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Post by silverdragon on Sept 3, 2017 8:01:05 GMT
beside the point. junior with leukemia doesn't get to be old enough to drive without a half million dollar injection. yeah, it ain't free, and rightly so, but is it right to put his family in hock for life to save his life? You can only know the answer by being the parent. Again I have to say this, but, I would pray to any god you may believe in if I felt it would help stop anyone I know in having to make that decision. |
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Post by the light works on Sept 3, 2017 13:55:58 GMT
beside the point. junior with leukemia doesn't get to be old enough to drive without a half million dollar injection. yeah, it ain't free, and rightly so, but is it right to put his family in hock for life to save his life? You can only know the answer by being the parent. Again I have to say this, but, I would pray to any god you may believe in if I felt it would help stop anyone I know in having to make that decision. but what if that God was soshulized medicine? |
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Post by Lokifan on Sept 3, 2017 14:41:05 GMT
beside the point. junior with leukemia doesn't get to be old enough to drive without a half million dollar injection. yeah, it ain't free, and rightly so, but is it right to put his family in hock for life to save his life? If the alternative is to not save his life because you can't afford to develop the treatment in the first place, then yes, it is. Ask any parent who has had to bury a child. Given the choice between a healthy bank balance and a healthy child...to any caring parent, the choice is obvious. If you get any other answer, then there is something wrong with them. Love often means sacrifice. Money is just...money. And ignoring the effect of charities that do provide medical assistance denies the obvious truth that they are part of the way the medical system works. And better yet, you are certain that their payments for treatment are voluntary on all sides. Just because you need something to live doesn't mean it must be free. You need food to live, but you don't assume a farmer should provide it for free. Over the course of your life, I wouldn't be surprised if you spend hundreds of thousands on food. charities are actually one of the most regressive forms of communism there is - although capitalists are finding new ways to get a finger in the pie. on average, less wealthy people give a significantly higher portion of their income to charity than more wealthy people. but that said, it only took 6 hours for us to collect about $10,000.00 in our annual collection for Muscular Dystrophy. That's not what the statistics say.  That doesn't even include the issue that the wealthy are actually subsidizing the poor's charitable donations by paying for the services the poor receive with tax money. In short, if you receive more services from the government than you pay in taxes, someone who pays more in taxes is subsidizing you. Absolutely not. I am pointing out that the research for a highly customized, extremely expensive item must be paid for in some manner. There has to be some incentive to invest billions for research. In medicine, you have to pay for the failures that lead to the successes, not for the businessman's sake, but for the sake of the patient. Altruism is a wonderful thing, but to "rely on the kindness of strangers" doesn't work as well as relying on their desire to make a living. That's why medical breakthroughs are mostly made in capitalist systems rather than communist/socialist ones. Capitalism provides the incentive to develop the cure that simply doesn't exist in most other systems. And even when non-capitalist systems do produce a treatment, it's usually for economic reasons. Take R-K: Radial Keratotomy. It was developed in the USSR. Why? Because they couldn't afford to provide eyeglasses and compact lenses to the people who needed them, and the ones they did provide were of poor quality. So, when a doctor noticed that a young patient who had gone through a glass window and required eye surgery had his vision improved, they developed the technique so that there were essentially assembly lines performing R-K. It was an economic incentive that drove them. And economic reasons are also why medical rationing takes place under socialized medicine--eventually, the powers that be decide that you're simply not worth the expense to keep living, and treatment stops. Eventually, the "greatest good for the greatest number" means you have to die. Socialism is simply a case where the state is equivalent to a monopoly in a capitalist system. And we know how well that works. Trying to stay alive is a universal condition. That's what insurance is for. Does the system work perfectly? No, at least in the case of breakthroughs, it's better than the alternatives. And it's always changing, as the medishare folks are proving. |
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Post by the light works on Sept 3, 2017 23:09:37 GMT
