How do we pay for universal health care??

Question

I did some number crunching using average dollar amounts from my own and others experiences and data form the US Census Bureau and CDC.

1) Routine Doctor visit:
$150 x 302 million people (everybody gets one) = $45.3 billion. This does not include ANY additional tests.

2) My wife's recent C-section:
$12000 x 1.2million C-sections in '04 (most recent records I could find) = $14.4 Billion

Total = $59.7 billion or $200 per tax payer.

This dollar amount includes very little, especially since C-sections only account for 30% of the births. Also, I have nothing in here about medication. Then we add long term care situation (cancer, aids, disabilities) and this dollar figure could be $5k per tax payer, not including the other taxes the government flushes down the toilet.

Where do we get the money, liberals??

--Ending the war is a stupid answer.
--Taxing business an even more stupid answer
--This additional tax is good, is a stupid person

Answer 1

Pay your healthcare by giving up the cell phone, and the 600 dollar a month payment on your car is how. Liberals will tax the people with vices to pay for healthcare, but I think taxing more people to more services lead to serfdom style goverment they have other in Europe. Americans are indiviualists, and not peasants to be master for elite democrats. Fix healthcare deregulate FDA, and get rid of AMA its labor union that drives up costs for the comsumer. Allow insurance companies to sell policies across state lines. If the leftists want goverment isurance you can pay the govemrent for your healthcare by opting for a higher tax rate, and leave rest of the us alone want private healthcare. I say if the taxpayer wants goverment healthcare just have them pay a higher rate, but if a person wants private coverage they can pay lower tax rate. Just dont stuff a tax increase on the employers, or business owners because they already pay the hight corporate tax rates in the OCED. Healthcare should not be provided by the employer over the long term, instead have healthcare sold like car insurance, and allow tax credits or deductions for people that buy healthcare coverage, or if you leftests will give you goverment medicare just pay higher taxes for it.

Answer 2

Universal Health Care

Answer 3

In 1976, a universal health care plan was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives. It was called "Ameriplan". It would have divided health beneficiaries into three categories. If one was wealthy enough to pay an annual insurance premium, that was precisely what they would do. If one was too poor to afford the annual insurance premium, then the premium would be paid out of governmental revenues. For those in the middle, they would pay a cost-share of their premium based on their income. If they gained in income, their cost-share would rise as well. If they became unemployed, their remium would be paid out of governmental revenues.
The author was Al Ullman of Oregon. He later became Chairman of the House Committee on Ways and Means when Dan Rostenkowski got into his legal troubles.
The plan would not have added another layer of government bureaucrats. A previous piece of legislation entitled the Health Facilities Planning Act had already established Health Systems Agencies at local, state and federal levels. That agency would run the program.
Despite Al Ullman being a liberal, his plan was endorsed by the American Medical Association and the American Hospital Association. That is a meeting of the minds which borders on the supernatural!
The plan would not dismantle the current health insurance system. It would not create a situation where government decides what facilities go into any area, the way it's done in Great Britain and Canada. Since everyone would be insured, the limits of their plan would be full and final payment for services rendered. It would level the playing field for one of the last examples of unequal bargaining power in contracts today. The party of the first part (the health provider) currently decides what is wrong. what it will take to fix it and what it will cost. The party of the second part (the patient) has little leverage in such a contractural situation.

Answer 4

You identified the single biggest problem -- trying to pay for it.

But also look at how much people are paying right now for health insurance. If the average person is already paying $200 per year (most are paying a lot more than that, but let's suppose) then paying that to the govt for the same service is just a different line item on the paystub. Nothing changes from the consumer perspective.

The answer, like any other govt spending issue, is that if we want to pay for it, we have to not pay for some other things, or we need to increases taxes to provide for the additional services that are being paid by the govt.

Those aren't stupid answers. Those are accurate practical answers. You just disagree with them, as do I.

Answer 5

The health care drastically needs reform--the costs you cite help show why. (BTW--I favor a systemic approach that will provide universal access, but not a nationalized health care system--and, yes, I'm a liberal).

