
Why are there only a few ins. cos. to choose from within each state? Whatever the reason is or was it has no merit. We don’t weather it is corruption, lobbyists or past reasons – it doesn’t matter. Our citizens want (need) more choices and be free to choose any insurance company in business. Any debate against cross state insurance purchases is bogus. People having more places to shop creates competition – competition lowers prices for the consumer – there is no debate about that – it’s a no brainer.
2. – Health Ins. premiums are to be equal for all people – no discounts for groups or organization. All health ins. plans cost the same for everybody.
Why should your insurance be cheaper if you work at X company than if you work for Z company? Why should your insurance cost more if you don’t belong to a certain group? Each insurance policy covers individuals within the group called America. We are not talking about shoes here – we’re talking about medical costs. All Americans should be entitled to the price for the same product in a market as big as America. We can put that another way – we want a group policy that offers the best price possible – our group is America – every American is a member of the group called America. Those that get the cheaper price now will bitch about this – they will bitch until they are faced with the situation as others are now – unaffordable medical costs. For those that have no representation – the poorer amongst us – those that aren’t in a union – those that aren’t fortunate enough to have a mouthpiece speaking for us have been at a disadvantage. It’s time we level this playing field and allow every American equal opportunity for medical care. This may result in more cost for some in the beginning (while others get their price lowered) but over time this equal pricing will lower the cost for all Americans. It will also enable all Americans an opportunity to change jobs or any social circumstance without the fear of encountering unaffordable medical treatment. Only the elite that want to suppress others will quarrel with this. Corrupt thinking is the only explanation for disagreeing with fair pricing for all for a product as crucial as healthcare.
3.- All Employer Healthcare Plans are to be converted to employer healthcare cash payments to employees to enable employees to buy individual health ins. plan.
All employers that pay for its employee’s health insurance will continue paying for their health insurance. The difference is they won’t pick the insurance company for the employee – the employee will get the money to buy his own insurance from any company he chooses. If the employee chooses not to buy insurance he looses the money – same way an employee that is offered money to enroll in a retirement program now. If an employee joins the retirement plan he gets the money – if he doesn’t enroll he gets no money. Our new healthcare plan calls for ALL people to pay the same price for the same insurance so the change from employer health insurance to employer health payments will have no change – no added expense – no change in coverage. The change will be that the employee will now be able to shop for better cheaper insurance policies than he has now. This will result in cheaper better healthcare for himself and all fellow Americans.
4. – Employers get tax deduction for providing money to employees for health ins.
This will encourage employers to continue providing money for health costs. It also provides other employers to provide employees with money for health costs. It is fair and equal – no employers excluded or favored.
5. – Employees get tax deduction for buying health ins.
Any and all American citizens shall receive a tax deduction for healthcare costs. A 100% deduction for health insurance and health accounts. There shall be no “special treatment” “special incentives” or any other “special situations or circumstance” for any American citizen no matter what.
6. – Doctor Care Insurance is legal and encouraged. This is a new type of healthcare ins. for primary doctor visits and doctor treatments. Each doctor may operate their own plan for his own patients. Doctor care insurance is a plan where patients pay regular premiums to their own doctor and receives free visit and treatment – same as current health ins. Doctors will be encouraged to operate these insurance plans. All doctors shall be eligible and no doctor shall have preference in any way or for any reason whatsoever The rules and guidelines shall be written by a team of doctors and insurance executives with no interference or input from congress government officials or government agencies.
These plans will have many benefits. Among the benefits are the strengthening of doctor patient relates. It will make the doctors payment collections more secure and less stressful. The doctor will have more time for patients and spend less time on complicated book keeping. The excessive paperwork and requirements by government and insurance companies will be gone. These plans will remove fraud and misuse. This means the patient will be making payments directly to the doctor and not to a third party. This will control doctor visit costs and eventually decrease the cost of visits. It will encourage patients to see the doctor more regularly and not wait until an illness festers and worsens and becomes more costly. This will cause many people to maintain 2 insurances – health and doctorcare. This will not be redundant or more costly. Health insurance companies will now be able to offer policies where doctor visit are an option (like dental and vision are now) thus reducing the cost of the normal health insurance policy.