charities are actually one of the most regressive forms of communism there is - although capitalists are finding new ways to get a finger in the pie. on average, less wealthy people give a significantly higher portion of their income to charity than more wealthy people. but that said, it only took 6 hours for us to collect about $10,000.00 in our annual collection for Muscular Dystrophy. That's not what the statistics say. That doesn't even include the issue that the wealthy are actually subsidizing the poor's charitable donations by paying for the services the poor receive with tax money. In short, if you receive more services from the government than you pay in taxes, someone who pays more in taxes is subsidizing you. Absolutely not. I am pointing out that the research for a highly customized, extremely expensive item must be paid for in some manner. There has to be some incentive to invest billions for research. In medicine, you have to pay for the failures that lead to the successes, not for the businessman's sake, but for the sake of the patient. Altruism is a wonderful thing, but to "rely on the kindness of strangers" doesn't work as well as relying on their desire to make a living. That's why medical breakthroughs are mostly made in capitalist systems rather than communist/socialist ones. Capitalism provides the incentive to develop the cure that simply doesn't exist in most other systems. And even when non-capitalist systems do produce a treatment, it's usually for economic reasons. Take R-K: Radial Keratotomy. It was developed in the USSR. Why? Because they couldn't afford to provide eyeglasses and compact lenses to the people who needed them, and the ones they did provide were of poor quality. So, when a doctor noticed that a young patient who had gone through a glass window and required eye surgery had his vision improved, they developed the technique so that there were essentially assembly lines performing R-K. It was an economic incentive that drove them. And economic reasons are also why medical rationing takes place under socialized medicine--eventually, the powers that be decide that you're simply not worth the expense to keep living, and treatment stops. Eventually, the "greatest good for the greatest number" means you have to die. Socialism is simply a case where the state is equivalent to a monopoly in a capitalist system. And we know how well that works. Trying to stay alive is a universal condition. That's what insurance is for. Does the system work perfectly? No, at least in the case of breakthroughs, it's better than the alternatives. And it's always changing, as the medishare folks are proving. your statistic is percent of adjusted gross income. not percentage of income. and taxes are not charitable giving, but nice try. - even then, however, it's already been pointed out that the wealthy have lower effective tax rates than the working class. and economic reasons are also why medical rationing takes place under capitalized medicine. you simply don't have the money to pay the powers that be for your treatment, and so you just go off and die. or get teeth pulled instead of repaired, or don't replace your glasses as often as you should, or go without your insulin, or not get seen by a doctor until you end up in the ER, and unable to pay, so people with insurance get billed more to compensate. yes, we know how well a monopoly in a capitalist system works, because our healthcare system IS one. unlike food, which we can buy damned near ANYWHERE, or make for ourselves. healthcare can only come from those who can provide the specific care we need. |
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Post by silverdragon on Sept 4, 2017 21:17:09 GMT
I sit here in a glass house...
I have NHS.
It may not be anything like perfect, but...
We all pay towards it in National Insurance, the more you earn, the more you pay, the less you earn, the bigger the discounted rate to help you eat, either way of looking at it, the bill is paid.
And we treat anyone. Well, Anyone in the scheme anyway... if you are UK resident and have lived here for [xyz] number of months, you have paid into the national insurance scheme for that period, and are not an illegal immigrant, you are in the scheme.
Of course recently we now ask people of foreign persuasion to prove they are UK citizen entitled, because people outside this country think "Its free so we can have some as well", but, otherwise, its not debatable on if you can afford help, its down to whats the best line to help YOU.
Within reason.... you may believe its Cannabis, we may think its illegal to prescribe that?.
There is of course a limit.
It has to be proven to benefit measurably and be "Affordable".
The moral question is being asked, the budget to keep one person alive for one month who is terminally ill, if that budget gets to the scale of the entire budget of the City Centre Accident and Emergency department for one month, what benefit is one extra month for the terminally ill, if they are closing A&E departments for being too expensive to run?.
I dont want to tackle that question, I aint sure I have the right answer.
But the idea of having to sell my house to pay for medical bills is "foreign" to me, as much as a working health service that is affordable and not the ba$tardi$ation of what you eventually got that was the Obamacare is to you.
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Post by Lokifan on Sept 5, 2017 4:14:21 GMT
When it comes to charity, I think someone is confusing revenue with income, but that's not the point we're discussing.
