Human life isn't even worth 10 bucks. - THIS IS WHY WE NEED MEDICARE FOR ALL

[SmileyRose]

One of Georgia's ballot initiatives was whether or not to add $10 to the cost of our car tags to build a half decent trauma care system. It failed.

I want to thank Jay Bookman of the AJC for putting better than I ever could.

http://blogs.ajc.com/jay-bookman-blog/2010/11/05/ten-bucks-a-year-to-save-700-lives-and-the-answer-is-no/

Critics of the measure called it a government tax, and it surely was. But it was also the kind of tax designated to do what individuals could not do on their own and what the private enterprise system had decided it was not profitable to do.

In this case, hospitals and emergency response systems simply cannot recover the cost of keeping trauma-care centers manned and equipped, particularly in rural areas.

In purely economic terms, the market was telling us that the value of 700 lives saved each year simply isn’t worth the investment.

Personally, I think the market is wrong. It is very good at setting the value of a pound of chicken or a bale of cotton, but its valuation of human life came up short, it seemed to me.

...........

The people of this country find themselves in a deep hole at the moment, and if you throw a bunch of people in a hole, they can react in one of two ways.

Either it becomes every man for himself, with everyone clawing and fighting and scrambling over each other in an effort to get out, or you decide to work together and help each other out. Contrary to what you hear these days, the American tradition has been to take that second course.

But if we have grown so alienated from each other and so scared and selfish that we balk at spending $10 a year to save the lives of 700 people, maybe this country has changed a lot more than I realized.

MUCH MORE AT THE LINK

[CountAllVotes]

1. are you and everyone else that recommends this thread ...

willing to pay as much as $150.00+ for the rest of YOUR life for Medicare? People don't even want to pony up and pay for the President's health care plan. Why would everyone care to participate in Medicare and pay the money for it?

I am admittedly confused as all hell by this. Do you care to pay for Medicare? Also, will you pay for everything that Medicare does not pay for ... the other 20% that is which does not include many other medical necessities that Medicare does not pay for?

[ScreamingMeemie]

2. I would pay for anything (at the prices you quote), even with the 20% that would allow me some

kind of affordable health care coverage. At this point I cannot afford the extra mortgage payment that the only plan available to me (high risk) would cost, with high co pays and a 10,000 K deductible.

I want to live.

[CountAllVotes]

4. will you enroll in the President's health care plan?

I take it your answer is yes. That is good. You will have something available soon and changes have been made to my health plan already due to HCR. :D

[ScreamingMeemie]

6. I will not have something available in four years. I, instead, have upped

my life insurance. For me, there isn't HCR. Saying it is so, doesn't make it so. Many, many people will not live to see what amounts to nothing for so many.

Answer my answer to your original question please. Many high riskers would be willing to pay even $500/month (I could afford that) for decent coverage. That wasn't, and wont' be, given to us. Forcing people to buy health insurance (not care) for a dollar cost set by the companies is not care. It never will be. I'm glad you got yours.

[CountAllVotes]

10. I have insurance right now

I pay for it big time and it is not "free". I'm not looking for "free". I'm hoping to see something that will cover everyone, not just a few.

[ScreamingMeemie]

12. You brought "free" into the conversation. Not me. I don't want free. I want

a chance. Just a chance. You are being disingenuous.

[CountAllVotes]

13. I'm not referring to you

just the general tone seems to be that people want free health care. Move to Europe I say to them and see what that is all about ... not good!

[Hello_Kitty]

23. It's not good here either. eom

[GreenPartyVoter]

21. We upped our life insurance too. If I am gonna die young, then at least let my kids have something

for it. :(

[Mimosa]

29. Soon?

What plan? There is no public option, no tax credits until 2014. Some of us are SICK NOW!

[Recursion]

5. A lot of people live in a magical world where Medicare's premiums will be low or non-existent

Because nobody knows how to deal with delivery costs, which will continue to make both private and public systems ultimately unworkable until they are dealt with.

[ScreamingMeemie]

7. Don't you get it?

A lot of people live in a shit world, where even insurance at $500/month is not available to them. To see the smugness of some posters here floors me.

[Recursion]

16. I do get it; that's what the high-risk pool is for

But people are pissed that it costs $400 / month or whatever -- well, that's what it costs to treat people. That's why insurance companies don't want to insure them.

[ScreamingMeemie]

18. My quote for high risk insurance? $1040 with a $7,500 deductible.

Administered through Blue Cross, the company that dropped me in the first place. I would give my left ovary for $400/month...or whatever.

Edited because, with the new "HCR" the rate dropped by $160. But adding $1040 to the $167 I pay a month for my son pretty much gets you there.

[Recursion]

20. Well, that really sucks, and I feel for you, and I wish the rollout of HCR had been faster

Because in 2014 the insurance can't be more than 9% of your income. I wish I had good news for you right now.

