MEDICARE FOR ALL - Sept 8

[SmileyRose]

Contact all my politicians.
Call the TV stations and request in depth reports.
Write newspaper and magazine editors.
Submit to the vent
email everyone
post up the net
button on my shirt
sticker on my car
stickies left around town
and whatever else I can think of

Every day. Until we we have it or I die.

[area51]

1. +1

Each day, 273 people die due to lack of health care in the U.S.; that's 100,000 deaths per year.

We need single-payer health care, not a welfare bailout for the serial-killer insurance agencies.

We don't need the GingrichCare of mandated, unregulated, for-profit insurance that is still too expensive, only pays parts of medical bills, denies claims, and bankrupts people. Republinazi '93 plan:

"Subtitle F: Universal Coverage - Requires each citizen or lawful permanent resident to be covered under a qualified health plan or equivalent health care program by January 1, 2005."

"We will never have real reform until people's health stops being treated as a financial opportunity for corporations."

[w8liftinglady]

2. excellent post

[Recursion]

3. Who will pay how much for it?

I keep coming back to the fact that the unsubsidized Medicare premium is $450 / month (and that's just Part A). People who pay less than that are being subsidized by the trust fund, which is slated to run out of money in 2029 as it is (it was 2017 before HCR). How much would it cost to join medicare for all?

[w8liftinglady]

4. I say we transfer funds formally serving as tax relief for top 1%

http://www.ctj.org/html/gwb0602.htm
from 2002
A new study released today by Citizens for Tax Justice and the Children’s Defense Fund reveals for the first time who stands to benefit from the 2001-enacted Bush tax cuts in each year from 2001 through 2010. Among the key findings:

Over the ten-year period, the richest Americans—the best-off one percent—are slated to receive tax cuts totaling almost half a trillion dollars. The $477 billion in tax breaks the Bush administration has targeted to this elite group will average $342,000 each over the decade.
By 2010, when (and if) the Bush tax reductions are fully in place, an astonishing 52 percent of the total tax cuts will go to the richest one percent—whose average 2010 income will be $1.5 million. Their tax-cut windfall in that year alone will average $85,000 each. Put another way, of the estimated $234 billion in tax cuts scheduled for the year 2010, $121 billion will go just 1.4 million taxpayers.
Although the rich have already received a hefty down payment on their Bush tax cuts—averaging just under $12,000 each this year—80 percent of their windfall is scheduled to come from tax changes that won’t take effect until after this year, mostly from items that phase in after 2005.

[Recursion]

5. OK, but if that money goes to new spending, the deficit keeps exploding

Most people who are talking about undoing the Bush tax cuts just want them to plug the current hole in the budget. If you want to use them for new spending we're going to keep seeing trillion-dollar deficits.

Getting out of Iraq and Afghanistan might free up enough money.

[w8liftinglady]

8. excellent point-one I have advocated for years

unfortunately,until we change these...this is an unreachable goal

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=War_profiteering

http://www.investingdaily.com/id/17191/how-to-profit-from-the-war-in-afghanistan-military-contractors-.html

http://www.truth-out.org/corporations-profit-from-permanent-war-memorial-day-201059924

[SmileyRose]

9. $450 a month for part A

Unsubstantiated stats but I'll play.

$450 for the most expensive portion of the population - so risky and so expensive for profit insurance refuses to offer it.
$450 a month that has successfully extended lifespan and quality of life for Americans.



Say we put EVERYONE'S total health care dollars in one big pot. Put EVERYONE in the same risk pool. It's absolutely clear we can easily treat seniors with better coverage costing far less.

ONE entity to bill means providers can SLASH administrative costs required to fight with dozens of insurance companies.
It means quicker payments to providers and less need for them to pay the interest on business loans based on their accounts receivable.
It means dollars previous taken by for profit insurance used toward actual medical care.
Consider the buying power of the government (ask the rest of the world why pharma prices are a fraction of ours)
In fact, it will force down all costs - think about Kroger, Publix or Walmart negotiating to buy the entire crop from a farmer before it's even planted.

[Recursion]

10. Substantiation

https://questions.medicare.gov/app/answers/detail/a_id/2260/~/medicare-premiums-and-coinsurance-rates-for-2010

It's right there. $461 / month is the full unsubsidized premium, and that's with a $1100 deductible.

Now, I'll grant that the medicare population is more expensive to insure than the general population. But how much more? Someone on the board at some point divided health care provenance costs by the population and came up with $600/person/month. That's cheaper than the Medicare A + B + D unsubsidized premiums of about $900 (information on D is deliberately hard to find). But not by much.

Removing the health insurance companies' profits will reduce health care costs, but not enough to make it as affordable as a lot of people seem to think.

[SmileyRose]

11. Cost

There is a wealth of info out there proving cost will plummet by putting all our eggs in one non-profit basket. Not to mention common sense. If you genuinely have not seen the detailed numbers, all variant but all showing a massive reduction in cost then let me know. I have no doubt I and the rest of DU can give you all you need to calm your concerns.

[Recursion]

13. There are a wealth of *claims* out there

People claiming, over and over again, that if we all were in Medicare, health care would be much cheaper. I haven't seen any evidence, though.

Medicare seems cheap because you pay into it for 40 years before you start to collect. That's why there is a trust fund. But that trust fund is actually in trouble, unlike the SS trust fund. In 2009, the Medicare trustees projected that the trust fund would be exhausted in 2017. After health care reform (which makes Part B significantly more expensive), it is supposed to last until 2029. That's only if all of us too young for Medicare keep paying in and get nothing out. If we start letting people in on subsidized premiums, the trust fund expires that much more quickly. If we don't subsidize the premiums, as the link above points out everyone would have to pay $460 / month.

The costs don't go away. Even if my premium, say, could be lower than $460 because I'm young and healthy, how much lower could it go without wiping out the trust fund? On average, I would have to put in as much as I get out (I do, after all, still go to the doctor once a year, for instance). But at that point I'm just self-insuring: what is the point of even putting me in Medicare? Cost negotiation, I guess, but it seems like there would be much easier ways to do that without enrolling me in a national insurance program just to essentially let me self-insure.

[SmileyRose]

14. Yes there are a wealth of claims out there.

Because the facts are clear. With all due respect, if you have not seen evidence that single payer works to lower costs then you are not looking very hard. Even those who have fought the hardest against single payer universal medical care could not do so on the basis of economics. They had to resort to "death panels" and "scary black dude deciding if you get heart medicine" type arguments.

We all know medical care is expensive. We've come to a point where everyone expects an MRI for a hangnail and a $100,000 heart bypass on a 90 yr old with terminal cancer that still smokes 4 packs a day. Some of our expectations have to change whether we continue with paying for medical care primarily with 100's of profit companies or move everyone to a singer payer entity. But ALL the evidence amongst our world neighbors points to the ability of single payer to deliver superior medical care at a cheaper cost than our for profit system.

[Recursion]

15. Switzerland has essentially the system we are moving towards

And has significantly lower health costs.

We are a very unhealthy country, so our health care is going to cost a lot more than other countries'

[Mimosa]

6. We have already been sold out.

I don't see any reason to hope. I won't be better off if I make it to 2014.

[xchrom]

7. Recommend

[a kennedy]

12. kick

:kick: :patriot:

[LWolf]

16. +1,000