Neither is it about bankruptcy, although, believe it or not, most Americans don't go bankrupt from medical care. Medicare and Medicaid take care of the very poor and retired, so there is no real reason to do without things like insulin. Except, of course, if they are too proud to go to the state for help, or who value their money more than their lives.
The original point was this:
How can you pay to develop new drugs if you won't let the developer make a living?
Shouldn't anyone be able to buy the treatment they want, if they can afford it and believe it will help?
Why should treatments only be allowed if they are affordable for all patients, and why do we have to have an authority to set that price?
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Post by silverdragon on Sept 5, 2017 6:58:45 GMT
How can you pay to develop new drugs if you won't let the developer make a living? Shouldn't anyone be able to buy the treatment they want, if they can afford it and believe it will help? Why should treatments only be allowed if they are affordable for all patients, and why do we have to have an authority to set that price? In Order. Making a living by living in a home that has one bedroom each for the occupants, a recent registered no more than under warranty 3 yr old car on the drive, perhaps two for "Mums taxi" as well as "Dads workhorse", mortgage paid monthly, in a decent area, with their "Two weeks in the sun", all modern kitchen and place looking spic and span, accepted. Living in a 32room mansion, a collection of priceless sports cars, membership of every "Exclusive" sports club locally and some no so local, a 100ft yacht, and gold plated taps in the servants quarters, which one is taking the pizza here?. If you can afford it, you can have it. But why should it be prohibitively expensive for those who may need it most?.. the ones who cant afford to live without it?. Costing me the price of my House is not "Affordable" WE all accept there are development costs. HOWEVER. Do we pay the cost of developing the plane every time we take a plane ride?. Yes we do, but, not on the same scale as medication... Where are the similarities? KEEPING THE CUSTOMER ALIVE, hows that for a start?.. and if you look at the cost of developing the "Fix" for the Dreamliner Overheating batteries case, thats an unexpected expense... how was that passed to the customer?. If they sold airfares on the same business model, the cost of a ticket from here to London on an A380 would be twice the cost of my home, and probably the price of a nice three bedroom apartment in the posh parts of London. And yes, I probably could get a ticket for an A380 between Manchester and London, "You just have to know the right person", and "At the right time", and if the plane lands in Manchester, off loads, and has a job from London, they dont like to fly them empty?. But yeah, there was the price of developing the first pill off the line, but, two billion pills later, they are still asking that this was expensive to develop?. Case in point, and think this through to that model above. I was one of the very first to go through the new-and-improved "Day surgery unit" in Manchester Royal Hospital, they were still taking the wrapping off their "New and improved MRI scanner" when I was there, and they did a Micro-discectomy on my back, they shaved a lump off one of my disks. Keep in mind this is over a decade ago, and a lot has been updated there since as well. This was keyhole surgery, no more than a band-aid elastoplast sticky patch on my back that needed inspecting daily for a week, but, importantly, it was DAY surgery, I was in at OhhhhMyyyyGodddItsssEarly oclock, and out, walking out, at 4pm. Before that, that surgery was in and bed bound for a week whilst a foot long scar healed. Five years before that, it was impossible... I was there and then on the ground-breaking first set of medical procedures that could be done on "Day surgery" and didnt involve a week as inpatient, and one of the first in the country to have a micro-dicectomy. The cost of getting that far in medical science?.. what do you think that would have been as a financial hit?.... Considering they had to build a whole new part of the hospital and put in a NEW MRI scanner at how many millions to do that?. The whole cost of that "New wing" in Manchester Royal, about the same price as an A380. Yet it cost me NOTHING.... so, ok, I have been a life long contributor of National Insurance, and that has been typically £30 a week out my wages, old figures, have no idea what it is today, I dont look at my payslips beyond did they pay me the right rate for the right hours. But, all that technology, NEW technology, and the research and development of the new procedure?. Its absorbed by the fact that the tax payer is "More healthy and therefore paying more tax". The Gobmint pays.... thats how the NHS works, they gobmint pays first, and claims it back in taxation. And they set a price that is fair for everyone, in that you never know when YOU may need it?. So should the Gobmint set the price?.. FFS, YES it should. This provides an affordable research environment where the country can afford to pay for the one month extra life for a terminally ill patent. There is a price on Human Life... is it of benefit to keep that person alive, if it is not of benefit to that person, if being alive is no quality of life, and a hell of a lot of pain, not having the ability to prescribe that earthshatteringly expensive I could afford to resurface every road in Manchester price medicine, that is a price. We do what we can with what we got. But going back to number one on the answer list... If the cost of my medication is keeping the boat he uses one or two weeks a year fully staffed "just in case" with a crew of 10 for a whole year, I think I have a right to complain about how much profit he is making off my medication?.. |
