Caplan On How The Market Can Supply Health Care For All

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Why would anyone think the rich should have to cover the poor? People work hard for their money and they should be able to keep it as their own and not have the government control what they do with it. If I find five dollars, I shouldn't have to give it to the homeless guy down the street to get some dinner. If he worked hard and applied himself he would be able to have a home and food.

brownbaby of PA @ Oct 26, 2009 10:55:31 AM

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Some municipalities may have local laws that are stricter then the state law. ,

Sad50 of KS @ Oct 23, 2009 06:34:50 AM

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We had the basic layout of the car figured out. ,

Kelvin30 of NH @ Oct 22, 2009 07:31:07 AM

What are the goals?

When I hear politicians talk about health care reform, I never hear what their goals are. If your goal is to cover 46 million Americans who are currently uninsured and keep everything else the same and the solution is obvious. You need to come up with some public-private hybrid. This is what is being discussed in Washington currently.

If your goal is to cover 46 million Americans and control healthcare costs and deliver health care more efficiently and finally, have a healthier America after reform. This public-private hybrid doesn't seem like such a good solution after all. Former Gov. Mitt Romney can tell you what happens when you throw a healthcare system together and have done absolutely nothing to control costs. Costs begin to skyrocket. This is exactly what is happened in Massachusetts. Massachusetts is a small state with a relatively small indigent population and yet healthcare costs are going through the roof.

As a physician, I know it is extremely easy to order tests. The more test you order the more confident you are of your final diagnosis. Yet, more is not always better. We need to pay hospitals and primary care physicians differently in order to control costs. We need to pay them to take care of a pool of patients. Therefore, we remove any incentive to order more tests. Secondly, both hospitals and primary care physicians should be given incentives if they're able to keep their populations healthy. If diabetics or hypertensive spore patients with congestive heart failure are kept healthier than hospitals and primary care physician should be awarded.

If you remove insurance from the equation and roll Medicare and Medicaid into universal healthcare then there is a proximally $700 billion left over. Use this money to cover all of the 46 million Americans who currently uninsured. Universal healthcare should offer the same services that Medicare and Medicaid offer currently. Supplemental insurance can be bought by individuals to cover other expenses.

The government needs to fund research that will give physicians better information at what is the "best" of medical care. Currently, we have little or no information at what the best practice is.

Controlling costs, delivering better healthcare.

ecthompson of NC @ Jul 07, 2009 04:59:40 AM

Caplan How The Markets Can Supply Health Care For All

Private insurance systems can not compete with government’s ability to provide low cost funding to pay for health care, a national sales tax would be the best source, nor can private hospitals and care facilities compete with government owned facilities staffed by government employed doctors and health care providers to provide high quality low cost care and medications.

A dual public/private choice health care reform system in which all government funded programs would be distributed through government hospitals and clinics could control costs and outcomes to save hundreds of billions of dollars annually from the $2.5trillion now spent, and no one would be left without care, nor would seniors, Medicare and Medicaid recipients suffer from the Presidents proposals to cut $600billion in spending over the next ten years in order to pay for his convoluted forced insurance health care plan.

It is not a level playing field with government competing against private insurance and for profit care providers for patients, nor should it be.

Health care reform serving individuals, businesses, taxpayers and the national economy should be the beneficiaries of this home court advantage.

In the public sales tax funded plan:

Every individual who wants free public care and medications should have it period.

Every business one truck plumber or General Motors who selects public care for their employees should have no obligations financial or otherwise to be involved in health care.

Private health care's roll in public/private reform should be to attract every client they can who would find their services so compelling that patients would pay good money to use them rather than take free public care.

Private systems would be rid of indigent care or any other loss producing government imposed mandates.

A dual public/private health care reform system has no equals or even a close contender to provide a world class solution for reform.

It is time for the President, Legislators, American businesses, unions, AARP, churches, banks, financial institutions, insurance companies and private health care companies to become pragmatic and do a true fix for the sake of producing healthy citizens and a robust economy.

Bill Watson of CA @ Jul 02, 2009 15:11:20 PM

We're not just trying to "help the health of the poor"

We're trying to keep the cost of health care down for everyone and keep massive amounts of wealth from shifting away from middle-class individuals and into the coffers of corporations. We're trying to get the risk of medical bankruptcy off of everyone who is in the working class.

A "public plan" option is not to be just an expanded version of Medicaid-style welfare where the rich pay to cover the poor. A public plan is to DEFINE standards, DEFINE prices, DEFINE best practices, and let people like a real "Joe, a plumber" (not that idiot, Wurzelbacher) have a place to go for affordable coverage so he can take the risk of being a real on-his-own plumber.

Yes, we can. That phrase is far from worn out. Just do it.

Muser of NM @ Jul 02, 2009 14:41:48 PM