People in the US have an obsession with owning everything. Owning lots of expensive things gives us a sense of individuality, like we have control of our lives.
The same goes for health insurance. The insurance companies want you to believe that you own your own policy. They want you to feel a sense of individuality, like you have control over where your money is going. They almost give you the sense that every dollar you put in to the company will be returned to you.
But health insurance, even through a private company, is a socialist concept. What insurance companies do is they pool together the resources of many people (millions of people for bigger companies). When anyone in that pool needs help, those resources are used to pay for operations, medicine, doctor's visits, etc. No matter what you pay for your insurance, you (theoretically) will get access to a large pool of resources to pay for your health problems.
Letâs say I've had a Blue Cross policy for a couple of years and paid a total of $1,000 for health insurance over that time. I get in a horrible accident that requires $100,000 of surgery. Blue Cross will pay much more than the $1,000 that I've put into their company. Even though Iâve put $1,000 into the company, the other $99,000 to pay for my operations has to come from other people's policies. So if you have a Blue Cross policy too, you are paying for my operations. You can believe as hard as you want that the money you put in is only for you, but itâs not. It's for everyone in the collective pool. This is a socialist system.
To say that you don't want a Universal system because "I donât want to pay for someone elseâs health problems" is an absurd notion. By having private insurance, you still are paying for other people's health problems. Your money is going into a company which collectivizes the money and pays for every policy holder's health problems, no matter how much that person puts into the company.
This is the same idea with Universal Health Care. It is simply pooling money together to pay for everyone's health problems, no matter how much or how little you have put into the system. So whether you get insurance through a private or public system, you are paying for everyone's health problems. So if you are scared that "Obamacare" is just a Socialist plot, take a look at how insurance companies work. They work on a Socialist model for profit. Socialism works in some cases, and insurance is a perfect example. It's time to collectivize all health insurance to guarantee health care for everyone. People should be given health care without the threat of going broke. A civilized country would not make people choose between health and rent, or prescriptions and food, just because profit is at stake. There is nothing wrong with making money. But when people's lives are at stake, it becomes a problem. A Universal System or Public Option is needed now.
Wow... this is basically the exact speach I gave to my Gov class a couple months ago during mock congress (I was trying to pass universal health care). But no one in the class knew what socialism meant, so it didn't go over to well.
This is the same idea with Universal Health Care.
With Universal Health Care, a higher proportion of your money will go towards actual healthcare because the insurance company won't have to pay for advertisements and the like.
Ah crap, I wrote this in Word, and some of it didn't transfer over well. The weird symbols are just apostrophes.
Not really. The first three and the end paragraphs were of you, and the two with symbols were copy-and-paste paragraphs. It really doesn't make sense when other paragraphs with apostrophes are fine but others aren't. If you are going to copy/paste, make sure you cite it please....That and the stickies say for OPs to anyway. :-/
While you do get to choose which insurance company is provided for you and your family, the methods are indeed socialist. The overall concept of private insurance is iffy.
Not really. The first three and the end paragraphs were of you, and the two with symbols were copy-and-paste paragraphs. It really doesn't make sense when other paragraphs with apostrophes are fine but others aren't. If you are going to copy/paste, make sure you cite it please....That and the stickies say for OPs to anyway. :-/
Except the third paragraph has both an apostrophe and a symbol thingy:
Let�s say I've had a Blue Cross
Notice that "I've" is correctly formated. So this seems legit, unless he just copied half a sentence.
A civilized country would not make people choose between health and rent, or prescriptions and food, just because profit is at stake.
Even for die hard neocons who are unwilling to concede an ounce of social conscience on the issue, purely from an economic perspective, UHC is far more efficient. With that in mind it's astonishing it's taken so long for it to get to the head of the political agenda in America, given the vast number of people it affects.
Clinton tried to get that passed, but since his legislative majority were Republicans (not on his side of the vote), it was near-impossible. Since Obama's legislature is majority-Democrat, he has a better shot at approving this than anybody.
But health insurance, even through a private company, is a socialist concept.
Fundamentally, I would have to disagree. I see where you're going with this and I'm partly inclined to completely agree with you. But then I thought how this model is similar, fundamentally, to the idea of joint stock companies. Essentially, it's just spreading out risk. In the case of joint stock companies, you're betting the investment will be profitable. Of course, health or life insurance is pretty weird. With insurance, you're basically betting that you're going to get sick or die, but hoping that you'll lose that bet. Anyway, my point is that in both models, personal risk is being spread amongst a group. I don't think this can translate into a socialist model, where people have an intrinsic worth and deserve to have wealth distributed amongst them.
But this argument is talking past the argument that is taking place over health care. The stigma, in the U.S., that is attached to socialism is that there is some from of government control over a sector of the economy. And while the insurance companies wouldn't necessarily be run by the government, the government would certainly have to control many aspects of the industry. Our insurance model right now operates, I think, on a capitalist model. Those with more money have more to lose and so they bigger better insurance policy. There is no intrinsic worth to a person in this model, so no one is required to have health insurance. This wouldn't be the case (for most people) under health care reform. I think there are plenty of fundamentally socialist aspects to the new model. Not that I'm saying that's a bad thing, though...