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Post by the light works on Sept 5, 2017 14:40:35 GMT
When it comes to charity, I think someone is confusing revenue with income, but that's not the point we're discussing. Neither is it about bankruptcy, although, believe it or not, most Americans don't go bankrupt from medical care. Medicare and Medicaid take care of the very poor and retired, so there is no real reason to do without things like insulin. Except, of course, if they are too proud to go to the state for help, or who value their money more than their lives. The original point was this: How can you pay to develop new drugs if you won't let the developer make a living? Shouldn't anyone be able to buy the treatment they want, if they can afford it and believe it will help? Why should treatments only be allowed if they are affordable for all patients, and why do we have to have an authority to set that price? the original point was that we're a bunch of inhumanly stingy bastidges for setting up a "healthcare" system that gives people the choice between gambling that they won't get a ruinously expensive illness, or gambling between $500-1000.00 a month that they will; from insurance companies that consider buying an NBA basketball stadium to be an "advertising expense"; just because we're afraid our socialized medicine dollars might help someone who didn't pay into the system. no, most americans don't go bankrupt from medical expenses - most americans don't go bankrupt at all. but the ones that DO go bankrupt, 62% of them are because of medical expenses and 78% of THOSE had medical insurance. www.investopedia.com/slide-show/top-5-reasons-why-people-go-bankrupt/nobody is saying people who develop new treatments shouldn't make a living. nobody is saying doctors shouldn't make a living. nobody is saying people should not be allowed to buy things they want, nobody is saying treatments should be prohibited if they aren't cheap enough for poor people to afford. those are all strawmen built by YOU. note that people ARE saying people shouldn't be allowed to make obscene profits at the expense of people who can't survive without the product, doctors WOULD be making a very comfortable living if it weren't for all the parasitic drains on their income (overpriced med school, out of control malpractice industry, etc), nobody should be allowed to sell untested unproven bogus "cures" to desperate people, and we should all be contributing to MAKE treatments affordable for all people. |
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Post by Lokifan on Sept 7, 2017 6:42:57 GMT
My main objections to socialized medicine is that it isn't as good as the system we have.
It puts too much power in the government, allowing them to make decisions best left to the patient and doctor.
I'm glad you agree that most Americans don't go bankrupt, even with our medical system.
If it's a choice between bankruptcy and death, I'll choose bankruptcy, for the rather obvious reason that you can recover from bankruptcy, but not death.
As for alleged strawmen,
1. That seems to be the point you were making. Like I said, I know people working in the field. They aren't getting rich, just making a living. Do some execs get rich? Sure, but show me a major industry that doesn't have a few rich execs.
2. Limiting doctor compensation is a factor in socialized medicine.
3. Check out Canada. It's literally illegal for a doctor to treat anyone outside the single payer system, at any price.
4. Socialized medicine is based on "the greatest good for the greatest number". As SD said, if a treatment is too expensive, it's not allowed. In a free market system, if you pay for it, you get it.
The delays and limitations on treatment as well as rationing are fundamental problems with single payer, and I feel they outweigh the benefits.
Frankly, I think any further debate is beating a dead horse, so why don't we agree to disagree.
By the way, I never want to say the current system can't be reformed. There is a new system that might be better than both, and the model is "Medishare". It appears to be something similar to Lloyd's of London, in which the bills are pooled by all members in the group, with expense sharing. I'm looking into them now, as there are several versions that seem to be an order of magnitude cheaper than traditional insurance.