7. – Doctors will receive tax incentives and tax deduction to establish Doctor Care Ins. Plans.
This will reduce the price a doctor must charge for Doctor Care Insurance. It will also provide the incentive for doctors to operate ins. plans.
8. – Give people tax deduction for doctor payment plans and all health ins. premiums.
There shall be a 100% tax deduction for health insurance and health accounts. There shall be no “special treatment” “special incentives” or any other “special situations or circumstance” for any American citizen no matter what.
9. – All people below the poverty level receive medicade/medicare – the same as the elderly receive (elderly will have no change from the present.
This is included here to insure these people will not loss the benefit they have now. Those that don’t have ins. and those that can’t afford to buy ins. are currently a big problem – they are draining our resources. But now each of these people that work would have health accounts and would potentially repay part or all Medicaid/ medicare payments. As worker’s healthcare account balances rise the number of uninsured and those unable pay will shrink. All the improvements contained in this healthcare plan will also dive down medical costs both enabling more people to be able to pay and when the government has to pay the cost will be less.
Fact; no person in America today is refused medical care. If you don’t have ins. and/or can’t pay your medical bills ALL people are covered by Medicaid/ medicare and/or other government agencies. That’s the current law. All the talk about poor people not having medical coverage is propaganda – no person in America has to go untreated. All the “powers that be” are playing on your sympathy – it’s a real con job by ALL government people.
10. – No illegal residents shall receive government paid healthcare. Only American Citizens receive any medical payments – without exception.
No explanation required.
11. – Guidelines shall be established for doctors tests – no unneeded testing – no “defensive tests”.
This will give the medical and legal system rigid rules about what negligence is and what is not considered negligence. This will give juries a rigid standard to go by in deciding lawsuits.
12, – Reform lawsuit laws to discourage excessive lawsuits
The cost of a frivolous lawsuit will become the cost of the lawyer that initiated the suit.
13, – Develop guidelines and parameters for doctor negligence dollar settlements.
Juries and non-affected parties now use emotion when determining awards. This eliminates excessive awards.
14. – Develop punitive damages guidelines – no settlements to be super-excessive.
Juries and non-affected parties now use emotion when determining awards. This eliminates excessive awards.
15. – Phase all healthcare changes over a 2 year time frame.
This will make the transition possible.
Phase 2:
A). – Individual healthcare accounts are now established – these are individual accounts similar to current retirement accounts (same basic rules) except it is mandatory (like social security). The deduction shall be 3% of the gross of employee’s paycheck. This shall be tax deductible. All employers will make proper deductions from paychecks and forward the money to the employee’s health care administrator (bank mutual fund etc.). The account is in the individual’s name and NOT held or administrated by government. The money in these accounts is used only for medical costs and nothing else. In the end, all remaining money in an individual’s account goes to heirs or elsewhere as directed by the individual – this money shall not be taxed. The individual owns the account, the only involvement of government is to insure proper administration and that the money is used for the owner’s medical expenses to the end. From time to time an individual’s account may have a negative balance (see other clauses) in that event there shall be no penalty or interest charge to the account owner. If at the age of 60 or at a later age any individual account balance exceeds a minimum amount – set by figuring the average medical cost expectation for the individual – the individual may withdraw the excess (tax free). If and when an individual’s healthcare account totals an amount equal to the average medical cost spent yearly then all money above that figure shall be eligible to be invested under the same terms and conditions as retirement
accounts. If healthcare money is placed in investments and a future illness occurs where the individual’s medical costs exceed the amount of cash contained within the account the investments shall not be deemed necessary to make up the deficit, instead a government loan shall be issued to pay the remainder of the outstanding medical costs. That loan shall then be repaid over time by the individual. Gains from investments shall not be taxed.