I think there are plenty of fundamentally socialist aspects to the new model. Not that I'm saying that's a bad thing, though...
Well, the way for a nation to be completely successful is to have a strong mix of both sides of the coin. Having some Socialism in an economic view isn't so bad.
It's not like I hate the insurance companies we have now, it's just that I hate how they operate. If a guy comes to an insurance company and requests coverage because of his heart disease, the company will offer coverage on everything about him except his heart, because obviously, his condition is active and could cost the company huge amounts of money to cover his medical bills. Everything but his heart condition. THAT'S WHAT HE CAME THERE FOR!
I'm only going to speak from my own experience when it comes to group health insurance premiums vs. coverage, life/death insurance premiums vs. coverage and UHC.
I'll start with UHC. I've seen the interior of one VA Hospital and if this is representative of how the rest of us will be treated if/when, Obama's plan takes effect then I pray for continued excellent health. I wasn't then nor am I now a military veteran, my family members were. I have had personal experience with having to file for government assistance back in the early 1990's and standing in line for a doctor's visit because the waiting room was full, every time, wasn't pleasant. Those memories I would prefer to not remember. Life insurance premiums are paid in the hopes of a long life but the benefits go to the assigned beneficiary when the insured dies. A lot of people use these policies as a savings account,of sorts, and that's not good. The money is suppose to be there when you die so you don't leave your living family in debt.
What I wish I had bought when I was in my early twenties was disability insurance.
Group health premiums are pooled and you're correct when you say the larger the group, the more socialist. Let's say you work for Lowe's Home Improvement and the policy is written by United Health Care, (I think this is the company that now handles AARP?), If these stores are all combined under an umbrella policy then the individual premiums would be small, say $14.00 out of the paycheck every week for a single student,blah, blah. But let's say, Mildred, the faux cashier at the customer service desk who's been with company since you were born, 18-20 yrs., needs triple bypass surgery. All she's going to have to pay is the deductible and a co-pay. The same is true for the 18-20 yr-old student who just started working full time one year ago. This sounds socialist to me, for all hourly employee's. Salaried and upper-management get a different plan but all salaried, I would think, would have a socialist, same-same, type of plan.
This sounds socialist to me, for all hourly employee's. Salaried and upper-management get a different plan but all salaried, I would think, would have a socialist, same-same, type of plan.
At first, I thought this argument just shot me down. But the more I think about it, the more I think I can wriggle out of it. My claim is that the current insurance market is, fundamentally, a capitalist model. If the argument for the quoted conclusion holds, it must show some intrinsic worth for life/humanity/something. Even if (for example) Lowe's insurance model is built like this; heck, even if all large group health programs are modeled like this, I don't think the argument holds. What it looks like is a fallacy of composition. Just because a certain sector of the economy operates by this model, it doesn't follow that the entire sector operates in this way. Ultimately, to even be able to be available for this coverage, one must be a salaried employee at Lowe's, or a member of a large health group. This is a very restrictive condition. Socialism needs to accept something along the lines of the notion that humanity has some intrinsic worth. Otherwise, the argument for picking socialism doesn't make sense. And all the members of the society must have this intrinsic worth. If we start breaking down the society into different groups and analyzing them in a vacuum, aren't we just guilty of philosophical gerrymandering?
Again, I hold that it is a descriptive fact of our society that those who have the means and the motive will get more insurance. Those that don't have the means simply won't be able to. The simple data of who's covered and who isn't I think is the best argument for showing our current insurance model is fundamentally capitalist.
Not really. The first three and the end paragraphs were of you, and the two with symbols were copy-and-paste paragraphs. It really doesn't make sense when other paragraphs with apostrophes are fine but others aren't. If you are going to copy/paste, make sure you cite it please....That and the stickies say for OPs to anyway. :-/
I fixed the first three and end paragraphs. I totally missed the middle paragraphs though when I edited it after pasting it onto the forums. I know the apostrophes don't copy/paste well, so I fix them, but I missed a few. It happens :/
lol that doesn't make any sense! I don't get that at all XD
Nevermind, let's just say that's his and the argument is invalid ;Q
How can you call an argument invalid when it makes no sense to you?
But this argument is talking past the argument that is taking place over health care. The stigma, in the U.S., that is attached to socialism is that there is some from of government control over a sector of the economy.
Yes, the US is obsessed with hating Socialism. The average citizen sees the word socialism and automatically thinks it equals Soviet Communism, which equals Stalin. It's such a radical and nonsensical jump.
As I've shown, though, it's really not. Sure, there's a stigma attached to socialism. But I think I've shown that the current insurance model is a capitalist one. Although I'm not entirely sure the new model would be a socialist one...
How is equating welfare to Stalinism not a radical and nonsensical jump?
Although I have to agree that the current system is more of a capitalist one than a socialist one, simply because the current model seeks not to provide a service, but to create a profit, regardless of the human consequences. No socialist could ever accept such a system. I do however think the parallels you pointed out were interesting.
Essentially the way the systen works now is as if there were a healthcare tax that you can choose to pay. If you can afford it, you get it, if not oh well. Just another example of how the free market does not gaurantee participation, let alone efficient distribution of resources.