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Post by GTCGreg on Sept 7, 2017 12:40:59 GMT
I still contend we are having the wrong debate on healthcare. Instead of arguing who should be paying for one's health care, we should be trying to figure out why the cost of healthcare is so high. There is no reason why an open heart operation should cost close to $1 million and a simple MRI scan of your liver $3000. If it was strictly a function of technology, it would cost you $300 to make a cell phone call and $100,000 to fly from New York to London. Medical costs are at least 100 times higher than what you pay for equivalent services in other industries. If medical costs we're more in line with everything else we buy, there would be no need to argue who was going to pay for it.
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Post by Lokifan on Sept 7, 2017 13:12:43 GMT
I still contend we are having the wrong debate on healthcare. Instead of arguing who should be paying for one's health care, we should be trying to figure out why the cost of healthcare is so high. There is no reason why an open heart operation should cost close to $1 million and a simple MRI scan of your liver $3000. If it was strictly a function of technology, it would cost you $300 to make a cell phone call and $100,000 to fly from New York to London. Medical costs are at least 100 times higher than what you pay for equivalent services in other industries. If medical costs we're more in line with everything else we buy, there would be no need to argue who was going to pay for it. It's hard to argue with that. In this specific case, however, I will note that a lifetime of treatment with AZT drugs for HIV costs from $300,000 to $500,000 on average, so this cure seems in line with that cost. It's just in one shot, rather than a recurring expense. |
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Post by the light works on Sept 7, 2017 13:24:49 GMT
My main objections to socialized medicine is that it isn't as good as the system we have. It puts too much power in the government, allowing them to make decisions best left to the patient and doctor. I'm glad you agree that most Americans don't go bankrupt, even with our medical system. If it's a choice between bankruptcy and death, I'll choose bankruptcy, for the rather obvious reason that you can recover from bankruptcy, but not death. As for alleged strawmen, 1. That seems to be the point you were making. Like I said, I know people working in the field. They aren't getting rich, just making a living. Do some execs get rich? Sure, but show me a major industry that doesn't have a few rich execs. 2. Limiting doctor compensation is a factor in socialized medicine. 3. Check out Canada. It's literally illegal for a doctor to treat anyone outside the single payer system, at any price. 4. Socialized medicine is based on "the greatest good for the greatest number". As SD said, if a treatment is too expensive, it's not allowed. In a free market system, if you pay for it, you get it. The delays and limitations on treatment as well as rationing are fundamental problems with single payer, and I feel they outweigh the benefits. Frankly, I think any further debate is beating a dead horse, so why don't we agree to disagree. By the way, I never want to say the current system can't be reformed. There is a new system that might be better than both, and the model is "Medishare". It appears to be something similar to Lloyd's of London, in which the bills are pooled by all members in the group, with expense sharing. I'm looking into them now, as there are several versions that seem to be an order of magnitude cheaper than traditional insurance. and I am pissed off that you don't agree that most americans who DO go bankrupt go bankrupt because of our greedy for-profit medical system. 1: exactly. patients are going broke and doctors are not getting rich, because private insurance industries are skimming the cream off the top. 2: actually, it is not as big a factor as your propaganda merchants claim. 3: believe me, I have, and I was very tempted to apply for refugee status when the little island community was looking for immigrants. when their residents say "we feel so sorry for you done there, not having the security of knowing you can get healthcare when you need it" and "yeah, our healthcare system has problems, but at least it isn't yours" you get the idea how they feel their system stacks up to yours. 4: what silverdragon said, is "This provides an affordable research environment where the country can afford to pay for the one month extra life for a terminally ill patent. There is a price on Human Life... is it of benefit to keep that person alive, if it is not of benefit to that person, if being alive is no quality of life, and a hell of a lot of pain, not having the ability to prescribe that earthshatteringly expensive I could afford to resurface every road in Manchester price medicine, that is a price. Read more: citadelofmyths.freeforums.net/thread/2191/medical-care-discussion?page=2#ixzz4rzyvSXST" delays and limitations on treatment are a bigger problem with for-profit-pay-as-you-go medicine, because people who can't afford two days wages for a checkup aren't going to go until it becomes critical - at which point, they will go to the ER, be unable to pay, may not survive, and leave people in the demographic of not being able to afford not to have insurance to cover the costs. and let me repeat, since it seems not to have sunk in: Moda Insurance - Oregon's largest medical insurance company - BOUGHT the basketball stadium the Trail Blazers play in - out of their ADVERTISING budget. single payer healthcare eliminates that middleman. isn't eliminating the middleman important to you capitalists? |
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Post by the light works on Sept 7, 2017 13:31:35 GMT