How do we start a direct payment method – there would be no money in health accounts? Anytime a person needs medical treatment but doesn’t have enough money in there health account an automatic (interest free) government loan would enable loan payment to be made from the health account. The patient would then repay the loan when insurance reimburse them and/or regular health account deposits would enable repayment of the government loan. That would mean your health account may sometimes have a deficit. That would be just like a credit card is now except there would be no interest penalties or fees. There will be people that become disabled or die or otherwise can’t repay the loan. In those instances the government would absorb the loss – just like they do now – it’s Medicaid/medicare.
How would health accounts work? They would work similar to the way social security does – mandatory payroll deductions. The difference is that instead of your money going to the government and the government administering your account the healthcare deduction would go into your own special bank account and you administer it yourself. This money can only be used for medical purposes. Government would not be able to take your money – use it for other purposes or keep your money in the end. Your health account would be yours and in the end you would decide what to do with any excess remaining – give it to your heirs or whatever you want. If you manage your healthcare properly you may have a substantial sum later in life.
The vast majority of Americans will have health insurance and doctor care insurance. Between these two medical treatment methods of payment a person that manages their healthcare costs properly might never need to use the money that accumulates in their healthcare account. This individual could end up accumulating a substantial sum later in life.
Healthcare accounts will become thought of as a sort of a nest egg or a rainy day account. This will give additional incentive for individuals to shop carefully and control the cost of medical treatment thus driving down the overall medical costs for all Americans.
How would banks and administrators handle these health accounts? They would be handled similar to the way retirement accounts are now. All that needs to be done is apply the same rules to health accounts that banks mutual funds and others do for retirement accounts.
Why confuse things by establishing a new primary doctor care ins.? This would open up a new world of benefits and improved health care. It personalizes and strengthens doctor patient relations. It secures payment without over regulation costs – without excessive booking – without risk of nonpayment. It eliminates fraud and abuse that occurs now. It also strengthens direct payment – that direct interaction between doctor and patient will reduce costs and enable better treatment.
B). – All American citizens shall be qualified for government healthcare loans. If any citizen requires medical treatment but doesn’t have healthcare insurance or enough money in their personal healthcare account and can’t afford to pay the cost of the treatment the government shall make an interest free loan to the individual for medical care payment. If, for valid reasons, the loan goes unpaid the government absorbs the loss.
C) – There shall be no third party healthcare payments. All healthcare payments are made directly from patient to healthcare provider (except Medicaid / medicare and other government subsidy payments). . It is the insured responsibility to pay healthcare bills.
How can people pay first and then wait to be reimbursed? Each and every person will have a health account where a portion of there pay go directly into (like social security payments are now) They are allowed to draw on this account to pay medicals costs only and when they are reimbursed by ins. that money goes back into the health account. Over time all people would have money to pay first and get reimbursed. If/when there is not enough money to pay first and wait for reimbursement the government shall issue an interest free loan to bridge the payment. Insurance companies should not pay directly to health providers – this makes costs high and enables the potential for fraud and misuse. All people should pay health costs and then be reimbursed by ins. Co. Also; by doing this people would negotiate the fees for medical costs – any savings they negotiate would benefit themselves and this would allow people to keep tract of the costs. If every person were to pays for their own medical costs those costs would be a small fraction of what the costs are now. Patients would negotiate to drive prices down. The competition would demand suppliers take less.
In every single incidence where a third party pays (Ins. Co., Gov. etc.) the cost is higher. A few examples:
• Auto accidents; if you pay it’s cheaper than if an Ins. Co. pays
• Apartment rental; if you pay it’s cheaper than when Gov. welfare pays the bill
• Business travel; you get it for less if you pay – if the employer pays it costs more.
•
• If you have to make a $10,000 down payment to buy a house you buy a $100,000 house – if you don’t have to make any down payment you will buy a $150,000 house.
• Teeth cleaning; if you pay it’s $30 – if Ins. pays it’s $60
Why do Doctor visits cost so much? There was a time when you went to the doctor and paid the doctor $10. then doctor visits converted mostly to a third party payer. There is now no direct interest in the amount paid and the cost skyrocketed. Direct payment will dive these costs down.