Think of it this way:
>First--as a society, we are laready paying for universal health care! THINK--only a tiny number end up NOT getting care wehn needed; therefore, the resources to provide that care are already there, and somebody is footing the bill now.
>Nevertheless, there is massive waste and innefficiency in the system. In adition, the system is "out of sync" (workers who have lost health insurance despite working for a company for 20 years is only one exammple).
>One key problem: we are paying hundreds of billions every year for treatment of conditionns among lw income people that are entirely preventable. Some on the riht object to "freebies" to the poor. FORGET the ideology--this is bad public policy. Providing health education and basic health care in an organized, efficient, and consistant manner --especially to children--REDUCES long term costs. That's not subject to debate; there's a massive body of evidence streching back a centry to prove it.

Finally--and I'll use the last as an example--providing universal access does not mean "socialized medicine." Programs to deliver public health education/care to the poor might benefit from federal participation--but they work best at the state/local level.

The system needs reform--badly. But--the last "reform" was the Bush/GOP "prescription drug plan." Which, among other things, took over a billion dollars of the money seniors pay into the system and handed it to the pharma companies as a subsidy--a SUBSIDY to one of the most profitable industries in the country. That kind of thing needs to stop. Period. And a warning: right, wrong or whatever, as long as that kind of thing continues to bbe a feature of the "reforms"proposed by conservatives, they will only make the case for socialized medicine that much more plausible.

Answer 6

We would spend less overall. How much does the average American pay in private health insurance premiums now?
The for profit insurance industry lobbies against national health care, and instead of investigating the costs in a rational manner, many swallow the lies the insurance and pharmaceutical companies spin into the debate to defeat this. Stop swallowing the distortions and lies. These parasites have a lot to lose if we get insurance coverage for everyone at a reasonable rate.
The average cost for a family of three making $40,000 per year would be $1900.00.

http://www.healthcare-now.org/

Answer 7

Your figures are based on bloated health insurance charges. We are spending 12 billion per month in Iraq (I know, stopping that silly little war in Iraq is such a stupid & bad idea. Maybe the next war we start should be in Saudi Arabia where most of the REAL terrorists that are going to Iraq to be car bombers are coming from.) Anyway that's 144 billion that could be going towards Health Care for all Americans.

Answer 8

First, stop treating medicine as a business and doctors as highly-paid CEOs. That will start to bring down thios outrageous prices.

Second, the health care gets paid by tax dollars, as it is in every other civilized country, and where health care is now getting better than in the US. Roads, street lights, sewers, etc., are less important than health. Are you one of those flaming neocons who thinks he deserves a free ride at taxpayers expense, paying for nothing, that you do it all yourself? If you're willing to go into the desert or mountains with no clothes and no tools and sustain yourself, you depend on taxes.

Then of course, people should be paid what they are worth to society, not to a bloated corporation that squeezes blood out of the people who actually do the work, while the top executives loot the corporation, stiff the stockholders and customers and believe they are worth more than the teachers who taught them how to get where they are.

Answer 9

$150 for a routine office visit is insane. you forgot to factor in a few things. how about some prenatal care? that might knock a few points off infant mortality, almost priceless. or how about hip surgery when your mom takes a fall? if complications set in she could well spend every bit that she had put away (and that you were hoping to inherit); gotta be worth something.

"Ending the war is a stupid answer" is a stupid comment.

Answer 10

It seems like we can always find the money necessary to fight a war, but have a hard time taking care of our own country. As corporations are covering less and less of the medical benefits for their employees people are starting to realize we have a problem.

I am now self-employed and the cost of insurance is outrageous. There are many out there who work for companies that do not provide for medical insurance and they do not make enough money to cover even the $150 doctors visit you mention. If it were critical care, most hospitals won't even admit them much less keep them for the necessary treatement.

I am so sick of the self-righteous, pseudo-Christian bs that people like you submit to this site. I hope that you never need anybody's help. And if you do, you can be sure it will be some liberal minded person that will give you that help, not one of your conservative buddies.