I still contend we are having the wrong debate on healthcare. Instead of arguing who should be paying for one's health care, we should be trying to figure out why the cost of healthcare is so high. There is no reason why an open heart operation should cost close to $1 million and a simple MRI scan of your liver $3000. If it was strictly a function of technology, it would cost you $300 to make a cell phone call and $100,000 to fly from New York to London. Medical costs are at least 100 times higher than what you pay for equivalent services in other industries. If medical costs we're more in line with everything else we buy, there would be no need to argue who was going to pay for it. because there are so many fingers in the pie; but the big one that people refuse to see is that hospitals are mandated to provide lifesaving care, if possible, to anyone regardless of ability to pay - and they have no other option to recoup that expense than to raise the prices on everyone else. imagine if you were required to sell your electronics, on credit, without a credit check, to anyone who needed climate control in an ambulance, and could not force collections. what would that do to the price of your components? assume half your customers couldn't pay. then assume half of the remaining customers paid cash up front, on the condition of getting the components at the original price. then assume you had to spend an extra hour each on the remaining customers negotiating the price they actually DID pay. now imagine you are serving ten customers an hour. how much would you have the prices marked up to compensate? |
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Post by GTCGreg on Sept 7, 2017 14:53:50 GMT
I still contend we are having the wrong debate on healthcare. Instead of arguing who should be paying for one's health care, we should be trying to figure out why the cost of healthcare is so high. There is no reason why an open heart operation should cost close to $1 million and a simple MRI scan of your liver $3000. If it was strictly a function of technology, it would cost you $300 to make a cell phone call and $100,000 to fly from New York to London. Medical costs are at least 100 times higher than what you pay for equivalent services in other industries. If medical costs we're more in line with everything else we buy, there would be no need to argue who was going to pay for it. because there are so many fingers in the pie; but the big one that people refuse to see is that hospitals are mandated to provide lifesaving care, if possible, to anyone regardless of ability to pay - and they have no other option to recoup that expense than to raise the prices on everyone else. imagine if you were required to sell your electronics, on credit, without a credit check, to anyone who needed climate control in an ambulance, and could not force collections. what would that do to the price of your components? assume half your customers couldn't pay. then assume half of the remaining customers paid cash up front, on the condition of getting the components at the original price. then assume you had to spend an extra hour each on the remaining customers negotiating the price they actually DID pay. now imagine you are serving ten customers an hour. how much would you have the prices marked up to compensate? Yes, that is part of it, so is liability costs, but that still doesn't account for diagnostic costs, doctor office visits and the cost of pharmaceuticals. Again, that's a chicken and egg type argument. If medical costs were reasonable, you wouldn't have all those people showing up at hospitals unable to pay. When a hospital charges a minimum of $5K for an ER visit, even for something as simple as a spranged ankle, of course there is going to be a lot of people unable to pay. If medical costs were in line with everything else, insurance coverage would also be reasonable so many of these uninsured and unable to pay hospital visitors would have insurance. You can insure a $250,000 home for around $1000 per year. If medical costs were in line, you should be able to insure your health for the same. |
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Post by the light works on Sept 7, 2017 15:07:47 GMT
because there are so many fingers in the pie; but the big one that people refuse to see is that hospitals are mandated to provide lifesaving care, if possible, to anyone regardless of ability to pay - and they have no other option to recoup that expense than to raise the prices on everyone else. imagine if you were required to sell your electronics, on credit, without a credit check, to anyone who needed climate control in an ambulance, and could not force collections. what would that do to the price of your components? assume half your customers couldn't pay. then assume half of the remaining customers paid cash up front, on the condition of getting the components at the original price. then assume you had to spend an extra hour each on the remaining customers negotiating the price they actually DID pay. now imagine you are serving ten customers an hour. how much would you have the prices marked up to compensate? Yes, that is part of it, so is liability costs, but that still doesn't account for diagnostic costs, doctor office visits and the cost of pharmaceuticals. Again, that's a chicken and egg type argument. If medical costs were reasonable, you wouldn't have all those people showing up at hospitals unable to pay. When a hospital charges a minimum of $5K for an ER visit, even for something as simple as a spranged ankle, of course there is going to be a lot of people unable to pay. If medical costs were in line with everything else, insurance coverage would also be reasonable so many of these uninsured and unable to pay hospital visitors would have insurance. You can insure a $250,000 home for around $1000 per year. If medical costs were in line, you should be able to insure your health for the same. I tried to look up how much of each healthcare dollar actually pays for healthcare, but I've lost enough sleep over my driver's license boondoggle that my google-fu is coming up short. |
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Post by Lokifan on Sept 7, 2017 16:27:11 GMT
Last time I checked, medical spending in the US was about 2.4 trillion a year, not counting insurance.