If you think medical costs can’t get dramatically cheaper – you’re wrong. My first computer cost me $9000 – my last computer is 100 times better than the first one was and it cost me $1800. I paid for every computer I bought – competition drove those prices down. The key ingredient to a free market is the payer shops and the shopper pays – not someone else with misaligned interests pays. Medical costs are no different than any other exchange of goods. Simple eyeball to eyeball – consumer to supplier works. Receiver is the payer controls fraud – receiver is the payer controls prices.
D) – Healthcare payment is first paid by the individual’s health ins. If not insured or ins. doesn’t cover the amount owed healthcare account money is used. If both those options are exhausted or do not cover the costs the government will supply an interest free loan to the individual for payment. If the individual can not repay the loan for valid reason the loss reverts to Medicaid / medicare and/or the government.
E) – Phase 2 will implemented over a time frame that completes phase 1 and 2 into a complete plan.
F) – Covering Preexisting conditions; Any insurance company may offer insurance that covers preexisting conditions but it will not be mandatory. it would be nice to have it mandatory for ins. to pay for preexisting conditions – but that isn’t a good idea. If ins. cos. have to cover preexisting conditions your premiums would soar. An ins. co. collects premiums and hopes you won’t get sick until you have paid enough in premiums to cover the payout – that’s a gamble – a gamble they are willing to take. If they have a huge payout for a known prior condition before they collect enough premiums to cover the payout where would the money come from? It would have to come from others without a preexisting condition – from huge premium increases for all. Also; if you knew you would be covered for a preexisting condition why would you buy insurance? You wouldn’t – you would wait until you’re sick and then buy insurance to pay the bills (that is currently called fraud – rightfully so). After your illness was cured why would you continue buying insurance – you wouldn’t. The only way covering preexisting conditions would be feasible is if every person were forced to buy ins. from cradle to grave. Now you know why the ins. cos. aren’t screaming against the current healthcare plans – it would be a bonanza for ins. cos.
G) – There shall be NO add-ons, NO misdirected funding, No pork-barrel inclusions – NO gimmicks added to this plan.
Supplemental possibility; Healthcare transition stimulus package to bridge the transition:
There are 350,000,000 American citizens. There are between 135m and 140m employed people in the U.S.
(We are going base this on a figure of 140m) 140,000,000 American workers. If each person were given $2,000 to open there own health account the total amount would be 280,000,000,000 (280 billion) – that’s too much.
Assumption; the average income is $37k. 40% of the workers make over $60k. 40% of the workforce makes under $50k – Assumption; 5,600,000 workers make under $50k
Assuming there are 5,600,000 American workers that make under $50k. If each person were given $2,000 to open there own health account the total amount would be 11,700,000,000 (11.7 billion) – that seems doable.
Another idea; It is possible to give the 12,500,000 lowest paid workers $2,000 each for healthcare ins. – the total would be $25b. Can America afford that?
If some sort of health accounts were established that required immediate funding we could give the 12.5m lowest wage earners $2,000 each to get them started. This would cost us $25b
If health insurance premiums were drawn from healthcare accounts and if an individual health ins. Premium was a $200 per month “cost gap” the $2,000 would cover a 10 months cost gap.
If 3% of wages were deducted from pay checks and the wage was $37k = $1,110 deducted per yr. – $92.50 mo.
If $90mo. were paid the draw on health accounts would be $110mo. – The $2k health stimulus would last 18mo. If we could do this it would bridge the gap from the current payment procedures to the new plan.
Al Belardinelli 9/20/09
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[...] Ron Paul: How To Solve The Healthcare Crisis Having practiced medicine for over 30 years, Ron Paul gives… [...]
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[...] Ron Paul: How To Solve The Healthcare Crisis Having practiced medicine for over 30 years, Ron Paul gives… [...]
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[...] Text of Ron Paul’s Speech Ron Paul Library Blame Congress for HMOs [...]
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The healthcare crisis will not be solved with the government-controlled health plan! See what line of thinking will influence the kind of care Americans will be receiving and what will be covered by the care in their little collection of health insurance companies.