[ScreamingMeemie]

22. I know you do. I just get angry sometimes when people (not saying you)

act as if everyone's problems were solved by this. I am glad that so many people are able to keep their over college aged children on their plans...but the high risk people were kind of left out in the cold.

[Mimosa]

33. Blue Cross is horrendous to deal with

Screaming Meemie, My partner and I pay $900 a month for a 70/30 with $10,000 deductible, no coverage for Rxs until $1,000 a year is spent.

In short we can't afford to use it, and every month seems like the last will have it. The mortgage and our health care cost the same, so given a circumstances, we'll have to drop health insurance. But if something catastropic like heart, cancer or falling accident ever happened...

I think we're going to have to drop it. We simply live bare to the bone and can't save for those inevitable emergencies or a rainy day or retirement because health insurance costs us too much.

The Dems blew health care reform. The health insurance companies are sitting pretty. Many are still broke and scared. IF the President and congress had helped us people wouldn't have been so angry.

[CountAllVotes]

8. Medicare premiums have doubled

That is in the past 10 years mind you. Now the premiums paid are based on income level. I have an in-law that pays close to $150.00 a month for Medicare and another $450.00 for a supplemental plan (Kaiser) which is where he goes for treatment.

It is not a freebie and people act as if it is a freebie.

Nothing in life is free. You'd think people would wake up from this magical world and realize this sooner rather than later.

[ScreamingMeemie]

9. Nobody is asking for free. I would be delighted to have coverage at

$650/month. I would be delighted to not have gone through (as a compliant patient under my husband's COBRA) 22 denials of coverage and a high risk pool offering of $1200/month. This person is not expecting a freebie. This person is asking for a chance, here in the present,to live to see my son grow up. This person is willing to pay, within reason and based on income, for a shot at life again.

[CountAllVotes]

11. well my in-law is a veteran

and he could use the VA but he cares not too. Said in-law is almost 80 years old and I think he deserves everything he is able to afford.

[ScreamingMeemie]

14. I am 40. A widow with a young son. I took good care of my health,

took my prescriptions and was compliant. I was dropped from COBRA (as expected) and unable to find coverage that would continue my care, and keep a roof over my son's head. I will state it again. I cannot afford $1200/month. I can afford $500/month, with copays and prescription copays. Because that isn't offered to those with pre-existing conditions, I have become a non-compliant patient.

[hobbit709]

15. And if you barely have the $150.

what good does the $450 more that you don't have do you.
There's a large percentage of the population that $600/mo is way more than they can come up with after basic living expenses.
Evidently in your world no one lives at or near the poverty level. And waiting until 2014 may mean that you had the Republican healthcare plan.

[CountAllVotes]

19. most people don't have money for supplemental plans

If you are paying $150 for Medicare, that means you have a high income and can afford the supplemental plan.

However, people on Medicare are elderly and/or disabled. They cannot afford the extra plan. If they end up in the hospital, that 20% bill can amount to thousands of dollars very quickly.

I'm not against Medicare, what bothers me is that it is presented as being something that is free. You pay into it for years and eventually, if you live long enough, you qualify for it. That is how it works.

If you don't have insurance, you can look to a high-risk pool but the premiums are costly no doubt. I just want people to realize that Medicare is not free by a long shot. If that is being "smug" well so be it!

[hobbit709]

24. TANSTAAFL

But that doesn't mean you shouldn't get get healthcare just because you're poor

[CountAllVotes]

26. huh?

what?

[hobbit709]

28. There ain't no such thing as a free lunch.

[Mimosa]

30. Hi risk pool in GA is hi deductible (2,500 ann) and $688 a month a person

I cannot afford it.

[Recursion]

31. And Medicare is $800 a month if you haven't paid in fully to the trust fund

Any plan, public or private, is ultimately going to have to deal with the fact that our health care delivery costs are insanely high.

[xchrom]

3. Recommend

[Cleita]

17. We defeated a prop here in CA for infrastructure also that would have

raised car registration. The problem is that car registration, like sales tax, is a regressive tax and penalizes the poor and working class. Those voters will vote against it and are in the majority. It would be better to find a way to fund this by taxing the rich or big corporations. I personally would tax legal and accounting services since it's the rich and businesses who use their services and they would be a minority vote so such a law would have a better chance of passing.

[racaulk]

25. As a Georgia resident, this was one of the most shocking results of election night.

I'm absolutely embarrassed and ashamed that the voters of my state chose to not pass this ballot initiative.

Disgusting. :puke:

[Phentex]

32. I wasn't shocked in the least...

even $1 would not have passed. It's a very strange mentality.

Actually, I'm surprised it got the votes it did.

[Mimosa]

27. I was shocked it failed.

I voted for it.