Divide by the population of 300 million, and you get about $8,000 per person. Therefore, a family of four should be paying about $32,000 per year for all medical product and services.
If we consider that there are about 127 million employed persons, that means they have to pay about $19,000 per person for care each year. In a family where two parents work, that means $38,000 annually.
These are back-of-envelope calculations, obviously. But you can see, the number is large.
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Post by the light works on Sept 7, 2017 16:46:43 GMT
Last time I checked, medical spending in the US was about 2.4 trillion a year, not counting insurance. Divide by the population of 300 million, and you get about $8,000 per person. Therefore, a family of four should be paying about $32,000 per year for all medical product and services. If we consider that there are about 127 million employed persons, that means they have to pay about $19,000 per person for care each year. In a family where two parents work, that means $38,000 annually. These are back-of-envelope calculations, obviously. But you can see, the number is large. close. the official estimates are $10,000.00 per person. Canada is $6299.00 (presumably US, but that could be Canadian) I found a 2010 comparison: www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/health-costs-how-the-us-compares-with-other-countries/ |
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Post by Lokifan on Sept 7, 2017 17:25:51 GMT
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Post by the light works on Sept 8, 2017 1:14:18 GMT
so is that the health care tax in Canada, or are they forgetting Canadians don't pay out of pocket? we also have to ask about cost of living at that point. I found one website that said the cost of living in Vancouver BC is about the same as living in Portland, OR. - but not sure how reliable or comprehensive that is. |
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Post by silverdragon on Sept 8, 2017 10:46:59 GMT
This is my main objection to "Privatised" medicine.
It HAS to be "State controlled" to ensure no one is skimming profit.
Medical things need to be kept as far away as possible from Profit sharing.
In that...
IF, a BIG If, if you should invent the cure for cancer....
The tankyou package for doing that should be that someone somewhere ensures that you personally live a comfortable life, not exactly luxury, but a sort of "All bills paid" kind of average comfortable existance for the rest of your life as a thankyou for your forwarding of human knowledge.
Be that on one lump sum or an investment that pays a salary.
However, you shouldnt be the one on a million quid yacht just because you swamped the marked with Asprin, or more recently put a 5,000% "upjar" on a life extending drug that not many can afford anyway but have to take because they have a serious illness.
This is why it HAS to be Stare controlled, to make sure that the right funds get paid to the right persons and the rest goes into medical research to still further forward human knowledge, whilst keeping the price of the product down to affordable by sa state controlled "Everyone is in" healthcare system that cares for everyone "Up to a certain point"
That certain point has to be one pre-agreed by everyone paying into the system,
And if the treatment of a very few takes the whole budget of that system, then it needs to be investigated why that is so expensive to do.
And maybe drag that price down "By Law" to affordable.
How will this attract investors?.
IT WONT.
Its not designed to do that, its not an investment for money making.
This is an investment by the very people you are treating, in that what they pay in by an affordable monthly contribution, collectively, pays for the whole scheme to run.
That scheme has an outlet for investment into research from its own funds... if you can invent new drugs on that limited budget, go ahead.
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