Making Nutrition A Crime!!! Wake Up America #6
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0lH23RFFpE&feature=channel
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No More Health Care Choice, Wake Up America #5
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oagETKvySyU&feature=channel
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Science of Profit, Corporate Takeover of Science,
Wake Up America #2
Science & the Influence of Money – Elite – Think Flu Vaccination
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-OWNdHgDmAY&feature=channel
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How did Ron Paul ever get elected? Here is a guy who has worked in the medical industry and doesn’t even understand simple medical economics. He states market reform works and tries to prove his point with an example of pricing trends in retail medicine. There are very few examples of groups that have competed for patient business based upon a sales proposition of price. In fact, I predict prices will start rising because of demand due to the influence of reality TV and the advent of medical finance companies.
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ha. yeah, me too. but you also hit on a good point, which is the callousness of the FDA. the regulations are over the top by a mile.
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Unfortunately, we’ll be stuck with whatever the current people at the top send at us. If we had 534 more Ron Pauls in Congress, this would be a non-issue.
I don’t think any one factor is the driver in rising health care costs – well, except for government over-regulation. If you happen to have been reading http://www.tcsdaily.com for a few years, you would have seen discussions (by people in the industry) about the cost of developing a new drug. The drug companies typically pay $1 billion to develop a new cancer drug, for instance. Most of the cost is wrapped up in meeting FDA requirements, and some of course in paying for lawsuits if there are problems.
Hence the high cost of medication, and part of the high cost of insurance.
Ron Paul cites other reasons above – the whole CYA attitude of the medical establishment. I can’t think of any other profession where someone puts everything on the line in his/her line of work.
If a doctor makes one little screw-up, or misses one symptom, for ONE patient, there’s an army of lawyers ready to take him/her to the cleaner. Therefore, doctors must pay huge sums for malpractice insurance. And of course those costs are passed on.
To a large extent, I believe we the people are responsible for the high cost of insurance – when a jury decides to award someone a couple million dollars, when that someone spilled hot coffee on herself through her own negligence, there’s a big a$$ed problem with the court system!
I’ve heard that in Canada (I believe – may be Britain, but I thought it was Canada – heck, maybe both) doctors cannot be sued for negligence. If that actually is the case, then it’s no wonder socialized medicine costs less. Of course, it provides less, too.
One final observation: I’d rather be bankrupt than dead.
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Whoever is working on the health insurance issue needs to address this fact….
While working for State government, I had plenty of health insurance, but I could not afford to use it because of the cost that would remain after the health insurance had paid their portion. It was all pure profit for the health insurance company with no claims and receipt of every premium paid monthly. The lack of health insurance was not the problem!
The problem is with the actual costs of health care services. This is the same as with any service we receive in capitalistic marketplace. The prices will come down and become affordable at the level of competing service providers and the quality of care as determined by the consumer…not at the level of insurance companies/government provided or not, who care nothing about us!!
If health care providers were affordable, then we could cut out the middle guy, the health insurance companies/the government, and use that “premium money” to pay for the actual health services we need instead.
This would bring down health care costs! The free market.
I would like to have a direct relationship with my doctor and health care providers without the input of a third party who is only interested in profit determining what care I can receive. And I would also like to have my health records kept privately in my doctors office, not blasted all over to who knows where for all to view, disregarding my right to privacy.
It’s amazing, the State government goes to great lengths to develop a “privacy program” and then all that is scrapped and they start developing a program to do away with privacy all together. What a waste of taxpayer’s money!!
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im 27 very healthy and self employed and they want to charge me $150 a month for a bull sh*t plan i think ill just pay straight cash homey. and no Gov’t health care please!
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Universal Declaration of Resistance to Mandatory Vaccination
http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/a-universal-declaration-of-resistance-to-mandatory-vaccinations
“When we give government the power to make medical decisions for us, we, in essence, accept that the state owns our bodies.”
- U.S. Representative Ron Paul
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Thanks for sharing the link. Very informative. I’ll not look at these people the same way ever again. This is like sci-fi, except these mentally sick folks are seriously planning and considering these things.
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The democrats big plan to solve health care is to build more sidewalks. Seriously
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you keep going on as if it’s working in a general free market way. It’s not. Most people never look to buy health care cause it’s basically forced on them at work. It would be hard to believe that the health care industry won’t swell up due to increased demand. And the governments idea is to swell it self to meet that demand. I’d rather have private industry swell. that’s just me.
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It is going to swell either which way. The way to fix the swelling is to provide room for it grow.
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well that makes sense. but when you said city hospital, i assumed it meant government run hospitals. If your advocating charity work, then yeah, they’ll do it cheaper and much better. I’ll admit going off and being wrong here.
but i still think your wrong on subsidizing consumers. that is who you subsidize. you don’t subsidize producers, if your going to subsidize at all. That’s why our education system sucks. we subsidize buildings and teachers, not parents who can make decisions for their children. the government is talking about right now subsidizing all health care. the lesser of two evils is a health care credit to everybody so they can go buy whatever kind of care they want.
I’ll put it this way more. We have food stamps, we subsidize consumers that way. We don’t set up separate grocery stores for poor people. we’d waste tons of food, so we give poor people stamps to go find the best deal.
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You don’t subsidize the student if you want him to learn.. The major problem in education comes from the minority groups within major cities where poverty is up. I forgot the statistics but like 80% of drop outs have divorced parents and grow up without roll models. Bill Cosby is a major advocate in education reform. You should check out his work to find out more.
food doesn’t go through high spurts of inflation because the velocity of consumption is more steady. the baby boom wont effect drastic changes in demand.
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Sean replies:
June 22nd, 2009 at 4:42 pm
what makes you think i’m left wing?
————————————–
Bwahahahhaaaahhaaaahahaaaaa
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you obviously don’t know what a rationalist is. dumbass.. I’m for smaller government but I don’t use it as my intellectual basis.
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I know what rationalizing is.
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Rationalism – “any view appealing to reason as a source of knowledge or justification”
“Rationalism is often seen as the mid-point between realism and internationalism. Whereas internationalism advocates a purely ‘global’ and orderly approach and realism a purely individual and chaotic approach to international affairs, rationalism appears to combine these two philosophies. Hence, the term ‘rationalism’.”
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And that has what to do with your ‘rationalizing’?
[devising self-satisfying but incorrect reasons]
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really, your for smaller government, so the answer to the health care crisis is more free city hospitals? Don’t go off the deep end now that you’ve been outed liberal boy. My first answer is that you don’t deserve health care, and certainly not health care paid for by me, and illegal immigrants definitely don’t deserve health care paid by me. second, if we have to have stupid universal health care, send everyone a tax credit to use for health care and get government out of it. there’s a bill called the patients choice act that does this. There are my answers liberal boy, now go call your congressman to ask for more city hospitals for poor people and illegals to go use on yours and my dime.
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you obviously didn’t read that article i showed u. again… 66% to 75% of the people who filed for bankruptcy because of medical costs were insured middle class people.
The reason why the costs are going up is because we are hitting the baby boom age. There are 50% more patients now than 7 years ago.
Illegal immigrants can’t get covered with government insurance.. You didn’t think that thru. Illegal immigrants can’t get any benifits that American’s get.
I know about the bill. I watched the republicans address it on cspan. I don’t think either of them will control the cost. I know you would have to boost the medical field instead of boosting sick people to bring down the cost. That is just simple economics. You don’t subsidize consumers to stop inflation. That is just stupid thinking, it’s backwards.
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http://liberty.pacificresearch.org/publications/medicare-costs-have-risen-far-more-than-the-costs-of-private-health-care
here’s the analysis of government health care costs.
now if you want to give in to a new government monopoly feel free. I don’t care how many people go bankrupt because of health care costs. How does that have anything t do with the government? How does it have anything to do with me. I don’t run to the government because I need a surgery. I get it my self. If i run out of money, i don’t run to the government. How does any of this have anything to do with the government, other than that they’ve ruined the whole system.
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simple economics? how does anything you’ve proposed, government run health care, fit into basic economics? basic economics would tell you that competition lowers prices. Government competition doesn’t, cause history tells you that it leads to a monopoly.
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wow, you are way off track. I’m not strictly promoting government health care so all these messages you have left are pointless and make no sense to what I’m saying. I don’t care who builds more hospitals, but we need more.
I did suggest that they be ran by the city because all the hospitals used to be owned by the church, city or county. I don’t believe and I never said the federal government should run these hospitals. Somebody has to build them and the private sector is not considering it. We could use incentives to build hospitals but my approach is more feasible.
I never said we should pay for other people’s treatment. Hospitals run themselves, so we won’t need to pay with tax dollars. You keep putting words into my mouth and have no clue what’s going on. If you think subsidizing consumers is the answer to control costs, than you seriously don’t understand the simplest of economics.
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I thought you were talking about medicaid.. okay medicare cost more per person but i never once suggested a government ran health insurance so i don’t know why you are trying to preach to me about it. You have been off topic this whole time and have not related one word to what i have been inferring.
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simple economics..
When demand is higher than supply than you have rising cost via inflation.
When supply is higher than demand you have decreasing cost via deflation.
Wow.. that was so hard to understand.
Because the number of patients raised 50% in the past seven years, we’ve had too much demand and not enough supply..
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I’ve never met a wealth re-distribution program that I didn’t love.
Hail, Obama The Chosen
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If I changes my name to Sean kin I git summo dat gummit teat?
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Were too obsessed with health care, and the person above here is totally wrong. health care destroyed the economy? give us a break. Who’s clamoring over health care? not me. Prices are going up because the government is involved, more government is not the solution.
Only ten million people in America don’t have any health care at all, and a lot of them aren’t even legal. And were supposed to change everything for that. These politicians are making the hugest power grab probably in U.S. history, and for the slightest reason. If there was ever a reason to leave the U.S., it would be this new crop of leadership.
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you have no clue. 45 million people don’t have insurance but that’s not the point. Again, 62% of bankruptcies were caused by health care. 2/3rd of these people OWNED health insurance and still couldn’t pay. The reason why medical bankruptcies have gone up 50% from 2001-2007 is because people opt out of their bill, and it raises the cost for everyone.
You are a sheep
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you idiot. go read the actual numbers on how many people don’t have health care. 12 million just don’t want to buy it cause there 18-30. another ten million make over 50,000 a year and just don’t wanna buy it. ten million could get on existing government programs, but don’t. the rest are illegals and the poorest of the poor. you want tp spend 2 trillion for that? your a moron and sheep. do some research einstein.
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hahahahaha what? I’ve read about 50 articles about health care over the past couple weeks and saw either 45 or 46 million from each source.
Check this out.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/03/04/uninsured.epidemic.obama/
haha, according to the US Census Bureau, the number is 45.7 million. Good Try.
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Your missing the whole point. I don’t think you can read or your slow. 2/3 of the bankruptcies were from people who were insured. Their average out of pocket expenses were 17k.
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read this.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/31099365/
The people filing for bankruptcies are all “middle class” people. Your statistics are bogus.
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good try? dude, your listening to Obama’s media hacks. You have no clue. if you think 45 million people in America can’t get health care, your looney. they don’t have health care, but they could get it. There’s a difference. A lot of them are just in between job too. Why would someone who wants to force people to get health care be on a ron paul web site? Liberals just go around trying to find republicans or libertarians they disagree with on the internet to yell at. Find something else to do. And go read from the pacific research institute, and read the census data closely. and by the way, medicare interest rates are going up faster than private insurance rates, so why would government be the solution?
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“Again, 62% of bankruptcies were caused by health care.”
——————–
Please follow up this statement with some evidence.
The cnbc link that you posted does not confirm this.
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Joe, I never said 45 million people can’t get health care… I said that health care debt is bankrupting a lot of people.
longshot, “Using a conservative definition, 62.1 percent of all bankruptcies in 2007 were medical;”
did you even read the article?
Haha, here you go, here’s like 20 articles that says 62%, pick one.
http://www.google.com/search?q=62%25%20bankruptcies%20in%20medical&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4RNWN_enUS257US257&tab=nw
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haha, there is actually like a thousand articles that say 62%. You can pick one from page 1-45 or something.
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and if you would actually read the article, it says that the reason health care prices got so high is because there are 50% more sick people in 2007 than in 2001.
Inflation-too much money chasing too few of goods.. Or too many sick people with not enough care.
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you didn’t say anything about the fact that medicare costs are going up faster than private insurance costs.
you also gave up on your false number of 45 million people who can’t get health care.
you’ve certainly given up a lot for someone who is so pleased with himself. No one is arguing that costs aren’t going up, it’s how to fix it.
Fix it through the market, not government.
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hahaha!! Medicaid cost are cheaper than private insurance according to the Urban Institute. Medicaid is about 65% cheaper for adults and 62% cheaper for children.
I never said 45 million people can’t get health care, I said 45 million people are uninsured.
You have no clue what you are talking about. Please give some details how the market would fix healthcare. You don’t know bc you don’t understand. You are just a sheep who says whatever ron paul says without any knowledge for yourself. You are a joke.
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From the cnbc arrticle that you posted:
“While only 29 percent directly blamed medical bills for their bankruptcy, 62 percent had medical bills that totaled more than 10 percent of family income …”
Your link for 20 stories that confirm your ’story’ shows they all relied on the same study as your cnbc article.
Just another example of your willingness to distort the facts. I understand though, it’s the Obamazombie way. (Hail Obama)
Again, why are you here?
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So what. The average medical debt for the 62% was higher than 17k. That is obviously why they filed for babkruptcy. It doesn’t matter what percent directly blamed it. The point is.. 62% of bankruptcies were from people with outstanding medical debt.
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There was more of a medical bubble than a housing bubble and it had nothing to do with the fed. 62% of bankruptcies in 2007 were because of medical care, not malinvestments. 2/3rd of these people were insured but their our of pocket bill was still on average around 17k.. The main problem has to do with insurance companies. They refuse to cover so many bills and so many patients, so people opt out of their bills and file for bankruptcy. Hospitals have to raise their costs for everyone else just to make up for it.. I’m afraid insurance companies have played a larger role in bringing down this economy than the federal reserve.
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Is ron paul a co sponsor of the patients choice act? Everyone should go try and check that bill out. It’s been proposed by paul ryan, i think that’s his name. It’s a system of tax credits, where everyone will be able to buy care, and just get government out. Unfortunately, no one talks about it. It’s never in the media, and it only has 4 co sponsors so far. If the republicans can defeat this obama plan, maybe the patient choice act will get a chance.
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What a novel idea! I believe that these ideas that Ron Paul talked about in this video will work. I do, however, think that we will see enormous resistance from the AMA as there are many doctors that really don’t want any more competition in their fields. I know a man that was arrested for practicing dentistry in his house without a license although he was providing a great service to many people that couldn’t afford it otherwise. He couldn’t pass the test because his English wasn’t that good (He is from Columbia) and he didn’t always understand the questions. Anyway, this is a great cause and should be our next project after #1207 is through! We all need to start on it now though as the debeate is being held now!
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“Leave the President free to choose his own coadjutors, to pursue his own measures, and support him and them, even if we think we are wiser than they, honester than they are, or possessing more enlarged information of the state of things.” –Thomas Jefferson
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Why are you on this site? I always see left wing socialist morons on sites like this. It doesn’t make an sense. Why are you not on huffington post? or the socialist party web site? or daily kos, or watching media matters or something? you have no arguments, other than costs are going u in health care, so something should be done. Ok, so you’ve found a problem, and have no solution to put forward. good job.
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what makes you think i’m left wing? I’m more of a rationalist than anything. I would actually build more city hospitals to bring down the cost. What great idea’s do you have?
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